(Honourable Mention in the 2012 International Photography Awards landscape category, as part of my 'Sand, Sea & Silence' set of five photographs)

 

(Published in Advanced Photographer, Dec 2012)

 

(Explore #347)

 

Sometimes these descriptions come easy and sometimes they don't (note: although I now realise this one flowed in seconds, which contradicts some of what I'm about to say) - much the same as the art of photography and all the trials and tribulations that go hand in hand with it. The last few weeks have been frustrating, I've felt in a rut both in terms of what to shoot and how to shoot it. I think it's probably akin to something like writer's block, where I'd imagine a pen will often glide fluidly, before stuttering and pausing in hesitation over a piece of paper before coming to a halt. I won't reiterate my dislike for the summer months where image making is concerned - I've already done that, but suffice to say I've had relatively few occasions recently where an image has 'felt' right as I was taking it. That sense you sometimes have, even before you frame up and meter, survey the viewfinder for distractions and so forth that the shot will be that little bit... special.

 

I'm looking forward to autumn and winter (although I'd best not whisper that too loudly elsewhere!) and am hoping that that sense might hit me a little more often than of late...

 

This shot was something of an oddity. It's a simple composition of course - one I've had in mind for this specific sea defence for some time now. A reserve if you will. Being out with my camera yesterday and suffering a particularly bad lack of inspiration, I decided to venture out to this spot again (I've done so two or three times recently) and see what prevailed. The tide was just on the ebb, and I was pleased to notice some promising cloud structure forming. I nearly missed the whole thing - thanks to much cursing as I did battle with a temperamental filter holder that refused to attach itself to my ND110. It's my own fault - I hadn't realised how much sea salt had accumulated in the threads but a clean sorted things out after I'd wasted several minutes determinedly trying to ignore the fact it wasn't going to play ball!

 

So, once home and I could view the shot properly, I started to feel that sense I mentioned above (you'll know how sometimes it doesn't happen until you see the shot properly) - only a little later than normal. I'm still looking forward to autumn and winter, but perhaps there's hope for the next few months yet...

  

Shape: Despite my account age, in-world, this is not my first second life avatar. My very first account actually, was made about 2006 I believe? I remembered logging on for the first time and trying to figure out how to customize my 'character' right then and there, thinking this was a game like Everquest or Aion, or, WoW and stuff. I went into the library folders, and I went through it, giving myself glasses and texturing a shirt I was wearing and everything. AND I had the actual SL default hair. Heh. But, when it came to shapes, I was completely clueless. I didn't buy any pre-made shapes back then, I made my own from scratch... And ended up looking like an asian child avi (I insisted on being really short for some reason.). And I wasn't open to changing my shape at all, even though someone was trying to improve my looks. My current shape now has been tweaked over and over again (constantly still) based on a pre-made shape I got with a pack of Mother Goose skins that I bought when I logged on with this new account for the first time. I think also, for the first time ever, I am very happy with the general look of my face now. I tweak it still with different skins I wear, but I feel beautiful now. Err, well, attractive I guess is the word. Although, I have to admit, I am not that great at making the actual body part of a shape. I'm not like most other female avies that I've seen on Flickr, blog feeds, in SL... I don't really like the big, pony-rider hip shape. Don't get me wrong. It looks good on others, just not on me. So, I prefer to be slim, still.

    

Skin: I've enjoyed wearing different kinds of skins over the years. My very first skin I think was uh... It was a Redgrave skin. An asian skin. I was very attached to it back then. Mainly because this really hot guy bought it for me (for some reason, he took it upon himself to sort of take me under his wing, and hook me up with everything until I had a decent looking avatar. And... Heh. I was his sex toy, basically.) *coughs* ANYWAY... The skin I wear as of now, most of the time, is a skin that I was given as a gift from the actual skin designer. I was browsing her skins at her store, and I was trying on the first demo I picked up there. I wanted a natural look, with little to no makeup on it (so that I could cake myself with clowny makeup, bwahaha! ;D) But, this skin designer though, for some reason, seemed to fancy the look of this demo on me so much that she gave me a free copy of the skin itself. This skin is the one I am wearing in this photo, and it is the one I wear most of the time now. I'm not really sure if I should mention the skin designer's name, but she knows who she is. And we have become friends, or at least I'd like to think so! Thank you soooo much! I will never forget your kindness. As for other skins, I'm becoming a fan of Glam Affair's recent ones as well.

    

Eyes: Well, I think most of everyone who knows me, or at least follows me closely on Flickr here, knows that I am a die hard fan for Dead Apple's eyes. I've been a fan since I picked up my first pair of her

Nebula Kawaii Eyes (in blue of course). As of now though, I am addicted to the blue shades of her Sinistre line. The pair of eyes I am wearing in the above photo though are one of the special colors of her limited edition Horror Haute Sinistre eyes that she released at the end of September (I don't believe they are available anymore now). But I think I will always be Soleil's biggest fan when it comes to eyes.

    

Lips: I'm kinda still trying to figure out my lip shape now a days, depending on what skin/lip makeup I am wearing. I've been actually attempting to learn how to make lipstick now for makeup, but uh... It's been a long and frustrating progress. Now a days though I just don't wear any lip makeup (like in the above photo). But it does depend on what look I am looking for. Lip shape wise, well, I try not to get a 'trout pout.' Whatever works with different skins I wear.

    

Style: Oh boy, style... Um. Well, I am honestly a fan of almost any type of genre of fashion, but for my avatar now, I tend to go for what I think a Nolanverse version of Harley Quinn would look like. However, it has grown beyond just that. It is just an experiment still. I see other things that I'd not normally wear, and I'd try to think of how I could make it work with my style? At the moment, I'm contemplating experimenting with more looks, different types of clownish outfits especially, in the future. Oh, heh... The cigar deal... I dunno why I keep insisting on smoking them. They empower me, I guess? Make me feel like a pimpin' clown lady! And I love taking photos of myself with a cigar in my mouth.

    

Hair: When it comes to hair, I have moved on to mesh hair when it comes to shoulder length to long hair. Sometimes though I still fancy the really fine detailed strands of hair some sculpted hair styles have. I am looking forward to how mesh will evolve in the future! Right now though, my most favorite hair brand would have to be fashionably dead's hair, and I am wearing one of the hairs that Toast Bard designed for the Sept Collabor88 (not available now), AND to top it off, heh, I modded and put on a hat that came from another FD hair (a non-mesh hair). I'm a fan of fashionably dead hair because of simply this, and I want any hair designer that is reading to take this to thought. I'm a major fan of FD's hair textures. They look so realistic and fine, even on the mesh hairstyles that are coming out now (although in this photo, I don't think you'll be able to see very clearly how the hair texture looks. I didn't want to draw hair over it kinda for that reason.) But I'm looking forward to what else Toast Bard makes when it comes to mesh hair! That is definitely for sure. And, usually, I will wear blonde hair (in different tones).

    

Personality: My personality... I guess it depends on who knows me. How my personality appears to other people. I know some people may not care for me, personally. And perhaps others do care and like me. I tend to try to be open-minded, although I do have faults. I'm not perfect. Nobody is perfect. I can be sweet at times, I can be aloof at other times... And there are times where I have acted or said some things that I perhaps should not have expressed openly, like the flickr post I uploaded before this one. I am a role player, have been for years, so, as of now, I try to be silly and funny with this clowny persona. But, I try to be friendly to just about everyone I meet. And... I'd like to think that perhaps, I could become a better person, or well, clown... In the future.

    

I'd also love to make more friends (I honestly do not have that many in SL...). The type of friends who would want to say hi to you often. I have met people in SL (and through Flickr of course) that I'd especially would love to get to know (and I... Uh... I have quite a few crushes on some of my male flickr contacts, heh. ;D) I'm not officially, uh... Dating anyone in SL. I used to want to very desperately find that special guy. And through the years I have loved and I have lost, and I have been used, I have been cheated, and... Well, it is very hard to try to trust any sort of guy in SL at the moment and want to be romantic with them. So, I guess, the right one(s) will come along when I am not looking. Heh. Maybe I'll meet my 'Misteh J' one day? I don't know. Not that many fine ass clowny men out there in the SL world (that are single that is.)

