Day 13? Halloween. More treat than trick, really.

The mute Belle who lives on the next block came trick or treating with us, as did the gifted and talented Red Ranger from down the street. Belle grunted and pointed and tried to take my camera when I showed her herself on the display. She had no bag, wanted no candy. Just to be Belle. Red Ranger and I had some sword fights, and some jokes about pajamas. My own Little Sid collected, inventoried and reported the candy tally after every score.

It was all good.

Day 13- Halloween! How apropros!

I took probably fifty pictures today, and there will probably be more tonight, but this was the most fun to take.

Beatriz and Marta are sisters who love to work together and love Halloween.


"Smile! You wrecked it! C'mon, take another one. C'mere, Marta"

"I ain't apposta smile, I'm an axe murderer. I'm trying to look serious".

I thought they were both adorable.

Mr Blurrycam's Father

These pics look okay when I preview them, then they turn out like this.

Dad and I have spent the past 5 days moving every freezer, cooler, counter, display case, rack, or box, repainting, replacing, or refurbishing everything which we can, all while keeping the store operating. Small business owners work twice as hard for half as much as a sane person.

Tonight we removed old tile and replaced it with an epoxy based paint which we hope will hold up. Dad's thumb fell off again, so I had to superglue it back on. I'm not nearly as skilled as he is at hammers and nails and miter saws and electrical work and plumbing and painting and all of that sort of thing, but I'm okay with superglue.

Two nights ago, it was his elbow that fell off. He had to work like that for a while. After three hours, I noticed that he couldn't drink his coffee anymore, he just straight arm pitched it right over his left shoulder. I found the elbow under a milk crate and stapled it back on.

I want to get better at fixing things. Someday superglue isn't going to be enough.

Day 12- Krista

My commute takes me about 50 minutes if I take the freeway. On gorgeous fall afternoons like today was, I cut through the delta, where there are at least three fruit stands that I know of. Today was my Friday, so I left a little extra time to stop at the pumpkin patch-fruit stand.

Krista actually approached me and asked 'Are you anybody?' with a great gravelly laugh.

"Yeah. I don't know. No". I laughed, too.

"They told me to come out here to welcome the staff photographer for _____, and I thought you might be her, but you look too cool".

"Me? You're tripping". We both laughed then, and I took this picture.

"You're good-looking. You know it, don't you?"

"Sometimes. I don't care though, you know? I like to feel good!" , face to the sky, rain just beginning to spatter around both of us, wind blowing the hell out of the corn behind her.

I know.

Day 12 - Two males. Two females.

The male human in the foreground is Tony.

He is the only member of his family who is voting for Obama.

I tried to talk to his sister, but she either didn't understand or didn't want to, I never did find out which.

Tony absolutely loved having his picture taken. This one was my favorite.

Day 11 - SixEdged

SixEdged is the username of a guy whose real name is even cooler but he doesn't like his identity known even more than he doesn't like having his picture taken. He wants to live a perfect life, like Jesus, or to be NASA's first resident philosopher.

His mother wrote to me on 'gmail swaps' (anybody remember that? ancient history) and was very grateful to have my dozen or so gmail invites. She invited me to dinner at their home in St. Petersburg.

Less than a year later, Ms. SixEdged was performing with our local symphony. I found out when I offered her son cooking lessons in exchange for Russian lessons and we all compared notes. Small, small world.

Their home is kitty-corner from the regional Republican headquarters where I went today hoping to catch a McCain supporter to photograph. No luck.

SixEdged isn't interested in politics, but he notes as a philosopher that no free people ever willingly elect an angry leader. "The Russians loved Gorbachev but they still all pretty much wished he would shut up", Six said as he ushered me in.


Today he is taking a break from world news by playing all of the folk songs he has heard in his travels or can imagine, from as far back as Kiev, St. Petersburg, Dade County, Oakland, Tokyo, Andromeda.......


.

