Here are some picture from the park, before I shot that Fashion Haus picnic promo shot. I suppose I'm getting a lot done, but I'm extremely lonely. Being productive is lonely. I suppose that's the curse of the workaholic, right? I don't feel like I'm addicted to working, but it seems like I've always got a huge amount of things I need to do. My good friends have always been ones who I could hang out with while working. I'm trying to slow production of new work to make room for finishing old work, but I don't really have that luxury. I've got to shoot more for my classes and for Fashion Haus (which I just shot two rolls for today), but I need to get the older work together for one of my other classes. I've got 70 gigs of scans now that I've got to get in some kind of order. The idea of producing seems to be ok, if you have some kind of end, a point where you can sit back and look at what you've done and appreciate it. As it is, I feel like I'm not finished because I don't have anything concrete, not often. This quarter I'm supposed to end up with two commercially bound books at the end, but I know I'm just going to feel those are rough drafts. I'm supposed to be finding a side job so I can have a steady income and not be homeless this summer, but I'm not sure how I'm going to do that when my every free minute is sucked up by the work I'm already doing. On the bright side, I've had a couple jobs and print sales, and Fashion Haus pays for all my film and developing for their work. Hopefully I can finish up the bulk of it by the end of this quarter.

I don't remember if I posted these two of andrew here already, but I know I didn't post these dorm meeting snapshots. The bad thing about scheduling shoots for friday morning is that they come right after thursday nights. SCAD kids know what I'm talking about.

Why am I so tired all the time? I don't get it. I'm not unhappy, underfed, unmotivated, etc. I'm just tired. Ah well.

Birthday was pretty great. Simple, but good. The day was beautiful and I pretended that it was just because it was my birthday. I biked around in a t-shirt, running errands. Scanned a fair amount of negatives, nowhere near my goal of course, but mainly because I was treated to a great lunch at Sweat Leaf (highly recommended) and then some pals came over, baked a cake, and my roommate ordered pizza. Pretty good. Sometimes I feel like I have to stop taking photographs, because I don't want to live my own life vicariously through myself! Here is a quote from a story a classmate of mine photocopied for me because it reminded her of a discussion we'd had: Italo Calvino - Adventures Of A Photographer - 1955 "... Because once you've begun," he would preach, "there is no reason why you should stop. The line between the reality that is photographed because it seems so beautiful to us and the reality that seems beautiful because it has been photographed is very narrow. If you take a picture of Pierluca because he's building a sand castle, there is no reason not to take his picture while he's crying because the sand castle has collapsed, and then while the nurse consoles him by helping him find a sea shell in the sand. The minute you start saying something, 'Ah, how beautiful! We must photograph it!' you are already close to the view of the person who thinks that everything that is not photographed is lost, as if it had never existed, and that therefore, in order really to live, you must photograph as much as you can, and to photograph as much as you can you must either live in the most photographable way possible, or else consider photographable every moment of your life. The first course leads to stupidity; the second to madness." Sometimes I do feel that I'm surely going mad.

I'm in Israel in my head. It's my birthday today, by the way. I'm 22. People keep asking if I have any plans, but I haven't really made any. I mean, it's tuesday. I'm meeting a client, scanning negatives, and hopefully having a good lunch. Last year I went to the hospital. Oops. Oh, regarding the credit card fraud, in the interests of trying to figure out what's going on I started a facebook group. At least three people have mentioned themselves or someone they know as another victim. Maybe one of our banks will figure the damn thing out. They would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for us meddling kids.

This whole fraud fiasco is just in time, I'm starting to run out of room from scanning negatives and am badly in need of another drive, and I've still got -300 in my damn account. They said saturday, then monday, and now tuesday. Lets hope that's fucking true. Even so, I'll only be able to use paypal because I don't have a new card yet. Blahhhh. Anyway, I've awkwardly (and temporarily) rearranged some files and will spend all day tomorrow scanning, which will be a good use of the day, I think.

Beth visited! Best friends!

I'm thinking about how I want to price my work. Or, more appropriately, not price my work. I don't want to sell prints. But I do know that when people appreciate something that you create, they want to support you. I want to support other people, all the time. So I think I'll sell my rent. Something like that. For example, instead of selling a large print for 500 dollars, I will let someone pay my rent that month, which is about the same. Then I will give them a print. Or some other work that they've showed interest in. That's how I think about it anyway, when someone gives me money. Maybe it's just pedantic, but it feels important to me. The future of the creative world has been shown by people like the guys at Penny-Arcade or Radiohead, people supporting artists they appreciate in order to keep them creating, even though they're already getting the creations for free (I'm posting my work up on the internet, for example.)

Andre Andrew you. I'm glad my roommate has turned our living room into the bike zone, and holds family movie night there.

I wanted to mention that 101 Dalmations (1961) is quite possibly the best Disney film ever made. I'm totally serious, although I'm open to discussion. The plot features a pair of animal loving bohemians and their libertarian nanny, versus a psychotic fashion major, and her British stereotype henchmen, accompanied by a pack of spotted cultural commentary, and the artistry is evident in every frame: I've paused it several times to more closely examine the various expressions. It's total genius.

Five AM after working all night moving periods around before deciding to remove them altogether seems like a fitting time to realize you're going to be 22 in four days.