 

RL wise... It is no picnic now. I have kinda hesitated about sharing this publicly, but, I think this post would be the most important one to share this with. IRL right now, I am in a group home. I am on disability, for reasons that I'd rather not share. But I have been hospitalized many times (mental behavioral hospitals, My most recent hospital stay was actually a few months ago... But I am doing 110% better now!) ). I'm not literally crazy or anything. I suffer from depression and have anxiety. I also isolate myself from other people, which is really hard to deal with especially when you live in a house with over 10 people living in it. I feel like one day, I will be able to handle living on my own. As of now my plan is to live by myself (if I can) and have a cat to keep me company. So, yeah... I have very little independence now, and doing these photos and spending time in SL and everything is my escape. I feel like opening up and expressing these personal facts about myself is going to bite me in the ass in SL eventually, but oh well.

    

Strangely, I am not online in SL very often now a days because (A. - My laptop needs a new battery, and when I log into SL sometimes, the laptop crashes (even when on low graphics.). - (B. - I am in the mood to watch movies and youtube videos and they lag and skip and stutter when I am logged in SL at the same time. or (C. - RL stuff is happening and/or I just don't want to be logged on.

    

So, for those who I do want to keep in constant contact with and those that would feel like doing the same with me, I do have Skype and I would love to add you guys and get to know you! But you'll have to flickr mail me or IM me in-world for the username. Heh.

    

I don't really know if I should mention this here, but I do have plurk as well. www.plurk.com/harleyquinade_sl

    

What else can I share? I am not certain, but I enjoyed filling this out. I saw other people in my flickr contacts that have been doing these posts. I'm not sure where it has originally started from, but I was inspired to do it when I read a couple of my flickr contact's entries, specifically Mar Pie's post & Ruben metal maggot's one too.

    

The photo above, was done in like 4 hours? Maybe? It WAS taken with SL shadows, yes, but I wanted to do a lighting editing experiment from within photoshop as well. I guess there is a bit too much yellow, but I like it ok. I'll work on another version or so I guess maybe with drawn/painted hair. And reveal the full body shot of this. But, I'm happy with it. This is the outfit I wear typically now a days. I'm too lazy to change at the moment, except for when doing photos. xD

    

Thank you to those who are my friends, and thank you to those that support my photos/makeup. I never really thanked everyone that has blogged my one and only makeup product so far, heh. I do love bloggers, and I love blogging, myself, whenever I decide to start doing it more seriously. I'd like to think, whenever I can get off my lazy clown ass and release more stuff for my MP store, that I can get to the point where I'd love to release review copies to bloggers eventually, when I get more established.

    

Hopefully my RL stress and my laptop-constantly-crashing situation will get better soon! It surprisingly did today. I didn't think I would be able to snap this photo today.

    

Thank you.

Just a few seconds ago, Hank was slowly dying, until he heard something that knocked him out. Everything was black, hollow, like a cave. There the paneling looked metallic, yet, felt like cement. And then he heard something.

 

-/Hello Hank/- he heard the same voice from before.

 

“Who’s there?!?” he yelled out.

 

-/We are./- A hologram of what appeared to be a skull appeared before him.

 

“Wha-What the hell are you?” He asks, frozen in fear of what’s in front of him.

 

-/Consider us an ally for your cause. Although, we wish we could’ve met through…… different circumstances. However it is how you humans say “Better late than never.”/- the voice responded

 

“Who are you?” he asked nervously.

 

-/Someone who is a fan of your work. Someone who saved you from your previous condition./-

 

“C-Condition?”

 

-/Observe/- it said as multiple screens were appearing around him, showing the news reports him being missing, Lex being arrested, breaking out, and being defeated by Superman.

 

“H-How long have I been gone?”

 

-/Long enough to lose your goal to that kryptonian. He took away the one thing that kept you alive…. Vengeance. You humans normally have that desire to fuel you. But he took it away./- He doesn’t respond, just looking to the nonexistent ground beneath him. Tears running down his cheeks.

 

-/Thankfully, We can help you get that vengeance from that kryptonian./- It interjects. He looks up and stands before asking.

 

“I must ask, why do you refer to yourself as we?” Suddenly, he hears a humming before turning around to see a red glow coming from behind him. Then he sees two more, they get closer to reveal themselves as robots that had an uncanny valley of looking human, yet non-human.

 

-/How about it Hank?/- a light appears, shining on what seems to be the remains of his body, surrounded by a liquid metal of sorts.

  

“Wha-what is it?” He stuttered out.

 

-/What we could save, but now, we can help you acheive your goal, to kill superman./-

 

-/Will you claim your vengeance? Will you become our avatar and claim your second life?/- He stares at it before responding.

 

“Y-Yes, but never call me Hank again. Hank died years ago, now Cyborg Superman lives.” The liquid metal then forms the superman symbol on his chest.

Rachel told me her VW bug "Stormy" had just been in a Christmas parade near Nob Hill in Albuquerque, New Mexico

 

Location: Starbucks, 4601 Wyoming Blvd NE just north of Montgomery Blvd NE, 7:23pm

 

⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙∘☽༓☾∘⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅

Also at this Starbucks:

 

Stuttering Barista

 

Monsoon Tabletops

"Nine"

 

I recall once on the church steps,

When I moved to kiss your chest,

How we paid such close attention

To each sweet and stuttered breath,

I should’ve stopped to paint our picture,

Captured honest pure affection,

Just to document the difference

between attraction and connection.

 

I can see all of my friends and

I break into empty buildings,

When the coast was clear,

With backpacks full of beer,

We’d throw our bottles from the rooftops

At this city-it looked endless.

Guess I still don’t see the difference

between real purpose and that urgent adolescence.

 

And I remember in a basement sharing sweat

With all these stranger boys and girls,

“We’ll change the world!” We sang,

“We’ll change the world!” But,

Nothing seems to change and

They say none of them will listen,

But I still see much more power in that basement

than in heartless politicians.

 

And if we get beaten by this winter,

If we get strangled by regret, just

Let our love of life and tension

Gasp in sweet and stuttered breaths, and

Have them lay us in a basement,

Smash some bottles on the ground, and

Say we couldn't tell the difference

between the feeling and the sound.

 

Remember not our faulty pieces,

Remember not our rusted parts,

It’s not the petty imperfections that define us but

The way we hold our hearts,

And the way we hold our heads,

I hope they write your names beside mine

on my gravestone when I’m dead.

And when we’re dead let our voices carry on

To find a better song.

To find a better song and sing along

  

by

la dispute

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPppInfmpvo

   

Pau D'arco or Pink Trumpet Tree flowers swim on Starbucks' outdoor tabletops during Albuquerque, New Mexico monsoon shower.

 

Location: Starbucks, 4601 Wyoming Blvd NE just north of Montgomery Blvd NE, 6:01pm

  

⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙∘☽༓☾∘⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅∙⊰⋅•⋅⋅•⋅⋅•⋅

Also at this Starbucks:

 

Stuttering Barista

 

Rachel's Car, 'Stormy'

The dapper Spotted Sandpiper makes a great ambassador for the notoriously difficult-to-identify shorebirds. They occur all across North America, they are distinctive in both looks and actions, and they're handsome. They also have intriguing social lives in which females take the lead and males raise the young. With their richly spotted breeding plumage, teetering gait, stuttering wingbeats, and showy courtship dances, this bird is among the most notable and memorable shorebirds in North America. www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Spotted_Sandpiper/overview#

Mixophyes balbus. Dorrigo National Park, NSW.

the lights you held in your hands so casually as though that is where lights go shine still and again over and under, too.

Doom Patrol Issue Two: Family Reunion

 

1984

 

Miami, Florida

 

“Hello? Lawrence? Lawrence Trainor?”

The Chief says, causing me to spit my rum into my bandages, soaking them. How'd he find my hotel room?

 

“Ch-Chief?” I stutter, confused as to how Niles found the number to the telephone in my hotel room.

 

“Yes Lawrence, it's me.” He confirms. “I'm sorry for bothering you, but it's urgent. Cliff disappeared about two weeks ago, a window in his room was broken violently. I have a couple leads, but I thought you may want to know. It's taken me quite a lot of time and effort to find your number.”

 

“I'm gonna need a one way ticket to Missouri.”

I growl, in my best Clint Eastwood impression.

 

“No, that won't be necessary. Rita and I will come to you. You see, the tracking chip in Cliffs body just went off on the outskirts of Miami. You won't have to leave your vacation quite yet. We'll bring the private jet, meet us at the airport at four.”

 

“Hey uh Chief I just wanted to-” He hangs up. I guess he's keeping it professional.

 

I resume drinking my rum, dancing to the upbeat tune blaring from my stereo.

 

4:32 PM

 

I drag myself sluggishly to the front of the airport. I see two blurry figures in front of the double glass doors. They don't look very pleased with me. I check my watch to see the time, I'm a half an hour late. I guess I lost track of time while I was drinking.

