I'm Still Alive

Yes, I'm still alive. I haven't fallen off the blogosphere.

I will be back to posting regularly soon enough, but for now I want to give a shout out to a certain scrap booking maven who's been waiting patiently for me to update this thingy.

I can't wait to catch you guys up on everything.

Gripes about _______.

Once upon a time, I used to work for _______. I used to LOVE working there. I worked at night and the other people on the night crew were great. Since there were only 6 or 7 of us working at night we would play music – LOUDLY - and just work. It was so perfect.

Then things changed. They moved me to the day crew. Most of the people were great, but I was I was beginning to find out that certain members of the management staff were less than stellar. Have you watched Office Space? Yup, it was like that.

The management staff and I had our differences. Let’s just say a certain member of upper management tried to do something illegal and didn’t like it when I called them out on it. Human Resources was there to protect the company, not the employees. I went to speak to the owner/CEO. This person told me, “We don’t want people with ambition to work here.” That was it. I handed in my letter of resignation 3 minutes later.

Ever since then I’ve harbored resentment for _______, both their management and their service/product. Let’s face it, if you’ve ever used _______, you know how expensive their service/product is and if you’ve ever worked there, you know where to get the same product much cheaper.

After attending a certain industry conference I heard that _______ had a change in command. New Management. Yippy. I heard the prices were more reasonable as well. Okay, I’ll give them another shot.

_______ FAIL!

I tried signing up for an account, and after filling out my info and clicking “submit” I received a message that read, "The field, Business State, is not valid." WTF _______, is CALIFORNIA not a state?

I also filled out a form asking for more info and pricing. One question read, “Do you have a studio website/blog?” The pull down menu gave two options: “Yes – I do” and “No – I do not.” I selected “No” only to receive an e-mail an hour later stating that my web site information was incomplete. The email goes on to say: If you… do not have a web site yet that's OK, just let us know.” I did you morons, when I selected “No – I do not.”

The e-mail then says, “Please email your web site or Blog information to website@_______.com for review. How the heck am I supposed to do that? I just said I don’t have one. I should just send them a link to this blog and post.

I went on to twitter to gripe about the situation and @_______michael offered to help. I suppose he tried and I appreciate it. Maybe, perhaps I’ll give them another chance. Maybe. Just maybe.

On the bright side, I made few good friends when I worked at _______, some of whom still work there. They still rock my world.

Note to _______. I actually was trying to set up a legitimate account for my business. So, I don’t have a site yet. Quit asking me for my pro website or blog already. There are other ways to prove I’m legit.

Swatch and Jellies

Okay, so I was only 2 when 1980 rolled around, but it’s still the decade that I identify with the most. I was a Toys R Us kid, owned a Lite Brite, a large collection of My Little Ponies, and a Pogo Ball (no one I know seems to remember what those were). I thought Cabbage Patch Kids were creepy, but loved the smell of my Strawberry Shortcake doll. I watched Rainbow Bright (which might explain my affinity towards rainbows), She-Ra, Care Bears, and Transformers.

Thanks to having older siblings I was exposed to a lot of 80s fashion. Yes, I had far too much Lacoste clothing, had permed hair (which looked awful), wore Doc Martens, and loved my LA Gears - with 3 different colored shoelaces, of course.

This year I was feeling nostalgic so I asked Randy for a Swatch watch and some jelly bracelets for my birthday. To my surprise, he bought me three!

Unless you were a complete loser, you had at least two or three swatch watches in the 80s. If you were really cool you wore them at the same time. Swatch watches weren’t just watches – they were a culture. Swatches were so cool, they had their own accessories: Swatch Guards. Oh yes, you needed at least one of those as well. The ultimate in cool was if you took two Swatch Guards of different colors and twisted them together across the watch face.

Jelly bracelets were also a thing in the 80’s thanks to Madonna and Cyndi Lauper. This was before Avril brought them back or before they became known as sex bracelets. Then again, I suppose they never fully went away.



Don’t worry, I’m not planning to go full retro. I will not be crimping my hair or wearing any Flashdance inspired clothing any time soon. I’ll stick to only one Swatch watch and a couple of jelly bracelets at a time for now.

