Andy v2.0: March 2006

Ok, so I've allowed myself to be back on "the market" after my voluntary and premature withdrawal. Got a little overexcited, that's all. Taken a few weeks to process and make sense of all this new experience. Strangely, I'm more attracted to Dark Haired Girl than ever before, now that I've dropped the intense feeling of needing to be with her. I feel more balanced, centered, inwardly calm, and self-assured than I have in a very long time.

Which is good for making burritos.

I was in "the zone" last night at work. I was like the Dalai Burrito Lama, rolling out foil-wrapped works of art with a zen-like serenity. It was a beautiful moment.

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I love working with Mexicans. They're just the smiliest most laid-back happy people you'll ever meet. And they take the language barrier in such stride...

Fabiola is learning English in leaps and bounds, and can pretty much hold a decent conversation. Her accent is so thick, though, that when she asks a customer whether they want mild, corn, medium, or hot salsa, it comes out like "You like mile-co-median-o-ha salsa?" I'm learning the vast majority of my Spanish from her, and it's funny, because I'm learning it in her accent. So when we got a new guy and I introduced myself, I pronounced my name like she does... "Mi nombre es ahn-DEE".

Her sister Nallely has a crush on me. I have a crush on Fabiola. She is happily married. C'est la vie. (Es la vida?)

Then there's Bart. I swear the guy understands more than he can speak, but he's just the biggest smartass. I can't wait until he learns more, because he's going to be a total riot. He always keeps the other spanish speakers laughing their butts off, I can only wonder what he's saying.

In Spanish, there's only a subtle difference in one vowel sound between saying "I'm hungry", and "I have a man." Bart was cutting up some chicken, and I patted my stomach and said "Yo tengo hambre!" He gets that patent grin and says "tengo hombre?"

Me: No, no, no... tengo HAMBRE.

Bart: "hombre?"

Me: HAMBRE! (I make a putting-food-in-mouth gesture)

Bart: Si, si, si... hombre. (he makes blowjob gesture)

Me: Dammit Bart! (we're both laughing) You know what I mean!

A minute later I hear him talking to Thomas and I hear the world "hombre". I whip around with a big grin and say "Don't you be making fun of me back there, motherfucker!" They both start laughing.

Good times.

These are the b&w photos I developed and scanned yesterday. I added the sepia tone afterward, but left in all the dust flecks to lend and illusion of age. This is a canal lock in Tipp City from the old Miami-Erie Canal that connected Lake Erie by Toledo with the Ohio River down in Cincy. Mysterious remnants of this old cross-Ohio throughfare sprinkle length, including many leftovers here in Troy. North of Piqua is a town called Lockington, where a string of eight or so locks took the canal up a hill. North of there is another itty-bitty little town called Lock Two. It just fascinates me to no end.

Canal Lock, Tipp City

Inside of Canal Boat used for "Canal Days" festival, Tipp City, Ohio.

Old Canal Boat

Canal Boat and Roller Mill, Tipp City, Ohio.

Tipp City, Ohio. Using the polarizing filter to darken the sky. Welcome to Ohio.

Good stuff! :-) Tipp City, Ohio.

Tipp City, Ohio

Clifton Mill

Clifton, Ohio

Clifton, Ohio.

I didn't like the crop on that one I posted last night... I left out the beautiful vignetting in the corners. Besides, who says I have to crop at a 3:2 ratio? I need to stop living under rules that exist only in my head.

An angle that I also captured with the Nikon for my final portfolio.

... and a few steps over.

Rocked my Camera Skills final today, despite my oversight on one little detail on the practical segment. Ventured to develop my latest roll of film afterward all by me onesy, Rodney having walked me through the process last weekend, and it turned out beautiful. I'll post a teaser at the end here for you.

So I'm watching Mythbusters and bored off my gourd, so I decide on a whim to kick off spring break and go to Dunaway's. Much to my surprise, a rocking blues band was playing. Spent several happy hours drinking beer and bopping in my chair. Ran into a guy who used to run the printing presses at mom's shop, and I hadn't seen him in probably ten years. Friendliest guy you'll ever meet. Had a fantastic time. Walked over to the Brewery afterward, and was approached by somebody identifying themselves as Dark Haired Girl's friend.

