Today I saw the cutest camera ever. I suppose I overlooked it, firstly because on paper it doesn't look like much and second because I am prone to overlooking things I don't pine over in some way or another. This is a darling version of my tool of trade a lot more expensive than a toy, but not good enough for what I aim for, so it's a bitch to consider it for what it is - just so incredibly, ridiculously adorable.

Fujifilm FinePix X100

The design is simply instant karma. This is the sort of camera that your dreams think all cameras are like. When you look through, that's the "stolen moments" machine if ever there was one. Okay, granted, it's missing two things that my fundamental childhood photo education distinctly recalls and that's the sound of the shutter mirror retracting (that I sometimes just LISTEN in Mark, not even taking picture, just LISTENING to taking pictures...) and the little thumb switch that pulled the film forward. My first tiny machine was a Minolta, but it was almost identical to this one. 

         Course, this little shit costs like it's made of hazelnuts and the 35 mm lens, although user-friendly, does require a certain amount of pre-knowledge ... and a lot of love for reportage shots. There's something very intimate with a frame like this. Something very Lucy Berliner. 

         Seriously. The game changers we find when having coffee with friends..

Workspace

:)
Featuring the "Cool trees" route.
:)

Most normal day ever

This has probably been the most normal day I've had in a while. First a chatty, chilly March walk with Drej and play with the dogs. Checking my mail, downloading Smash and watching some of it. (I'm team Derek, so I wanna see him back in the center of the mess that is Bombshell, FYI.) Most of the trouble with the editor has been put aside and I took the sketches to a potential contractor. I washed and hung the clothes, neatly, because there's just something so very cool about hanging matching socks that smell fresh, while the General napped and then we went uphill to have lunch with my parents. Actually the plan was to go up to photograph sausages and dumplings, but also I wanted their opinion on my professional predicament. I'm glad they went though all this beforehand. At times I am not sure what my rights are and I don't know I am allowed to insist on certain matters.When the editor completely re-arranged my first chapter into an unrecognisable, very politically correct and absolutely boring rip-off (basically she just kept the ideas and data and wrote the entries anew in a way she saw fit.) I didn't know she was not allowed to do that. In fact the editor is not allowed to change anything about the text without the consent of the author and certainly not completely. I was also sad because she cut vast portions of my text - after I was asked to write them to make the book more story-like. This before anyone mentioned the texts are too long. 

              Long story short, I think now this mess is resolved (I hope. Other than this, I love the way the book is becoming.) and I think mum&dad are proud of me for doing what I'm doing. I think they're okay with me being a pauper writer as opposed to being a mediocre-situated clerk. Also, dad said I make good landscape photos. Which is all I ever need to hear to smile about that.

               Breaking the diet because of the sausages and dumpling (damn but some things are really yummy when you're hungry), we had a small lunch and we talked simple, friendly stuff. Dogs were funny, until the elder bitches got tired of Lyra and went to nap under the dining table. Then Gen and I returned home and went to bed. At around six he had to leave for a hunters meeting and I got to renaming and resizing the photos for the summer chapters. Two hours later he came back home and we went out to have a drink. We ventured into the Cuba cafe and General had hot chocolate and I had violets-flavoured white coffee. The chocolate was mesmerising, but my coffee was way too sweet. I forgot to ask for just a drop of syrup. Since our diet, I've gotten so unaccustomed to salt and sugar, it tastes too hard every time someone uses them. 

               Treating himself (I would have done it for his birthday in a few weeks), General bought a new video game and uploaded it while I tried the latest new dungeon in the Pandaria expansion. Got over the first boss and got two new gear points, but the raid was not very good, so I left. Now I'll join him in the horizontal, where he's reading a military magazine and I'll play DrawSomething or read a comic. (Saga? Thor, God of Thunder? Wolverine, Best There Is?)

               Can't think of a day spent more calmly. It was such a refreshment after the last two weeks of havoc. Drej gave me fitness exercises to start working on, but I forgot to do those. Curse my distracted brain.

The Station Agent

I saw an odd movie that I really liked. If I ever got into making movies, this would probably be what my first feature would be like. It's incredibly minimalistic, slow, very few actors, very little dialogue, but it's almost absurd how excellent the actors who ARE in it perform - and how very well the few lines that are in it, deliver.
     Towards the end you almost feel like even  the three catharsic/turn points - the librarian girl being pregnant, the painter lady trying to kill herself and the main character's school speech - are unnecessary. I was worried the Cuban guy's dad might die or something. Which would be needless in it's entirety.

The story is about a dwarf/little person, who is very removed from social buzz because people treat him as if he was ... something. He says of himself that he's actually really boring. He probably would have room to develop if he was of normal size, but little by little the mockery and the stares numbed him and he is entirely dissociative. So much so that he tends to mistake the interest of strangers for ridicule. Oddly enough, he is actually very attractive. All three female protagonists, two of which (Played by a very lovely Patricia Clarkson and a really cute, still very raw Michelle Williams) are drawn to him, although more in a friendly, chavalieuristic mannerism than an actual kinky sex variety. The third is a train-interested little girl that ultimately draws him out of his shell. The two male protagonists, one of which passes on at the beginning of the film (thus starting the story) and the other who talks for all other five combined, also find profound connection to Fin.
            The photography and the use of the set is amazing. Even the glacier pace is perfect.
            And there's trains. Which I can watch in any movie. Even Trainspotting, that has almost nothing to do with them..

Spleeny

... Sometimes this is exactly how I feel ....

Low and high

Low light of the day. The editor sent back the 'edited' first chapter and it was so changed it was entirely unrecognisable. None of my spark was in it anymore. She's okay, she means well and was trying to please a very broad spectrum of the readers, but my job was to write yet another guide, in a completely new and cool tone. Now it's just yet another guide. That kind of felt like I just gathered the info and somebody else used it in sentences that have nothing to do with mine. Like they didn't trust me with my approach. Dunno. They probably made the book a lot more sell-able, but... Anyone's name can be put on it now. It has very little left to do with me. Today, when a nasty case of vertigo has me and I can barely focus. Lowlite indeed.

Highlight, on the other hand, makes me feel alright again. We bathed the cat (again) in anti-flee shampoo (again) and she was super fluffy and clean and flee-free and white and majestic (again.) A flawless household pussy cat. 

Next she went and waited for the dog to pee and rolled in it.

That much about that.

Best quote ever.
(By Dolly Parton, a lady who shares my cup size.)

"The reason my feet are so small is because things don't grow in the shade."

and, just this once my exception to the rule on no-quotes-please-ever..
some more by the fine lady:

I'm not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I'm not dumb... and I also know that I'm not blonde.
It's a good thing I was born a girl, otherwise I'd be a drag queen.
You'd be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap!

If I were asked to create one sentence that involves God, music, and food as they all relate to my life it would have to be: Thank God I have been able to sing for a supper.

Have you ever been asked to pose nude?
Yes, I have agreed to pose for Penthouse on my hundredth birthday. Everybody is going to be sorry.

Some pickies from the roadtrip the other day

I am trying and trying to understand landscape/architecture photography, but all I can do is look for shapes and composition, not the narrative. Perhaps I am trying too hard. There is this argument I keep offering, despite the fact my pictures are too monographic, that a good photo should give a promise of "(wonders) just around the corner".

 The beds in Ajdovščina hostel. Of course if there were zombies or aliens running around, catching them in a room like this would be very difficult.  But other than that, the rooms were perfect. And the bar served nice coffee.