By the way, I can still sing you the theme song to the Greatest American Hero if you want me to. “Believe it or not I’m walkin’ on air, I never thought I could feel so free…. Believe it or not, it’s just me!”

It's Just a Number...

Happy Birthday to me! It’s my birthday today and I have no shame in telling the world that.

I think I may be breaking some female code telling people my age, but I’m 32 today. I don’t really understand why some women feel so ashamed to tell others how old they are or why the they feel the need to lie about their age, at least not in this day and age. I relish getting older. Don’t get me wrong, I still wish I had the body I had when I was 22, but I don’t see how lying about my age is going to get me that. Maybe a few more sit-ups would get me closer though.

I’m going to work today and I’m regretting not asking for the day off. I would spend most of the morning on the computer on twitter and FB, and then go shopping for some new jeans (most of my jeans now have holes in them where my thighs rub together).

I hate shopping for new jeans. First of all, I hate they way manufacturers label sizes. I’m a 9 with some brands and a 17 with others. Why can’t those people just standardize on one sizing convention? I wouldn’t care if it said I was a size 23 if it would just remain constant. Okay, I get why. I know some women do care about what size they are; they want to be able to tell people they are a size 6, even if that means the waist size is actually 40 inches.

While we’re on the topic of numbers, I’m 168 pounds right now. Lying or not telling people how much I weigh is not going to make me look any different either. Sure, I don’t like the way I look and I want to loose weight, but that’s not going to stop me from telling people how much I weigh. It’s just a number. I just have to eat less junk food and exercise more.

Okay, maybe when it comes to exercise the number does matter. Doing 10 push ups is probably better than doing 1.

The Book I'm Reading

For the past few weeks I’ve started writing at least a dozen blog posts, but I’ve deleted them all because I thought they were pointless. Then I thought, “Why does it have to have a point?”

I might as well just tell you about the book I’m currently reading. It’s called “Pour Your Heart Into It” by Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks. It’s a story about how Starbucks came to be.

I never thought I would like non-fiction books. I’m more of a Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter kind of girl, but here I am. Lately, I’ve been reading books about large corporations and how they got started, always written by the people that founded them. I want to start my own company one day so I figured this was a good way to find out how other people did it.

It turns out that I'm just as enthralled by these stories as much as the ones about lions, hobbits and wizards. I want to find out what happens next to the main characters and how they overcome the obstacles they face. I get irritated when I have to go to work because I have to put the book down.

The next two books I’m going to read arrived in the mail this week. One is called “Built from Scratch” by Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank, founders of The Home Depot and the other is “Dave’s Way” by Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy’s.

I get most of my books from Amazon.com and almost always used. They’re usually in pretty good condition; some are as good as new. I picked up the Dave Thomas book for a paltry 42 cents. Heck, the shipping ($3.99) cost more than the book.

See, there’s no point at all to this post and I’m fine with it.

Family Dinner

My dad recently got a job in South Carolina and is leaving on Tuesday. He could have retired a long time ago, but I think he gets bored staying at home. It must be nice to work because you want to rather than because you have to.

My sister wanted to have dinner as a family before he left so Randy and I went over to the house. As usual, she and Chatchi prepared a mini feast: steak, crab, and clams.

I’m still not used to eating together as a family. We never did that sort of thing when I was growing up. The fact that my dad and I are still estranged just added to awkwardness.

My sister has been trying for 10 years to get my dad and me to get along again. She has made some progress. She’s gotten me to say hi to my dad when I go to the house and he actually acknowledges my existence these days.

Last month he spoke to me for the first time in 13 years. I had gone to the house without Randy for the first time in a long time. My dad walked up to me and asked where Randy was. I was so caught off guard by the question it took me a couple of seconds to realize he was actually talking to me. I told him that Randy was still at work and he would be by later. We stood next to each other in silence for a moment while I tried to think of something else to say to him. I was drawing a blank. After a few more seconds of the awkward silence he walked away and we haven’t spoken since.

After dinner my dad went about the process of opening up a durian for us to eat. I was still in the documenting mood so I got up to take pictures of my dad prying open the spiky fruit. It was the first time I’ve ever taken a picture of my dad. He never said a word or looked at me while I snapped away, but it still felt like the most intimate moment we've shared in 25 years.