Dear readers, I think I may have been misleading you in my exhuberance of finding somebody who treats me with interest. Keep in mind that she and I are friends, and friends only. Nothing more.

I knew that a guy she had been seeing off and on was back in town this weekend, and of course, I was out by myself to give her ample breathing room. I'm cool like that. Anyway, turns out she and her date for the night were there and had seen me, and I offered to her friend to leave if my being there made either Dark Haired Girl or her date feel awkward, but she said no, just be cool. Like I'm going to be all macho and posessive.

(Ok, ok, ok, I felt a little envious, but that's my problem to deal with, not hers)

She and I said our hellos, exchanged hugs, I met with her people and shook hands (very decent folks), and went about my business dancing my butt off the rest of the night. Roundabout last call, I decide to hit the road, and as I'm leaving, a very statuesque lady walks past and twirls her fingers in my hair. I must say, that was a helluvan ego boost. ;-)

Walked back to Dunaway's parking lot and drove the entire three seconds over next door for a couple of doughnuts at Tim Horton's while perusing the latest issue of Shutterbug before heading back home.

All in all, and especially with the unexpected band at Dunaway's, had a great spontaneous evening. :-)

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Here's one of the photos I developed and scanned today. I added the sepia-esque toning in Photoshop here at home, but left in the dust flecks from the scan to lend a nice "old fashioned" effect. Enjoy!

Ran around with Elizabeth yesterday taking a ton of ho-hum project requirement photos, but managed a few good ones as well. For as much as I keep repeating my mantra "the path of the photographer is a solitary one", and as much as I really am not comfortable taking photos in a group setting, I find that going out with a really good friend to bounce ideas back and forth with really helps.

Went to Dunaway's with Dark Haired Girl and a friend of hers. Called Angela, she stopped by and got to meet Dark Haired Girl. She passes the best friend test. :-)

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My Dad and I were talking on the phone the other day, and got to talking about politics. I am so angry with things right now, I just want to break something. I'd write more, but it's all just opinionated crap, nothing of real editorial value. Fuck it, I'm ranting:

I sense this country's pressure level reaching a critical boiling point, like a pressure cooker, and very shortly we're going to see something drastic happen on the political scene. What it is, I don't know, but I just feel like something big like the Watergate scandal or a sweeping neo-hippie social revolt is about to transpire.

You ever get to feeling like history is repeating itself? It's like Dad was saying... the word back in the day was "Vietnamization", where the plan was to stay there as a police force until Vietnam set up its own government and could take care of itself. Sound familiar?

Meanwhile, Bush is saying that resolving this historic blunder he made for us will fall on the shoulders of the next president. (link 2)

Way to pass the buck and weasel your way out of responsibility, you fucking loser.

He knows damn well this war cannot be won with any decisive victory, as we don't even really know who the fuck we're fighting. "The terrorists". There is no big bugaboo "enemy", just scattered and disconnected handfuls of people around the world, driven by hatred of an animalistic depth we cannot possibly comprehend. How do you declare victory? We're just there being bullet and shrapnel catchers, dying gory pulpy deaths, and Bush and his unholy trinity are going to keep gleefully sending off our men and women to return to the US as globs of blood pudding in caskets as long as they're in power because their fat egoes won't allow them to be the first in American history to have lost an officially declared war.

That's it. I'm done.

I stomped my photoshop basics class final into submission tonight. Hell yeah. Afterward, my instructor showed me how to use the negative scanner, and I got all but five of the images I wanted off of the black and white roll that I developed saturday. Elizabeth had me check out her new site, and I added her banner up top of the blog. Check it out, she's so good it just makes me wanna puke. Notice anything familiar about any of the locations? A lot of them came from days when we ran around taking photos for projects. Speaking of, that's her with the motorcycle helmet on in the "headshots" section of her site. She took that for the self portrait project I talked about a week or two ago. We're gonna cruise around tomorrow shooting for our last Camera Skills project. I'm so behind on this one....

Anyway, here's just a few of the photos from the black and white roll:

Solarium at Hayner Cultural Center here in Troy.

Texture and light

Harpsichord

Major lesson learned from this day: tilting the camera distorts lines. Note how the vertical is nice and aligned on the right side, but because I was tilting the camera up, it distorted the lines on the left side. :-( Still a neat photo, though.

