http://www.skyreid.com Skyler Reid Sun, 12 Feb 2012 02:13:41 +0000 http://www.skyreid.com en http://skyreid.com/Covered-in-Dust-Rites-of-Passage http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Covered-in-Dust-Rites-of-Passage Sun, 12 Feb 2012 02:13:41 +0000 Skyler Reid 1412944 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/P1030271.jpg" border="0" width="505" height="700" width_o="505" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/P1030271_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0318_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="457" width_o="1000" height_o="572" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0318_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0115_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0115_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0147_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0147_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0192_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0192_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0040.jpg" border="0" width="423" height="700" width_o="423" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0040_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0115-2_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0115-2_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0124_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0124_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0218_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0218_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0245.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0245_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0345_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="490" width_o="1000" height_o="613" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0345_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0402_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0402_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0409_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0409_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0417_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0417_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0434.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0434_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0458_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0458_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0487_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0487_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0790_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0790_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0577.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0577_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0625_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="558" width_o="1000" height_o="698" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0625_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0734_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0734_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0746_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0746_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0895_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0895_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0386_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0386_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0565_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0565_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0797_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0797_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0664_1_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0664_1_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0673_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0673_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0693.jpg" border="0" width="442" height="700" width_o="442" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/1412944/DSC_0693_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— On the 25th year of the Burning Man Festival, over 50,000 attendants descended upon the playa for a week of wonder and chaos, debauchery and transcendence, and the constantly churning mass of idiosyncrasies that make up the annual celebration in Black Rock City. http://skyreid.com/Arts http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Arts Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:46:55 +0000 Skyler Reid 825061 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts01_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="505" width_o="800" height_o="505" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts01_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts02_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="565" width_o="800" height_o="565" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts02_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts03_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="532" width_o="800" height_o="532" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts03_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/AMH_1597_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/AMH_1597_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts06_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts06_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts07_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="526" width_o="800" height_o="526" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts07_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts08_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="550" width_o="800" height_o="550" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts08_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts09_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="518" width_o="800" height_o="518" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/arts09_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/_MIN0068_10.jpg" border="0" width="460" height="700" width_o="460" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825061/_MIN0068_10_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— 1. An actor portrays the struggle of immigrants assimilating to South Africa during the performance art piece "Exhile", part of The Spier Performing Arts Festival "Infecting the City 09" in Cape Town, South Africa. 2. Nomfusi and the Lucky Charms performs at a free concert in Cape Town's Green Market Square preceding the 10th annual Cape Town International Jazz Festival. 3. Liam Gallagher (center) of Oasis performs with the band as they headline the 2009 Coca Cola Zero Fest in Cape Town. 4. Leslie West of Mountain performs at San Francisco's Warfield Theater during their 2008 tour with Joe Satriani. 5. The art piece "Epiphany" is engulfed in flames as part of The 9th Annual Fire Arts Festival, organised by Oakland based non-profit The Crucible. 6. Kevin Branes of Of Montreal basks in the spotlight as the band plays to Oakland's Fox Theater. 7. Patty Gallagher takes on the lead role of Winnie in Samuel Beckett's absurdist comedy "Happy Days", performed by Cal Shakes in Orinda's Bruns Ampitheater. 8. Alternative rock band Kinky gets the fans dancing on the opening night of the 2009 Outside Lands Music Festival in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. 9. Tom Jones performs on the opening night of the 2009 Outside Lands Music Festival in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. 10. TV on the Radio's Tunde Adebimbe belts out lyrics during the band's performance at the 2008 Treasure Island Music Festival. http://skyreid.com/Pastor-Joseph http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Pastor-Joseph Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:44:34 +0000 Skyler Reid 858700 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe01_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe01_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe02_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="479" width_o="800" height_o="479" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe02_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe03_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="522" width_o="800" height_o="522" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe03_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe04_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="624" width_o="800" height_o="624" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe04_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="576" width_o="800" height_o="576" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe06_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe06_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe07_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe07_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe08_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="378" width_o="800" height_o="378" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe08_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe09_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="506" width_o="800" height_o="506" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe09_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe10_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe10_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe11_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="467" width_o="800" height_o="467" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe11_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe12_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="582" width_o="800" height_o="582" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe12_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe13_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe13_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe14_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="498" width_o="800" height_o="498" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe14_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe15_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="502" width_o="800" height_o="502" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe15_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe16_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="488" width_o="800" height_o="488" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/858700/Joe16_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— When I first met Pastor Joseph he had just returned from taking a week of vacation; the first time he had taken any time off in over a decade. "Don't you ever do that again," was the greeting given to him by one of the volunteers. Pastor Joseph is the backbone of Life & Community Welfare, an organization which strives to give support and safe haven to some of the most impoverished children in the sprawling Khayelitsha and Elsies River townships in South Africa. Several times a week Pastor Joseph makes the rounds to community markets and large grocery outlets, collecting donations of food which volunteers the prepare for the local youth in the townships. For many of the children, these will be the only full meal they'll have that week. In the eyes of the pastor, this is his mission in life; a mission he takes to proudly. http://skyreid.com/Location http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Location Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:44:26 +0000 Skyler Reid 825058 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location01_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location01_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location02.jpg" border="0" width="491" height="700" width_o="491" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location02_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location03_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location03_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location04_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location04_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/_MIN0007_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="544" width_o="1000" height_o="681" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/_MIN0007_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="518" width_o="800" height_o="518" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location06_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="324" width_o="800" height_o="324" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location06_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location07_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location07_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location08_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="505" width_o="800" height_o="505" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location08_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location10.