I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to the way we were, but I am content with where we are.

NOTE: all photos were shot and edited on my iPhone with the Photoshop ap.

It IS the camera

As photographers we talk about gear A LOT. We throw out combinations of letters and numbers that sound like gibberish to the untrained ear. “I just picked up a 28-300 3.5-5.6L,” or “Is that an EF or EF-S?” and “Are you getting the D3x or the 1Ds Mark III?”

Inevitably someone always says, “It’s not about the camera, it’s about the photographer.” Every time I hear that, I cringe (and I occasionally want to whack that person upside the head). It’s just not that simple.

My nephew, a rather successful photojournalist, said the dreaded, “It’s not about the camera, it’s about the photographer,” line to me once after hearing me rant about wanting a better camera. Okay, sure, he could out-shoot me any day of the week no matter what camera we each had, but I still think gear plays a very important role in image making. It’s not like you see all the pros on the sidelines at a Super Bowl with a pink Sony ultra-slim Cyber-Shot or a Nikon Coolpix.

I’ve seen beautiful pictures shot with a cell phone camera and I’ve seen horrible images taken with expensive SLRs, even with all the nice lenses. Sure the photographer’s eye plays a huge roll in picture making, but having the right gear in the right hands offers a large degree of control over the outcome of the photograph. There are some photos that would be downright difficult to shoot without the option to choose your focal length, your f-stop and shutter speed. Even the glass inside the lens gives a noticeable difference in image quality.

Okay, even I think that 45 autofocus points are overkill, but I could use camera that had an ISO range of 50 – 25600. I may never fully utilize the 63-zone TTL full aperture metering, but I’d be pleased as punch to have up to 5 custom white balance settings. So please, please, don’t tell me it’s not about the camera anymore, because sometimes it is.

JP's visit

This weekend my friend JP came to visit from New York. He wanted to get away from the cold weather for a while.

We already did the touristy thing the last time he came to visit. This time I wanted to do something a little bit more ‘local.’ I struggled for a few weeks to figure out where I could take him. What did SoCal have to offer that New York didn’t? In the end I decided to take him to one of my favorite spots, Ports O’ Call in San Pedro.

My parents used to take the family to Ports O’ Call when I was little. We would buy some seafood and head up the coast to White Point Beach for lunch. The Port of Los Angeles is the largest working port in the United States. Often, cargo ships would go in and out of the harbor as I ate my lunch. Sometimes I would even wave to passengers on the cruise liners as they went by (usually when Randy wasn’t around because he gets embarrassed when I do that).

My first order of business was to choose a live Dungeness crab for lunch. Vendors around the market place will cook up any of the seafood you buy there. The next stop was for, what I like to call, “tray o’ shrimp”. I can never resist getting it! The shrimp fajitas come with corn tortillas, several lemons, and salsa, but I usually get a side of garlic bread too. To top off the meal JP and I got some Coronas while Randy had a strawberry smoothie served in a pineapple.

After lunch I mentioned that I normally have a frozen banana for dessert. To my horror JP said he never heard of it before. I had to remedy that situation right away! For those of you who don’t know what that is, it’s a frozen banana on a stick, hand dipped in chocolate and rolled in chopped peanuts. Yup, he seemed to enjoy it.

After San Pedro we went up to LA for some Thai desserts at Baan Kanom Thai. They have all types of sweets like “kanom buang” and “sai mai”, stuff you normally have a hard time finding outside of Thailand.

Since we were so close, we decided to go to Grauman’s Chinese Theater. I’ve only been there twice, even though I grew up here; the last time was when my friend Kat was visiting. We looked at the footprints in the cement and walked down the Hollywood Walk of Fame to see the Kodak Theater where the Academy Awards are now held. Shortly after that it was time to say goodbye.

I can’t believe we’ve known each other for almost 20 years now.

I already miss JP.

Glue Gun Fun

I bought my first glue gun last week. It’s not the first time I’ve wielded one, it’s merely the first one I’ve ever owned.