Look familiar? I parallelled several shots with both cameras that day. This still remains my favorite, even moreso in b&w. Ooh.. sepia tone would be cool.

Hi all! Lots happening lately, I'll go all "Mememto" style and start from the present and work backwards...

I am currently drinking beer and eating generic blueberry pop tarts. Not a good combination by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm hungry and wanting to maintain my buzz.

So I get off work tonight, and on my way home decide I need to consume at least a little alcohol this weekend, so I head over to Buffalo Wild Wings before calling it a night. I drink a couple of glasses of beer and pick up one of those NTN trivia pads. I proceed to totally kick ass in trivia, all the while doing my little head-nod-butt-wiggle bar stool dance to the several dollars' worth of carefully selected geek music playing from the jukebox. It's the simple things that amuse me. Andy has a fantastic spontaneous moment. I'm feeling too good, and stop to pick up some beer on the way home.

Was sacked out saturday night and napped through my otherwise planned trip to Hobart Arena for public skating. The Ontarios are lonely and calling to me from my car's trunk. "Skate us... Skate us..." they say. I kept saying to Chuck how bored I was, and despite his simple advice "Well, then. Go out." I was too tired and my back was still super stiff from the previous night's festivities.

Worked till close friday night, but not without agreeing to meet up with Dark Haired Girl at Dunaway's. So I show up as St. Patrick's Day's festivities are winding down, and we head over to the Brewery. It's shoulder to shoulder, front to back packed in there, and while we're there, a couple of guys nearly get into a fight on the dance floor. Dark Haired Girl is standing against a wall, and I immediately get all puffy-chested and protective, stepping in front of her facing the arguing dudes until a bouncer breaks them up. I figure, if a brawl breaks out, I want to be between her
and it.

You know, there's something distictly homoerotic about guys about to fight. Sure, there's the initial nonverbal posturing, but then as the arguing ensues in a near-deafeningly loud environment, they take turns leaning into each other, putting an arm around the other's shoulder, and talking into their ear (lips nearly touching the other's lobe), all the while making aggresive pointing gestures with the free hand. It kinda turned me on.

Anyway, succumbing to Dark Haired Girls devious smiles at me, I drive her car instead of mine back to her apartment and... well... let's just say that my back still kinda hurts. ;-)

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Speaking of, upon reading my last post while we were talking on the phone, Dark Haired Girl and I had a discussion to the tune of "Don't you be falling in love with me." on her part. Of course, I knew this from the very beginning. We're friends first, and anything else just happens if it happens.

Now what have I been saying for some time now? That I don't want the first girl I meet after Caroline to be the last woman I meet? That I don't want a relationship, but a friend with benefits? Remember when I wrote "I don't want to be the center of your universe, just one of the brighter stars shining within you"?

See, I finally found exactly what I've been wishing so hard for, and only through said over-analysis (and her verbal wake-up) did I process and comprehend these intense emotions I've been feeling to this happy conclusion.

Do I wish we could be boyfriend/girlfriend? Maybe. But I also realize that is anti-advantageous to both of us for various personal reasons. Therefore, the current setup is absolutely perfect. I've mucho growing up to do before thinking about any sort of relationship with anybody.

Problem is, I'm still lonely. I maintain what I screamed to the heavens the night right before I met her. I give up. I give up trying to meet people. I give up on women. Setback after setback after setback have indicated to me that Dark Haired Girl's positive attention is a rare and fleeting anomaly in the grand scheme of things. From watching the same pimp daddies thursday night (as every goddamned thursday night) at Dunaway's have women flocking all around them, and then walking out the door with them, I'm still pretty much invisible.

You know, this post was going so good, and I've talked myself down into a bad mood. I hate when I do that. Here, I'll boost my ego and give you a couple of kick-butt pictures all in one swift upload. Here are the photos I printed out on 13x19 paper at school:

Oh yeah.

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Last week I mentioned black and white film to my camera skills instructor, and he offered to show me how to develop it myself. So last saturday after class, he took the extra time to walk me through the process. I spooled the film into a little plastic canister in this little pitch-dark room no larger than a phone booth, added the chemicals, agitated, washed, rinsed, and dried the film all by hand. In the end, I held the strip up to the light, and there were my images, clear and crisp. I almost got teary, it was such a simple and absolutely beautiful process of creation.

