August 28, 2008

four days, a pack of luckies, and a camera

I've been trying diligently (ed: off and on during the day while the supervisor was not lurking) to find a reasonable day trip this weekend. Turns out New Orleans was the cheapest with a flight for $145 (I can drive it for $120 and have my car). Wonder if the hurricane has anything to do with the cheap price?

Found out that according to Expedia, you can't get to Taos from Birmingham and it turns out that Birmingham is not much of a direct flight to anywhere except Atlanta and Charlotte. *sigh* I had some plans to go to Houston tomorrow night to see Tom Petty - turns out Gustov had other plans for me. It's cool because I was really just going to hang with a friend.

I could go to NYC for $1,000 or even Mystic, Connecticut. Yes...I've loved the thought of Mystic since the movie. But....I may have to console myself with a drive down the Natchez Parkway instead. I saw some cool shots of a cypress swamp just outside of Jackson....and, I would have to drive through Elvis' birthplace and I love that song, Tupelo Honey. A good "maybe" if I don't park my lazy ass on my sofa.

It's been a while since I've had four whole days to myself.....

August 26, 2008

stuck on the set of Roxanne

I lost my edge somewhere....the sharp wit of my tongue has become dulled. Maybe it's because I took a vow to be nice or some such thing. I miss it - that pocket Dorothy Parker that would come whipping around the corner, ready to slash and burn at a moment's notice. I feel she's lurking there in the dark, yearning to peer over her cat's eye glasses...

Is it because I stopped drinking martinis? Lately the cape of cotton wool has enveloped me in this cushion of .... nothingness. Irony and wit is dulled by the blunt edges of people who really don't get it.

August 24, 2008

regained power

weird how things work out....last night before going to bed, I told the cat not to wake me up at 4:30 wanting food. my power went out at exactly 4:26 and the cat was nowhere to be found. he was hiding out from the 30+ mph winds and monsoon gushing down from the August heavens and the leavings of Fay. I tossed and turned until 9:30 when I finally awoke completely after several 30ish minute naps. I went to work and thankfully the power was on there.

finally, power returned around noonish and I was cool again. funny how we can miss things so very easily.

yesterday was a lark - full of photography doings and then going to see Tropic Thunder with some friends. the movie was better than I expected and full of bathroom humor as one might expect with the cast. I didn't realize Tom Cruise was in it or I might have missed it (I have a ban for Tom going). he was wonderfully vulgar actually - as arrogant as I would expect him to be - maybe it was the part written for him.

I got nothing accomplished that I wanted done today....there is always tomorrow. keep your fingers crossed I can take off Friday for a four day weekend.

August 23, 2008

this might be


my favorite of my shots to date....

August 22, 2008

fair warning

I do not know what is about me...but I seem to attract drama llamas lately. Is it my calm exterior and determination not to be involved in toxic situations? It is a test? What? I'm tolerant until someone pushes me past my limits and then...all bets are off and I'm over it.

So...fair warning llama, you're about to be gone. Calm down and deep breaths. Make it work.

August 20, 2008

happy jazz

Thing that are so cool within the last seven days, I had to share:

1. My haircut - short, nay - very short. It's the first time the nape of my neck has felt sunshine in a very long time.
2. Baby Bites - no, not the slobbery kind but a bakery here does the insane version of a petit four with is basically two bites of the most lucious, moist cake covered with a matching icing. My favorite - caramel. It's sin cake-i-fied.
3. I'm half-way through my certificiate program for photography. woot and....the prof actually liked a shot last night. He's been pretty hard to please.
4. Speaking of photography - one of my shots (see yesterday's blog) made it to #14 overall on Flickr last Friday. I didn't know until someone told me. But it made me feel rather dork-like.
5. Work is smooth this week - lately it's been one gigantic pain in the ass, so a smooth week makes me feel accomplished.
6. Just being happy today....that's always cool.

August 19, 2008

and this I do know....


seamless days stumble onto each other, stacking like cords of wood during a Thoreau-punctuated winter...simple, uncomplicated, barren. I seem to like them that way - as I leave them laying there unadorned and unexamined. I shrug and turn away. staring at the endless supply of hours and minutes that I whittle into tiny shavings of rosemary scented cedar.

I could pick the shavings up and mold them instead leaving them to dance in the wind but....I don't. it seems like too much effort really when nothing much seems to change. of course, I'm taunted by my cupboard of bon mots, "be the change you want to see in the world" *sigh*. some days I'm so full of myself, but secretly I know that it's true.

this is my pattern - working aggressively to get through an issue and stand at the end and wonder, "what the hell do I do now." now that I have nothing to worry about in a life that was filled with worry. now that most of my problems are solved. now that I'm bored with everything ... not everything. but the interia of being unable to move towards something else.

maybe because I don't know what else I really want to move towards. shiny lights? warm candles? .... what....I don't know. or if I do know, I don't know that I know. nothing is impossible I tell myself...unless I continously hold myself back...then, nothing is possible. that much is true.