 

“Larry? Are you okay?” A soft and familiar female voice questions.

 

“Oh, it is you guys!” I scream ecstatically. I limp over to an aging man in a wheelchair, it's Niles.

 

“Lawrence, have you been drinking?”

He says, with his british grandpa voice.

 

I place my hand on his shoulder and turn to Rita.

 

“I'm okay Chief I only had a little. You ready to get the Doom Patrol back together?” I slur, collapsing to the hot pavement.

 

I awake in the backseat of what I presume is a taxi, sandwiched between Rita and The Chief. They both seem fairly annoyed by my drunk antics, but I'm having the time of my life.

 

I guess we arrive at our destination, because the cab comes to a screeching halt.

 

“This is the place, uh, Chang's International Buffet? The fee is gonna be six fifty.” The taxi driver says to the general group.

 

“Thank you, kind sir.”

Niles says, handing him a twenty dollar bill from his pocket.

 

“Damn, twenty? Thanks man.”

The driver says, a smile forming on his face.

 

Rita opens the door on her side, and steps out of the cab. She stretches both of her arms, one opening the trunk and taking out Chief's wheelchair, and the other taking me forcefully by the shoulder and pulling my wasted ass out of the car. She leaves me on the ground, while she wheels The Chief's chair on over to him. She gracefully lifts him up and places him on the chair, and begins wheeling him to the buffet.

 

I'm too drunk for this shit. I watch them make their way to the door, still lying on the road. I get assaulted with exhaust as the driver speeds away. The door to the restaurant blows open and a short, greasy, Asian man walks outside, wearing a white tank top and sweatpants. He swings his arms open when he sees The Chief.

 

“Niles! Niles Caulder! It's been years!”

He bellows, an enormous grin on his face.

 

“Ah, Mr. Chang. How have you been?”

Chief says, receiving a big hug from Mr. Chang.

 

“Business is good, so I'm great! Come in, come in.” He says, opening the door and gesturing Rita and Chief inside. They follow him inside and I shut my eyes, hoping to wake up from this nightmare. My eyes shoot open as I feel Rita's arm stretch out of the doorway and drag me inside the Buffet.

   

Fast. Fast is one of the only words to describe how 2013 felt. It's hard to believe that tomorrow begins the New Year. Even though this year was fast, I feel it was one of the best years of my life in the LEGO community.

 

First off, this is the year I started to make characters from The Walking Dead, which got my YouTube channel and Flickr stream a new audience. Making figures from The Walking Dead was one of the best decisions I made, and I have really loved doing it. I cannot wait until Season 4 returns so I can begin to make more figures!

Along with The Walking Dead, this year I made an attempt at creating the prison, but that didn't turn out great, but check it out on my YouTube channel if you would like.

Even though its a smaller event, the creation of Infinity Squad was big to me. I really liked the idea of making stories based around a squad, and I can't wait to continue with them in 2014. Hopefully I'll get some new Phase 2 armor for them soon so I can actually pose them :)

 

Also, I began making a lot of Mandalorians this year, which I am very proud of. My Jango Fett, Boba Fett, Pre Vizsla, and Bo-Katan figures are some of my best and stand out in my collection.

One of the biggest events that occurred this year was BrickFair: Virginia. That event was one of the greatest experiences in my life. I met so many fantastic people and had an outstanding time there, it kind of felt like home. It was a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by people who had the same interests as you.

 

Throughout this year, my figures significantly changed, as did my attitude about creating them. I began to take my time on painting and actually planning out what to do for them rather than just winging it like I had done in the past. I explored new themes and new ways to customize, as well as attempting camouflage which you can see on my upcoming Battlefield 4 figures. I had to step put of my comfort zone on a lot of figures, but all of them turned out just the way I was hoping, thus expanding the zone.

 

Some of you may remember I had posted a "Steps Toward Profession" photo at the beginning of the year, seen here: www.flickr.com/photos/52286648@N06/8336046355/

I listed several goals, which I had wanted to achieve in a few months, but that didn't happen. However, I am proud to say I did complete all of those goals by the end of the year. I made a more professional looking background, which changed to a banner with YouTube's new layout. I did create a new studio with better lighting and used a better camera for filming. I began to upload more and more, trying to get back into the game. Lastly, I finally verified myself as a Partner, thus allowing me to make custom thumbnails for my videos which I had always wished to do. Throughout this journey, I regained my lost 200 subscribers, along with 1,600 more, giving me a total of 4,800+ subscribers which I am grateful for!

I went farther off these goals to make my channel and photostream more professional. For the channel, I made an introduction, outro, new logo, and planned what to say so I wouldn't stutter as much. For my Flickr stream, I better prepared my showcases with related backgrounds and camera/figure angles, as well as exploring Adobe Photoshop to edit my shots to make them look better.

 

In the photo above, I put all of the figures I have made this year. I not sure how many, but I was amazed I was able to paint so many of them! You can notice the difference in the quality of the figures by comparing the old figures to the new, which I think really shows how much I believe I've improved. In the comments, tell me which figure(s) is your favorite!

 

I just want to thank you all for how much support and feedback you have given me. It really contributes to my improvement, and I couldn't have done it without you all!

 

I am now saying farewell to 2013, and looking forward. 2014 is going to be amazing, and I am super excited to showcase my Battlefield 4 figures! I plan on making Lilly and Tara from The Walking Dead, but other than them, I have little to no idea of what figures I will be making in 2014, but I am certain something will pop up!

 

Thank you all again for you support and appreciation, it means the world to me! I wish you all a Happy New Year!

 

-Aaron/LM9 Productions

 

Cole looked at the woman, clearly impressed, awaiting her payment. She leaned forward to Archer making sure to put everything out there, her voice sultry with age and experience. "Don't you think I could pay you, some... other way." Her red lips curled up and seemed to get plumper. Archer stuttered in shock, "I.. uhm... as tempting..." they cleared their throat. "As temping as that is ma'am," they said in all seriousness. "We only take Galactic Coins."

 

ARCHER -

 

FEATURING

[DS] Strapped Pants 02

[DS] Strapped Shirt 02

[DS] Group Gift - Punked Collar

L'Emporio&PL::*Dragon's Grip*::

Wicca's Originals - Bullseye

 

OUTFIT/ACCESSORIES

WINGS-ER0714-HAIR

Grexor Boots FATPACK / Legacy

Hiemal Stella Dagger Earring Blood Drop Right

Astara - Daddy's Belt

Chipped Nails - Legacy M

Gloom. - Felicis Collection - Sclera 02 - Fatpack

 

TATTOOS/ADDONS

AsteroidBox. Shredded Nets - Black w/ Bandages

TF: Machinist (M) :: LelX : Face With Hollow - Light (50%)THIS IS WRONG The Leader tattoo FADED LIGHT RED - BoM EvoX

 

COLE -

 

[DS] Strapped Pants 02

[DS] Strapped Shirt 02

[DS] Group Gift - Punked Collar

Evil Baby Moonchild Glasses

Cult Umu Boots

M E M E N T O FVTE Rings

WINGS HAIR-TZ1110 Red

 

SPACE COUGAR -

 

OUTFIT -

*barberyumyum*P02(anime)

[MODA] BETTY DRESS: LEOPARD

Foxwood - Space Pup Pack - Gold

[Fetch] Alicia Glasses

 

THE LOOK -

UNHOLY_Green Alien

Izzie's - LeL Evo X Anger Wrinkles

Izzie's - LeL Evo X Bunny Wrinkles

Izzie's - LeL Evo X Smile Lines

 

SET UP // BACKGROUND

 

Confort Travel - Rix Cuchao - The Bearded Guy

Cerberus Black LowLag by VIX MOTORS

Haunted Warehouse - Bio Hazard Bucket Spilled - Breaux Willow

Haunted Warehouse - Bio Hazard Bucket - Breaux Willow

Haunted Warehouse - Bio Haz Spill - Breaux Willow

graveyard austerity

 

a stuttering contempt unfolds in some

but others blinded by attempts at reason

deny the discontent and bleak horizons pending

 

sustainable or not it will unfold

the damage done in years to to come

with futures wrapped uneasy

round a knife thats steadied by a clumsy hand

intent on slicing through the fabric

misguided in intentions deep and cutting

too much that is good consigned to earth

Alias: Waysider

Real Name: Zane

Gender: Male

Alignment: Villain

Faction: Sons of Silver

Personality: Loud, boisterous and arrogant. He can be quite brutal when he wants to be. However, he is rather loyal to the Sons of Silver gang. Also, when around girls, Zane/Waysider is rather nervous, often stuttering or avoiding eye contact with them.

