Archive for the ‘in which I use my camera’ Category

random bits

Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008

OMG, the Peach Pit! The theme song! The campy-ness! 90210, I am only 32 minutes into you and yet, I think I love you! You’re not Gossip Girl, but I saw a blowjob in your first ten minutes, so points for that! And you ran jparks off in 9 minutes, so bonus points for that.

Hey looky, here’s jparks after biking 24 miles and me after running 18 miles. The Golden Gate Bridge was behind us, but our big heads cover it.

So I roasted that chicken yesterday then realized that I have no idea how to carve it. Jparks and I basically hacked at it and it’s not yielding the best results. Seeing as how I planned on roasted more chickens in the future (it’s going to be a chicken genocide over here at Parks Place) I should probably learn. Any suggestions or tips?

Speaking of roasted chicken, the other day there was a guy on CalTrain eating a roasted chicken. Not a plate of roast chicken, not a sandwich, but a whole roasted chicken. With his fingers. I know we’ve been through this before, but dude, why? How do you walk into a grocery store, knowing that whatever you buy will need to be eaten on public transit, and pick out something totally ridiculous? A sandwich from the deli is acceptable. A whole chicken is not. Disgusting person. Sorry this is blurry, but a flash would have been too obvious.
gross

Remember awhile back I twittered about the very expensive whiskey I was sipping? Here’s what it looked like:
whiskey
Doesn’t it look extra fancy? No? I know. Shouldn’t it have gold flakes in it for that price? Oh, but then it would be Goldschlager and only 16-year-olds would drink it. For the record, the right glass is the $1000 per bottle whiskey and the left is the cheap $750 bottle. Bitches, that’s how I roll.

photoshop/photography

Thursday, February 14th, 2008

Now that we are back from Disney it’s time to download and sort through the 800+ pictures I took. The good news is that I won’t bore you by posting all of those pictures. The bad news is that not one of those pictures is of a tacky outfit. I know, it’s a sad day when a girl can’t go to Disney World and be assaulted by skanky outfits. I did see a few outfits that were picture worthy but they were all at Downtown Disney and it would have been way obvious that I was documenting the outfit. And then jparks would have had to fight the slut’s boyfriend and I really like jparks’ face the way it is. So, no pictures for you.

So I’m sitting here facing 800+ non-slut pictures from the trip and am feeling highly overwhelmed. The problem is that I had vowed that these would be the first pictures that I give the photoshop treatment to. That decision was made because I’ve had photoshop for awhile now, and have been so scared of it, that I haven’t even opened the application. Yeah, I suck. But photoshop is so big and scary. It’s got so many buttons to click. And I’m a pansy.

To help me get over this irrational fear I bought a photoshop how to book that a friend recommended. And that book was nice, but not quite the kick in the ass that I needed.

What is the kick in the ass that I’m looking for? I don’t think it’s a class because those are too expensive. I don’t think it’s another book, because the one I have doesn’t suck. I think what I need might be more of a tutor, either human or website based. Someone or something that can take a picture and show me what they would do to it. I’m fairly certain that having a hand to guide me through the scary “where the hell do I start?” phase would help a lot.

In my ideal world wide web there would be a site that allows you to submit a picture and then uses it to create a step by step tutorial working towards a final product. Does this site currently exist and I just haven’t found it yet? Please, TELL ME! Do you want to take the time to show me a step by step tutorial? Again, TELL ME! I would be your best friend and probably would make you cookies. Is there a good photoshop tutorial site that you love and you just know I would love as well? FREAKING TELL ME! I mean, please FREAKING TELL ME!

fun with photo booth

Monday, January 7th, 2008

When you marry a first cousin your kids come out looking kinda strange:

We’ve asked doctors to separate the twins, but they all agree the operation would not be successful: one brain, two bodies

Her growth spurt seems to only have affected her eye. Maybe the rest of her face will catch up soon:

end of an era

Thursday, December 27th, 2007

I gave jparks a Nikon D40 for Christmas because I am dumb. Before, when he had to use my D80, I could delete whatever pictures of me I wanted and the world would never get to see them. My only hope is that he won’t want to drag his camera around as much as I do. Or that I suddenly become very photogenic. Wish me luck.

pissed

Thursday, November 8th, 2007

Since September I’ve been a member of a flickr group called the Working Closet. We take pictures of what we wear every day and post them for all the world to see. It’s honestly more exciting than it sounds, I swear.

