Bowling Night

Game 1: 114
Game 2: 127

It All Started With This Butterfly Flapping It’s Wings In The Amazon

I’m not one of those people that believes everything happens for a reason. Sometimes things, good or bad, just happen. People are lucky, or they’re cursed, and it’s not necessarily because of anything they did or who they are, it just is. There doesn’t have to a meaning behind everything.

Which isn’t to say that sometimes things DO happen for a reason. And when they happen, it’s not always for the reason you think it’s for.

Today was shaping up be a bad day. Besides work, I managed to give myself a rather nasty papercut. I’ve been giving away band aids, so my supply was down to one, and that one didn’t fit very well. Rather then head on over to the Got Fire event, a detour to the drugstore was in order. A detour that made me late and saddled me with many more band aids then I needed. I was a little bit pissed.

And yet, late was good, for fire hadn’t even started when I arrived. Earlier would have just mean sitting it out in the cold night. And box o’ Band Aids turned out to be helpful as a burned hand needed some tending. A bad day wasn’t so bad at all, if things hadn’t begun badly it wouldn’t have ended well.

However, I would prefer if things started well and just got better. That sequence doesn’t happen enough for my tastes.

All Hail Comrade Bloomberg

Let’s be clear from the start, Bloomburg is probably the better candidate for mayor. He’s been pretty efficient as mayors go, and if the polls are any measure, it would seem that most of the city agrees.

That’s always how it starts. Hugo Chavez didn’t start as the worst choice, for millions of poor votors, he was the runaway better candidate. He promised to funnel millions of dollars to the poor and raise their living standard, and he did just that. Likewise Mugabe was a leader in overthrowing white oppression and empowering millions of his African countrymen. Castro lead the revolution against the vestiges of colonial rule and laid the foundation of a socialist cradle to grave support system. Mayor Sharpe of Newark was of a generation of mayors to retake power for disenfranchised and disillusioned residents of Newark. The dictator always begins as the better choice, otherwise how would the people support their rise to power?

The problem is when these great leaders see themselves as too important to step down, when they are more important then the system they are supposedly fighting to fix. Rather then have faith in the people, have faith in the system, they unilaterally decide that they have to stay on, just one more term, to helm the ship through the storm. Laws get conveniently changed, small rulesmaking councils of dozens overturn covenants laid down earlier by millions of voters. Backroom deals by billionaires trump the will of hapless ordinary citizens. Millions of dollars get spent greasing the wheels of party machines to ensure that challangers of all walks get silenced. It happens so many times you’d think the pattern would be easy to spot, but time and again dictators too important to step down get pushed up to power by adoring throngs. Mao, Lenin, Adminijad; democracy doesn’t die with a whimper, but to the applause of cheering men.

Tomorrow we exercise our right to vote. It’s an important responsibility. One day a year, no matter who you are, your voice gets heard as clearly and as loudly as everyone else’s. Class, race, sex, age, everybody is equal. Everybody gets just one vote. It’s a luxury I’m fortunate enough to enjoy, had the war ended differently my entire family would be praising the deeds of the Dear Leader.

I will be damned if I ignore the lessons of history, and elect a dictator of my own. I’m no fan of Thompson, but I love this country. I believe in democracy, in freedom, and the uniquely American way of life; and Mike Bloomburg represents everything that goes against all of that.

At Federal Hall there stands a statue of George Washington. A British General who lead a rag tag army to victory against the world’s greatest power. 8 years after assuming the presidency, the young nation had no capital, no formal army, no central currenc, no true sense of unity, and no term limits. If ever a time a leader was needed to stay on, just one more term, it was then. Washington, at the peak of his power bestrode the capital, New York City, delivered a stern warning on the danger of tyranny, and went quietly into the night.

Thank you for 8 years of service Mayor Bloomburg, but it’s time for you to go.

Jailbreak

There are two great challanges in shooting the NYC Village Halloween Parade. The first is getting access to the parade itself. For many years I would jump fences, make official looking credentials, sweettalk cops. Turns out, you can get a press pass from the parade organizers pretty easily ahead of time. I never even thought to ask. So really, the first great challange is overcoming your own stupidity.

The second great challange is getting access to the costumed marchers. Sounds redundant, no? The thing about the parade is that it’s an open parade, anyone in costume can march. As you would expect, a lot of people show up to march, so the great challange for the organizers and the police is crowd control. Controlling the spectators, and controlling the marchers, both are handled the same way, using massive holding pens and controlled releases of people.