I’ve been wanting to “bling” out my camera strap and camera bag for sometime. My friend Craig calls it my "need to bedazzle." My friends know I'm a sucker anything shiny. Heck, I'd hot glue rhinestones to my car if I had enough money to do it. If it's good enough for Liberace, it's good enough for me. Sure it's gaudy, but luckily I stopped caring what people thought about this part of my personality a while ago. I like a little flare in my life.

I’m not done yet, but I wanted to show you what I’ve done so far. So excited!

I am a photographer by default

I am a photographer. The problem with telling people that is that they seem to think that I take pictures for a living. I don’t.

Sure, photography is what I’m trained to do. Every job I’ve had and the past 12 years of my education has revolved around photography. I honestly don’t know how to do anything else. I doubt I have the skills to get a clerical job and I think they would even fire me for being incompetent at McDonalds. Photography is my life – by default.

I never intended to enter this field. I just liked to take pictures – with no intent to make money from it. It was only after being immersed in it for a while that it occurred to me that I could make money from it.

Seriously, the thought of taking pictures for a living makes me nauseous. Don’t take this to mean that I think of myself as an artist – far from it. Calling myself an artist feels just as wrong as calling myself a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist.

I don’t know what I am. I just know that I’m not that easily labeled. I like to write, but I don’t want to be a writer; I like to create. Then, of course, it occurs to me that I don’t need to be labeled as anything at all. I’ll just do the things I like to do and that’s enough.

Cypress College Bookstore Food

OK, OK. I get it, you’re tired of looking at that blog post of Randy’s finger. I’ve heard from 4 people already that I need to update my blog. Frankly, I’m surprised that there are even four people reading my blog!

Let’s talk about food then – it’s always one of my favorite topics.

Lately, I’ve been buying my food from the Cypress College Bookstore (they’ve been making a small fortune from me) rather than the food service place in the Student Center or places off campus. Yes, it’s pre-packaged food, but I’m telling you that the food from the bookstore tastes better than the stuff they prepare at the food service place, it’s less expensive, and the people in the bookstore are way nicer! My peeps in the bookstore take very good care of me.

I’d like to give a shout out to my homies, The Bookstore Crew! Holla! (I know, I know, I’m not supposed say “Holla!” ever again, but I couldn’t resist.)

Breakfast: Lisa’s Natural Gourmet blueberry and peach yogurt parfait with crunchy granola toppings.

Lunch: Cajun Chicken Sandwich on Pita Bread with aioli sauce, a bag of sour cream and onion Lay’s, and a cherry Dr. Pepper. Oh Yum!

Afternoon Snack: Kosher Couscous Salad with green onions, parsley, bell peppers, tomatoes, olive oil, marinara sauce, and some spices (that is if I can beat a certain buddy of mine to it first).

***An honorable mention goes out to the chicken salad sandwich. It’s also very good.

Randy's Hand Surgery

Good news, the surgery on Randy’s hand went well. He still has all 5 fingers.

Part of the pinky on Randy’s right hand was swollen. He’s not sure what caused it, but thinks a splinter he got in his finger at work a while back might have caused it. After living with it for some time Randy finally asked his doctor about it and his doctor recommended the surgery after seeing an x-ray of the hand. There was no splinter, but something was definitely there that shouldn’t be.

I went with him to Kaiser in case he wouldn’t be able to drive home. I was thoroughly impressed; it was unlike any doctor’s visit I’ve ever been to. It reminded me of checking into a hotel more than anything. Their system seemed to be organized and efficient. We were in and out so quickly I barely had time to enjoy their oh so comfortable waiting room. I even brought two books and a fully charged iPhone in case it took a while. I’m not sure why I had such a bad impression of Kaiser before. It was great!

Anyway, Randy’s hand is out of commission for a few weeks so he’ll be staying home from work until at least the end of the month. He’s doing quite well despite not being able to use his right hand. The anesthesia wore off around 8pm and he started experiencing some pain, but his spirits are pretty high with the thought of getting to take two weeks off of work.

We’ll see how things go over the next few days when he has to take a shower or do just about anything he normally does with his right hand. Somehow, I have a feeling he’ll be able to use the remote control just fine with his left hand.