I had brought my own photos to life. Not through a lab, but with my own two hands and the advice of a mentor.

I'm not sure what I'm feeling right now, suffice to say it's probably alcohol and loneliness induced. I can't help but feel this creeping suspicion that I like Dark Haired Girl more than she wants or can handle being liked right now. I'm still a million miles away from the "L word"

(ok, maybe seven hundred and fifty thousand miles away)

But damn, I mean how often is it that somebody can sense the contents of your soul and repeat them back to you without any prior knowledge? And add the exponentially more improbable factor that she's hot. And she says I'm beautiful. what are the odds? Honestly.

Of course, I say this after a night of drinking and karaoke at dunaway's, where I watched a crowd of random people slowly clump into binary molecules and walk out the door, leaving me (however admired by at least one non-present person) and my arms still empty. That's what I want more than anything. To hold somebody. To be held. I didn't want to talk to anybody else there. Fuck those people. I just wished to be near Dark Haired Girl, and comfort her in the troubled times she's facing right now.

This is so wrong. I'm going to push her away by the mere involunary act of my admiration for her. But then, who the fuck am I to say what she wants or doesn't want? We're still essentially strangers who've connected on an unusually deep level.

I have no idea how this all works. For now, I'm just surfing the wave and hoping I don't fall off the board.

Oh, the over analysis.

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On a more positive note, I took a boatload of photos today, and a couple weren't bad. One I even printed out on some 13 x 19 paper at school, and it looks fucking awesome. I'll have to post them tomorrow.

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I giggled today when somebody on the radio said the word "exacerbate".

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AFter two and a half months, instead of growing sick of my company's product, I am now more hopelessly addicted to Chipotle burritos than ever before

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Enough rambling. I'm going to bed now. Sweet dreams, dear readers. I know mine will be.

This and the next two are the source images for the movie poster project. Gives you an idea just how much digital manipulation it took to get the final project. The only real thing I had to do with this was erase the chair and create two separate images out of the hands and the head so I could place Chuck's face directly over the hands.

You can see just how much I had to alter this to get the final image.

And the shadow. This still cracks me up. The "mini-Nosferatu" is now proudly hanging up in my room. :-)

When I went to the mall for the next photo, this was laying on the lot just outside my door. That's the Mirthmobile's shadow. I thought this would've been great for the sorrow project, but I'm keeping it for the class's final portfolio. That's coming up in a week or two.

Our last project was to do five self-portraits. I took a bunch, and submitted the project twice for extra credit. Here's a few of my favorites. For this one, my strategy was to get enough neutral density filters (basically, sunglasses for the camera that darken the image so the shutter has to stay open longer) to get a psycho long exposure. I wanted to go to a busy public place and sit still with a long enough exposure that anything that moved wouldn't show up at all, so that it looked like I was in some normally busy place all by myself. So I go the Fairfield Commons Mall and get Security's permission to shoot inside. What happened in this 30-second exposure is that I didn't hear the shutter click open, so I got up to check. That's why I'm just barely visible. Several people did walk by as the scene exposed, they were just too quick to be picked up. My plan kinda worked, but I was so pleased with the result, I didn't bother taking any more pictures and getting in security's hair.

This is at Dorothy Lane and Far Hills. OIP&T is a couple of miles from here, and I was actually headed there when I realized the empty lot on the corner would be a great place to get a motion blurry shot, as this intersection is one of the busiest in Kettering. Far Hills is Dayton's main street, just renamed through this neighborhood.

This is one I took while setting up the camera for the movie poster project. I just thought it made me look... I dunno... intrepid. Actually, I'm just squinting directly into the light bulb. I must admit to a little photoshopping on this one, as two monster-honkin zits have mysteriously vanished off my face.

Toying with the idea of taking a self portrait not directly, but rather taking a picture of a picture of me, within context. There I am, all naked and alone, curling up away from the glamorous passionate couple. Too bad the mood is somewhat interrupted by those weirdo frog figures sitting on my monitor. I do love that poster, though. What a beautiful high-key photograph.

And again with this one. It's a portrait of me in the sense of a picture of my room and favorite photos, but indirectly there I am staring back at you through that rectangular window in the wall.