The nature of people is that they don’t want to wait in holding pens doing nothing, so they jam and push to get to the release point in the front. Which, of course, means that they pack into the holding pen like sardines in a tin. The more they pack in, the harder they push to get out, which packs them in ever harder. The net effect of which is that most of the people in costume are trapped in the pen, where it’s impossible to get enough room to take a picture, much less move around.

If you’re trapped in the pen, the only way to get decent shots is to get into the parade, but that means pressing forth to the release point, which takes forever. Your press pass is useless at this point. Sometimes you have to go backwards to get ahead. If you press back to the start of the pen, the crowds are thinner and there are plenty of marchers to get photos of. As an added bonus, everybody is pumped up to be in the parade, but they haven’t had their enthusiasm dampened by the pen yet.

And here’s the thing, there’s nothing inherently special about the parade marchers. Except for the bands and the floats and the dancers, all the same people you see in the subway, on the street, and in the club are the exact same people you see in the parade. That’s not to say the parade isn’t great, ideally you would have staked out a spot out in the route early and *not* gotten trapped in the pen in the first place. But if you do get trapped, keep in mind that all is not lost. You could probably just set up shop in the subway or at Union Square or at 22nd and 5th ave and get plenty of great shots.

Committed

Today I brought both my film cameras out to play. As usual, didn’t get much chance to use either all day, until I was waiting for my train. Perfect Hopperesque moment of a woman sleeping in profile, framed by subway window. Didn’t think I’d get the shot, as I stumbled with runaway lenscaps and tangle of straps getting my camera out. But I did, with time to spare, and so I metered, focused, and wound the camera. And that’s when this oblivious lady walked into the middle of my shot.

I had forgotten that this was the great frustration of film. Digital or film, you miss the shot you miss the shot. Blocked shots are more difficult. Digital is nothing, you’re just missing the shot; but with film you’ve just wasted a shot and lost some film. But pre-blocked shots, this is the greatest of all frustrations.

I’ve cocked the shutter, but I can see the shot is blocked. Of course the lady stays put until after the train leaves, and the moment is gone. But the film is still all loaded up. I can’t put it back in the bag, it will knock around and will eventually release the shutter, wasting film on a blank frame. But there’s nothing here to shoot, the shot I wanted is gone. I’m being forced to waste film on a terrible picture I don’t want to take. But if I don’t, the film will get wasted anyway. Once you commit to taking a shot, the camera doesn’t care if the shot is gone, you’ve commited to taking a shot whether you want to or not. It’s pure frustration. Frustration you will never get with digital.

Which is a long way in saying that in many ways 35mm sucks.

Disconnect

I’m not sure quite what’s going on, New York City is it’s own little bubble of a world that doesn’t necessarily play by the same rules as everyone else. Business is clearly off, but when I walk by the bars and the nightclubs of the meatpacking district, it’s all good. There are still plenty of people living it up in fabulous fashion.

When I talk to people who are unemployed, they can’t get jobs for months and months on end. Plenty of people are either in forclosure or are steadily getting there. People keep saying business is still down, and I’m seeing a lot of empty storefronts.

Banks are going bankrupt, FDIC is broke, and yet investment bankers and traders are reaping bonuses like it’s 2007 all over again. Stocks are up 60% since March and profits are up too, unless you start counting all those losses that were papered over with accounting tricks. But even though I read the pessimistic news reports, the market continues to climb.

It just seems like there’s a real disconnect between people with money and people with none, between the retail Main street and the high frequency trading supercomputers on Wall street., between reality and finance. I fear how the two will come to the inevitable reconciliation.

Money to Burn

I still have a few unused gift cards sitting in a drawer. The logical thing to do would be to use those cards for groceries and hoard my precious cash in these difficult economic times. I’m not going to do that. These were gifts, meant to be splurged on something meaningful and personal as a tolken of appreciation. The question is, which perfectly useless item should I spend this on.

On one hand there is the Polaroid Mino. A discontinued small format instant camera that uses the same film as the Fuji Instax Mini line. It may, in fact, be a simple rebrand. It would probably be easier and cheaper to just get the Instax Mini camera, but I like doing impractical and obscure, thus the Polaroid Mino. At $.50 a shot, it’s a pricey novelty format that never really took off. Maybe because it never had the arty nostalga that Polaroid 600 or Spectra had, maybe it’s because in a digtal era instant analog simply can’t compete, or maybe it’d because it’s $.50 a shot. Camera plus 3 pack (30 shots) for approx $120 at Village Camera.