Powers: Can create a flame based aura, which can enhance his skateboard's speed.

Combat: Is never seen in combat without his baseball bat, or his skateboard. He's constantly traversing using his skateboard, even using it to deflect blows during fights.

Backstory: A skateboarder, who has always had problems with authority figures. At his core, he's just looking for a place to belong, and has struggled finding such a place. People tend to throw him to the wayside, due to his offputting personality. This would cause him to pick fights with others frequently, armed with only his baseball bat and skateboard. His skills would eventually catch the attention of the Sons of Silver. His admiration for the leader of the gang would be almost instantaneous, and his loyalty would often be tested. However, Waysider stayed strong to the Sons of Silver, never giving them up.

Me siento y miro.

Me pongo a pensar sobre las causas –conjuntas, suficientes, necesarias, geográficas, económicas, sociales... históricas e histéricas también– y sobre los efectos –los de las noticias y los que no andan ahí, los que no me esperaba y los que ví inevitables con el ceño fruncido– de este fenómeno... sobre sus fases y dolencias, sobre sus interminables interrelaciones.

Me da vértigo.

Síncope...

Y se me lengua la traba...

 

-Reset-

Great Horned Owls are nocturnal. You may see them at dusk sitting on fence posts or tree limbs at the edges of open areas, or flying across roads or fields with stiff, deep beats of their rounded wings. Their call is a deep, stuttering series of four to five hoots.

Bathing in Del Rey Lagoon while youngster forages.

 

Thought I'd, once again, try posting directly to Flickr, rather than uploading to YouTube and posting the link in Flickr. However, when I play it, there's a stop motion/stuttering. If anyone else experiences this, please let me know.

I love photographing these lovely flowers when they are available in the spring at our garden centers. Admittedly the genus name is a bit of a land mine for mediocre spellers. People so often judge us more for our minor flaws, rather than for our profound statements or brilliant accomplishments. I have a friend with dozens of patents (several marketable). He's a very poor speller, so many people think he's stupid! Another acquaintance is a valedictorian of his high school class. He has a foreign accent and stutters, so he's incorrectly judged as a moron by many.....Fuchsia is a plant genus with 110 species, consisting mostly of shrubs or small trees. As I mentioned previously, one of my favorite flowers to photograph. ❤❤

a new variety of agapanthus in our garden - trying for bokeh - quite a bit of 'faffing'......

 

I found this on Google: "faffing - late 18th century (originally dialect in the sense ‘blow in puffs’, describing the wind): imitative. The current sense may have been influenced by dialect faffle ‘stammer, stutter’, later ‘flap in the wind’, which came to mean ‘fuss, dither’ at about the same time as faff (late 19th century)"

UCLA, Los Angeles, May 2011

"A rich, russet-and-gray bird with bold streaks down its white chest, the Song Sparrow is one of the most familiar North American sparrows. Don’t let the bewildering variety of regional differences this bird shows across North America deter you: it’s one of the first species you should suspect if you see a streaky sparrow in an open, shrubby, or wet area. If it perches on a low shrub, leans back, and sings a stuttering, clattering song, so much the better." Cornell

“.. that appears to be something but is not really so.”

Sounds like a false front, no?

 

Fact: At times, I could be shy, have the stutters and act silly when I'm with someone I have feelings for. It's pretty embarrassing.. coz' by the end of the day, I'm all smiles and people go asking... "Emily, why are you smiling to yourself again?!"

 

It happened. Uncountable times.

 

From today's many discoveries..

“Well, now you know I don’t like chocolates.” – E.J

 

Just one soul, yet so many truths to reveal about one self.

I’m simply saying.. it takes time to understand someone.

Minutes, days, years, decades.. yeah.

 

… but the process of it is the most intriguing.

 

p/s: This is how the hair colour actually looks like without sunlight. So, yeah, all those previous shots have had sunlight in it. I've never dyed my hair before.. and I want a haircut. :D Yes, it's the oversized shirt that I wore in the previous shot.

 

Happy Friday!

 

Thank you to all who have made suggestions for improvement. I myself knew I had a better version inside of me and I hope this is it. All comments and critique very welcome and please let me know if this is better or worse.

 

Anthem for Doomed Youth

 

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?

Only the monstrous anger of the guns.

Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle

Can patter out their hasty orisons.

No mockeries for them; no prayers nor bells,

Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, -- -

The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;

And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

 

What candles may be held to speed them all?

Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes

Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.

The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;

Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,

And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

 

Pitiless Repressors.

 

Listen here suno.com/s/gEtbr7rLZiLQPrtk

 

(Intro - 140 BPM)

(Heavy, distorted 909 kick drum thuds in. High-pass filter gradually opens. Fast, relentless off-beat hi-hats slice through.)

 

(Sampled voice, pitch-shifted down, echoed and stuttered)

"Flaming tongues... tongues... tongues...

Screaming demons... devils... rules..."

 

(Pounding bassline drops: driving, distorted acid bass synth)

 

(Verse 1 - Build-Up)

Flaming mercurial tongues and violent arms!

Hysterical demons scream through burning fires!

Naked flesh in twisted tormenting pain!

Divided laws and dark aggravated desires!

 

(Snare roll starts ramping up fast: 8th notes to 16th notes to 32nd notes)

 

Abominations in the dark!

Human relics beneath the stone!

Bloody valleys! Broken paroxysms dreams!

Revolutions overthrown!

 

(Drop 1)

(Aggressive, Donk/Hard House synth lead stabs in with relentless speed)

 

UNREDEEMABLE!

TORTURE IN THE PSCHIATRIC SHADOWS!

CURSING SPIRITS!

NO LIGHT! NO LIGHT!

 

(Massive, rolling hard house kick-bass combo explodes. Fast hoover synths screech across the beat.)

 

(Verse 2 - Driving Rhythm)

Horrid delusions labors! Ghastly deaths!

Heavy burdens laid in sin!

Trumpets blare despair and doom!

Let the punishment begin!

 

Groaning serpents, swift and dark!

Dangerous gardens, poisonous flower!

Rolling answers, twisting questions!

FEEL THE UNSOUND POWER!

 

(Breakdown - Pitiless Repressors)

(Kick drum cuts out entirely. Dark, atmospheric pad sweeps in. Industrial alarm sound reverberates in the distance.)

 

(Robotic, vocoded vocal spoken coldly)

Unmoved... the stern repressors stand.

Enforcing law across the land.

No tear shall thaw their iron heart.

No prayer shall pull the chain apart.

 

(Gated synth trance-lead starts pulsing, building energy higher and higher)

 

With pitiless and frozen eyes...

They watch the embers die!

Deaf to groans!

Relentless night!

NO ESCAPE!

 

(Build-up synth pitch rises rapidly. Snare roll crescendos into chaos)

 

3... 2... 1... PITILESS!

 

(Drop 2 - Main Climax)

(Full chaos breaks loose: heavy 140 BPM hard house kick, screeching hoover riffs, and fast off-beat synth stabs)

 

FEED UPON THE TEARS!

GLORIFY THE PAIN!

MONUMENT OF COLD DESPAIR!

FEEL THE CHAIN!

 

(Acid synth line twirls and distorts at full volume until a abrupt final kick-drum hit)

 

(Outro)

(Synth fades out, leaving just the raw, heavy kick drum and trailing reverb)

 

"Lessons... never... learned..."

NEVER LEARNEEEEEDDDD!!!

(Final kick clap)

 

lyrics and music by Steve.D.Hammond.

   

Stuttering Barred Frog (Mixophyes balbus), New England region, New South Wales.

 

A nicely marked but threatened species which once extended from northern NSW to Victoria. However it is rare and possibly extinct south of Sydney and its populations to the north are fragmented and affected by chytrid fungus. The bright blue in the upper iris helps to distinguish it from other barred frogs which occur across its range.

 

I found this male at night in the leaf litter along the banks of a creek. After a heavy downpour several male frogs emerged from the leaf litter and began calling perched high on granite boulders along the stream.

I am so thankful that my family never worries about their next meal. It is a blessing I do not take for granted.

 

Mamiya 645

Fugi Superia

200 ISO

 

Composite of 47, 28 second images, 17 mm @ 4.5, processed using StarStax and StarCircle Academy Advanced Stacker; also LR4. The moon was so bright it created beautiful shadows in the river. Though there are a few stutters in the trails (teensy screw up on my part), I am still pretty pleased with the results.