So I’ve been uploading self portraits for a couple of months now and it’s become a running joke that I don’t smile. If I were a LOLcat I would be “serious regan does not approve“. And I have no good reason for why I’m not smiling.

The frowning started strong here:
fair isle

Looked like it might start to turn into a smile here:
9.26.07

Diverted into sarcasm here:
9.25.07

And then went right back to pissed here:
these colors scream fall to me

I never really thought of myself as unhappy person, but these pictures sure do a fine job of making me seem like one.

So, because I don’t have enough freaking goals for this month (one blog post per day! A different pair of shoes every day!), I’m adding another one to the mix. I want to take one picture of me smiling. One picture! Surely that can’t be too much to ask.

Yeah, we’ll see how this goes.

Years ago I waited tables at Applebee’s and my manager always told me I didn’t smile enough. I always thought she was insane, but what do you know, she was right. Damn her. hmm, maybe my smile muscles are broken. Sometimes I think I’m smiling but it turns out I’m not. See, my smile muscles are broken. Or maybe I was born without any. Like a smile birth defect. I was born to be permanent gloomy girl. grumble.

my precious

Saturday, November 3rd, 2007

I’m not a particularly girly girl, but I’m not really a tomboy either. I do have a few stereotypical girl traits though: I love shoes, walking around the mall even if I don’t need anything, and makeup. The shoes and mall thing make sense to me, but my obsession with makeup is an enigma.

On a daily basis I wear little to no makeup. We all know of my recent discovery of mascara and other than that I maybe wear a little chapstick or, if I’m feeling saucy, some lip gloss. Woohoo, a hint of color! I am a crazy woman.

But if I’m dropped into a Sephora than all hell breaks loose. I go into a trance and when I come to my senses again I’ve got a bag of makeup in my hands worth enough to feed a family of four for weeks. Maybe even months if one of the salesgirls has approached me offering help.

Last year Sephora offered a Blockbuster Palette that made me feel tingly in my special place but before I could order one, they were out of stock and I was left to mope about, lamenting the fact that I did not have one. damn you Spehora and your poor planning! You and Nintendo should get together and laugh over how you like to not meet the needs of society.

Well, imagine my surprise and excitement when they brought the palette back this year. With new colors! And a higher price tag! (figures. bitches.) I, of course, ordered one and then checked the tracking every day (multiple times each day) to watch my precious make its way across the country to my loving arms. Once it arrived I threw jparks out and the Palette and I had a few moments of alone time. It was all I was expecting and more.

I’ve had it for a few days now and I’m kinda a bit nuts about it. It arrived on Wednesday and on Thursday and Friday I brought it to work with me. Yeah, really. It sat on my desk and stared at me all day. My bosses asked what it was and when I exclaimed “Makeup!” and then opened it to show them, they just looked at me like I was a lunatic. And maybe I am because I’ve yet to actually use any of the makeup in it.

Right now it’s so pretty and new I can’t bring myself to drag a brush through any of it. I want it to stay perfect. I like looking at all of the little colors contained into their spots all perfectly untouched and fresh. I like how the lip glosses have perfectly smooth tops. And how the eye shadows haven’t been accidentally touch by a brush with another color on it, contaminating the first color.