Beyond Chubby

I’m in shape. Round is a shape.

Over the past 3 or 4 years my metabolism has decided that it’s worked hard enough and it’s going into retirement. I’m now 175 pounds (down from my high of 180).

Needless to say, I’d like to be in better shape than I am now, ideally about 130 lbs. A major part of the reason I want to get in better shape is vanity. I just don’t like the way I look. My belly shouldn’t stick out farther than my boobs, I’m just sayin’.

The other part is because I’m sick and tired of not being able to move the way I used to. I have a hard time tying my shoelaces or clipping my toenails. They’re hard for me to reach because every time I bend over my belly prevents me from going to far.

For those of you that don’t know me that well, I hate shopping for clothes. I’m still wearing some of the clothes I wore back in high school (much to the disapproval of some of my friends). I hardly have clothes that fit me anymore and if I don’t lose weight, I’ll have to go shopping soon. Eeek!

I’m going back to Thailand this June to visit family and friends and I just don’t want them to see me fat. I want to look good. The last time I saw my mom 10 years ago (too long, I know) she said I looked like a water buffalo – and I was only 130 pounds at the time!

Anyhow, this is me now. Luckily, I don’t have issues sharing unflattering pictures of me on the Internet for the entire world to see. It’ll just make the before and after pictures more dramatic. My goal is to loose two pounds a week until the end of June. If I do, that’ll put me at my goal weight of 130 pounds. Wish me luck.

Yet Another Party

My sister is having a birthday party for Chatchi at the house tomorrow and the food prep begins tonight. Chatchi and my sister are cooking machines! I’m not sure how many people are invited, but by the looks of it there should be enough to feed about 200 people. Knowing that, I’m guessing there are going to be about 30 people or so showing up.

Grammar, pronunciation, and style! Oh my!

A few days ago I was initiated into a group of people who write to each other in order to gripe about the pet peeves they harbor about grammatical, pronunciation, and spelling errors that others make. This happened after I tweeted about how one of my pet peeves is when people pronounce the word “accurate” as “ak-red” instead of “ak-yur-it.” I find it ironic that someone who talks about accuracy can’t pronounce the word accurately.

Ever since I joined the group I’ve been afraid to write anything in fear of publicly committing some (or many) grammatical faux pas; I feel the need to reference dictionaries and style guides before I send out an e-mail, let alone post something on my blog.

There are socially accepted conventions to how we should write and we begin learning these formal standards in elementary school. We’re inundated with rules such as: avoid run-on sentences, avoid dangling participles, and never split an infinitive. What was an infinitive again? Or, for that matter, what the heck is a dangling participle? Yes, my mind just went into the gutter with that last question.

I still don’t know when to use “who” and when to use “whom” or if I’m using a dash, en-dash, and em-dash correctly. I may never figure out when to use a semi-colon instead of a comma. Do I overuse quotation marks? William Faulkner and James Joyce got away with using run-on sentences, why can’t I? Can fragmented sentences be used for rhetorical effect?

There are a few blogs I read from time to time because I know the people that write them. Their writing style makes me cringe. I’ve grown accustomed to those rules for how we should write and deviation from those norms makes their writing tedious to read.

My two favorite blogs are by Max Gerber and Anthony Bourdain. Neither strictly follow the formal rules of writing, but there’s something about the way they write that gives me a sense of pleasure. I can see, hear, and taste the things they write about. I feel what they feel.

Where is that line between bad English and an effective writing style?

Wasn’t one of those aforementioned rules to not have a paragraph consist of only one sentence?

Yes, I make judgments about a person’s credibility by the way they write and I don’t think I’m alone. An article released by The Latimer Group, states, “We all want to be thought of as intelligent. We all want credibility. We all want to be taken seriously. And one of the best ways to do that is to express ourselves clearly and articulately…. The importance of verbal expression, and the way it affects public perception, is crucial for success and has never been more important than it is today.”

I can’t always pinpoint what criteria I use to judge what bad writing is, I just know that I wince when I read it. I expect people to make mistakes from time to time and that’s okay with me, but when someone deviates from the norms of communication that I’ve come to expect, I question what other knowledge they lack – what else do they not know how to do, I question their credibility and ultimately their intelligence.