 

© 2013 All Rights Reserved. My photographs are available for licensing and fine art prints. If Interested please contact me.

252 / 365

 

...a girl's best friend.

~Lorelei Lee, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

 

I've been on a movie binge lately. We saw "King's Speech", "RED", "Die Hard" and just finished "Salt". "King's Speech" so far has been most impressive from the batch of Oscar wannabes. Colin Firth is so damn good of an actor that he reportedly continued stuttering for two months after the movie, in which his character stutters terribly, has been finished.

 

The rest of them are just straight actions. "RED" is actually surprisingly not bad. Bruce Willis, John Malkovic (damn that guy's great), Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren and a couple of others. the movie has some kick-ass funk tunes in the soundtrack. Being partial to funk I can't miss that.

 

Bruce Willis in RED prompted us to re-watch "Die Hard", the first one. You know, when the guy actually had hair. The movie is 23 yrs old, still looks good.

 

The last one is "Salt", which is a womanese for "Bourne". Some new actors, some more Angelina Jolie lips and hips, panties hung over the security camera and, above all, bad, Bad, BAD Russian language from the actors that are not Russian natives. Hell, with a budget like that I could teach Angelina Jolie to speak those four Russian phrases fluently.

 

Strobist setup:

* Sunpak 5000AF left @1/64 135mm

* Sunpak 5000AF right @1/64 135mm

* white sheet of paper as a diffuser bent over the bracelet

 

To see how simple it really is, see the strobist setup shot: click HERE

 

Monday, 9 December 2019: temperature is -6C (windchill -10C) at noon, and it was snowing up till about a minute ago. Sunset is at 4:29 pm.

 

I am adding this very sad email that I received yesterday, just in case there are any local birders/photographers who knew Sue Konopnicki, but have not heard that Sue passed away on 6 December. Thank you, Joan, for sending out these thoughtful words. My condolences to Sue's family and friends.

 

"Our Birding community is deeply saddened to inform you of the passing of Sue Konopnicki on Friday, December 6th after a courageous battle with cancer. For many years Sue has been an enthusiastic Saturday participant with the Friends of Fish Creek Birding sessions. Her passion for nature and especially birds developed at a young age and continued throughout her life. As a principal with the Calgary Board of Education, and working together with a group of like-minded teachers, she facilitated a nature-focused learning environment in her school. As well, Sue was a board member with Nature Calgary, a volunteer with Nature Conservancy and a long-time bluebird nest-box monitor. Highlights of her various volunteer roles included arranging funding for students to attend nature-focused field trips, co-founder of the Family Birdwatching Course and Youth Birding Camp with Friends of Fish Creek and Nature Calgary and membership with the Calgary Bird Banding Society. Her love for life-long learning, leadership skills and deep appreciation for the outdoors were inspirational. She touched many lives in deep and meaningful ways. Sue will be greatly missed and lovingly remembered by her daughters, sons-in-law, grandchildren and all who walked the pathways with her. She has been a great friend and the Saturday group will miss her immensely. We were privileged to be a part of her life."

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Today, 9 December 2019, I have just posted five more odds and ends of photos, from way back in my archives, instead of going through photos taken more recently. I'm just not getting time to get out and take any new photos, anyway. I am adding the description that was under another photo taken the same day.

 

"Yet another overcast, dreary morning here today, 18 November 2016, with a temperature of -3C (windchill -7C). The sun is supposed to come out this afternoon, which would be a really welcome sight.

 

This photo of a Great Horned Owlet was taken on 6 May 2016, in a local natural area/park. Unfortunately, I had half a dozen errands to run before allowing myself to go out with my camera, so I didn't get there till late, and the light quickly began to fade. No time to look around the area for any other birds on this visit.

 

This beautiful owlet had been on the ground for a while before I arrived. There were a few people there and more came and went. However, I later heard that the owlet had been able to claw and flap its way up one of the trees and was safely out of reach of most predators. Meanwhile, the other fledgling had been very high up in a different tree, along with Mom. I'm glad I did call in at this location when I did, as this beautiful little owl gave us a few chances for photos when it was up on a log or down on the ground, usually partly hidden by the plants and bushes. I don't know how it ended up on the ground, but obviously it fell from somewhere or misjudged flying distance and missed an intended branch when it finally left the nesting tree. An interesting world for it to explore, though it wasn't very steady on its feet yet : )

 

Things seem to happen so fast this spring and I missed seeing the two owlets balancing on the rim of the nesting tree, exercising their wings before fledging. Also, I had been so busy that I only went over to see the youngsters a handful of times. Looking on the more important side, this meant one less person intruding on their area, of course, though I have to say that these owls are remarkably tolerant of humans. If a Canada Goose, on the other hand, should get anywhere near the nest or the little ones, Mom or Dad flies in for an immediate attack."

 

"With its long, earlike tufts, intimidating yellow-eyed stare, and deep hooting voice, the Great Horned Owl is the quintessential owl of storybooks. This powerful predator can take down birds and mammals even larger than itself, but it also dines on daintier fare such as tiny scorpions, mice, and frogs. It’s one of the most common owls in North America, equally at home in deserts, wetlands, forests, grasslands, backyards, cities, and almost any other semi-open habitat between the Arctic and the tropics.

 

Great Horned Owls are nocturnal. You may see them at dusk sitting on fence posts or tree limbs at the edges of open areas, or flying across roads or fields with stiff, deep beats of their rounded wings. Their call is a deep, stuttering series of four to five hoots." From AllAboutBirds.

 

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Great_Horned_Owl/id

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horned_owl

Boy this is old

But I've loved it for about

4 months now

 

+1 SOOC

 

I hope everyone had a terrible superbowl night.

Just kidding.

Go Steelers.

====Cobblepot Subway Station====

 

"Get away from him."

 

Flannegan smirks, admiring her makeshift costume. "Hello gorgeous, A for effort, F for execution. Oh boys!" He lets out a whistle, and on cue, rats come pouring through the walls towards her. Kate fires a warning shot, but, realising it's a waste of ammo, sets her sights back on Flannegan, shooting him squarely in the chest. The connection severed, the rats squeek away, back into the sewers where they came from. Flannegan mumbles "Come back, come-" before trailing off into unconsciousness.

Kate rushes to Batman's side, trying to silence his crying, then plunges a needle of adrenaline into his arm, jolting him awake. "Sorry."

 

Bruce sits up, back to business immediately. He doesn't know who this woman is, but, he also doesn't have the time for introductions. "Where are they-?"

 

"The guy in the rags? Must've gone before I got here"

 

"The children, he's got-"

 

"I know, I know. Just hold still," she says, applying antiseptic cream to his bite marks.

 

Bruce mutters in protest, before finally asking "Who are you?"

 

"I don't know yet, trial and error I suppose. But I'm here to help," she replies

 

"If you really want to help, you can start by ditching that," he responds, now on his feet.

Confused, Kate looks at her holster.

 

"I don't like guns." he explains, as he handcuffs Flannegan to a pipe.

 

"That gun just saved your life."

 

"And it could've just as easily taken his. You're an soldier, aren't you?"

 

"Was. Sargent Kate Ka-"

 

"No. I don't need your identity, that's how we end up with-"

 

"End up with what?" she asks.

 

Could it be? "Kate *Kane*?"

 

"Yes, why?"

 

Bruce smiles weakly to himself. Of course it'd be her. "Nothing," he responds, as he examines the Scarecrow's laboratory... The children, who took the children? He looks at the walls, across them are various formulas, essays and theories all linked to fear. On the table, there lies a shipping manifest Paris, it's cargo? A hundred wild mushrooms. Strange.

He opens a drawer, inside a letter. The recipient's name has been marked out, but it's been written by...

"Hellfern."

 

"Who's Hellfern?" Kate inquires.

 

"A Nazi. Figures... A master chemist, run into him before. Whoever this... Scarecrow is, he's learned from the very best..." He moves the letter away, and jolts back. "No."

It's a blueprint of Gotham General's ventilation systems... The kidnappings were only a teaser of what's to come. He pulls a camera from his belt, and hands it to Kate. "Send these to the GCPD. That madman's going to hit the maternity ward. Hundreds of newborns!"

 

"Wait, where the hell are you going?"

 

"To see if I can't get there first."

 

Batmobile's parked outside, must be how she found me. Clumsy... I jump in, and go over the files. "Master Bruce! Thank goodness you're alright. I've been trying to reach you all night!"

