STL

I'm tryin to get in the grove again but the last 3 days have been chaotic and impossible...it seems like I'm not getting anything done today PLUS little man doesn't want to nap so yeah...so much for me time!

I helped my "friend" move her stuff back home after 3 years with that ass I mentioned in a previous post.  What a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnng 2 days.  I got up at 4am on Saturday morning and headed for St. Louis for what would be a turn & burn trip.

I want to start off by pointing out what a truck driver's wife I am.  The smaller the trailer, the harder it is to back as a general rule.  This one is no exception.  But I rocked it out :)

This is what 4:30 am looked like to me.  A little shaky, a little blurry, a LOT of Mt. Dew and this damn GPS that my husband insisted I take with me.  Here's the thing about GPS...while it's totally dope to have that map in your face...I HATE that every time I look up at it I end up saying "DAMN IT!  I've only gone 2 more miles since the last time I looked!"

I'm a huge fan of looking at a map, knowing my route, and just going.  I was amazed how late it stayed dark.  The following morning was the day we set the clocks back, so timing was just right for me to have a 3 hour ride in the dark.  I do have to admit that the photographer in me loves the velvety blue color that everything gets just before sunrise during the fall and winter.

Once I had consumed 3 Mt. Dews and a bottle of tea, it was time for a pit stop.  I was thrilled to see that some truck stops keep their restaurants open 24 hours a day!  Did I get Subway at 6am?  No, but it's good to know that I have that option in the future.  Never know when you will need Subway at 6am!  

I also got a kick out of the pole cars.  What's a pole car?  Well obviously you guys don't work in the trucking industry!  A pole car (as seen below) is a car with a giant pole attached to it.  Yes, I'm serious.  They drive before and or after wide and oversized loads (in Illinois, any load wider than 14'1" or taller than 14'6" require an escort vehicle such as a pole car).  The pole is only attached if they are escorting a very tall load, they set the height to the height of the load the truck is hauling and if their pole hits a bridge, they know the load won't make it under that bridge at which point they're all pretty much screwed.  Since oversize loads are not allowed to haul at night unless they have a very specialized and very expensive permit, I would assume these guys were heading toward a job.  Also, they had cartoon drawings of windmills on them, which leads me to believe they work exclusively with the wind farms out here.  I know, I'm a freakin genius!

I did not take my camera so forgive the crappy nature of my Blackberry photos.  As I continued along, the sun finally came up.  This was somewhere into CD #5 I believe...Tool.  Funny watching a sunrise and hearing "I'm praying for mayhem, I'm praying for tidal waves...".  I couldn't have asked for a prettier sunrise or for better timing, the dark was getting to me and making me wish I was back in bed; which would essentially be my sentiments the rest of the day.

 I like the blurry one below.  It's not blurry, it's 'soft focus'.

 Truck in the sunrise for my husband :)

Just as the sun crested I came into Springfield.  Springfield, Where?  I can't tell you what state it is!  But what I can tell you is that Springfield is a dirty icky polluting town and it sucks.  We should put a dome over it.

It's ok, because apparently there is little if any brains being used in the town of Springfield which I realized as I came upon this guy below.  It's 28 freakin degrees out and he's on...well a Vespa.  Brain dead sign #1.  Brain dead sign #2 was that he was doing 65mph on a Vespa with no helmet.  Now, I'm not someone who believes helmets should be required.  I actually do not and will not wear a helmet when riding horses, motorcycles or other such things, but a Vespa?  At those speeds?  I didn't even know the gerbils running the wheels in the motor could go that fast!  Something about this just screamed DANGER!  Then him weaving in and out of traffic turned that to, "DANGER, IDIOT!"

I'm not entirely sure that it's healthy to drink something that is radioactive blue in color, but by this point in the trip I was on at least bottle #5.

Ah St. Louis.  I hate you.  Land of psychotic drivers, the most ridiculous road system ever, horrible traffic, insane lane shut downs and of course, East St. Louis which is essentially one of the 5 armpits of the United States.  Yes.  We have 5. The entirety of the states of Oklahoma, Missouri, and Arkansas are some of the others.