Day 10 - The Hun and Brightblack Morning Light

This is a surprisingly lush and rich camphone shot of the radiant Hun, with a nimbus of East Bay early summer light making a halo around her freshly done original ink.

Taken shortly after our last meet-up in June.


I talked to her as she was leaving town last weekend.

"Use me! You have lots of me, and you always had to ask me first! I know! Use a recent one of me for when you guys finally get someone new to join".


PanasonicYouth requested an invitation yesterday.

So; behold the Hun.

Day 9 -``I reckon I'd like me some of them french fries, uh, huh.''

Bravo Alpha is a co-worker of mine who is also one of only two other people who commutes from the same town.

We shared rides a few times, only under extreme duress, because while we each delight in the other's company, we both have the same self-imposed isolation, in her case, tempered by a long stint in the Navy.

I know certain things about her, all sad. The one thing that I remembered from our first conversation four years ago was that she had never been on either a picnic, to a circus, or on a fishing trip.

We've made and broken several dates over the years to make up the gaps in our childhood.

Last week I took her to the Corn Maze for the first time. Here she is whipping my butt at the Pumpkin Blaster.


We worked up an appetite and stopped off at a Denny's for grilled cheese and french fries. Bravo Alpha asked for extry mustard with her french fried taters.

"Yes, ah know, just like Karl in Sling Blade. Ain't that a beautiful movie? It's really North Carolina, though, same as where I'm from. And we really put mustard on ever'thang! including taters and biscuits."

Her pleasure in shooting pumpkins out of a cannon, and wandering around a corn field for fun, for the first time, felt as momentous to me as Karl's discovery of french fries.

She had also never had her photo taken by a digital camera before.

Here ya go, B.A. We had ourselves a time, didn't we?


Karl: I don't think anything bad ought to happen to children. I think the bad stuff should be saved up for the people whose grown up. That's the way I see it.

Mr. Blurrycam's Mother

Autofocus? What's that?

Finally, documentation!

I found this Bigfoot, or as some call them Yeti, perusing the juice selection. Apparently this particular specimen preferred apple juice. Maybe it reminded him of his native home.

Interestingly, this one seems to have discovered a way of blending in with the local fauna. I searched the area for droppings, but none were to be had. Clever bastard must have realized what I was up to and took them with him.

Good hunting, friends!

Day 8 - Here's Donovan

Baby nephew of one of my co-workers.

Photo edited at his request.


Welcome to the world, Donovan!

Forward to Yesterday

I know, this is against the rules. That's not a person. It's not a photo of a person. It's a photo of a photo of a person. I'm a damned hermit, and I couldn't come out today except to fight and argue with every person I encountered.

(Her name is Lottie. She's Blue Lake's first telephone operator, circa 1910. I've been collecting pictures of my hometown for the past four years. My dad and I are in the process of turning our store into a museum. I have another picture of Lottie from a few years before as a little girl. She's got a pony or two hitched up to a little carriage and is driving her mother to church. I don't know how long she lived, or what her life was like after the great war. I imagine that I would have liked Lottie, though. We have lots of pictures from that period, she's the only one smiling. I suspect that Lottie was a modern girl. Maybe we would have got high together and listened to Bowie's "Modern Love.")

I wanted to take a picture of my friend, Lauren. I talked to her on the phone right after her grandmother died this afternoon. She broke down a bit. We'd been texting back and forth, but when it's time to break down, you at least need a voice.

I'm sure that Lauren probably wouldn't have wanted her picture taken today, anyway. But she was the only living person I wanted to photograph.

So there's Lottie.

Day Seven -Children of the Corn Maze

I thought I was lost until I saw these two.


We always find who we need as we grope towards the center.

Day Six - Rabbit and Crow

Rabbit is the nickname (an English equivalent of her Polynesian earned name) of one of my work friends. She is a Navy Veteran and prolific webmaster(she has a popular women's sports' site)in addition to being a senior radioman.