 

"I'm fine, Alfred. Had a run in with our kidnappers. I'm fine, but the ringleader escaped. Goes by Scarecrow. Don't worry, I know where he's going..."

 

"That's all well and good sir, but your vitals, they're still far too high... Can't you let the police handle this? We wouldn't want you to faaaaaaaail aaaaaaaagain wooooullllld weeeee?"

 

I pause. "Alfred, what did you say?"

 

"I said, surely the police can take care of this?"

 

I'm still not at my best, still hearing things...

"No, this maniac's got some kind of hallucinogen. I've seen it, Alfred, it's able to bring anyone's darkest fears and phobias to life. Anyone's."

 

I turn the corner.

 

"Now a scarecrow... He chose a scarecrow for a reason. Alfred, bring me up a list of families living in the rural areas of Gotham, cross referenced with students of Karl Hellfern... Any psychologists who specialise in fear."

 

Alfred sighs. He knows something's wrong. "One moment, sir. Here we are, one Doctor Crane, Jonathan Crane. Rather troubled upbringing, orphaned at birth, raised by his aunt. She died when he was a teenager- a rather grisly end at that..."

 

"Go on."

 

"She was pecked to death, by hundreds of... Crows. They never linked it to him, but later evidence seemed to suggest she beat him on a regular basis... A neighbor of theirs claimed she locked him in their family's aviary, on a nightly basis. She said she could hear the screams almost a mile away."

 

"So what happened next?"

 

"Crane left for college a day later, and, upon graduating, took up a role as a professor in psychology at Gotham University up until... One year ago. Reason for dismissal... ah. "Unorthodox and dangerous teaching methods."

 

"So he was testing his toxins on his own students..."

 

====Gotham General====

 

"Who are you, you can't be here!" an orderly yells, as the Scarecrow enters the maternity ward, smiling his Glasgow smile, and stretches out a bony finger. "Earl, stop him-"

 

"Hush little baby, don't say a word," he cackles, spraying the doctor, Earl with gas. "Momma's going to buy you a mockingbird..."

"Spiders! Spiders everywhere!" he screams, rolling on the ground, trying desperately to scratch them off.

"Arachnophobia. How... Boring," Crane says, disappointed, as he approaches the now cowering orderly. "How about you, my dear," he asks, a vial of toxins in his hand.

"Please," she's begging. "Please don't."

"Oh don't worry, there's nothing to fe-"

 

A batarang knocks the vial out of Crane's grip, and it falls to the floor.

 

"Get away from her."

 

Scarecrow laughs. "You're too late, Batman. My work is done. All that separates the newborns from their nightmares is this detonator."

 

Alfred's right... The GCPD *can* deal with the gas, but leaves me with Scarecrow. Have to keep stalling. "Don't."

 

"You know, we never finished our talk. So, tell me, what nightmares keep the Batman awake?"

The gas... I'm still... Keep focused on him, keep focused on-

 

-----------------

 

I'm here. Crime Alley. Dirty, damp, dark... My parents' blood runs along the ground, in the centre, is him. The gunman... Their killer.

 

No. No, it's not. I'm not in the alleyway, I'm in Gotham General.

 

He has a gun. A revolver. Mother is dead, Father is dead.

 

No. It's not him, it's the Scarecrow. They're gone, he's gone, I have to move past it. I need to move past it.

 

"You've failed us, Bruce," my father calls. "You killed us..."

 

It's just the toxin... Not in the alley, I'm in the hospital... Remember Bruce, it happened, they're gone, now fight it! Remember what you promised them, that's how you honour them, not by surrendering to these... Ghosts.

 

Remember. Remember. "By the spirits of my parents-"

 

"Bruce, this is your father!" the ghost screams.

 

"I will avenge their deaths-"

 

"Bruce, stop it now! You're too late," Mother echoes.

 

"by spending the rest of my life-"

 

"Stop it, I command you, I-"

 

"warring on all criminals."

 

-----------

 

The hospital. I'm in the hospital.

 

"Now... tell me, Batman, what did you see?" Scarecrow asks again.

 

So I tell him. "I see... A boy."

 

"A child-?" he inquires.

 

"An orphan. His parents, dead."

 

"Of course... Yes, of course it'd be your childhood... What do you see now? Failure, is that it? The fear of failing, of disappointing them?"

 

"Yes, I... I see bats, and alleyways, and I see birds."

 

For a second, Scarecrow falters. "Birds?!"

 

"An aviary. Filled with them, all of them angry, and hungry, pecking and knawing at this poor little boy... He calls for help, but no one listens... What do you suppose that means, Doctor?"

 

He's on edge... Push him too hard and he might press the detonator.

 

"How do you... How could you possibly-?"

 

"Because I'll tell you what I think-"

 

"Enough!" he cries.

 

"I see a sad, broken man, a man who shuts himself off from everyone else, a man burries himself in his work, all to find that final, pressing answer, the question that's followed him all his life... What drove his aunt to beat him?"

 

"I said enough-!" he bellows. "How... How are you doing this? How are you resisting my toxins!" His finger's on the detonator.

 

"I'm not."

 

His lip's trembling. "Impossible. Impossible!" With a click, he presses the detonator and... Nothing. Gordon... Gordon's done it. Realisation dawns on Crane's face, he runs at me, and then, a crunch. He's stepped on the vial, breaking it.

"No," he whispers, as he falls to his knees. Whatever he's seeing... It's too good for him.

 

"Now," I ask, pulling him up. "Where are the children?"

 

"T-the mushrooms... I needed the mushrooms for my research..." he stutters.

 

"The children, Crane, where are they?"

 

"S-so, s-so I gave him the children..."

 

"I need a name!"

 

"The Monk! The m-mad m-monk," he shrieks, as he returns to his nightmares.

I recognise some of those megalomaniacal male tendencies you are describing, and why wouldn’t I (DUH!)? I know that ‘lost boy’ behaviour. It’s even attractive until one reaches a certain age, then it slopes off through unfortunate, and heads downhill rather swiftly towards downright tragedy. Applying the brakes at that stage is no party, let me tell you. Sometimes I feel as if I had been worn down up to the knees, a would-be demi-legged, own-trumpet-blowing, Falstaff, (if only those Jesuits had gotten hold of me) but then this isn’t about me. All these men searching for mammies, what can I say other than sorry about my gender, and thank Yahweh that I am a cis-gender homo (can I call myself that anymore?).

 

I think you can tell that I have arrived at the point that I am at, now, not at all sure what I am, or am not, permitted to call myself. I fear that I, at last, know what and who I am, but I am not at all sure if being that is acceptable in an evolving world. Luckily, we will all be dead soon enough. Now that’s something to really look forward to for the terminally bewildered. I like the idea of ‘A Death’ as the inflection point of this ‘Comedy’ we are constructing. I have that funny death story to tell yet properly. That one where Jeffrey suddenly shot upright, screaming at his parents who were quibbling over what to watch on the TV. He screamed fiercely at them “I’m dying, I get to choose the video!”. It was gloriously well said. I do love the tyranny of the dying. I do love the abject tyranny of the victim (my specialty). Feck it, I will go the whole hog. I do love tyranny. I also love saying ‘Feck’, when everyone understands that you are insinuating another vowel in the place of that ‘e’. I love that feck is proper and Irish, a softening of that blow, like a dropped ‘h’, that sort of softening and lilting.

  

He chose 'Singing in the Rain' and collapsed back into bed raving madly about having to make three different types of pies to prepare for some party or other in his head.

  

I did my job. I pressed the button and released more morphine, through the catheter in his chest, awash in the 'poor meeees'.

 

mea culpa, mea culpa,mea máxima culpa.

 

Later, I made a drawing about his wonderful, life-affirming, self-assertion. I photographed myself beside it, the drawing that is, but discovered, whilst looking at it later, that I seemed to have disappeared.

 

I guess that's how things go. (Secretly, I love removing myself (with photoshop), but don't tell anyone).

 

John: A fine eulogy, full of life.

 

Ruin: I want to reply to this, a little later. I might even have to go into the third person, to get a little distance from the answer, and what it means. This will be an important part of 'the book'. I am putting this here as a sort of commitment.

 

Anyway, to start, another extended version of this 'story' begins under this photo (the title in parentheses below) below this. It starts with “I’m dying, I get to choose the video”, about halfway down. But I now want to write something a lot more personal, a lot more 'private' perhaps. So far I have been writing about what I call the 'Wild Geese', a recognised phenomenon in Irish history and culture. Now I want to talk about something a little more close to home, and that's the cuckoo gene. That born out of desperation taking up domicile in the 'nests' of other birds, that type of 'taking over'. I think of it slightly relative to that 'banquet idea' that excess, like a pheasant being stuffed with a quail, and the quail in turn being stuffed with a starling, or any smaller bird, that decadence. Anyway, I want to look at that goose initially stuffed with a cuckoo, that idea of the self as a desperate exploiter, but also looking at it as a survival strategy, a Darwinian ploy, even. I am still brewing it in my head, so it will stutter along.