The 'Gateway to the West'.  A giant arch in the sky.  Too bad it wasn't 2 arches, and golden rather than steel. I was starving by this point.

A little known fact about Missouri is, that it is so fucked up as a state...that it even confuses alien visitors.  Here you can see that in a state of utter chaos and confusion, ET accidentally left his crop circle on the side of a building!

 I had to throw this next one in because...well because.

Upon arrival I found that there were 3 issues.

1.  My friend as a basket case and purt-near worthless in the packing and hauling field.

2.  The furniture was filthy and too big to fit easily down the stairs.

3.  There was no one else there to help except the guy she was breaking up with...I had to move big heavy furniture.

By the time we got stuff downstairs and to the trailer I was so aggravated that I said F it and just started stuffing things in.  This was not a professional moving job, I was losing my ability to give a shit very rapidly.  Everything made it in one piece without being damaged so apparently it worked.

We literally stuffed the trailer and my SUV to the gills.  That vacuum hose is holding the cat scratching post in!

On the way home I was stoked to see my pink elephant!  The 1st trip my mom made with me to Mississip we stopped in Hayti, MO at a gas station that had 2 huge pink elephants.  Upon our next trip we were sad to see they were no longer there.  They had been moved to an antique shop further north in MO.  Sure as shit, I found them along with a giant man (standing behind the giant ice cream cone) and a ton of other wicked shit.  I HAVE TO go back to this place and check out all they have some day!

It was also around this point in the trip when the cats I was transporting decided it was potty time...or their owner did.  We hit a gas station and I went in to use the facilities.  When I returned to my car, the cats were being moved to a larger cat carrier one at a time so they could use a box.  The box, had litter that I would bet was at least a month old and smelled worse than anything I had smelled in my life.  The funny thing was, my friend who was sitting in the car with all the windows down begging the cats to pee, was doing something like this:

"Kitty, would you *BLEHHH*  please please go *BLEHHH* potty!  Please  *BLEHHH* go potty!"
Yeah, she was borderline horking when I returned to the car.  Me being smarter and less concerned for her cat's urinary tract health than she was, stood outside of the car while this gross display of obsessive pet ownership went on.  The more she made horking noises, the harder I laughed.  The harder I laughed the more she yelled "It's not funny!" which again, only made me laugh harder.  The people fueling up next to our car were looking at us like we were on drugs which like the former and latter, only resulted in my maniacal laughter getting worse as tears began to roll down my face.  To make matters even worse, she was now done with the cat peeing, and had attempted to back into the front seat and in the process had gotten her leg completely stuck, fallen backwards, and had the litter box resting on her chest right in her face.  She was yelling "Abby!  Help me!  I'm stuck!  Take the litter box!"
Which was met with me saying (while laughing), "Fuck you!  You take the litter box!  I'm not touching that thing!"  By the time she got out of the car, tossed the entire box in the garbage and walked into the gas station, still making horking noises, I had calmed down and the smell in the car had gone mostly back to  normal.  I don't think I've laughed that hard since right after I had my baby boy.

After what seemed like the longest 5 hour drive of my life...make that 6 hours after all the stops we had to make...the sun started to set and I was almost home.  That didn't mean my job was over.

The next day I had to take the trailer and junk enclosed in it another hour east to drop it off.  After offloading, I decided to make use of the trailer to get my stuff that was still housed at my parents house.  The long weekend was winding down.  I worked my way back to the sticks staring into some sun dogs and once home had some fun digging through old treasures.  

 

I will save my treasures for another day.  I just figured I would share with you all my journey which kept me from family and blogging for 2 days.  Fear not, I have returned!

HOLY FRICKUS

Today was one of the longest days of my life, but guess what, I took pics!  Lots of stories and cool shit to come tomorrow :)

It's not like it is in the movies!!

When I walked through the door of the ER at my fastest pace possible with 3 little ducklings trailing and one in my arms last night I expected to feverishly yell "My 11 month old is having an allergic reaction" and get a response like this:

Or like this:

Or even this:

But it was more like this:

Well honestly, there was a waiting room full of people but the 2 people behind the desk and the slew of nurses flowing out of the back room chit chatting it up with the front desk guys were less than interested in my emergency.  I walked back out the door, looked up and came back in and said "Uhhhhhhh...this is the EMERGENCY room right?  Cuz I'm having a fucking emergency!"