I strive to avoid those communication fumbles, but I know I still have a long way to go before I can communicate effectively. I toy with different styles and the manner in which I write depends not only on the context of the writing but also my mood. Sometimes I’m feeling serious so I’ll write in a more formal style; sometimes I’m feeling playful so I’ll use more colloquial phrases. Anyhow, please, please, please be patient with me as I try to figure all this stuff out. Correct me when I’m wrong and suggest (as delicately as possible – my ego is easily bruised) how I can improve my writing. Please.

Happy Birthday Andrea

A few weeks ago I got a message on Facebook inviting me to a surprise birthday party for my friend Andrea. Of course I was going to go!

As the day of the party drew near, I realized that Randy wouldn’t be able to go with me because of work. I knew I was going to the party no matter what, but there was a part of me that didn’t want to go to a party alone. Well, yes, I would know Andrea, but I knew she would be busy talking to all the other guests, and I didn’t know if I was going to be stuck alone in a corner for most of the party. In a last ditch effort, I called up my friend Tanin, someone I knew from RIS (the high school I went to) and invited him to be my date, my wingman, at the party.

Tanin and I hadn’t seen each other since he graduated RIS back in 1995, but thanks to Facebook, we reconnected a few months back. I figured this party was a great excuse to see him again AND I wouldn’t have to be alone.

So, this was my first surprise party. All the guests arrived sometime before 6:00pm, when Andrea and her husband Michael were due back home. The text message came telling us they were on their way back. The lights went off and we all got into position. For the next 7 minutes all I heard was “sssssshhhhhh……ssssssshhhhhhh!” Everyone tried to get everyone else to be quiet. Oh damn! Her dogs were outside and barking! Were her dogs supposed to be outside? Would she notice? Nope! SURPRISE!!!! Success! She didn’t suspect a thing.

I met Carol, Andrea’s best from RIS at the party. She remembered me, but I didn’t remember her. That’s always an awkward situation, but it quickly passed as we chatted about our days back at RIS. Yes, we both loved going to school and we both loved the cafeteria food.

As Andrea greeted her other guests Tanin and I snuck out to the back yard (where the smokers were). We caught each other up on our lives since RIS and it was great remembering old times.

I also met Michael’s grandmother. Normally, I feel the need to be prim and proper around anyone’s grandmother in general, but something about this woman who sat outside chain smoking with us made me feel… comfortable. I could be my semi-crude self and she would just chuckle along with us. I could never imagine either of my grandmothers ever being like that. For a moment, I was envious.

I met all of Andrea’s friends and family and I have to say, everyone was, well… cool. Normally there is the one weird person in every group. Since I couldn’t spot one among them, deduction meant the strange one was me.

Cake time came and oh, it was it beautiful! Andrea beamed at the cake her husband picked out and her friends singing happy birthday to her. Tears welled up in my eyes as I saw how happy she was. It was a perfect moment.

After Andrea opened her gifts we all helped clean up the house and got to know each other even more. Michael told me how they loved photography and talked to me about art. Andrea danced for us in her living room. Yup, she still has her moves. The night ended and I didn’t want it to. I loved these people. I hugged Andrea and Michael gave me a parting bottle of wine. I loved these people even more. We agreed we would have to see each other more and hugged again. Fantastic night with old friends.

Happy Birthday Andrea!

New Year's Dinner

My sister invited Randy and me over to the house to have a New Year’s dinner. As always it was a fabulous meal. I was stuffed silly.

Lobster, steak, and Dungeness crab, oh my!

Normally I avoid the whole Dungeness crab because it’s a pain in the butt to get the meat out, but I was feeling daring today and dug in, ripping off legs and breaking them open. It was my first time. Normally I give my sister or Randy puppy dog eyes until they dig out the meat for me. I don’t know why, but crab always tastes better when you have to get the meat out yourself.

Thanks to my sis and Chatchi for making a fab dinner as always.

Happy New Year!!!

Happy New Year! Welcome to a new year as well as a new decade!

Truth be told, I wasn’t all that into celebrating the New Year this time. I would have rather sat home in front of the computer with my headphones on, sifting through images from 2009. But off to celebrate I did.

