THIS STAYS BETWEEN YOU AND ME, INTERNET
My laziness has reached epic proportions. Yesterday I moved furniture around my apartment so that I could LIE ON MY COUCH AND SEE MY LAPTOP. I am really that lazy. I moved FURNITURE so as not to have to move a laptop. It was only one piece of furniture, really. Just the couch. It makes a certain kind of sense - I'm dragging around ONE couch instead of unplugging, untangling, moving, and reattaching, like, THREE cables (external hard drive, speakers, mouse). Plus one laptop. That's four (light) things to move instead of just one (incredibly heavy) thing.
I can't believe I'm trying to justify this. I am lazy. I am ashamed. Sort of. Mostly, I'm really comfortable.


ALL THAT COMPLAINING, WASTED.
Now that my work schedule has abruptly gone back to normal, I find that I'm freaking out. I didn't want to work all day every day but I liked having money. I'll still have money, mind you, just not as much. I liked all that much. I was getting used to it. My concern is such that I'm seriously considering getting a (gasp) second job. My job, as it is, pays enough to cover my bills and the rent but SHOES!! All those lovely shoes that I can't buy! Not to mention all those gorgeous summer dresses that are going on sale RIGHT THIS MINUTE! This is why I need a second job. The extremely shallow aspects of my nature are stronger than the very lazy aspects and I'm going to drag myself out of this extremely comfortable, well-positioned if not very decorative couch and get another job. Then I will be able to lie right back down again while wearing the beige Steve Madden platform pumps I have been coveting for months now. I recently got the electric blue ones and they are a dream. Shortly after getting them, I saw photos of Victoria Beckham, my beloved Posh Spice, wearing those very same shoes with three different outfits. It's kismet. We're meant to be besties. I can tell. We have the same taste in shoes.




IT'LL CHANGE YOUR LIFE, I PROMISE
The other thing I've been enjoying lately is 8track. You can make your own playlists and share them. I love anything that lets me force my favorite music down other people's throats and my obsessive love of making lists means that I have playlists about EVERYTHING. This is my playlist that has songs about Paris.


I also have playlists about coffee, breaking up, zombies, shoes, Los Angeles, covers, death, unrequited love, circuses, and photographs. They will all eventually make their way onto that site. I'm having so much fun with it!

This may not work. . .

this is an experiment. i was going to try and write some bloggy stuff using my keypad on my super nifty smart phone only it is not working out as well as i had hoped. my notsosmart phone will not let me use capital letters or any symbols. it is incredibly annoying and i am aborting the bloggy attempt now.

goodbye.

And then that happened

Some things are inevitable. I live in LA, I've been driving for over fifteen years, and I drive nearly every day surrounded by wackos. Friday, it happened: I was in an accident that took out not one, not two, but three cars, two of them completely totaled. One of the destroyed vehicles was the car I was driving and it wasn't my car. Good news is I'm ok and the dog that was in the car with me is ok.

That is the dog, being OK. My airbag didn't deploy and my brains are pretty rattled but China, who was in the passenger seat, flew straight in to hers, bounced gracefully off, then slid gently down to the floor of the car. When I could finally come to a stop, I was frantically pushing airbag out of the way to find her confused and happy, hanging out under the dashboard.
I've been in a few accidents, mostly fender-benders here and there and a couple big ones when I was a passenger but this is the first time I've been involved in something like this as a driver and I'm still waiting to find out what I'm going to need to do (pay) and how I do it. It's all very exciting (nerve-wracking).
I'm ok, sustained no permanent damage, just some whiplash and muscle pains. I should be as right as rain in a couple of weeks. And if you're in the LA area and need to go to emergency care, go to Cedars Sinai. I cannot recommend that place highly enough. I was in and out within three hours, everyone was kind and professional and, given the situation, it was a remarkably pleasant experience.

That's it really. That's the big news. Car accident.
I did a photo shoot the week before and I'm pretty happy with how those came out.

The model was a doll, super fun and easy to work with, despite the fact that she was sick. She was a trooper. People like that make me look good. Here's another of my favorites:

She's all super-model styles here.

Some days, I love what I do.

