journal Archive

Here is a shot from a recent set I did for Blue Blood’s GothicSluts.com. This lovely is a blast to photograph. Another potentially NSFW shot is at this link.

I have PMS. I generally try to avoid anything which could be ruffling at such times. Apparently the world did not get the memo. LOL Can a journal be considered a memo to the world? Probably not. I hope not. I really don’t post my ready-for-primetime thoughts here. I wish fewer people used this medium as a memo to the world generator. I really enjoy the concept of a diary which can allow feedback. But a diary does not equal a site. If I want to communicate a finished thought to hundreds of thousands of people, this is not where I would post it.

Late late night last night. Feeling very crusty today, but slept really well.

Actually, it is not just PMS. I mean, I do try to avoid conflicts if I fear my own reaction might be too strong or otherwise off. For a long time, I was holding my tongue on a lot of things because I wanted to avoid conflict. Not sure those two things go together though. Something for me to think about. In general, as time goes on, I like to reserve my energy for conflicts which matter and not just any old thing. I would rather create than battle, unless the battle is for something important i.e. good cause gets a battle hymn from me but baseless drama does not.

There is a leopard-spotted pink paddle in my suitcase from Comic Con. I wonder who it could possibly belong to . . .

I can’t decide if I should go to the funeral. I had kind of decided I couldn’t do it, but then I woke up early this morning from one of those horrible nightmares where you are racing to get somewhere you never arrive. And I was trying to get some friend of my parents who was kind of like Eddie Izzard to get me to the DC airport so I could catch a flight to make it to the funeral, only I’m not even in DC right now and my parents would be very unlikely to be friends with anyone who was anything like Eddie Izzard.

I really don’t like mortality.

There is something wrong about funerals. Like the person you are going to see won’t really be there.

I used to look forward to autumn every year. The last four years in a row, however, I’ve had a death in the family around this time of year. Every damn year. If I never pick up for my mother calling before noon again, will my family live longer?

I have a leather jacket and preserves from someone with extraordinary taste in spreadables. Thanks, baby! 🙂 Next time, I promise to go barefoot in your garden. Topiary pets rule.

This shoot with Kellie was so perfect. Sometimes there is just that flawless moment for the photographers and the photographed. This is the most recent update to GothicSluts.com.

Really HUGE (but beloved) second image from this set at this link. Whole set of course appears on Blue Blood’s GothicSluts.com.

Been a while since I posted much photography, although the site updates march on. Thank goodness I edited some sets ahead of time. Anyway, I finally had a night where my dreams were not all flood and fire and Mad Max.

My gym equipment arrived. It requires assembly, so I actually have to tidy up to make room, darn it. So I am procrastinating here. The box weighed like a zillion pounds. Don’t they know I ordered it because I can’t lift that much. LOL

Anyway, here is a favorite shot from the most recent update featuring Scar to Blue Blood’s BarelyEvil.com. Another shot from this series can also be seen at this link.

Forrest and I saw the colored wrap when we were shopping for our trip to go visit Scar and we just had to get it. The paintings in the background are her actual work and she was a real sport about the plastic. We had a very fun trip! Scar rules!

Attempting to get my mind off of CNN, despite Anderson Cooper’s good looks . . . This is a shot from a set which just posted to Blue Blood’s BarelyEvil.com. I love shooting this girl. She is so awesome. You can see another shot from this set at this link. I’m sort of allergic to cigarette smoke, but I think smoking is sexy. I blame the society. 😉 The only people who I don’t mind blowing smoke at me are people I am photographing while they smoke.

NSFW shot from the same series after the jump

It really bugs the hell out of me when there are people who try to profit off of something like the Katrina disaster. I’m talking about the sort of people who ask you to buy their products and they will donate a portion of profits. Note that most of this profiteers offer a % of profits and not actual gross proceeds. Then they just make enough expenses that there are no profits. Most of them do not have real businesses either i.e. they are thinking of throwing a club night or making arts and crafts or something and, despite lack of experience in that arena, asking other people to support their fledgling business because, although they are not a registered charity, they are planning to give later. Yeah, right.

If a genuine going concern of a business decides to donate part of a regular ongoing profit stream, I think that is decent if they are doing it that way just to make sure they are giving what they can afford. If they are doing it to make people buy their products, I think that is vile.

A Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance spokesperson pointed out that, even if the middleman asking you to give through them is legit, the middleman is taking a skim. If you want to give, you should give directly to the charity.

I’d like to add that of course giving directly to someone you know needs help makes sense too. For example, a lot of people in the Houston gothic scene are providing temporary housing to people from the New Orleans scene. There is a town in I believe Tennessee where the local churches and suchlike basically paired local families with their counterparts from a stricken town so that people were assisting each other on a personal and direct level.

You should research what charities you want to support. Besides the BBB folks, Charity Navigator the guide for intelligent giving has a specific guide for the Katrina disaster at this link. None of these is a be-all-end-all instruction manual, but I think they have good tips.

The following is the list of charities I have been supporting:

I think that housing is going to be a really important issue for recovery. I believe the people who run this charity truly intend to do good and have a track record of success.

This is a service created by MoveOn.org for the purpose of matching up people able to put up victims of the storm with people who need a place to stay for a while. I think this is a wonderful and immediate concept to help with the immediate problem. Those donating housing can state preferences for who they would be most able to give shelter and support to i.e. gender, children, families, orphans, pets, smokers, nonsmokers, etc. Those seeking housing get an intuitive interface for searching by location and so forth.

I know some people oppose their Christian message, but I think the Salvation Army actually embodies a lot of the good love-thy-neighbor stuff which the political Christians have robbed the religion of in the public eye. I saw the Salvation Army spokesperson on CNN and was impressed with his compassion. Can’t say the same for everyone I saw speak during my compulsive news-watching this past week.

Again, I was impressed by the spokesperson for America’s Second Harvest on CNN. Obviously figuring out how to get food shipped to people is an immediate need and these people have a track record for doing this successfully.

I’m incredibly impressed with everything Magic Johnson has been doing as well, although the Magic Johnson Foundation is not specifically a Katrina charity. For example, he has been feeding the displaced at his Burger Kings and giving them new shoes to replace the disease-ridden cardboard some people have been walking around in. A bunch of other stuff too. I feel good that it seems like the majority of people really do want to see the right things done and so many are helping in the ways available to them.

What charities do you all like and why?

It is starting to sound like FEMA was worse than ineffective; they were actually damaging. They reportedly stopped Wal-Mart shipments of water and turned away fuel and boats and, according to the following video, even sabotaged communication systems. WTF?

At this link and this torrent mirror

This is just so much worse than merely not mobilizing on time or efficiently. How could FEMA or anyone human block other people from mobilizing help? I just can’t imagine what goes through someone’s head when they stop someone from handing a bottle of water to someone who is dying of dehydration. I’m no bleeding heart, but Broussard sure as hell does not come across as one either. It makes me so sick and angry and I can’t even imagine how it must have been and still is for people down there sworn to help.