The day I took this picture, I was wearing my "You Betcha I'm For Obama" tshirt, and she was watching the giant big-screen t.v. with the constant closed-captioned stories about Sarah Palin.

No one whom I work with knows anything about my political leanings. I try not to talk about anything divisive, or personal, at work.

But I had to get a picture of that kitten, so I had to come in wearing the tshirt.

Rabbit is a dog person who passed the shivering and starving little black kitten where she had been dropped, in the street right in front of the Comm Center. It was love at first sight.

I took about ten photos of them together while we decided that the coolest black thing either of us could think of was a crow. So that's what we named her.

And we also decided that bonding over something you have in common (sympathy towards animals) gives you something better to talk about than constantly announcing talking points to the poor captive co-workers.


She's an Obama-girl, btw.

"I love Sarah Palin. She seems like someone I could have known when I was in Anchorage. And I respect McCain's contrariness. Dude is con-TRARY! But they go against just about every belief I hold".

Looks like some old kitties learned some new tricks.

Yellow and Blue make Green

Last customers of the day. I nearly forgot. Yeah, I know that the quality is simply amazing. Do not be jealous of my mad skillz. Man in blue and woman in yellow are having a baby in a week or two. They're decent folks, I like them.

They know my name, but I confess that I'm not sure what theirs are. I always think of them as "the nice couple who usually forget to come into my store until thirty seconds before we close."

So I have forgetting stuff in common with them.

oops

Do dogs count? Just once? I forgot to take a picture of a two legged person today, as I was in full-blown hermit mode. Roxie the doggie would have none of it. She reminded me of one thing, and one thing only.

I have a lap.

Day 5 - Alekko

Alekko ("Am33r" on his restaurant sign) was the first of my subjects to say 'no' to being photographed at first.


I gave him a big order today - Two sides of falafel, 9" gyro sandwich, two chicken souvlaki wraps, grilled eggplant and feta salad (for me) and three orders of fagioli hummus.
While he was wrapping up the sides, I added a quart of avgolemeno for Husband's sore throat and four baklavas, for the supervisor's sweet tooth.

Then I accidentally dropped my phone.

"That's the camera you use?"

"Yeah, that's it. They took away my other one. I mean, I can't use it at work anymore. This takes pretty good pictures, though, look".

"Oh, I believe you. I'm just bad at having a picture taken. I hate it. I work with my wife and she never complains about how I look".

"I work with my husband. I never even notice how he looks".

"So you know! Hey, I like to cook. I'm a good cook. You can't be good at everything."


Then I took his picture and showed him how handsome he looked in black and white.


"Let's show your wife!"

"No, she's not here. I made her take a break. She works too hard. It's a break for me, too".


By the time I got to the door with my food, he was already lighting a mint bidi.

By the time I was pulling out of the parking stall, he was frowning slightly and talking intently into his cellphone. The only word I understood in English was 'darling'.

Day 4-"I am going to follow my eentalekchual pur-soots"

Scotuccio is not just Florence Italy's biggest Frank Zappa fan and the only atheist instructor at St. Mary's Italian Language and Culture Center, but he also does a killer "Ren" impression.

photo taken in his study

More about the fez

Welcome to Tomorrow!

"There's a future, and I'm in it."

"What's the world of tomorrow hold, little dude?"

"I'm not holding out for flying cars and rocket belts. That's the stuff another generation wanted, but they didn't make it happen. The kids are taking over, and we have another vision. I know I should probably say peace on Earth and all that stuff, but other's wanted that too."

"What is it that you want then?"

"I don't know yet. I'm only a kid. Ask me in thirty years."

Curious Joe

"Hey, dude, what are you doing? Texting somebody? You're always doing stuff. Trying to write something or looking at something. I'm bored, dude. I want in on whatever it is that you're doing. Do you have any games on that phone?"