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825058/location10_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— 1. Trees affected by the 2008 wildfires stand out against a cloudy sky at the Steenbras Catchment in Cape Town. 2. Foliage on the side of Cape Town's Lion's Head Mountain stands out against the edge of Table Mountain. 3. Various community-built shacks sit on pavement outlying the Delft informal settlement near Cape Town. 4. Smoke from fires in Cape Town region's Hottentots Holland Hills and Nuweberg Muntains obscure the sun above the Eikenhof Dam, where homes and properties were threatened by the spreading flames. 5. The emblematic carousel looks out as the sun sets over the second annual Treasure Island Music Festival in the San Francisco Bay. 6. Tourists look across the desert sands to the famed Pyramids of Giza. 7. Old Cairo is viewed from behind the debris of a crumbling wall. 8. Cranes peek out from the fog covering the construction of Cape Town's Green Point Stadium, built for use in the FIFA 2010 World Cup. 9. The Saldahna Steel refinery is visible in the distance after having been temporarily shut down due to the accidental release of a large quantity of molten hot steel. 10. Attendees scale "Minaret", an art piece allowing for 360 degree views of the playa, during Burning Man 2010. http://skyreid.com/People http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/People Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:44:24 +0000 Skyler Reid 825056 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people01_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="800" height_o="531" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people01_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/DSC_2162_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="560" width_o="1000" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/DSC_2162_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people03_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="415" width_o="800" height_o="415" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people03_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people04_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="653" width_o="800" height_o="653" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people04_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="577" width_o="800" height_o="577" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people06_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="550" width_o="800" height_o="550" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people06_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people07_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="542" width_o="800" height_o="542" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people07_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people08_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people08_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people09.jpg" border="0" width="413" height="700" width_o="413" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people09_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people10_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825056/people10_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— 1. Kenny Huang, age 5, dresses as Elmo during San Lorenzo's annual Halloween Carnival, which brought over 250 children parading down Paseo Grande Avenue to the San Lorenzo library. 2. Photographer Anna Hiatt sits in an improvised home studio. 3. Cape Town based rockabilly band Them Tornadoes, made up of Ian Arrow (center), Simon Perry (right), and Matt Ferguson (left), pose for a photo at the Speedway 105 Cafe with Daisy, the bar's dog. 4. A child from Khayelitsha (arguably the largest township in South Africa) eats a small meal, though an abnormally large amount for many children in the impoverished informal settlement, at a soup kitchen run by Pastor Joseph, a pillar to many in the community. 5. African National Congress (ANC) President Jacob Zuma holds a massive campaign event at Khayelitsha stadium, in the Cape Flats region near Cape Town, with tens of thousands of ANC supporters attending. Zuma would go on to win what many consider to be the most contested election since Nelson Mandela took the presidency in 1994. 6. Erik Laubscher, 82, pictured here in his Green Point home, is honorary life president at the Ruth Prowse School of Art and has recently had one of his pieces (Still Life with Mandolin, Sheet Music and Fruit) sold at auction for R1.2 million (approx US $150,000). Laubscher is also editing a book which details his life and the development of South African art since the 1950s. 7. Bijoux Badeawaghi, who was injured during xenophobic attacks, in her family's tent at Blue Waters refugee camp. 8. Karen Thorne is station manager of Cape Town Television, a local community station which maintained steady growth despite a struggling economic climate and other television stations being in major crisis. 9. #25 Brett Johnson, Safety for Cal football, is adjusting from being the "big man on campus" in high school to being less renowned due to the higher caliber of Cal's program. 10. A Burning Man attendee shelters herself from the midday sun with a vibrant rainbow-colored umbrella. http://skyreid.com/Sports http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Sports Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:44:23 +0000 Skyler Reid 825054 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports09_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="548" width_o="800" height_o="548" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports09_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_0049_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="448" width_o="1000" height_o="561" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_0049_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports001.jpg" border="0" width="466" height="700" width_o="466" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports001_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports04_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="545" width_o="800" height_o="545" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports04_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports003.jpg" border="0" width="636" height="700" width_o="636" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports003_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_4126_10.jpg" border="0" width="458" height="700" width_o="458" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_4126_10_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports010.jpg" border="0" width="445" height="700" width_o="445" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports010_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="607" width_o="800" height_o="607" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports007.jpg" border="0" width="559" height="700" width_o="559" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/sports007_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/_CL20143_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="506" width_o="1000" height_o="633" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/_CL20143_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— 1. The California Golden Bears' Kevin Riley dodges a tackle as he goes for the run against the ASU Sun Devils. 2. The California Golden Bears get hyped up for the 2009 Homecoming game against the USC Trojans. The Bears would go on to lose the game 30-3. 3. The 2009 Argus Cycle Tour in Cape Town, South Africa. 4. The Vodacom Stormers practice for the scrum during training. 5. Scrumhalf Ricky Januarie (center) in a practice scrimmage with teammates. 6. The Berkeley Rugby Football Club goes up against the nationally ranked Fresno Rugby Football Club. 7. Mathias Gydesen of Cal men's swimming does the backstroke as he takes on Stanford swimmers at the UC Berkeley Spieker Aquatics Complex. 8. Pat Mtatsi celebrates South Africa's soccer team Bafana Bafana at the FIFA Confederations Cup. 9. The Cal Bears' wide receiver Jeremy Ross gets pulled down after a catch during the 2009 Homecoming game against the USC Trojans. 10. Rulon Davis (left) holds onto the axe as the California Golden Bears celebrate reclaiming it in their victory against rival team the Stanford Cardinals in the 111th Big Game.<img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_4126_10.jpg" border="0" width="458" height="700" width_o="458" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/825054/DSC_4126_10_o.jpg" align="left" /> http://skyreid.com/News http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/News Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:44:22 +0000 Skyler Reid 723441 <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news01_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news01_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news02_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="502" width_o="800" height_o="502" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news02_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/SMR_0247_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="493" width_o="1000" height_o="617" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/SMR_0247_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/_CL20040_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/_CL20040_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news05_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news05_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/SMR_1453_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="513" width_o="1000" height_o="642" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/SMR_1453_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/DSC_0092_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="511" width_o="1000" height_o="639" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/DSC_0092_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news08_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="800" height_o="535" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news08_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news09_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="545" width_o="800" height_o="545" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news09_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news010_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="800" height_o="531" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/723441/news010_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— 1. Stellenbosch residents watch as fires coming from the nature reserve in the Cape Town region move towards the Coetzenburg Sports Field in Stellenbosch. 2. Adam and Andrea Lindberg travel to Cape Town's Robben Island on Valentine's Day to renew their vows after 6 years of marriage. They were one of the 14 couples married during the ninth Annual Valentine Wedding organised by the Robben Island Museum. 3. A man carries his child through an Old Cairo slum. Despite being one of the stronger economies in Northern Africa, much of the population lives in relative poverty. 4. One of the last remaining tree-sitters speaks on a cell phone as he prepares to descend. The Berkeley tree-sit, spurred by controversy over the construction of a new UC Berkeley athletic facility, lasted 647 days, making it the longest urban tree-sit in history. 