Apparently a massive and rapidly spreading rash is not a big deal as long as your baby is still being cute and flirting with the female docs.  When I say rapidly spreading, I mean from only in the diaper region to his entire chest, back, legs and most of his arms and cheeks within 20 minutes.

There is a SLIGHT chance I might have walked into this place with a chip on my shoulder, seeing as how I've had 2 bad experiences there and have only been to the hospital...uhm...2 times.  Yeah.  Not a great track record with me.

The 1st time, I was having an anaphylactic reaction and my doc called ahead to tell the ER I was on my way with chest pains and difficulty breathing.  After letting me sit for 5 hours (until my pulse ox came back up to normal) the ER doc tells me he thinks I have a rib out of alignment and that's why my chest hurt.  Uhm...what would make you think that?  They didn't do any xrays or anything like that!  Then gives me a chiropractor's phone number and a script for Vicodin!  :headdesk:

The 2nd time, I suddenly popped up with a rash while pregnant and the doc said to go get checked out to make sure it wasn't PUPPS (super itchy belly rash for those of you who've never been pregnant).  While I'm there, and 16 weeks pregnant, the nurse was having trouble finding little man's heart beat on the doppler.  I ask her to see if someone else can find it.

She leaves.  Then she comes back in the room 10 minutes later and says, "The doc says that what you have is just contact dermatitis so that wouldn't effect the baby anyway and there's no one else available to do a doppler right now."  I go pregnant woman postal and flip my lid  because only a few months earlier I had lost a little belly bean at 10 weeks.  I tell the woman to go get another person to do the doppler.  She leaves, another nurse comes back.

This nurse tells me there is no one from labor and delivery available to come down to do a doppler.  WHAT?  I say, "I have a doppler at home!  Give me the fucking thing!  I'll do it myself!"  Of course no no no, that's hospital equipment and blah blah policy blah blah.  So I say, "Fine, I have good insurance, you have given me reason to suspect I may have miscarried, take me for an ultrasound."  Of course that didn't happen either.  What did happen was me being gently walked out of the hospital by a very nice security guard while cussing openly about how incompetent they are.  I got home and got the Moose beat on the monitor right away.  Go figure, I was right, totally incompetent ER staff that night and a GQ wanna be doc who was more worried about his hair and fake bake orange tan than making sure my  baby was still ok.  Fucker.

So when my son's pediatrician said last night to get him to an urgent care facility and not to drive the 45 minutes to my ER of choice (they know me so well...) I had no choice but to swallow my pride and take him to the hospital who's reputation is good with the media (thanks to the NIU shooter) but not so good with locals.  I know one woman who says she "wouldn't take her dog there to die"!

I walk in and get no  only  and what I was really hoping for was a little bit o' but instead I got to sit in the waiting room trying to explain to my 3 healthy kids that NO, THIS   (Adult Swim, for those of you without a pulse) is not really cartoons for kids because the 2 male nurses sitting at the reception desk were so busy dishing about Grey's Anatomy that they didn't have time to be bothered with changing the channel or finding us a God damn triage nurse to check us in.  They did however have time to comment that my son looked "just fine".  OH GOOD!  The flunky who has to work reception because he didn't make the 'doctor cut' thinks he LOOKS fine so we have nothing to worry about.

After a nice long hour of waiting, whining, and spending a small fortune on Gatorade because the kids were parched (that's what happens after bedtime...the gremlins need water) they finally found a room for us.  Of course, by this time my husband had made it there...thankfully the whole herd didn't have to hang at the hospital any longer.  It would be my luck that I'd have to make a 9pm ER trip the one and only night in the last 2 months that my husband has to work late.  That's my life.

So as it turns out, my poor little guy had a reaction to his meds (duh, we already covered that) but this type of reaction is kind of weird.  It was a yeast reaction...not a  yeast infection...a yeast reaction.  So we have ointments and new meds and Benadril and extra baths.  We've been having the joy of free-ballin time because the rash is worst near his bum & junk because the meds were also kind enough to turn his pee so acidic that in the 1 hour between his normal diaper changes-it burned his skin (also a reaction from the meds but somewhat more rare).  And what this all adds up to is a really long last 24 hours.