The family partied at the A Boys’ newly remolded house this year. As usual, there was a ton of people and nearly as much food. In the end, I’m glad I went. It was nice to be with family and friends.

I have high hopes for 2010. 2009 was a difficult year as learned to balance a social and family life with work, school, and dealing with the death of two very close friends.

I’m not making any resolutions this year. I was never a big fan of them, but that doesn’t mean I don’t plan on some changes in my life. As some of you may know, I’m nearly obsessive about cleaning and organizing. I’m a happy camper if I could just have my pine sol and pledge. A lot of my frustration in 2009 came from disorganization, which is why I spent so much time cleaning. I plan on being more organized so that I can have more time to do the things I want to do.

I hope that 2010 will bring you whatever makes you happy, be it an organized life, or just one in which you find contentment with the things you have.

Here’s to a new year and a fresh start… again! May friendships and days of auld lang syne be remembered. Surely you’ll buy your pint and surely I’ll buy mine.

Note to self: drink less beer, shoot at a higher ISO, and squeeze the shutter.

Phillip Stewart Charis

For as long as I can remember my parents have had these two portraits of themselves hanging in our house. My father kept them lit under spotlights in our living room. Over the years I’ve watch them slowly fade the way old photographs do. Faded as they were, there was something that had timeless, elegant, and yes, a certain dignity about them. I figured the portraits were at least 25 years old and there was little to suggest that those photographs were shot in the 70s or 80s, except for my father’s glasses that may have hinted at the decade. There was something about them that looked liked they could have been created yesterday.

It occurred to me a few years ago that I should try to figure out who took the shots to see if I could get reprints. I had hoped there might be a label on the back indicating who the photographer was. This Christmas I noticed that they had been moved from their usual location to a place I could actually get to. I looked at the back... nothing. I was a little disappointed, but that was pretty much what I thought I would find anyway.

The pictures had faded so much that it became obvious where the image had been retouched since the pigments they used hadn't faded nearly as much as the photographs themselves. Back in the day, before I discovered Photoshop, I did my retouching with paints and pigments too, but that was almost 10 years ago. I stood there and noticed where some of the pigments were applied with a paint brush and saw the areas where an air brush was used. I was studying the technique. The area around the sleeves of my father's jacket and the area around my mother's hair had been painted in with a brush. An air brush was used to darken the right side of the image. I imagine it was a vignetting technique. My eyes followed the line made by the airbrush all the way to bottom right-side of the portrait and it was there that I noticed a faint signature. "Charis ©1979". I looked closer. Event fainter: "Phillip". I couldn't make out the middle name, but I hoped I had enough.

I grabbed my iPhone and typed it in. The first entry on the list: "Charis Portraiture - Phillip Stewart Charis". Wow, that was easy. Had I thought about it longer I would have had little hope that a photographer working 30 years ago would still be working today and have a web site, but there it was.

Today, I called the number listed on the site. I told them that I believed that Mr. Charis had photographed my parents back in 1979 and asked if they might still have the negatives and if it was possible to get reprints. The person on the phone, a very kind sounding woman, said that it was very likely that they still had the negatives and should the negatives be found, it’s still possible to get reprints. She also told me that at 92, Mr. Charis is still alive and working.

Charis’s site described him as a master of photography. Was it true or was it just another photographer tooting his own horn? I decided to google Mr. Charis. Perhaps he wasn’t tooting his own horn after all. He was given a five-minute standing ovation as he stood to speak at the Professional Photographers of America (PPA) annual convention, Imaging USA in 2006, Epson features Mr. Charis’s work on their site, and he was written about in the Los Angeles Times. Some of the people he’s photographed include Nancy Reagan, Joan Collins, Henry Mancini, Michael Landon, and Engelbert Humperdinck

I wonder what kind of photographer he was back in 1979. Was he as renowned then as he is now? How did my parents who had only immigrated from Thailand a few years before find him.

I called his studio again, this time to ask how much a commissioned shot would cost. Prints start at 16x20 and cost upwards of a thousand dollars. Somehow I wasn’t surprised. Maybe, one day, I’ll sit for him too.