5. Sisters Karene (left, age 3) and Thesie (age 6) Sewika in their family's tent at Blue Waters refugee camp. Almost a year after xenophobic attacks displaced much of South Africa's refugee population, many families still do not feel safe leaving the camp, despite it having officially been closed, and support services mostly cut off. 6. Vivi Moni, age 8, plays on a swing attached to a clothesline at Blue Waters refugee camp, where she lives with her two sisters. 7. A firefighter rests before moving up to the main blaze of a major fire in the Elgin Grouw hills outside Cape Town after setting a backburn to prevent the flames from reaching nearby residences. 8. Francina Jantjies, mother of 7-year-old murder victim Nadine Jantjies, nails in a cross at a rally in honor of her daughter in Wesbank, a suburb near Cape Town. Almost 1000 community members attended to show their support. 9. Daria Garina, a senior Public Health major, takes part in a human chain outside Wheeler Hall at UC Berkeley in Northern California. The protest was a reaction to fee increases and staff layoffs. 10. A mob of approximately 200 protesters burn garbage and vandalize property in downtown Berkeley, California before being dispersed by police. http://skyreid.com/Points-of-Reference-single-images http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Points-of-Reference-single-images Mon, 06 Feb 2012 06:14:46 +0000 Skyler Reid 2750238 <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/_CL20040_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/_CL20040_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_0092_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="511" width_o="1000" height_o="639" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_0092_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_3601_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="570" width_o="1000" height_o="713" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_3601_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_3671_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_3671_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_4845_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_4845_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_5005_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="529" width_o="1000" height_o="662" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_5005_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_5749_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="529" width_o="1000" height_o="662" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/DSC_5749_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0027_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="502" width_o="1000" height_o="628" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0027_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0095-2_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0095-2_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0247_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="493" width_o="1000" height_o="617" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_0247_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_1324_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_1324_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_2499_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_2499_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_2543_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_2543_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_3940_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="607" width_o="1000" height_o="759" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750238/SMR_3940_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— http://skyreid.com/Playa-Face-Faces-of-Burning-Man http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Playa-Face-Faces-of-Burning-Man Mon, 06 Feb 2012 06:14:43 +0000 Skyler Reid 2750353 <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4654_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4654_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_2331.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_2331_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_2409.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_2409_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3613.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3613_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3629.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3629_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3803_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3803_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3847.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3847_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3916.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3916_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3999_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="551" width_o="1000" height_o="689" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_3999_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4064.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4064_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4510_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4510_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4573.jpg" border="0" width="460" height="700" width_o="460" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4573_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4595.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4595_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4665_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="546" width_o="1000" height_o="683" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4665_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4683_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4683_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4733_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4733_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4810.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4810_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4812_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="548" width_o="1000" height_o="685" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_4812_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_5013.jpg" border="0" width="399" height="700" width_o="399" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_5013_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_5118.jpg" border="0" width="468" height="700" width_o="468" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload22.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2750353/SMR_5118_o.jpg" align="left" /> ———— As a participant-driven event, the Burning Man festival in Nevada's Black Rock desert is best defined by the those who attend: a global community who spend a week clad in furs or sequins or bandanas or cotton or nothing, who are weary and hungry and unkempt, who sleep all day or all night or never at all or only on Tuesday. Attendees of the 24th year of the festival in 2010 were no exception to this rule, but for all the differences these participants shared one common trait: dust. More photos at Playa Face. http://skyreid.com/Shadows-of-California http://skyreid.com/following/skyreid.com/Shadows-of-California Sun, 18 Sep 2011 04:35:23 +0000 Skyler Reid 2014326 2011/10/15 11:34 Location: Home, stagnating To call a project "complete" seems a bit of a misnomer. There's still editing, re-edits, composing, pitching ... all a part of the project. More so, however, there's the inevitable return. For this type of project, I can't really see how I could call it "complete", even when all those after-the-fact, why-don't-I-have-an-intern-to-deal-with-my-life, business-y type details are wrapped. I haven't covered everything. I'd like to get back out there. Maybe not right now - I've taken a liking to sleeping in my bed. But there's more ground to cover and recover and retread. For now, I'll call it done. But that's just not all that accurate. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0524_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="527" width_o="1000" height_o="659" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0524_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0530_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0530_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0555_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="527" width_o="1000" height_o="659" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0555_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4935.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4935_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4970_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="523" width_o="1000" height_o="654" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4970_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4971_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="415" width_o="1000" height_o="519" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4971_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4985_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="504" width_o="1000" height_o="631" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4985_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5018_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5018_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5037_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5037_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5058_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5058_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5068_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5068_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5080_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="515" width_o="1000" height_o="644" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_5080_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/08 10:12 Location: South Humboldt Bay Redwood's are REALLY FUCKING TALL. How did I live on the far side of a redwood grove most of my life and not notice this? But that's today, and that all will depend on how much longer today goes (and that sentence made sense to me, but I'm so bloody caffeinated that words are starting to splinter and dance, and that might be too caffeinated). Yesterday along the Lost Coast, cut-off not just from the electronic leash but also stuck well past the inclines and dips of the coastal range. Gorgeous and far away. It's somewhere to go back to when I have more in the way of provisions than half a bag of almonds and a granola bar. Maybe bring a backpack that's for carrying something other than cameras. Oh well. Next time. There most certainly must be more next times. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0411_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="606" width_o="924" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0411_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0415.jpg" border="0" width="419" height="700" width_o="419" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0415_o.jpg" align="left" /> l<img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0429_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0429_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0444_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0444_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4743.