On the other hand is the new Nikon 35mm f1.8, a lens exactly 4 years too late. Due to the 1.5x crop factor on entry level and prosumer dSLRs, the old trusty 50mm f1.8 that used to come with every film SLR is effectively a short tele. Or, to put it simply, the cheapest most popular lens is no good on digital SLR cameras, you need to stand 20-30 feet away to get everybody into the family portrait. Sigma jumped on the problem, and their 30mm f1.8 became the defacto droolworthy normal lens. Nikson had a 35mm f2.8 macro, which is ok but it’s no f1.8. And it’s more expensive then the Sigma, which was already pricey at $300. For comparison, Nikon 50mm f1.8 runs $100. I use the Sigma 28mm f1.8 macro, which clocks in at $280, but it’s not so robust, I’ve had to send it in for repairs twice now after minor 2ft drops (on wooden floors, INSIDE my camera bag). The new Nikon 35mm f1.8 is a little tight, I love the wider angle of the 28mm (and even then it’s a bit tight inside a room, 25mm or 20mm might be better), but at $200 it’s exactly what I was looking for 4 years ago. Now that I have the Sigma, not to mention f1.8 primes at 50mm and 85mm already, it seems a little redundant to get the 35mm f1.8 Nikon. But I do want it so.

Currently leaning towards to the Polaroid. I’ve never done instant, the film is still relatively easy to come by, and I hear it makes a great tool for getting portraits when traveling abroad. You take a picture with the Polaroid for the subject, and then they’re a lot more willing to pose for a picture for you and your fancy Digital SLR. Of course, the picture I take for me will suck because I lack the 35mm f1.8 all it’s Normal goodness.

Blog – Analog Edition

Blog – Analog Edition

Originally uploaded by LarimdaME.

0 for 3

Looking back on it, I’ve actually had a fairly good run of things. Warm leads, hot leads, even most of my cold leads have been incredibly productive. There have been a few notable busts, but mostly the issue was that I had overlapping commitments, so something gets lost in the shuffle.

These past two weeks have been rather disasterous, in comparison. Prior commitments sidelined me from the big surefire events, like Big Wheel Race or Zombieland Zombie Crawl or Bonk!, and the smaller events I pick up in it’s place have turned out to be busts. Which all the more disturbing because I actually tried getting people to come out with me for a change.

Monduna Robot Party was noticably lacking in robots, and the band I went to see I had to miss because they were scheduled to take the stage at 2am. BrokeAssStuart’s recession party was definitely missing hooping and fire arts (not counting the massage) and a very talented performer whom I came specifically to see. And now today’s final Bonk! event, besides being a potluck which I didn’t realize, I’m pretty much missing because every time I try to figure out my way to Greenpoint, the MTA throws yet another construction detour in my way. It shouldn’t take three trains and a shuttle bus to get to a place that’s 15 minutes by car or bike. It actually may have been faster to walk there then take the train. The details are unimportant, the theme is the same, big bust.

Between this and my camera (body needs repair, lens needs repair, memory cards are eating up my pictures), I’m having a rather bad run of luck. Got to turn this ship around soon, Gene’s getting a little tired of it all.

Not Sure I Belong on The Island of Misfit Toys

Decompression is this Friday, and for a change I actually know about it before the fact. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to go. The fact of the matter is, I’m not a Burner. I’m not even too sure what being a Burner means. If it means going to the middle of the desert and having a transformative experience you can’t quite explain, then I’ve actually done that. What I don’t do is goggles and costumes and various states of undress, and that seems to be the unofficial uniform of Burners.

Not that I don’t want to wear goggles and furry vests and bright green boots with tassles, it’s just that I don’t. I don’t know where to get that, I’m unhandy (Do It Yourwhat?), and I’m poor (cheap to boot). I missed the last Make Fun, and I’m notoriously terrible at shopping for costume parts (where does one find a furry vest for under $15?). You can always get away with skimpy and spandex, I suppose, but I’ve got some body image issues there so that’s not an option. All of which is just a longwinded way of saying I have no costume for the costume party.

Which never stopped me before, but it seems that Decompression is something different, something bigger. Something that maybe I just don’t belong at. I thought about volunteering for a change, give back to this larger community that has been so generous to me, but between all my traveling it’s just one of those things I never got around to applying for. And you know what they say about good intentions.

Have fun at Floyd Bennett Playa, and bring back pictures of firey goodness. Gene is going to be lame and balance his checkbook tonight, sort through a bag of shirts I got as a “gift”, edit down fire pics from last month’s Got Fire, and work on creating a porfolio for a possible misadventure in the wedding photography business.