Day 3-Lovey and the Change We Need

note - my camera was confiscated at work last night after I took the latest in a series of one of my co-workers in the act of manipulating and flirting-to-the-point-of-harassing one of my sex-starved, impotent and spineless new corporate masters.



I ran into Lovey here again this morning at a MoveOn event about a week after I first took her picture at an earlier event.


"Hey Camera-girl, holla! You ast if you could take my picture and then I looked and looked in the paper but never saw it. That's alright. I work at the _____, they know me. Whoo hoo, they don't want no Lovey all up in there again! *laughs*

So here we are again! SO good to see you. Make sure you spell my name right this time, I'm Lusille LaVey, but everybody calls me Lovey. My auntie give me that name. I got a lotta love. That's what you felt when you first took my pic. All those pretty things, remember? handing out they personal trainer business cards and you and me found each other. Straight up.

I believe that enough love can stop an atom bomb. I don't exactly believe in Obama, but I like him well enough. He's got something, you know? See you here on the fourth."

Abi at the Market

I've known Abi for a few years, or at least I've known of her. I'm not talented at meeting people or allowing them to know me. We accidentally became friends when I let my guard down, just like Abi did in this picture - post yawn.

Day 2- Jason Halo

"Hey, sure you can take my picture, that's cool, I see you here a lot, you had that Prius with all the cat prints on the windshield. That's cool, I have a lot a cats too, funny how they all know who the cat people in the neighborhood are. My dad is going to buy me a Prius when my sister gets back from her Fullbright year. I have to get a haircut first, haha, I keep putting it off and then boom one day I wake up with this mad afro. Yeah, tell Sonnyboy I said holla. Good luck getting rid of those kittens, aw, c'mon you know you want to keep 'em. Haha, yeah, I know my hair does that halo thing, my sister just sent me a postcard from the Uffizi store with a dude she said looked like me. Peace out."



The Angel in the Supermarket

Day#1 - Wane and Shayne

I was on my last day of 4-day sick leave,and feeling crazy with anxiety and boredom.

My camera was broken, all my favorite bloggers were AWOL or unispired like me,I had no privacy at work, no free time at home and no internet to speak of.

I was so fucking sick and tired of taking my own picture - of admiring the self-flattering self-portraits of other people in turn - that I couldn't count on my usual creative urge to get me up out of my sickbed.

The only book on my nightstand I hadn't read already was Danny Kaye's UNICEF Book of Children's Fables.

'The Laziest Man in the World' really spoke to me.

A dude who resents having to perform all the necessary small efforts of existence (I feel ya, pal) suddenly experiences infatuation. And gets insomnia.

The Czar's advice - catch a rabbit with your bare hands and present it to the lady who comes between you and your sleep.


I had heard laughing and sounds of life outside my window from my neighbor's house all morning.

"I don't even know my neighbors", I thought, incredulously, to myself.

Then I changed into clean clothes, splashed cold water on my face, and went outside with my busted camera.

"Can I take your picture?" I asked.


Turns out that Shayne, the blond, was the son of a photographer. His friend Wane ("we take turns using the 'y' in our names") was an aspiring actor.

I had walked into their semester project.

"Let me take your picture" was the abracadra for getting over my chronic illness, my social phobia, my long dry spells of needing to communicate when words fail.

Wane and Shayne confessed much to me that day, beginning with their influences and dreams.

We all agreed that we had been inspired by the pre-Haditha portraits of Kilo Company.


"Let's all make a promise - not to be scared, or lazy, and when you wonder what your life will be like a year from now, find someone you don't know and take their picture."


I made that promise.


The Laziest Man in the World spent 365 days chasing hares.

"The beautiful lady he had met at the banquet took one look at the slender, agile and suntanned suitor and found him irresistable, and she accepted his proposal at once. The hare became the pet of their many children".



You are all welcome to join me.

One picture a day for 365 Days, of anyone you haven't photographed before, who isn't you.

Let's see where we all end up.

It's a good time to start keeping track of the next 365 days.