There have been happenings. Many concerts, some movies, a few parties, a Fourth of July. I saw The Murder City Devils in.... May, I think? Cursive, Sage Francis, Gogol Bordello (Hooray!), some local bands, some friends bands. It's been a good summer for music, so far. There are a few more concerts I'm looking forward to this year, Muse and Crooked Fingers being the most notable - those are my number two and number one favorite bands, in that order, and I've never seen either of them in concert before. My head might explode from the excitement.
I had a little notebook with a couple of notes I'd written for the express purpose of remembering to blog about them and now that I'm sitting all comfycozy, I'm too lazy to reach across the two-and-a-half feet span between me and my purse, which has the notebook. I'm pretty sure I was going to mention something about Facebook but now that I'm sitting here and doing the typing, I'm thinking that the Facebook story is not so much 'funny' as it is 'whiny'. The facebook story will not be told.
The BFF and I spent a day in San Diego a couple of weeks ago and it was fantastic. We took lots of pictures and did lots of talking and I thought about how wonderful it is to have such a great friend to grow with.We started the day at the San Diego County Fair and made a beeline for the food carts. I wanted to try the deep fried butter but when it came right down to it, I chickened out and had deep-fried apples instead. It's the healthier deep-fried alternative. We went on my favorite ride, the Ferris Wheel, looked at some of the vendors booths, ate some more, and left. It was kind of ideal, really. I'm not so big on trudging around in the dust and the heat and Charles, she is exactly the same way. From the fair, we went to a local cemetery, took some pictures, ended up at the beach for dinner (pasta!), took some more pictures, and I went home. We're going to try and do these photo field trips at least a few times a year. It's great practice for both of us and an even greater excuse to hang out.


Another great day was Universal Studios - I hadn't been in years and it was really cool seeing all the changes made to the park. It felt much more Theme Park-y, with the kiosks and booths and themes, less like a working movie studio with a couple of attractions. It was fun but not the kind of place I'd visit regularly. You, Universal, are no Disneyland.

There was this guy, though. That's definitely a point in Universal's favor. Also, margaritas. More points to Universal.



MY CAT IS A JERK
My mattress is pretty hard and until recently, I liked it that way. I was comfortable, sort of, until suddenly I just wasn't. Lying on my back was exactly like sleeping on the hardwood floor, it was impossible to get comfortable on my belly, and my poor hipbone had no idea what to do with itself when I lay on my side. Because I am a Problem Solver, I betook myself to Target and bought a thick, comfy mattress pad. Target being what it is, I also walked out with a shower curtain, bathroom floor mat, a kitty litter box with a lid and swinging door, a couple of dresses, and a book (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. It was good). I got home, cleaned the apartment a little, arranged my purchases around the place, forced the cat in and out of the litter box a few times so he'd know how to use the door, got ready for bed. The mattress pad, it was heaven. Squishy and soft and comfy and I got exactly two hours of slumbering bliss out of it before a horrible smell forced me awake. Startled and completely grossed out, I started to look for the source of the smell and found it almost right away and it was coming from the bed.
The cat, confused by the new litter box, peed in the bed, soaking the sheets, the comforter, and the BRAND NEW MATTRESS PAD. His first accident, ever, and it's on the one item I can't easily clean. I couldn't even get mad at him. He was confused! The door on the litter box defeated his tiny, tiny brain and my lovely mattress pad paid the price.
The smell was foul. Just brain-searingly awful. It's been a couple of days now and I've done everything I can think of to get rid of it, up to and including spraying the mattress pad down with Very Expensive Perfume. Funnily enough, that's what seems to work best. I've been drifting off to sleep lately in a cloud of Chanel and cat urine.

TWO THINGS THAT ARE UNRELATED BUT I THOUGHT I'D MENTION.
I got the awesome discount at the neighborhood boutique of Doom and now I'm more broke than ever. I will, however, be spending my time at the soup kitchens in some great dresses. Hooray! Also, my head has survived another self-applied haircut. There was a tense couple of hours while I waited for it to dry (I stupidly cut it fresh out of the shower and soaking wet. I sort of forgot that it's not always like that) but much to my simultaneous relief and annoyance, no one even noticed I'd cut it. Three inches, people!! That's not nothin'. Either my hair is so long that no one can tell bits of it are gone or it looks terrible, possibly from an angle I cannot see, like the back of my head, and no one wants to make me feel bad.

*My cat crawled onto my lap while I was typing this and he just gave himself a big ol' languid cat stretch and slipped right off my lap. I find this kind of thing hilarious, despite the leg-clawing I got when he panicked at the beginning of the extremely un-languid fall.
He's back now, dignity and balance intact.