My personal favorite part was when the little guy pooped on the floor and before I could get across the room, began Van Gogh-ing with it in a Starry Night sort of swirly sky fashion.  I yelled at my sister on the phone "I gotta go, Moose is playing with poo!"  Poo?  Who says that, I mean other than Elliott on Scrubs?!?  I'm not sure what was worse, him pooing on the floor, playing with it, me getting it all over my shirt (which by the way, I totally didn't notice for like an hour), or the fact that while I was bathing him in the kitchen sink, the dog licked said impressionist poo painting up completely.  Gag!

I'm so looking forward to the remainder of this evening.  Perhaps we can avoid any more pee or poo mishaps...probably not.  In the mean time I have my Clorox Clean-Up and paper towels locked and loaded.
A special thank you to my dog for for me but I got this covered!

:( *Sad face*

Sorry there was no post yesterday!  My baby boy and I are both sick and we had a rough go of it yesterday...ended up in the ER last night because he had a reaction to his antibiotics.  It runs in the family...long story.  Anyway, rough day-rougher night...but I will get a post up today and one tomorrow, then I'm out Saturday to help my friend who ditched the wife beater move the rest of her stuff home :)

Wannabees...UHG!!

I should totally be editing photos (because that's what REAL photographers do...make sure images look their absolute best before they share them with the public or their clients) but yeah...I'm here.  No worries, clients....I'll get them done today (because that's what GOOD photographers do...produce work quickly for their clients).  Yeah, uhmmm guess what today's blog bitch is about...

Photographers.  Wannabees.  Professionalism.  Consider it a 21st CDG 'How To' and 'How NOT To' and again...'How To'.  You'll see...

So for starters just to put to bed any idea that I'm  not qualified to vent rant  bitch moan and or blog about this subject, here are my credentials.

I began taking photography classes in 1st grade.  No I'm not joking.

I took photography for 3 years in high school.

I have a Bachelor's Degree in Documentary Photography from Columbia College Chicago.
No that is not a normal degree that they offer, I'm old enough have gone there back when you were allowed to apply for the right to earn a specialized degree and do extra time and extra work to earn said degree.  That is exactly what I did.  A few tweeks to my requirements and a whole extra semester concentrating on documentary work and my Photography degree magically poof'd itself into a Documentary Photography degree.  I have a separate minor concentration but it's not in the photo field so I will let that go for today.

I have studied under photographers from National Geographic, Time, Conde Nast, Life, The Chicago Sun Times, The New York Times and more.  I have studied under some of the greatest photographers ever including;  Chris Rainier, Rick Sammon , and John White.

I have traveled the US and parts of Africa photographing.

I have been published multiple times.

I have one documentary photography book out and another on the way.

I have owned and operated a photography business since 1998 and learned the hard way sometimes and the easy way sometimes but the business is prospering and growing.

I won a Best of Photography award in 2000 from Serbin Publications.

I pretty much kick ass.

Now that I'm done tooting my own horn, here's my ventastic post.

Naked Babies!!

Ok not really.
I was totally going to blog about my day and my frustration with house purchases, but then one of my good friends sent me this link and now I feel compelled to blog about this:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39899002/ns/health-kids_and_parenting/

1st off, on behalf of MSNBC I would like to apologize to everyone for the 16-year-old-cheerleader big bubbly font they posted that in.  I kept wanting to flip my hair and say "Like, Whatever!!!" as I read that.

For starters...this has been an ongoing issue over the last few decades.  Our parents (if you're my age or older) had naked pics of us out the wazoo and never once were they suspected of doing anything wrong.  As a photographer, I hate that #1 there is such a stigma attached to naked baby/kid photos and #2 that some people are idiots and can't tell the difference between an appropriate photograph and one that crosses that line, even if that line has changed some in recent years.  As a former photolab manager, I also know that there are limits to what you can be prosecuted for, and that line is not something I would ever consider crossing when photographing my children or anyone else's.