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4743_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4755_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4755_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4765_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4765_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4778_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="555" width_o="1000" height_o="694" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4778_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0457_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0457_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0460_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0460_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4813.jpg" border="0" width="449" height="700" width_o="449" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4813_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4815.jpg" border="0" width="557" height="700" width_o="557" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4815_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4845_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4845_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4895_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4895_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0510_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0510_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/07 10:29 Location: Not in a fort, Fort Bragg I can't help but think I'm starting to wrap it up. A part of me just wants to call it, wrap up, pedal to the floor (don't get another speeding ticket) up to the Oregon border and stick my pinky toe over (note: this shouldn't result in the same awkward conversation with Homeland Security that doing that on the south side of the state did ... ). Sleep in my own bed and never touch a Starbucks cup of coffee again. But then I remember that I shouldn't be rushing and that I CAN BE ENJOYING THIS. The photos might be wrapping up a bit; can always take more photos, but the rest of the redwood-lined ocean coast is probably not all that different from this stretch and the last. And it seems to be harvest season of non-Central Valley agriculture, so people aren't necessarily that friendly to having their photo taken. I'll be home soon. I need to slow down. [Ed. note: Seriously. No more speeding tickets.] <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0254_29_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0254_29_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0263_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0263_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0271_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="552" width_o="1000" height_o="690" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0271_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0305_118.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0305_118_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0316_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0316_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4585_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4585_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0317_74.jpg" border="0" width="445" height="700" width_o="445" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0317_74_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4621_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="520" width_o="1000" height_o="650" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4621_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0344_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="522" width_o="1000" height_o="653" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0344_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4647_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="507" width_o="1000" height_o="634" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4647_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0356.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0356_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4661_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4661_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0370_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="625" width_o="895" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0370_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0382_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0382_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/06 10:14 Location: Back along the PCH Coasting west along CA-20, early in the drag and just outside Yuba City, I don't know what the landscape is. The sun's well past down and I'm beyond the regularly-spaced intersections shooting off into fading perpendicular lines. No streetlights, no traffic. A thin double strip of luminescent yellow, the faint darkening of concrete off to the shoulder, and black. No distant light of stars of far-off cities. Surreal blackness. And then the landscape forms and it's coasting over an overpass. Faint twists and turns, drawn out over hundreds of miles. And up into the hills and the edges of the trees twinkle and it looks like snow but it isn't. The stars and moon are out and the light just makes it a little colder - the cold of elevation, into the mountains. Of fog slowly wrapping around the car, just thick enough to obscure the sky but not the hint of road as I pull around the tightening curves of the descent through the trees and down the ravines and towards the sea. And then the trees drop and it's open. [Ed. note: a little artsy rambling for a few artsy shots, taken in the hours when there's nothing else to shoot. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4505_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4505_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4518_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="468" width_o="1000" height_o="586" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4518_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0231_26_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="532" width_o="1000" height_o="666" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0231_26_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4546_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4546_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0251_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0251_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0235_61_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="450" width_o="1000" height_o="563" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0235_61_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/05 18:43 Location: A Starbucks along a freeway heading from somewhere southeast to somewhere northwest. Seems familiar. So long town-that's-not-Sebastopol. It's been somewhere between pleasant and quaint, which is more or less what I would have suspected. For some reason I find myself often talking to and photographing old men (let's just skip the weird jokes that can go along with that). Something about the mix of societal standards that make it acceptable for men to put less effort into fixing their appearance and the weathered quality of people who've seen enough summers and winters makes for a far more interesting portrait. Wrinkles and veins and sandpaper skin. And generally dressed with the simple ideal of "don't really give a damn". As to talking to these guys ... well, some may say I identify with tired, bitter, angry old men (despite the contrary argument that I am, in fact, a bitter old lesbian. But that's another story). It was talking to some of these types - the old men who look like they've been weathered by long, hard labor and the simple and persistent hardship of just being (even if they've really spent most of their days in in an accounting office and go home to watch Gossip Girl ... because I really don't know) - that I gathered most of my knowledge of Grass Valley. In the coffee shop I learned a bit of the history of the town. It was a mining town. That's about all I cared to remember. More immediately, it turns out the sorely out of place transient-looking twenty-somethings were, in fact, out of place (not just my Hollywood-fueled imagination of a quaint forest town). Again, like the-town-that-it-is-not-actually, Grass Valley has a major economic backbone built around the cannabis crop. The kids are trimmers from whereabouts outside the immediate area. Go figure. Another world-wearied older gent - this one sporting the unkempt, partially-graying mane and jet black cowboy hat and trenchcoat ensemble indicative of unemployment and in-depth knowledge of his surroundings - informed me of the secret rooms and history of the Empire Mine, the former pot fields grown idiotically close to one of the town's central parks, and the local newspaper's police blotter, which manages to be painfully over specific to the point of creating a darkly comic narrative of small town life. But these are all just the little details and my attempts at creating some type of story. Today I wandered a small town in the foothills: end of story. The storm that's been threatening continues to kick in with inconvenient intervals. Though as I said in an email last night, my complaining about non-ideal weather conditions is really more of a Goldilocks level of actual trouble ("This porridge is too hot! This porridge is raining!"). It's California. Frankly, the weather's pretty damn good year round. The storm clouds may have the undesired affect of the occasional bout of hail, but they certainly make for a more dynamic landscape. So I suppose I should quite my bitching. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0002.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0002_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0060.jpg" border="0" width="543" height="700" width_o="543" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0060_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0065.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0065_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0086_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="594" width_o="942" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0086_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0096_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0096_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0110.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0110_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4416_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="527" width_o="1000" height_o="659" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4416_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0120_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="520" width_o="1000" height_o="651" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0120_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0124_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="554" width_o="1000" height_o="693" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0124_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4445_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4445_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4467_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4467_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0156_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="527" width_o="1000" height_o="659" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0156_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/04 20:48 Location: Stage Coach Inn, Grass Valley "See you later, bro." - Safeway cashier It's a 166 mile drive away, but I swear I'm in Sebastopol. Drifting along the 49, figuring out which of these pine tree-lined little foothill towns I wanted to spend a day cavorting in, I turned more or less at random into Grass Valley. Coming in to town it was just a little voice in the back of my head: "Hm. Little locally owned farming equipment stores. A feed shop. A quaint little completely-useless-crap-knick-knack shop." The buildings seemed familiar. Not-quite-obvious grid of roads lined with boutique bakeries and neon-lit village pubs. Passing by the Veterans Memorial in Green Valley which is not the Masonic Lodge in Sebastopol, noting the centrally-located Safeway off to the right, is when it becomes just a little too much like deja vu. The weather's the light drizzle that's not quite rain that I've come to expect of the place that I'm not at right now. But it wasn't until that little phrase from the cashier - "See you later, bro." - that it sunk in. The intonation, the casual, absentmindedness of the term. Sebastopol. Stepping out into the mostly empty parking lot is all too reminiscent of that same lot where we annually ran off with our arm loads of Fourth of July watermelons (what better to put the fireworks in?). It all just smells a little more of pine. It's strange how a place can be so familiar without any actual experience here. Who knows, maybe I'll find out that it's not similar at all. But right now ... well right now I'm in a hotel room, which is nothing like most of my experiences in Sebastopol. But more generally, right now is somewhere I've been. Sebastopol, not the hotel. I mean Green Valley. And the hotel is like a hotel. But not a Sebastopol hotel. Not that I'd really know. And I'm not actually there, I'm just ... ah fuck it. Here's a picture of a coffee drink I had yesterday, in lieu of any new photos (since oh so long ago this afternoon). What can I say: I've been busy. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/Untitled-1_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="1024" width_o="1640" height_o="2100" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/Untitled-1_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/10/04 15:06 Location: Still Salgu's, Sacramento Silhouettes, reflections, motion, detail, framing. I think there are a few more, but off hand these are the easy tricks to make a photo. Just came to mind. Might as well type 'em out. San Francisco's a center. I knew this before the trip, but it just fell into a deeply contrasted landscape ("became visible" if I wanted to be punningly visceral) compared to my previous, somewhat hazy knowledge of the fact. A lot of my knowledge is like that -hazy and general, more just a gut understanding that something is probably someway; I'm just particularly good at acting like this lack-of-knowledge is -really-honestly-totally-knew-that knowledge. But I digress (shock). The cities and towns and fields and places that sprawl out around the Bay Area all kind of feed into the city - it's "hip" and "jive" (though not "jive-turkey"). There's business and jobs and infrastructure and culture. I'm not saying that there aren't these things in other cities. It's just harder to find, fewer and sparser (and, yes, sometimes just completely nonexistent. I'm looking at you, Pixley). And certainly San Francisco isn't the only center - it's just one I'm more familiar with. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0001.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0001_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0013_93_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="436" width_o="1000" height_o="546" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0013_93_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0016_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0016_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0049_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="569" width_o="983" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0049_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0081_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0081_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3664_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3664_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3671_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3671_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3689.jpg" border="0" width="380" height="700" width_o="380" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3689_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3717_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="435" width_o="1000" height_o="544" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3717_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0130-2_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0130-2_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0149.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0149_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3758_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3758_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3787_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3787_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3794_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3794_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3819.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3819_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3826_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3826_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3839_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3839_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3905_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3905_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3987_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="512" width_o="1000" height_o="641" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3987_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3997_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="555" width_o="1000" height_o="694" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3997_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4005_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4005_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4023_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4023_o.jpg" align="left" /> For instance, Sacramento isn't so much a center, but it has plenty of personality, culture, livelihood and the like. I guess it's more of a business and government (see: employed) based version of a "center" (have I mentioned that I love making up terms and then using them to death? So much easier than actually expanding my vocabulary with "real" words). People have jobs. People wear ties. Well, San Francisco does, too, but ... I ought to stop trying to qualify every painfully hyperbolic generalization I make about places. Makes me incapable of making a point. I guess I'm kind of incapable of that, anyway, but ... whatever. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0256_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0256_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0272_92_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0272_92_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0305_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0305_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0307_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0307_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4038.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4038_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4060_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="532" width_o="1000" height_o="666" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4060_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4087.jpg" border="0" width="389" height="700" width_o="389" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4087_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4107_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4107_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4116_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="576" width_o="972" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4116_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4130_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4130_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4191.jpg" border="0" width="467" height="700" width_o="467" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4191_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4208.jpg" border="0" width="518" height="700" width_o="518" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4208_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4254.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4254_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0008.jpg" border="0" width="435" height="700" width_o="435" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0008_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0026_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0026_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0064_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0064_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4306_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4306_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4325_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="428" width_o="1000" height_o="536" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_4325_o.jpg" align="left" /> I'd love to think up a story to tell (could've sworn I was going to try and do that more), but the only thing that springs to mind immediately is that I managed to get in trouble with security at a mall, but not with security at the Capitol building. There's something there. ---------- 2011/10/04 00:15 Location: Salgu's house, Sacramento Back out. A different strategy, which I think will do well. Spending more time in single locations, marching onwards and upwards and outwards, not necessarily in ever-expanding spirals out from a central point (though that's sure to happen eventually) but the general idea is such. As Salgu and I discussed today as we lugged cameras around Sacramento, one of the hardest things to get over in photography can be the irrational, self-imposed chastisement that grabs your lower intestine and gives a 60 degree twist right before you approach an unwitting victim of a photograph. While in some situations the prey has become accustomed to your willy-nilly disregard for any semblance of privacy they may feel entitled to, it's a different matter when you're just wandering the streets on a whim. No assignment. No familiarity with the subject. Not all that much respect, as far as they can tell. And that feeling can make you not take the photo. And that's never the right thing [Ed. note: The author of this statement does not claim to be an expert in this area and cannot be held responsible in any instances wherein the explicit disregard for others' privacy results in grievances against the photographer, including, but not limited to verbal or physical assault, defamatory expletives, and stabbing.] Just get over it, I guess. And try not to get stabbed. Shooting from the hip is good, to, so long as you don't accidentally cut-off the top half of someone's head (in the photo, I mean. Though cutting off someone's head in real life is also ill-advised in many situations. Aren't I just a fountain of fucking wisdom?). Photos from SF and Sac to come, but I want to go clean my sensors. Why does that sound like a double-entendre? There's something wrong with me. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0272_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0272_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0013_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="436" width_o="1000" height_o="546" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0013_o.jpg" align="left" /> Post-script: I actually had a reasonable thought for a post-script, and now it's gone. I guess I'll just reiterate that I need to actually code this to something more like a blog. Or at least start archiving it to different pages. There. That wasn't a complete waste of post-script. Post-post-script: It seems really weird to write "post-script" twice in a post-script. And let's not go in to the infinity-loop I just inadvertently opened up. ---------- 2011/09/30 10:26 Location: Berkeley As a kid if I had to restart a videogame I'd tend to go through all the motions, all the "learning" exercises that I had to go through the first time, even if I already knew them. I wanted to create a clean, perfected vision, properly layered with the illusion of "experience" that I already had from a previous run through. I like to reset. Maybe it's a little obsessive. I'm not really content (or happy, or even really just "okay") with how this project has been coming out. I'd like to start over, but that just seems insane. I still haven't headed back out on the trip. I've been trying to wrap up a few important things, then deal with a few other things that were really just procrastination. I should start shooting again today. I'll spend a day or so in the San Francisco Bay Area, then head up towards Sacramento. There is - somehow - something resembling a plan starting to take shape. Hopefully the photos will be different, a different focus. Instead of trying to soak in every little detail of every little dilapidated town and every little stain on the cincrete at every little rest stop I'm trying to work with people. Trying to work with how each specific stop actually encapsulates a part of the state as a whole. People. Major imagery, instead of random tourist sites. Hopefully. But either way, I'm going to take a chance at not resetting entirely. And not just trying to carry on to fit the mold I've already started. I don't like the mold. As an aside, it's come to my attention that people are actually reading this. Which is ... shocking. And maybe a little disturbing. And mostly just shocking. I don't really intend to change anything, but maybe I'll try and fit in an actual story every here and there. Maybe. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3554_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="597" width_o="937" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3554_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0577_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="445" width_o="1000" height_o="557" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0577_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0589_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="529" width_o="1000" height_o="662" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0589_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0599_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="537" width_o="1000" height_o="672" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0599_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0605_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0605_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0634_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0634_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0643_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="402" width_o="1000" height_o="503" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0643_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3599_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="456" width_o="1000" height_o="571" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3599_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3626_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="495" width_o="1000" height_o="619" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3626_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/26 09:49 Location: Home (Berkeley, that is) Somewhere along the Dumbarton Bridge turn off it starts to sink into familiar. The glazing over, the conversion to two-dimensional. My mind switches out of the sharper analysis of the alien. It takes a moment, a bit of mental yoga or stretching or writhing or _____, but a shift and a crack (I think it's somewhere in my lower spine ... I've gotta stop sleeping in the car) and I'm back in place. I'm seeing from the objective eye, the silhouettes of familiar playing against a sunset I don't remember seeing before. There are more palm trees than I thought. Ivy on the freeway walls. Oakland skyline over the debris in the cold of an empty parking lot. I'm not stopping, but I can see the shots, and I can only hope I'll still see them tonight of tomorrow. I'm home, but I'm not back. Or I'm back but not home. I have to figure out which one. While I'm back, on vacation from a vacation of working, I'm not sure if I'm working. I'll work, but am I working. Today will be rest and planning. Tomorrow shooting. Then back to the road. ---------- 2011/09/24 20:27 Location: Salinas, California (yet another bloody Starbucks ... not literally bloody) Thought at approximately 2:30pm today: "Screw your iPods and XM radio, give me a good classic rock station and I'll drive 'til the tires pop." Thought at approximately 3:30pm today: "How is it that the only stations in range are Christian rock and mariachi music?" With the exception of that later predicament, however, today started to feel like home. Veering westward over from the I-5 and into Coastal Range divide, the climate changed. The thermometer in the car dipped below 100. More oaks, less palm trees. Even the trim on houses just felt more like what I've become adjusted to over the past 15 or so years of living in what is generally referred to as the "greater Bay Area", and not (purposefully) in the pompous sense. At breakfast my eyes were drawn towards a horrible handlebar moustache sitting across from a large woman with "Dallas" tattooed across her shoulder, and an unanticipated detour resulted in my trying desperately not to touch my hat or fidget in any way that might signal an interest in dropping two grand on a (theoretically functional) tractor. Jeans and flannel ruled the day, and not in the same way as in the Mission district. Now I'm sitting (yet again) at a Starbucks, and I'm only vaguely conscious of the preponderance of clothing emblazoned with the insignia of colleges that the people around me look either too young to be attending or too old to still be flaunting. Shorts and hooded sweatshirts are common. This is my normal. It's a mixed bag: on the one hand, it's calming to be in the familiar. While it's not like I've been in a foreign land where my regular actions would be found offensive (at least, no more so than in my day-to-day life, where I simply don't give a rat's ass), there are small things which it helps to be accustomed to. People care more about having their photo taken near the border (not going in to that). Ordering a hot coffee isn't as bizarre when it's not 104 outside. People drive differently throughout the state. On the other hand, it's harder to work. Maybe it's a little on purpose; an attempt to rope my meandering mind back from the all-too-present-edge of looking at everything as an outside objectivist, with no knowledge of the strange habits of this alien species that is mine own. But it's also just that the little things seem normal again. As I stated before: the dress code is normal. I could find a photo in the see of cowboy boots and denim in the Central Valley, but it takes me a moment longer to spot a shot of someone navigating a bike across three lanes of traffic in a city center. They're both representative, I'm just (more) used to one of them. When I first got to the Cape Times a handful of years ago, the picture editor on duty (the only one who wasn't out to holiday in the first week of January) told me that, as a foreigner, he wanted me to just go out and take pictures. Put fresh eyes on what they were used to seeing. When Anna first got back from that same paper (prior to my going there), I remember pointing out some basic photos that I liked, but she had become accustomed to those sights in SA. I needed that same redirection when I came back from SA. And now I need to turn that same foreigner's eye onto what I'm used to. Just hopefully without letting my rambling mind wander too far astray. Things get interesting when that happens, and not in a way that makes much sense or uses real words. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0298_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="546" width_o="1000" height_o="683" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0298_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0317_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="513" width_o="1000" height_o="642" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0317_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0323_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0323_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0371_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="533" width_o="1000" height_o="667" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0371_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0418_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0418_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0458_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="432" width_o="1000" height_o="540" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0458_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3383_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="563" width_o="993" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3383_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3426_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="439" width_o="1000" height_o="549" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3426_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3488_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="559" width_o="1000" height_o="699" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3488_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3496_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3496_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/23 2011/09/23 21:36 Location: Tulare, California A moment of the aforementioned scatter-brained introspection, resulting from a sudden influx of personal patience and steadier footing provided courtesy of Mom and Dad. My expectations for this trip have pretty spectacularly been tossed around in a burlap sack and smashed against a rebar-ridden concrete pillar, only to be mangled and digested by a starved coyote and excreted off a cliff and into a raging forest fire. I'll admit, looking back (on posts and into the garbled semblance of my memory), that I didn't really know what I was getting myself in to, nor did I have a specific expectation. But I certainly wasn't expecting this level of physical drain. But my expectations aren't really important. I have to keep in mind that it doesn't matter what my product is here and now. This is, as it were, an adventure. There is, at the end of this trip, a whole, and only then ("then" in this case being after I've been home long enough to have not driven for a whole 24 hours) do I get to judge its effectiveness. And even then, it's not about a set product. I've certainly done something today, yesterday, the day before. Mostly driving (fucking driving and driving and driving), sometimes stopping. Maybe not the most exciting adventure (indeed, I've only been in the middle of two slow-motion kung-fu shootouts so far. WTF, mate?), but still. There, a positive (bitter, cynical, kinda pissy) post. I needed one of those. Christ, I'm having some crazy mood swings. ---------- 2011/09/23 19:32 Location: Tulare, California I am not explicitly knowledgeable (in any useful or academic sense) about history or social norms, but as I've been traveling I'd like to lie and say that I'm building a stronger sense of what California is as a state and a culture. And seeing as this is my bully pulpit, I see no reason not to expound on these half-developed thoughts that have flitted through my mind among the dozens of inconsequential others ("What's the overall nutritional value of almonds?" "How does dust stick?") and pretend that I know what I'm talking about. Besides, it's either that or more non-specific introspection, tinted by feelings of panic and disorientation. California is a system. I'm sure if you looked closely enough at any state you'd see something similar, but just due to either it's size and layout or it's relative importance to me personally, it seems to encapsulate this element that much more clearly. [...] Edit - 2011/09/30 09:28: Looking back towards that shit, I actually started to feel physically ill. Pompous pseudo intellectualism (oddly, that's generally how I characterized the Bay Area) in a series of blocks of mortar-connected text. Crass generalization (though not as crass as the thick-tongued way in which I initially penned it): SoCal is culture-obsessed, Central Valley is a series of agricultural and suburban grids, NorCal is trying so hard not to be SoCal that they gave birth to hipsters. There, short, sweet, and still somehow less idiotic. Ah, revisionist history. [...] Hm. This is why I should stick to scatter-brained introspection: I don't have to explain or describe anything consistently, so I can don't make a shit show of rambling to the point of physically fatiguing myself through boredom. I swear, in my head that was originally pithy, quick, and sharp-witted. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3147_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3147_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3152_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="548" width_o="1000" height_o="685" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3152_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3176_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="512" width_o="1000" height_o="641" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3176_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0130_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0130_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3201_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="488" width_o="1000" height_o="611" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3201_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3251_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="550" width_o="1000" height_o="688" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3251_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0157_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="400" width_o="1000" height_o="500" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0157_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0193_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0193_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3278_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="527" width_o="1000" height_o="659" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3278_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0200_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0200_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0204_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0204_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0235_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="488" width_o="1000" height_o="610" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0235_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0264_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="575" width_o="973" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0264_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0274.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0274_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3300_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3300_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3323_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3323_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3344_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3344_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/22 16: 42 Location: Santa Clarita, heading north or east or possibly west ... So I'm at one of the many pavement based outcropping of the I-5 trying to do a bit of research on where to set my ill-aligned sights next, and I'm hoping to find more of that texture I mentioned once, less of the plastic islands springing out of the desert. The first leg seems, for better or worse, to be closing. The wandering through what I will generally refer to (with a snide, holier-than-thou nonchalance) as "the southern part" is finishing. The major stops are checked off, and I'm just geographically starting to drift across some unspecified, imaginary line in the sand and rock. I'm going into the Central Valley next, and I know pretty much just left of jack shit about what I'm looking for (which generally is a good indication of my understanding of what I'll find). There are plants or something there, right? And it's hot? Given my self-imposed time constraints (which I'm also ignoring, of course) it's hard difficult to get any real encompassing view of California without feeling like I'm just glancing off the surface a bit too much, settling for the easy shot. I'd like to improve that, to start finding some meat in my images (not actually photographs of meat, no) instead of just trimmings. Maybe that's a little harsh self-criticism, but it's a gut feeling. Maybe that's just an unfortunate side effect of this first leg. Maybe I'm just warming up. Maybe I'm just not trying hard enough. Probably some combination. So a goal is to improve. Nice, vague goal. My longest single interaction so far provided little in the way of improved photos and was held over the legal border between Mexico and the US. It also resulted in a shorter, also fruitless discussion with a border guard. But interactions are good. People are good. Meat is good (I'll include the edible variety in this sense). Vaguely Orange County: <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0007_17_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0007_17_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0012_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0012_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0057_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0057_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0074_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="538" width_o="1000" height_o="673" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0074_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2867_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2867_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2883_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="384" width_o="1000" height_o="480" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2883_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2892_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="416" width_o="1000" height_o="520" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2892_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2924_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="561" width_o="997" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2924_o.jpg" align="left" /> Vaguely Los Angeles: <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0090_47_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0090_47_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2959.jpg" border="0" width="527" height="700" width_o="527" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2959_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2969_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="511" width_o="1000" height_o="639" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2969_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2978_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="563" width_o="993" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2978_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3014_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="519" width_o="1000" height_o="649" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3014_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3022_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="548" width_o="1000" height_o="686" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3022_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3031_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="508" width_o="1000" height_o="636" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3031_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3034_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3034_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3047_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3047_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3058_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="465" width_o="1000" height_o="582" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3058_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3096_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3096_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3132_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_3132_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/21 21:10 Location: Inglewood, Los Angeles Yesterday wasn't a good day. It's hard to think of a day as not being productive when it stretched over hours wherein I can't help but think I was working, or trying to work, or searching and wanting to work, and did I mention that I was working? At least, insofar as all of this, what I'm doing now for free and without direction or publication outside of this blog, can be considered "work" (my definition of work becomes increasingly vague as I become increasingly discontent with regular person jobs). But yesterday wasn't a good day. It wasn't productive, though it certainly involved working. Aimlessness. I was aimless yesterday. Toss in irregular sleep, a dried-fruit-and-car-snacks centric diet, and just the general turbulence of my second (or third, or twentieth) adolescence and it was a bad day. Photos came, but nothing felt right. Nothing felt like it did anything more than just scratch at the heavily-waxed surface of what you're supposed to see in Orange County and LA. It's a problem, something that I've realized I have little stomach for: I like texture. I don't like the neon and plastic that sprouts from the desert out here. And I know there's more, that there's depth, and I try and fixate on it, but it seems just out of focus. It blurs and wanders off and next thing I know I'm circling the same block of the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica that I went to back when I knew it only as "the place with the dinosaur fountain". And that doesn't help to set my mind on track or to focus. Being aimless in a project without a firm grounding at a time in life that's aimless and I can't find my grounding and I look back to a childhood that I hardly remember and where I can't seem to figure out where I'm grounded in te first place and it gets a little confusing going in these spirals and ... oh. Wait. I should take a deep breath. So yes, yesterday was not a good day. Today wasn't perfect, but it was better. There are stories. I'll try and remember them. Recording the stories verbatim doesn't really feel right to me. It feels like telling a joke and explaining the punchline. I should work on that, should learn how to tell some of these stories. Maybe you just had to be there. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0087_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0087_o.jpg" align="left" /> Post-script: This seems vaguely reminiscent of my old LiveJournal posts, now that I think of it - which makes it all the more accurate to have mentioned my retreat into mental adolescence - and that's just ... well, bothersome. Hopefully I'll find more time tomorrow to sit and actually write something about something. Whether or not it will translate out as such is another question, but I'd at least like to know for myself that my writing isn't just a pedantic exercise in auto-erotic self-pity. ---------- 2011/09/20 09:07 Location: Alta Coffee, Orange County Coffee's a necessity to keep me sane. Not just the requirement that my blood stream consists of at least three (3) parts caffeine to every two (2) parts A negative, but also the ritual. It's like my church. It keeps me grounded and together. Not having a place to just sit and rest throughout a given day, having the closest thing to a nightstand be the dashboard while I curl up in the bucket seat at a gas station, it wears on me quickly. I think the benefit to having travel partners is that they'll require you to stop working occasionally, even if it's just for a few hours at night or when you first dare open your eyes in the morning. As it is, my mind snaps into working mode immediately, so even the walk from the car to the toilet consists of potential missed-photos. It can be exhausting. The coffee keeps it grounded. Starts me fresh at a "new day". Fortunately Lala land will be a bit of a reprieve. I was given refuge from my own self-destructive work schedule last night by a friend in Orange County. Even just a few cushions on the floor with an over-anxious cat attacking my blanket is a majestic change of pace when I realize that I haven't actually been in a full recline in three days. Today I gain a short-term travel partner. The change of pace will be good. The Salton Sea destroyed me. Not mentally, although it should have. Like a compilation of David Lynch sorts squeezed together and shoved into a shitty suburb, Salton City wrapped my brain in ways I hadn't realized. Tiny little tract houses straight out of a suburban day dream, precisely manicured lawns and delicately chosen trinkets scattered around entryways, all falling away to the consuming desert immediately next door, a small ocean that reeks of millions of dead fish quietly resting just over the next street (all of which are named "Shore Something"). It's easy enough to live disoriented when you're looking at the world with an eye to the View From Nowhere, but when the world decides it's going to be a compounded joke of itself - perfectly orchestrated suburban tract homes sprouting willy-nilly out of a desert of shit and bones - it wrecks the brain a little bit. But no, what got me was just the sheer heat. Boring, simple, equilibrium-shifting heat. Sweating out over a pile of fish corpses and burnt-out trailer homes, the fake ocean is taxing. But a night of something resembling real rest to reset, and now my morning prayer session over an onyx-filled cup. I'm almost at 1,000 miles of travel and I'm hardly an hour north of the border. Many more mornings to come. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2668_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2668_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2690_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2690_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2754_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="538" width_o="1000" height_o="673" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2754_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0145_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0145_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0183_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0183_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0203_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="406" width_o="1000" height_o="508" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0203_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0231_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0231_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0248_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0248_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0236.jpg" border="0" width="469" height="700" width_o="469" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0236_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0254_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0254_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0257_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0257_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2800.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2800_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0056_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0056_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/19 17:24 Location: Coachella, I think Excerpt from email to Dad: Right now my main goal is to get some handle on what types of photos I'm looking for out here. I spent about half an hour trying to shoot the San Diego skyline yesterday before I realized that I just don't give a deep-fried shit about that type of shot (also my D300 sensor is dirty. Fuck). I'm veering in a direction, but I figure I'll have a better sense by the end of the day. Still don't think I have a hang on it, but my mind is sullied from a mix of the heat and the salinity of the Salton Sea. That shit smells like the inside of a can of kitty treats. I better find some neat debris out on the edge of that shit hole. Sunset's coming. And a few more images from yesterday: <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0007_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0007_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0010_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0010_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0029_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0029_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0052_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0052_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0063_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="535" width_o="1000" height_o="669" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_0063_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/18 21:44 Location: Gaslamp Quarter, San Diego Another Starbucks. What can I say: they have internet. And though the caffeine may do me dirty once I get to the next rest area, at least it should keep me alert enough to get there. Sleep deficit in exchange for not dying in crush of twisted steel on the I-8? Yeah, I'll take it. Part of me would like to stay in San Diego longer. The different elements of this town are difficult to get exposed to in a single day. I could spend at least a week looking at the culture around the border alone, and now I can't help but think I might have over-prioritized that over the rest of the city. Oh well. Sorry, San Diego. Forgive me. Sitting in the Gaslamp Quarter, however, watching hoards of gussied-up ladies and bro-ed out gents, and I don't know how long I'd really last. Times like these remind me that I don't really blend well with the heart of city nightlife; I survive best in the sordid hole-in-the-wall pubs and slightly-too-shitty-to-translate-to-hip coffee shops. At least, that's what I tell myself. There's a lot more to muse on about San Diego, most of it hyperbolic and generally inaccurate (hey, I've been here for 24 hours; I'm bound to get most everything wrong), but I'll leave it for now at this final observation: so many fences. Between the border and naval bases and the exclusivity of the trendy downtown locales, I can't help but notice that there are a lot of places that are just off-limits. And not too camera friendly. I have another memory card to upload, but it's time to get out of Starbucks (much like getting out of dodge, except not at all). Tomorrow it's a slow, meandering, 5-hour detour through to the Salton Sea. In case the total lack of preparation didn't make it clear, I'm not too concerned with the efficiency of my route. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2384_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2384_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2400_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="504" width_o="1000" height_o="631" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2400_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2413_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="666" width_o="840" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2413_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2458_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2458_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2472_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="507" width_o="1000" height_o="634" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2472_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2491.jpg" border="0" width="460" height="700" width_o="460" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2491_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2564_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2564_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2573_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="451" width_o="1000" height_o="564" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2573_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2589_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="574" width_o="975" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2589_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2596_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="531" width_o="1000" height_o="664" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2596_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2620.jpg" border="0" width="465" height="700" width_o="465" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/DSC_2620_o.jpg" align="left" /> Post-script: Yes, I know, I need to clean my sensor. I tried before I left, but apparently I didn't do a very good job. Let's just pretend all those spots lend the photos "character". ---------- 2011/09/18 01:40 Location: Aliso Creek Rest Area, north of Oceanside Lessons from the road: Rest stops will invariably be miserable. Please remember: Your normally high caffeine tolerance will revert back to that of a three-year old with a bag of Pixie Stix: i.e. you're not going to sleep. Although you've eaten nothing exotic or interesting today, you will experience the worst heartburn of your life. If in normal life you're relatively indifferent to light or noise while sleeping, you'll find yourself wondering what alternate dimension that ungodly light (that seems to be targeted directly at your face) and the Hellish baboon-raping screeches are coming from. It's not human. Your bladder is now the size of a pea. That minuscule amount of playa dust you left on your sleeping bag is now enough to thicken the air to a consistency not unlike a sock stuffed with mothballs. You cannot punch away heartburn. Trust me. ---------- 2011/09/17 21:14 Location: Starbucks in San Diego At some point instinct just kind of kicks in (though where in evolution "just get on with it you puss" became an instinctual device, I'm not quite sure) and you go. Albeit a bit behind your self-imposed, entirely arbitrary schedule, but still: go. It was about an eight hour drive, compounded by somehow hitting rush-hour traffic in LA despite it being Saturday. As I passed through San Diego there were fireworks going off, which is a somewhat strange sight when you have no idea why or where the fuck are these shiny lights coming from while I'm trying to fucking drive, ooh, pretty. It was around the third offramp before the border that I realized the thick distribution of low-wattage lights in the distance was Tijuana and not ... well, I don't know what else it would've been. Between the drive and the irregular-intervals of populated areas and controlled-burn emptiness I began flashing back to the drive from Zimbabwe to Johannesburg. Different, yes, but I'm still going to wake up not knowing where I am. Speaking of which, I should find somewhere to sleep. Now the question I must immediately address (other than where do I sleep, where do I go, should I eat something, what the Hell am I thinking): do I count my mileage from here or from Berkeley? I zeroed it in Berkeley, but I wasn't really shooting on the way down (not well/not consciously/not consistently, anyway). Oh, the difficult questions in life. <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2924_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="600" width_o="933" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2924_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2926_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="600" width_o="933" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2926_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2936_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="600" width_o="933" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2936_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2938_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="600" width_o="933" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2938_o.jpg" align="left" /> <img src="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2939_800.jpg" border="0" width="800" height="600" width_o="933" height_o="700" src_o="http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/1/61060/2014326/IMG_2939_o.jpg" align="left" /> ---------- 2011/09/16 13:00 Location: Berkeley, CA I'd be lying if I said I didn't have the jitters. I'm pretty much a finger's breadth away from completely and totally unprepared for this trip. The saving grace there being that there's basically no preparations necessary. The car's working, I'm not (to my current knowledge) going anywhere that's beyond communication range, and my license hasn't been suspended yet. Originally today - now tomorrow - I'll get in the Volvo and take a direct path down to the fence at Border Field State Park (apparently not called border beach, despite my constant repetition of that descriptor and the seeming comprehension expressed by anyone who's been pigeon-holed into listening to my nebulous attempt at a "plan" for this trip). Take some pictures, maybe even force myself to interact with some people. Then begin heading north. Maybe a little east. Mostly north. Hopefully not get lost. Or get lost in interesting places. I'd rather have a plan, but if I did I'd probably ignore it. So ... here goes, I guess. Or tomorrow, "here goes". Maybe late tonight. Fuck I am so unprepared for this. Lovely. ----------