YOU CAN PROBABLY SKIP THIS NEXT PART.
Clementine the Wonder Bug is in the shop again. Looking over this blog, I see that there very many entries where I talk about my car breaking down or catching fire. The latest thing is breaking down while parked on hillsides, for no particular reason. It just doesn't want to drive anymore. It's confusing my super-genius mechanic and he's keeping the car in the shop until he can figure it out. This means that I'm walking a whole lot. Walking to work, walking to the store, walking to the bus stop, walking walking walking. Occasionally biking. Mostly walking. I have discovered that it's much easier to walk up a hill than it is to ride a bicycle up one and because there is a large hill between me and EVERYTHING ELSE, the bike isn't getting as much use as I'd originally thought.

Abrupt ending because I can't think of anything else to talk about.

THE NEVERENDING 36FAIL
I started another attempt at the 365 - you know, that thing on Flickr where you're supposed to take a picture every day for a year? This was number three for me and I lasted less than a week. This time, though, I'm just gonna pretend that the portraits, they don't have to be in order. I can take them over the course of, say, six years. Or twenty. 365 is just the name of the project, it doesn't really mean anything.

That is the face of Failure.

GOD WANTS ME TO SPEND ALL MY MONEY
There's a gorgeous little neighborhood boutique just down the street and it has been the bane of my existence for years. Every time I walk by, I'll see a dress, or a coat, or a skirt in the window that I just have to have. The owner, Sarah, has nearly the exact same taste in clothing that I do and I can never resist her shop windows. I've spent so much money there that six months ago, I made a deliberate, conscious decision to avoid that store at all costs. I haven't been inside since and I studiously avoid looking in or at the windows, despite the fact that I walk or drive past the storefront nearly every day.
Sadly, I'm not exaggerating at all. Because I have ZERO WILLPOWER, that place was driving me to wreck and ruin.
Sooooo..... Last night I was having dinner at a local eatery when who should happen to sit at the table next to me? Why, Sarah, manager and proprietor of the gorgeous little neighborhood boutique, of course! I have never, ever seen her outside of that store. Not once, until last night. She recognized me, I recognized her, we chatted for a bit and then she said, "You know, you should come into the store sometime this week. I'll give you a great discount!"
A DISCOUNT! I die.
All resolve has been chucked out the window. That was a sign! I'm SUPPOSED to spend all my money there! I even get discounts!

Erm..... Hello there.
It's been a while.

NEW BLOGGY RESOLUTION:
I am not going to keep this up on a regular basis. Clearly, I am not nearly focused/motivated/mature enough for that. Nor, however, shall I let this blog die. The new bloggy resolution is to blog, you know, whenever.

While I'm always chock-full of great excuses for not keeping up, the one I've got now is a really, really good one - I was at work, all day, every day, ALL THE TIME. The occasional afternoon/day off I had was spent in a heap on my bed, bemoaning the lack of time I had to spend the funds I'd been accruing (thank God for the internet, eh? You can shop from ANYWHERE!). After nearly five months of that, my schedule is going back to normal. I'll have two days of a week and most afternoons to do with whatever I'd like. I'm seeing a lot of sleep in my future, with occasional naps just to shake things up.

I have managed to squeeze in a couple of shoots here and there, one in particular that I'm really proud of. This is Amber:Isn't she purdy? And she's a dream of a model. Our first set-up, after she'd been made up and costumed, I positioned her, she took up a pose, I snapped a shot and suddenly, she was moving all over the place, posing and hair whipping and generally being incredibly awesome and making me look good. I barely directed her at all and as we wandered Elysian Park, she'd spot trees and power converters I'd completely overlooked and suggest shots. I luff her.

In other awesome photography news, I've met a new neighbor who is an incredibly talented professional photographer and who is willing to gang up with me. He's been teaching me great tips and tricks and I'm already seeing improvement in my own work.

So, you know. That's fun.


I AM A GEEK AND THINGS LIKE THIS CANNOT GO UNMENTIONED.

The guy and I went to a BBQ in Echo Park a couple of weeks ago. It was in a small lot behind an art gallery off of Sunset Blvd and while it was sparsely decorated, there was a pretty tree strung up with Christmas lights in the middle of the lot and some vinyl benches scattered around. Nothing special UNTIL I overheard a guy ask the girl who was hosting the event where she'd gotten the benches. Oh so casually, she answered that she was friends with a set decorator and had he ever heard of the show Pushing Daisies? Well, those benches were from the diner set.

THE SET OF PUSHING DAISIES!!! My beloved, canceled, favorite show of ever!! I am such a nerd for that show that in no time at all, I'd commandeered a bench and parked myself there for the rest of the evening.

That expression right there? That is nerdy bliss. Glee, if you will. My behind is part of Pushing Daisies now. And there is photographic evidence.