I mean, look at this, doesn’t it make you a bit randy:
Sephora Blockbuster Palette

eyeshadows

the spread

sparkly

Seriously, I love it. And maybe tomorrow I’ll actually use it. Yeah, tomorrow definitely.

look at what you’ve forced me to do

Wednesday, July 18th, 2007

If you haven’t donated you really should, otherwise Lily’s feelings will be hurt. And we really don’t want to upset the world’s cutest chihuahua. Clicky ckicky

Thanks to Lauren, Whitney, and Carolyn for donating!

Let me tell you a little story

Thursday, July 12th, 2007

Once upon a time there was a boy and he was in lurve with a girl. They both had their own flickr accounts but when the girl posted pictures of the boy she only selected ones where he didn’t look bad. The boy, on the other hand, posted any picture of the girl that he could. He didn’t care if she looked bad, if her eyes were closed, or if every picture was exactly the same. He didn’t care if she begged him not to give those pictures to the public, the bastard boy still posted them.

One night the girl came up with a plan. “I have a bunch of pictures of my love on the beach and in ponds without his shirt on. I could threaten to post them and then he would understand why I don’t like it when he posts all those crappy pictures of me!”

Thrilled that she had come up with a way to stop the posting of unflattering pictures of her, the girl floated through the rest of her day. That night she laid down the law for the boy and he scoffed at her idea. Then he told his secret lover best friend “She won’t do it.”

The girl responded with a hearty “Not only am I posting them, I’m sending links to TONS OF PEOPLE!”

This, dear friends, is where the story turns into a picture book.

“I wonder if she really will post those pictures of me?” thinks the boy.
hmmm

“Uh oh, I think she really is posting those pictures. Maybe if I flex my guns and show her I’m a sexy beast she’ll change her mind”
uh oh

After recovering from a laughing fit over the boy’s “guns”, the girl continued to upload pictures.
sexy

“This picture is pretty identical to that other picture” the girl thought as she posted it.

dead sexy

“Sexy!” thought the girl.
hehehe

“hmm, this picture of the boy running and jumping in the forest is best viewed at the large size so people can see his facial expression,” thought the girl but she posted it anyway.
jump!

And finally the girl posted the last picture of the boy, a closeup of him lounging on the beach. “Hmm, he seems to have forgotten to take off his sweater,” the girl thought.
an aura of fur

As the girl finished uploading the pictures a great feeling of satisfaction washed over her. “HA!” she thought as she waited for the boy’s reaction…

i r a dead woman

Wednesday, May 30th, 2007

i r karate kid

I told you it was an awesome picture.

24 hours of flickr

Monday, May 7th, 2007

Saturday was 24 hours of flickr, a group project where everyone takes pictures throughout the day and submits one image to represent them and their day. I signed up because all the cool kids were doing it it seemed interesting and fun.

Normally, I tote my camera around with me religiously but, a lot of times, I don’t use it out of fear that people don’t want their picture taken or because I don’t want people to think I know what I’m doing with the camera. Nothing worse than having people expect greatness only to have a blurry picture be the outcome. I figured, with 24 hours of flickr, I had an excuse for taking pictures and nothing could prevent me from participating.

I held onto this train of thought until jparks and I left the house for aerial acrobatics and trampoline without my camera. I didn’t even have my little point and shoot in my purse, which is always there as my backup camera. On the one day when I have carte blanc to take as many pictures as I want, or anything I want, I was left camera-less.

After class I dropped jparks off at the BART station and headed home. I still had a few errands to run and decided that, while they were not as interesting as circus training, I would have to make the most of them photograph-wise.

So here is my 24 hours on flickr:

I had to take Molly to the vet. She was not pleased about this and hid under a chair most of the time. hiding

Tangi has been spending lots of time upside down lately.
DSC_3590

I am hopelessly addicted to Martha Stewart’s Everyday Food. I can’t throw them away because someday I will have time to cook.
everyday food

Again with the name.
getting warmer

And finally, this is the picture I added to the group pool as the picture that best represents my Saturday.
she really wanted a bite

I just figured, you can’t go wrong with a picture of Lily.