Rough

"Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky."

-Rainer Maria Rilke

JUST SAY NO (to cheese?)!

"The belly rules the mind"

-Spanish Proverb

I heard some grave news today.

I'll first start by explaining that I have had problem skin for the past several years.  I wouldn't call it full fledged morbid acne, but for at least the past 10 years I've had AT LEAST one SERIOUS blemish at all times.  I've tried everything from Tetracycline, to Proactiv, to glycolic based cleansers/toners,  to birth control pills, to egg/garlic based masks, to simply dove soap, to Retin-A, to 100% natural make-up-and back again-And NOTHING has made a whole lot of a difference.  I don't even want to think about how much money I have spent on skin care in my short lifetime.  The number would be sickening.  

As of yesterday, I read in TWO different publications (Cosmo and Women's Health aka the bibles) that DAIRY (!?!?!?!?!) is often the culprit behind breakouts.  After researching further, I couldn't exactly pinpoint the specific reason why milk based products cause acne (most sources linked it more or less to hormones in the cow), but the sources were unfortunately pretty scientific-which must mean that there is at least some truth to it.

Ok.  I've seriously got a problem here.

Let me put this in perspective.  If I had to choose to NEVER eat either cheese or chocolate EVER again in my life, I would HAPPILY forgo tasting chocolate (CHOCOLATE!) in favor of being able to continue to enjoy cheese.  I consume more dairy products than probably 90% of American children.  I've drank a glass of milk almost every day since I can remember.  If I'm starving at 3 am I ravage my mom's refrigerator in search of a cheese slice.  The only way I can stomach salad is if there is some sort of crumbled cheese on it.  My favorite dessert is cheesecake.  Macaroni and cheese comprises a good 20% of my weekly meals.  Cheese goes beautifully with my drink of choice: wine.  My most favorite dishes have at least some element of cheese in them.  I literally get at least 3 cheese cravings a day.

I really don't know what to do.  I tried to avoid cheese all day.  My efforts were unsuccessful.

BREAKFAST:  I poured myself some cereal.  

"Damn!  I'm WAY past the sell-by on this carton (hey, I've been out of town), oh wait...I'm not supposed to be drinking milk anyway."

LUNCH: My mom made me a sandwich.

"Mmmmmm, ham and cheese...wait...UGH!"

DINNER:  I was on my break at work.  A little carton of "easy mac" was batting is promiscuous eyelashes at me from my purse.  

"Easy mac...or go buy something else.  I'm broke...besides, I bet everything I could possibly BUY has dairy in it.  Good justification, Katie."

So yeah... O and 3

I seriously need some advice.  This is maybe more tragic than Hillary losing to Obama.  And if you know me at all, you'd know that I cried that day.

And I've mercilessly ridiculed vegans my whole life.  Karma is such a bitch.

I took this picture in Colorado.  Probably after eating some god damn cheese.

I'm hungry.

The day that nothing changed.

"In the end is my beginning."

-Eliot

Sooooo, at this VERY moment, instead of being on the autotrain moving to Miami, I am pulling an all nighter so I can drive to the airport at 4 am.  I'm going to Vail for the weekend to see my stepsister and stepbrother.  I'll take lots of pictures-PROMISE!  Be back Monday.

Ok so Joos always makes me smile

Ok ok ok ok ok...no matter how bad of a night you might be having, when you find THIS on the internet you can't help but smile.

My very dear friend William Joos is without a doubt the best photographer I've come into contact with.  PLEASE check out his website.  This was his thesis show work-and I love how Sarah Jones and I are exhibiting the "same sex relationship" here.  Well- if I was gonna do that with anyone, you'd be it JONES!  well...maybe.  For all of you who are confused...my head is on Sarah's body and her head is on my (Savannah thesis weight) body.  And I can't get over how clean this photo makes my house look.  AND my baby Venus' pose in the background!  HYSTERICAL!  Seriously-you all must check him out.

Give MAMA a JOB!

"Leave it to me as I find a way to be

Consider me a satellite, forever orbiting

I knew all the rules, but the rules did not know me

Guaranteed"

-Eddie Vedder, Guaranteed 

 

My friend Tara (fellow SCADie) and I are going to start shooting some weddings together.  More info to come!  She's designing a little flyer for us (she also does graphic design...God I totally should have done that) that I shall post here when it is finished.  TELL YOUR MARRYING-TYPE FRIENDS (bc mamas got BILLS)!

That's going to be all for tonight...feeling a bit emotionally "under the weather" I shall say.  SO you know what that means!  Time for some good 'ol healthy BOTTLING UP OF FEELINGS!  HOORAY!

haha...and do you all notice that this picture looks JUST like the other wedding picture I took/posted a few days ago?  Disturbing. 

Oh, but before I go-you all should check THIS out.  Pretty friggin' amazing.

Time?

"What if we chose the wrong religion?  Each week we just make God madder and madder."

-Matt Groening, The Simpsons

TONS of effects of reciprocity failure, but at least at this size it looks neat.  This was a 13 second shot nightshot off the side of my parent's boat.  Time might be interesting to explore.  Been done, but what hasn't?

Shut up and do it.

"My heart is like a mason's heavy weathered skin, each scar makes it harder for me to hurt again."

-Avett Brothers, Pretty Girl from Chile

I've been in the process of (more thinking than doing) beginning a new body of work called Manscape.  The idea was in some form born even before the first photograph in Decay Constant.   For some reason this series isn't pouring from me in the way my thesis show stuff did.  The top photograph here is an EXTREMELY elementary version of an idea I have for it (the real one definitely won't feature my feet anywhere in the frame).  The bottom photo is a cookie-cutter-whatever-Annapolis-photo I took tonight after the Wednesday night races (and is  in no way related to Manscape so don't worry).

I feel like I can't shoot this work the same way that I shot Decay Constant.   The landscapes (?) that I have been planning will not allow for that 2.8 aperture/shallow misty depth that has become a big part of my style/aesthetic.  I love f-2.8...I cannot really ever imagine anything above f-11 even.  Is it possible to successfully shoot something in a style seemingly different from my own?  But then again I want these photos to be a little funny.  Decay Constant was so friggin serious.  I don't want any mystery.  I want straight forward, awkward, and ironic.  Misty, shallow depth won't do those things.  

I always do this.  I think myself into a corner.  I think about everything before I do it and stress myself out about it.  I don't think I've ever planned a photo that I have actually liked in the end.  Sure in Decay Constant I would set out to photograph a certain person, a certain area, or a certain thing, but the only photos I would actually LOVE were the ones that I shot on a whim...in an unplanned light/untried/thought of angle/obscure moment.  Its like split personality disorder.  I've always had a tendency to be entirely too cerebral...but things (not just photography) always seem to turn out best when I haven't really thought about them too much.  But to not "think(!?!?!?!)" about something too much before I do it...why, that goes against everything I stand for!  Its like an epic battle between Aries and Taurus (I was born on 4:20, and no one ever knows which sign I'm supposed to be), and Aries always wins. 

If you are reading this Rebecca Nolan (an old professor of mine), I'm sorry.  I'll "shut up and do it"...just like you always told me.