I love this one... my room is two things to me. Not only is it my sanctuary where I can not be touched, but it is also my dungeon. It's the cul-de-sac where I can go no farther from the outside world, and often it feels more like a prison.

This is what I had in mind when I went to the church... a photo of me in the throes of spiritual self-doubt. How lucky was I to get that lighting?

Kinda spooky, eh? As if there's this reflection of a solid Jesus-like figure that you momentarily catch out of the corner of your eye, but if you look up, there would be nobody.

Ok, despite my respect and reverence while shooting in the sanctuary, I did have to be a bit of a smart ass on my way out. This photo was just begging to be taken.

Stained glass window in the church. I love a well done window, and this one was strikingly attractive.

I took this close up because, and tell me I'm wrong, but Jesus is looking awfully effeminate. Look at those eyes with those big long eyelashes. What was the artist thinking? That, and I do love the blues, purples, and greens. All in all, a very attractive stained glass window.

And to make my point, I removed the facial hair. Yes, it's a really rough clone stamping job. Sue me. I'm not going for perfection here, just giving you the basic idea. :-)

Hi all. Through a billing glitch on Corecomm's end, I've been offline since late last week. I'll get to your emails later tonight... I've got to go to work now, then Stillwater afterward. Hopefully, after that I'll be able to see Dark Haired Girl for a little. We haven't seen each other for about a week now. We both have outrageously busy lives, and our schedules more often conflict than cross paths.

Besides, it's not like we're steady or anything. We're friends first, and all else second. But it still sucks having made such a close friend and clicked so well, and then not getting together for these periods. I miss her. :-(

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Went out and had a blast saturday night. Am still limping slightly from the mosh pit. Will explain later. :-)

Ok, folks, here it is. First, the original:

And now, my recreation:

The vampire guy is Chuck, my stepdad.

Our lastest project (after the book cover) in Photoshop Basics is to re-create a movie poster. I chose the poster for Shadow of the Vampire, as it's just about one of my favorite posters out there with its sepia-toned art deco feel. It's entirely do-able, yet is still posessed of a decent amount of technical wow-the-teacher skill in reproducing the gradient bars at the bottom. Anyway, I was taking pictures of Chuck for Willem Dafoe, and myself for John Malkovich. I realized that I needed a large wall, bright light, and somebody to pose in a robe with fingers splayed so I could photograph the shadow. That's not very practical for somebody with my limited resources, so I opted to make my own miniature cardboard cut-out Nosferatu so I could photograph the shadow. This was the scene in my hallway last night:

We had guests over. There was much belly laughter at the sight.

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I bought a two-pack of those Vanish tablets that makes your toilet water blue. For some reason, that always amused me. Unfortunately, one tablet only gave it a nice sky blue color, and that just won't do. I put the second tablet in the tank. Now, after a good day of being gone and letting the Vanish dissolve in the tank, when I come home and flush, the water is damn near cobalt.

This pleases me.

Walked around Meijer grocery with Dark Haired Girl late last night, and I picked up a bag of cat foot for Armand and Cozy. Since we met at a parking lot near Dunaway's and took her MAV (multi-activity vehicle, not to be mistaken for a minivan) to the store, I (quite distracted by being with her) left the cat food in her Mazda thingy. Tonight, she stopped by Chipotle while I was working, and upon seeing her and her daughter I beamed so brightly that if the lights were to have gone out at that moment, I'd've been emitting light. I tossed her my keys to put the bag in the car (as it was the middle of dinner rush and I was tending the cash register), and only later realized that she saw just how trashed my car is. The passenger floor is basically carpeted with drink cups. You can't see the mat. I'm so embarrassed. :-)

All night afterward, I was making all sorts of stupid mistakes like taking customers' money and shutting the till without giving change, all while sporting a goofy grin. The only "L word" I'm going to say about her, as we're still essentially strangers who've connected well, is "Like". I like her. I really Like Dark Haired Girl. I have my own life separate from her, and she has her own, separate from me.

And that's damn near perfect.

Hello all! Jeezy creezy, have things been crazy lately. I've got about five million things to write about, but I'll try to condense...