I guess for starters, I think it should go without saying that your child's junk (be it girl junk or boy junk) should NOT be in photographs.  While I totally get that photographing your naked child's cute bum may result in other parts slipping into a photo here or there.  Guess what...this is the digital age...if you've got nutter butters in your photo...delete it!  Your little girls girl parts have no business in a family photo album and likewise little boys boy parts.  If they don't belong in a family photo album, they sure as shit don't belong on the internet.  So to that end, keep the photos appropriate and keep your ass out of jail.  Quite simple.

Issue #1 is that the internet is not monitored the way that mom's of cute babies would like it to be and that's a simple fact.  If you have a blog, if you have a website, if you have a facebook/myspace/flickr not locked down to private-yes pedophiles could be looking at your photos...so could serial killers, stalkers, rapists, identity thefts, want me to keep going?  The internet is a blessing and a curse.  You can share your family stories and photographs with your family and friends, and you can also share it with people you don't want to.  You have to be the judge of what you feel is an acceptable level of control of privacy on your sites, your photographs, and the content you place on your sites.

What this article has failed to point out is the fact that a vast majority of pedophiles can get off just by touching a child's toy or clothing.  A photograph of your child in a baseball cap and t-shirt can be just as big a turn on to them as a photograph of your child in a diaper.

As for photographs of your child breezing through your back yard naked, well I don't let my kids outside naked, or near windows naked, or hell...even let them walk around the house naked!  Naked is for birth, baths, and boinking (sorry, that's such a lame term but I was trying to stick with all B words).  That's it.  It's not the 50's, even though some of us wish it was.

Now to me, it's creepy to have a pic of a kid naked in a cop hat.
The artist in me says we cover up because we conform and it's bullshit and we should be more free.
The Christian in me says that we cover up because we are stupid and made ourselves believe it is shameful but it's not...yet we can't overcome that.
The mother in me says that I cover my children to protect them and to teach them what society says is appropriate.
The wife in me says I don't want anyone looking at my husband's junk but me, even if its a childhood pic.

As someone who's had her photographs stalked, copied, and used by other persons (sometimes the same person repeatedly), there is only one thing I can suggest.  Don't put it publicly online if you don't want your worst enemy or worst nightmare of a human being seeing, copying, and using it.

The cops pepper the media with the information they want to, the information that they think the main stream Sally Dick or Joe can handle.  That information gets filtered through the media in the way they want to present it to us to drive their ratings.  The fact is that unless you work with pedophiles you don't know what makes them tick.  If pedophiles are the reason the internet and photos scare you, then keep your babies off public sites.

I can't see myself ever deleting a photograph that I took because I was afraid that someone might find it.  I can't see myself ever stopping the cute baby butt cheek photos that mom's love to have me take when I shoot their newborns.  But I don't post those images online.  Check my business site, my blog, my facebook or flickr and it's easy to see that I respect my subjects.  Yeah.  I shoot baby buns from time to time.  Yeah I have photos of my little man in the bath, of him wrapped just barely in a towel, of him sitting facing away from me with his wrinkly butt cheeks fully exposed.  I guess I just don't see the need for a full frontal photograph of a child ever ever ever.  But if you're a parent who does...then its easy and simple and should go without saying that those images are private and should never touch the world wide web.

And if a pedophile ever drools over one of my photographs, he/she better hope to whatever god they pray to, that I never find out.

Dear God

Ya know that prayer, grant me the whatever to whatever and yadda yadda accept what I can't change.  Yeah.  I'm feelin' it today.

I'm like the poster child for the concept of 'things happen for a reason'.  I honestly believe it.  Everything happens for a reason, you may not see what the reason is for years and years and you may never totally understand it...but there is a plan, or at least a direction that sometimes things get steered in.

We've been in the market for a house for a while.  We out grew my tiny pre-marriage house a long time ago.  Last spring we found this great place.  Not huge but bigger than this house, great interior spaces, perfect for parties (and we're a party family), water access for boating, private neighborhood, room for me to have a separate studio, big enough garage for a man cave.  We laid in bed late at night and made plans for additions and the like.  The place needed work, new carpet, floors needed to be stripped and refinished, kitchen was ancient...the yard-freakin disaster area!  But they say Location Location Location, and man did it have the location!