August 18, 2008

this weekend

"you have to say that because you're my sister."

"no, I would totally say that anyway....and shit."

August 16, 2008

I haven't slept well lately...I've spent the hours between midnight and five tossing and turning for no apparent reason but to keep me sleepy during the long days between naps. I don't know the reason, even with trying to examine reasons of possibilities. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. damn.

But, today is a good day and I'm grateful for all that it holds. I must dash but good thoughts to all of you there in cyberland. I feel loved.

August 14, 2008

i gots a new toy



no....not the train. a photoshop toy.

now...where are my next victims?

August 12, 2008

clean

the rain comes and washes everything clean. even the sooty disaster of the city looks new and pastel as I drive in today....it's a rain made for lovers - slow and silky against the skin.

I saw lovers walking without and umbrella to get pancakes. as she carefully avoided the mud puddles, he laughed and tugged at her hand. his shirt was plastered against his chest and the carefully cut shaggy do was hanging in brown cords against his neck. his voice was playful and deep. she was more timid and unsure - careful in her pink chucks. head ducked and watched where she was going....but following regardless. all seemed good in the world at that moment. the rain fell and I wondered if it would feel the same to me.

August 11, 2008

diverse

this weekend I went shooting - a lot of shooting. then naps from getting up early and some old fashioned wandering. I saw a watermelon colored sunrise over a misty lake - I would not have been shocked if a southern lady of the lake offered up a battered and weathered sword. the herons dotted the horizons and the quiet spoke to my heart.

of course by saturday evening I was ready for a nap old fart that I am these days.

sunday was a very different day. the usual class outing with lots of folks that I don't know that well. we went to the train museum where I've gone before - I challenged myself to try shots that I didn't try last time...and to use my tripod. the instructor swears the next jump in improvement is using the tripod. it was a hazy afternoon. the light was flat without much contrast or interest. the place looked shopworn and abandoned as onlookers drove by slowly staring at we weirdos with our cameras. we clustered up in antlike lines - snaking our way through the place. if one shot the shot, then everyone else would follow - I found myself drawing away and going to opposite sides. the rusts and flaking paint abstract into shapes and shadows and the hulking masses of metals dissolve away into colors, streaks and curves. occasionally, little pieces of beauty would pop up with wild colors and delicate petals. where saturday morning was a beatles tune, sunday was the hard core rockabilly and cornpone memories of days past and abandoned hurts.

today - i'm firmly back in my world of numbers with no hope of abstractions and colors. ltv and dsc have no color except the red and greens of economics. decisions are rational and the light at the end of the tunnel could be the one that ends it all. but...in the aftermass, I couldn't trade a thing....it is all pieces of a larger whole.



August 9, 2008

morning has broken

the things that photography will drive you to do. this morning, I got up at 5:00 a.m. to try and capture the lake at sunrise. well, first thing you need to know - exactly where is the lake? okay, so I found it. and it was beautiful really - the mist rising, the sky bushing in antipation of her beau and herons winging low, low, low over the water. as I parked, two guys came along to fish and we trudged down to the water together very quietly. I set up my tripod and they began to fish. the morning quiet was dotted with the plops of their casts and the occasionally bird calls. I was alone with my thoughts. and..I had none. It was a beautiful thing.

the water was adorned with water plants and as the sun slowly peeked over the horizon, diamonds grew in the water. finally....the sun hit the top of the trees - stunning. I haven't downloaded the shots yet...I'm enjoying just thinking about the beauty.

as I left, one of the fishermen came back up top to enjoy my view and a bicycler stopped by. we stood for a moment just looking and then parted.

I drove home by the way of the gardens.....now I need my coffee....a good day indeed.

August 8, 2008

to infinity and beyond

8-8-8

if you turn it sideways, it's infinity times three...that's a long time and we have four more of these before it will be another century of single numbered dates. forever is mentioned a lot of times in love...and out of love. too often the quote that springs to mind is, 'you told me you'd love me until you died -- but you're still alive.'

thus is the nature of promises....sometimes easy to make and difficult to keep. part of the whole reason I don't make promises if I can avoid it. I really dislike them...with the intensity of a burning blue flame. so, I try. I try really hard. sometimes I fail...we all do.

I didn't sit down to be all down and harshing on relationships. I admire people that make them work...I do. In fact, I'm sort of jealous of how easy you all make them look. *sigh* life is never just easy is it?