Dark Haired Girl and I had made a "date" for last saturday, but Thursday night I got an email from her asking if I was going to be at D's. Saw her for the first time sober, and as it happens, I indeed was experiencing my patent "inverse beer goggles". She was so much cuter sober than when I was, ahem, under the influence. Sang Squirrel Nut Zippers' "Hell", which I prefaced by announcing during the musical intro, "And now, for what is by far going to be the dorkiest song of the night..." Despite my disclaimer, it was well recieved. :-)

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Flashforward to saturday night, and I met Dark Haired Girl at the Hobart Arena, but they were having junior hockey tournaments. Crap. We decide to go to dinner, and despite my insistance otherwise, she pays. She tells me that she's been in my shoes working part time as a student, and if I must pay, I can pick up the drinks afterward. :-) She's so understanding. Sitting there at the restaurant, I couldn't stop just looking at her and smiling. She'd ask "What?", and I'd answer "I never thought I'd ever be sitting across from somebody so hot."

So we spend a wonderful conversation motoring over to Greenville, and a bar called "Tail Gator's". There's a band there, and the singer is the karaoke DJ from D's. We find Dark Haired Girl's friends and sit at their table. The singer/karaoke DJ recognizes me and say "Everybody! We've got ANDY in the house! Get up here man!" He asks me if I know Secret Agent Man. I tell him I wouldn't know it unless I had the words in front of me, so he tells me to stand over by the bassist and sing backup on "Beverly Hills" with him and his mic.

Sop there I am singing "Be-ver-ly Hiiiills, that's where I want to beeeeee! Livin in Beverly Hiiiils!" nearly cheek-to-cheek with the bass guitarist. Good times. I get off stage and tell Dark Haired Girl that it's official, she's on a date with a bona-fide rock star. :-)

We dance our butts off until we're both all hot and sweaty, and frankly, with the baby-soft skin on her neck, chest, and shoulders glistening with sweat in her tank top, she went from hot to knock-out SEXY. There are other girls there dancing on the bar. Something I've never seen before, and a nice spring-breakish environment I was happy to be experiencing, but I really had no urge to watch them.

After that, we motor on over to Covington to a little bar called "Crossroads". It's a tiny little dive where everybody seems to know everybody, and I'm introduced to a dizzying array of new people. Some dude says "Hey, don't you sing karaoke at D's in Troy? You're pretty good, man!".

I, your friend and humble narrator, am unintentionally deveoloping a reputation. Equal parts thrilling and frightening, which leads to a concern I was discussing with Angela. (pardon the digression) If I go to D's thursday night, whether or not Dark Haired Girl does, it will be the first time I go for any other purpose than to drift off into my own little invisible world of beer and singing to myself. It will be the first time I go there to maintain and/or further my social standing. For some reason, that doesn't sit well. I must keep sight of the real reason I started going there... just for myself.

Afterward, as I've had only one beer that night and otherwise been drinking pepsi, I follow one of Dark Haired Girl's friends to another friend's house where a handful of people are drinking beer and smoking weed. After a while, her friend leaves and as I have no idea where on earth we are (turns out we were outside Piqua), we spend the night. The owner opens a wall and a bed drops out there in the living room. Everybody leaves, and Dark Haired Girl and I again make love more glorious than before.

The best part, though, is that this time, I could curl up and fall asleep with her in my arms, her smooth bare skin feeling like a warm silk sheet against mine.

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Spent last friday running around Cincinnati with Elizabeth taking pictures. She's becoming such a good friend. I also brought along the Canon, and for the first time since school started (and really, since I got the Nikon digital), took pictures on black and white film. No worrying whether it'll work for a project, no concern whether it'll maybe do for a slide page or final portfolio... just photos for my own goddamn sake, and it felt so cathartic. In ten frames, I regained all the passion for photography that I thought was fading. It wasn't going away, just hibernating in the face of school work. I can't wait to finish the roll and see how I did, without the instant gratification of seeing your shot on an LCD screen, and having to be so much more sparing with my compositions, as you can't erase a film shot you don't like.

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Anyway, that's enough typing for now, and I'm sure you've got things to do, so I'll not keep you any longer. :-) Please enjoy the new photos below...

A couple of saturdays ago, a group of us from Camera Skills went to the Oregon District after class. I wasn't in good head space that day, and only popped off a couple of photos. Plus, it felt weird taking pictures with other people other than maybe one other friend, like when I hang out with Elizabeth. But anyway, here they are...