 

‘On Universal Innocence and The Forgiveness of Freckles’.

  

But back to Geese and cuckoos.

 

‘The Rôti Sans Pareil Is 17 Birds Stuffed Inside Each Other and It Is Delicious’. So ran the headline.

  

"The recipe calls for a bustard stuffed with a turkey stuffed with a goose stuffed with a pheasant stuffed with a chicken stuffed with a duck stuffed with a guinea fowl stuffed with a teal stuffed with a woodcock stuffed with a partridge stuffed with a..."

  

There is a sort of madness there, manifesting, perhaps, one of the reasons we don't deserve to be here at all. Not that deserving has anything to do with it anyway.

 

Chickenman, Wild Geese, and now Cuckoo, this sounds like I am on a type of fowl trajectory. Here's to soaring, or swansonging, or attempting both, even!

  

John: The cuckoo was a popular metaphor in the 1950s, quite possibly in response to the aftermath of WWII and your revival gives it greater depth. One of the explorations of Bernard Malamud and Saul Bellow was the impossibly undermined reconstruction of male identity, no matter what roots they sought to revive. The cuckoo, with its echo of cuckold, the returners from war rewarded with the ghost of doubt of paternity, puts all into those same murky depths of identity which artists equally embrace or flee. As ancient mythology evidences, we have always had a need to understand and belong. Post-wars and natural disasters our need for the perceived solidity of information is greatly enhanced. Technically, having a family formed of my partner's and her ex's three daughters, I am a cuckoo.

  

Apart from the actual people (greatly rewarding) I have also wondered if I was defying my sense of unbelonging by consciously electing to be the cuckoo, which, unlike being an artist, is I believe a choice.

  

Ruin: Yes, that would be true, that returning soldier thing. I would guess it has always been the case, have soldiers not been returning since time immemorial? I didn't make the connection between cuckoo and cuckold, a 'duh!' moment for me. Of course, it is there. I particularly like the cuckold personage. If I was going by the evidence of Reddit, or wherever, cuckolding seems to be enjoying a huge revival in the fetish world currently. I would guess it was all part and parcel of dealing with the diminished, and further diminishing, male, that area of 'twixt and 'tween being generated by an excess of hormone disruptors now in the environment (in plastics and whatever). But I have a whole theory about that relative to the possibility of the human animal evolving from sexual reproduction to bifurcatory splitting, that laboratory-assisted dividing known as cloning, the copying of the self, whilst we are at that point of the Y chromosome being, apparently, at 3% of its former glory. Scientists tell us that it appears to be stable at 3%, but infinity is funny like that relative to stability.

  

The only place we would differ on here is that "unlike artist", which I am pretty sure we might partially agree on anyway. I don't see making art (or writing, even), any form of communication really, as a 'choice'. I see it both as an instinct and a compulsion, and for the most part a disruptive nuisance, an itch. I would have to fight very hard to resist it, that scratching called art making or communicating. I would have to go totally against my 'natural' self.

  

But this is something I will continue to work out until I no longer can, compulsively, this awful/wonderful itch. I like writing here, simply because it is immediate communication, and sometimes the feedback like yours is invaluable. There is this idea that writing needs to be done alone, like art, but I don't think that is necessarily 'true'. I think you have to work it out the best way you can, and there are no rules.

  

When I quote you, should I call you John Seven, or just John? I have been calling you John, but thought I should ask. As in "John: A fine eulogy, full of life." Would you prefer John Seven?

  

John: Well, I don't know what went wrong with my sentence construction there, as I intended to state that artist is not a choice (nor a guarantee of quality). Now amended. Regarding my name - John used to be the skinhead universal form of address, as in "Y'want bovver Jon?"

 

It was also, in the the year I was born, the Mohamed, It was also, in the year I was born, the Mohamed, Muhammad, Muhamad, or Mohammad of its day, the most common male name in the world. In its many forms - Ian, Iain, Ifan, Sean, Shaun, Shane, Jens, Jean, Joan, Johan and so on.

  

I am happy with whatever you choose.

  

Ruin: I guessed we were on the same page relative to art, or writing, this 'fever' to communicate is uncontrollable. It’s not a choice at all. But I feel the same about this cuckoo behaviour and this catfishing too. I see them both as survival manoeuvres, generated mostly out of desperation. Anyway, that's the point I will be starting from for this 'chapter'. I will be using the text generated here, and pulling it through the pronoun mangle, writing it in the third person, to get some distance, some overview.

  

Blimey, he realised, his behaviour had been stark raving cuckoo. He found it as difficult to think about as to write about this, but felt in the writing of it, that some liberation might be found there. The working out of it was going to have to be in the present, but there would be references and stories that harked back to his ‘Wild Goose’ history, his wandering, his running away. He knew too that he was going to have to stop playing with words, stop trying to entertain, this was not the way to go. By this he meant that “meself” as opposed to myself, that ‘cod Irish’, that “at all, at all”. That would naturally fall away anyway, as he moved away from childhood, as he learnt to speak, to communicate, even. His leaving Ireland was, in a way, his learning to talk. Before that period, he had been that oft-described stuttering, nervous entity, floundering between church-generated guilt and maintaining his secret—that abuse, that incest, that familial interference that could only serve to completely sunder him from family, and any semblance of security, of a feeling of belonging or of ever having been nurtured. It was nobody’s fault. Those who haven’t been nurtured have no idea how to nurture, and similarly those who have never been protected have no way of knowing how to proffer protection. Both his parents had, in their turn, been abandoned as children. It was all they knew. This was somehow part and parcel of the history of that emerald island, that history of hundreds of years of abuse. That this abuse caused Irish literature to blossom, in that foreign tongue, English, is one of those creative offshoots of abuse, one of those ‘miracles’, as his mother used to say, describing anything good or beneficial, a silver lining around those multi-generational deadening clouds.

  

He was angry, sad, and excited when he discovered that he had to leave to survive, that he had to give up everything and everyone he had ever known, and set out alone for that pagan land on the other side of the Irish Sea. Looking back, he liked that this cuckoo also described a sort of madness; other than the survival instinct it became somewhat renowned for, it also described that ‘stark raving’ idea, that there had always been this connection we humans make about this misunderstood creature, and its development of certain Darwinian characteristics generated by its struggle to survive.

  

Stealing somewhat from the title of the book by Mr Foster Wallace (of the multiple footnotes on footnotes), he suspected that he had come to that point where he might, at last, ‘Consider the Cuckoo’.

  

John: This riffing on a thought, expanding out to discover surprises and similarities is a thing of wonder.

  

Ruin: It's a bit strange to be working it out in 'real time' here. I am literally working it through in my head as I write it. It becomes a self-justification, of sorts, I guess. I will tie it in, somehow, to the main theme. I am coming out of that chapter which has to do with childhood, and heading towards London, via a year in Liverpool—that age-old Irish route—through Aristophanes' The Birds, from which the expression 'Cloud Cuckoo Land' comes, through Mr Darwin, on the way towards New York, and 'Rack and Ruin'.

  

But yes, he was heading for ‘Cloud Cuckoo Land’, only inasmuch as it was to be totally unfamiliar; there was the madness there of difference, a way of thinking that was foreign to everything he knew. The old rules just didn’t apply, but there were also new rules to learn.

  

On Universal Order

Or blessed lack thereof.

  

Dear Rack,

 

I suspect we have both had our moments with each other, compassionate and understanding, and the opposite. I have never felt particularly worthy, but that’s a universal, some dreadful leftover from a hideously insecure childhood, neglectful parents, an absent alcoholic father and an abusive uncle—all that palaver, that stuff of amateur melodrama, probably endemic, commonplace even, on that little emerald jewel called ‘home’. The thing is, or the pedestrian tragedy is, that you don’t really realise what you are carrying with you when you set off into the world alone; when you put on your walking shoes, you have no idea what your coping mechanisms are, how skew-whiff they might be relative to a world out there, a place that has most likely generated another type of abuse, a foreign variant, one which you have no experience of at all. It’s not unlike our beloved Omicron, another spiked battering ram, something that you might survive or not.