I've been so busy lately and now I'm writing this as I need to get started on something I have no clue how to do. I'm making it a monster because I don't like doing what I don't know how to do and if I dived in it would probably get better. *kicks at desk* stupid desk. stupid work. stupid stapler.....and stupid files.

sounds like a case of a girl that needs to take the same advice she dispensed this week and get started before she worries about absolutely nothing. stupid girl.

August 5, 2008

a work in progress

lately I've practiced diligently letting things go. it's very difficult for an intense, overpleasing personality to just let something go...especially when I've been raised to be in control at all times. but....control comes often at very great costs. costs to self-esteem, costs to sanity...great costs...even costs to relationships.

I've practiced knowing what I can change....and what I cannot. I've found there are a great number of things that I cannot change....even within myself. some of those things are good -- a good number are those are not as good. like my wee bit of obsession and repeating gas prices over and over again. not so good. correcting someone - yeah, not always so great. and there are others that I'm sure my friends will tell you. I'm working on those...and probably will continue to work on those for the rest of my life.

August 3, 2008

Adventures through Rural Alabama


An adventure in the wilds of central Alabama in that we learned kites are also birds, cows run from cars, salvation can make you crazy and rain can make you sleepy.

Best line - "I thought kites were those pretty paper things you fly." "I can just pee anyway - pull over." and "Sex sends you to hell? Well....hell."

The intrepid photography class took off south this afternoon in the middle of a scorching hot afternoon. The thermometer hit 100 before we reached this long stretch of Highway 82, not too far from the hospital where I was born. The acreage was filled with rustic, rough crosses and painted rusted appliances with messages of hellfire and damnation. Apparently sex and alcohol are very, very, very, very bad. And if I read the signage right....I must give both up immediately.

And...there was a very big, yellow, icky spider there. I was told it is not poisonous - but the bite is mean. Well, come on - if a spider that big bites me - it might as well be poisonous because I would die out of fear. But, she was very polite and waited while we all photographed her. Now that I think about it, she looks like she could have posed for Mrs. Spider's Tea Party.

Then, we drove through many rural roads where I could not navigate you back - and found.... well, no kites of any variety. Our teacher though did identify many other birds - I think I heard something, something woodpecker, blah-blah-blah taniger....and maybe hawk. Don't quote me or anything. He's published in a lot of regional publications with his bird pictures so he was pretty jazzed. Me - I watched for ticks, wasps and mosquitoes. Thankfully - I'm bug free.

We stopped on the way home to photograph some cows. They were very pretty standing by the side of the road and looked as if they were posing. Until we climbed out of the car - then a slight cow stampede started until we quit approaching. They were sporting green tags in their ears and I guess if I had to wear such unappealing earrings - I might be leary of any other humans.

The rain was off and on the rest of the way home - I wanted to fall asleep but....as I was in a car with three other strangers from class, I resisted. Now...I must give in.
For more of the adventure....go http://flickr.com/photos/charlaneg/

August 1, 2008

When we are no longer able to change a situation — we are challenged to change ourselves.

The one thing about six hour long drives is that it puts the brain into overdrive. One thing - oh how I love my iPod - 12 hours in the car with no repeats. Yes, I have that many songs and love that many songs. I'm diverse bitches. Somehow my random mixing of The Temptations, Frank Sinatra and Nirvana works for me.

"Life is a banquet and most fools are starving to death." That's a quote from Mame. I thought about that. I thought about that a lot. I'm still thinking about that. Are we starving on purpose or are we on just a steady diet of what we can afford. I live life as juicy as I can afford so I'm not really starving...there are days that I'm downright full to the brim.

Wouldn't it be nice if men wanted the same thing as women? No....not that!!! Then no one would be happy. *shakes head at her pervy friends* Well, it's sort of pervy related. According to a commercial I heard on satellite today - women don't want length, we want "girth and width." Too bad all we women with body image problems couldn't find men that want girth and width. Maybe then you wouldn't be judged by the size of your penis.

Which brings me to another issue. (Apparently all of this has been stuck in my head lately) Someone told me this week that she had a pre-emptive rejection. You know that kind - where a guy you wouldn't even consider dating tells someone else that he's not interested. It brings out the inner child, where you want to run up to that person and say "I wouldn't date you anyway asshat." The nerve. How do you deal with that - how do you let that person know they're an idiot without....well, looking like an idiot. Several scenarios were discussed but nothing rational came out of the conversation. Maybe she can just drop into the next conversation that she heard he had no "girth."

I drove to north Florida during my trip this week. There was much rain, much traffic and much of nothing there. I forgot my cell phone and didn't have GPS for the first time in a while. Luckily, my map reading skills remain very high and I found both properties. In the rain, I might add. I feel a little proud. Maybe some of the shots I took in the car will turn out - I think I caught this cool rain cloud coming towards me.

"When we are no longer able to change a situation — we are challenged to change ourselves." Isn't that just the hardest thing of all?