  

Yes, it’s the same old same old, those ‘Wild Geese’ setting off, full of youthful energy and dreams of conquest, already weighed down by their own undoing. Compassion was easy for me when we met. You had, apparently, fallen at the first hurdle, or so it seemed. I was very wrong about that. Wrecked Rack was phoenix-like. I didn’t know that then, though that constant re-igniting can work a certain ruin on the old cadaver. I notice a chemical smell in my urine, and I was wondering if you do too. We are now part chemical; a bit like our beloved de Selby’s part bicycle, part human. We have been absorbing chemicals now for decades, and you even two decades more than I have. One cannot help but wonder how they have an effect on our very DNA, our day-to-day thoughts, our moods and our hopes, or despairs. But, butt, chicken butt, as I like to say, I have decided to make their influence positive. We are a hybrid, a new man and woman, a chemically enhanced super-breed of survivors.

  

How’s that for famous last words?

  

We are like no one else, though this is true of everyone. Now we have the added input of our screens, our hard-drives and external devices, all brain-enhancers and exploitable. These are our external memories, as that innate ability to remember slopes off, and it’s nothing less than a frigging ‘Universal Superhighway’. Nobody has had that before, though I would question as to whether this is a recurring phenomenon, forgotten but recurring, on an infinite, ever-expanding loop (call me loopy). Heloise and Abelard could have done with a bit of that, but they managed anyway, so how can we not rape and pillage the universe with this magnificent, unimaginable tool at our disposal? The only thing that holds us back is our massive insecurity, and our excuses. But the proffering of these to each other, the unashamed exposing of them, is the beginning of this Knausgaardian ‘struggle’, and we have been doing this for almost 30 years. We have the capacity to cross-germinate, to percolate Sontag’s ‘Camp’ through Knausgaard’s, and the other tyrant’s, ‘Kampf’—that tragedy and camp comedy combined. I would like a little more of that ‘fun’ back, the laughing at the absurdity of it all combined with the realisation of what we wrought, and how blindly reactive it was, and we were.

  

It would be wonderful to laugh, and scream, together again.

  

"But I wonder if you share my feeling that to write anything sufficiently accurate and engaging, and actually get it over all the hurdles of publication, and risk the ultimate disappointment of remaindering ... Oh, I could not do it now."

  

No, I have no intention of 'publishing', or even presenting what I am writing and thinking about, other than on Flickr. I find that I do things in 4-year tranches. The idea is just to sort out some of the mess I made, that cacophony of images I generated whilst trying to understand.

  

I am looking for where I didn't manage to communicate, although some of it ended up in museums (with appropriate puffing out of chest). A 4-year tranche is a challenge, a challenge because of age and the dragging of another 'fatal' disease along with one through a pandemic. Blissfully, science has intervened yet again, somewhat offering respite, temporarily, from the Horsemen. I got that second AstraZeneca yesterday, but am still jealous of those enjoying the intervention of the mRNA vaccines into the livestream of their DNA. If we are going to be so interfered with in that way, I want to be one of the first on that cutting edge of the glorious new Science religion (that I love)! I would have loved to have been the Musk of death, that space pioneer and not the smell. Although, one appears to have missed that boat, along with many others, for now. But there is an acute awareness of their fetlocks and broomsticks—of those aforementioned Horsemen, that is, and their Woo and Woe.

  

Publishers, Bookshops, Museums and Galleries are over. Didn't you get the memo?

  

At the same time, that remainder bin is essential. It is, more or less, where we all end up, the good and the bad, those who write with clarity and those who lick and salve their purple wounds in public.

  

You know that I love purple, in a hate purple sort of way. Don't start me on Orange.

Exposition Park, Los Angeles, April 2011

Had to pump up the ISO, because of poor light, but there was no doubting the excitement and drama, as Black Five 45407 thundered through our little station on a Liverpool to York Yuletide Special

 

Explored Dec 14th 2008 #90

 

The Last Express

 

Where did those years go, I often sigh

Since the last express cloaked in steam roared by

The smoke and stuttering noise of steam

Evokes a never ending dream

All now gone except a few remain

In preservation their only domain

Lime Street station still there proud

Quieter now, no smoking allowed

The turntable at the top of platform nine

A faded memory of days so fine

Where engines would turn for the journey home

And young boys collecting their numbers roam

The driver and fireman on the footplate await

The signal, the sign, we must not be late

Years of experience a formidable team

Shrouded now in a cloud of steam

The signal changes the whistle blows

The coal in the firebox brightly glows

The graceful movement as she pulls away

A green light showing the right of way

The passengers now in their seats sit back

Awaiting the sound of the clickity clack

They are off on their hols, away from their mates

Away from the boss and the factory gates

The seaside beckons, the excitement grows

To paddle in the sea with their lily white toes

And then suddenly, I realise

I awake from my dream and rub my eyes

I can never go back to those long gone days

Never to return to my youthful ways

When steam locomotives were my only passion

Numbers and names spoken parrot fashion

Youth and expectation were taken as read

Alas, long gone, that era is dead

 

A Stoddern

 

That's right, i didnt stutter bitches, the amahhhzing peeps of dcny are treatng us with a freaking wall of dollarbies, go get em!!!, follow the lm!

 

Taken at DCNY Clothing Co. @ Lo Lo, Lo Lo (90, 105, 24)

Butter yellow with a 6 legged fellow.

Yesterday, 23 April 2016, I joined a few friends for a walk at Inglewood Brd Sanctuary. I only took about 10 photos and this is basically the only one that I will be keeping. Posting it just for the record of where I went that day. Such dismal weather - more like winter, especially when my vehicle got a light dusting of sleet/snow on the drive home. I knew the weather would be no good for photos, but I wanted to spend some a bit of time with firends. As well as the leisurely walk, we also went to the Blackfoot Diner for lunch. Always an enjoyable experience.

 

"A rich, russet-and-gray bird with bold streaks down its white chest, the Song Sparrow is one of the most familiar North American sparrows. Don’t let the bewildering variety of regional differences this bird shows across North America deter you: it’s one of the first species you should suspect if you see a streaky sparrow in an open, shrubby, or wet area. If it perches on a low shrub, leans back, and sings a stuttering, clattering song, so much the better." From AllAboutBirds.

 

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Song_Sparrow/id

 

Today, the weather has been very unpleasant, too, but didn't stop nine of us from going on a day trip SE of Calgary, to the Frank Lake area. Will post a photo from there tomorrow morning with a species list of 56 bird species seen!

M7 105mm Howitzer Motor Carriage, Priest.

 

My LEGO rendition of the iconic self-propelled artillery from World War II, incorporating an M2A1 gun reverse-engineered from the Brickmania kit.

 

Read the write-up on The Brothers Brick.

Low key studio shots of Hannah playing the flute, using one studio light in home studio on low power. f/11 stutter 1/125, ISO 100, white balance = flash.

More wire sculptures by Polly Verity can be found at www.polyscene.com

 

Work in progress: Wire and Paper Sculpture of a Dodo,

After Tenniel from his illustration for Lewis Carroll's 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'.

 

Here the Dodo is about to take flight from his paper chrysanthemum.

 

Lewis Carroll's (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson's) use of the Dodo in his book is a reference to himself, he had a stutter and very frequently pronounced his name "Do-do-dodgson".

 

Materials:

Silver wire, acid free tissue paper, copper walking stick

 

Technique:

Small pliers are used to manipulate the fine wire, wire is wrapped around wire at every join. Eventually this process creates a wireframe creature, the wire describing the contours and the outline. Finally, fine paper is applied sized and wet. As it dries it becomes taut like a drum and forms the translucent skin.

The dodo stands on a paper flower tuffet that is created using a ancient Chinese modular money folding technique. Hundreds of the same miniature origami pattern are folded up and these are slotted together to make the paper chrysanthemum. No glue holds the flower together.

 

photo: CS Stevens

Max Headroom was a futuristic computer-generated character on a popular British television series back in 1985. He became well known for his jerky techno-stuttering speech, wit, and puns. Now he's just a piece of discarded cardboard.

Washpool National Park, New South Wales.

 

For use of this photo please contact clancywildlife@gmail.com

Double-sided glossy business cards arrived yesterday (500 cards)! And they're so smooth (from the glossy finish) I cannot wait to start handing these babies out! :D

 

Check out some of my samples designs here!

 

UPDATE: If you would really like one, I'd love to send you some (especially if you'll be sharing with friends/family). Feel free to send me an email with your mailing address and I'll send some your way, free of charge: madelaine.etsy@gmail.com