The "Chuck Doesn't Fit In" Edition

*Martha’s Apprentice notes: I agree that Chuck should have been let go, but isn’t it obvious that Jim HAS to be fired? He is just pure evil. I was hoping that Martha would pull a Donald and just fire him on the spot. He was the biggest problem in this task – he just couldn’t shut his hole. I was just livid the whole time. I should probably stop watching, but I must like it or else I wouldn’t be so involved in it so far . . . it’s sucked me in!

*I’m hoping that the weather is nice enough on Saturday that I can take some B&W pictures at the Art show. I’m getting kind of rusty, and I really like taking crowd shots at these types of things.

*I would have put my pictures up by now, but they are all mostly in frames or mats, and it would be a pain to take them all out and then bring them to the office to get scanned in. (I work mostly in film.) I have some great shots that in took in the French Quarter of New Orleans in January 2004 that I would love to share with you all . . .

*There is a new blog that I’ve found called Politics, Theory and Photography (http://politicstheoryphotography.blogspot.com/) which seems really intriguing to me. I need to take some more time to delve into this gentleman’s arguments about “documentary” photography. I know quite a few people who work for newspapers in the photo departments as either photographers or editors, and I am in awe of what they do. A little teeny part of me would like to be the next Gordon Parks, and this blog may bring up some interesting viewpoints that had not even been on my radar screen.

*Another blog that I sometimes look at that is linked to a friend of mine’s blog today was kind of slagging off on the media as being politically biased, blah, blah, blah. You know, most journalists are just trying to do the best jobs they can, in the time restraints they are given. Because of deadlines, while they try to get every argument and side, sometimes people don’t call them back in time, editors cut out huge bits of the article due to space, etc., etc. Knowing how newsrooms work, and also how the companies that own the newspapers work (more worried about the bottom line than the content of their papers, and so they layoff people to keep the profits high,) being someone trying to report the news is a thankless, demoralizing job. Most people do not make the big bucks that some of the high profile people make, they do it because they love reporting what is going on, getting the rush of being there as things are happening. When people describe the media as a monolith, I always think of my friends and family and go, “What the Heck are these people talking about?” Oy! This is really a rant of mine to continue another time . . .

*Anthony Williams is not going to run again for mayor of DC. The guy was not a politician in the glad handing sense, but he did try his best with the mess he was given and I give him props for that. Large swaths of the city are in the process of being revitalized, which is a good thing, but many longtime residents are still left out of getting any of the benefits of this, which is a bad thing. Maybe the next mayor can figure that out, I don’t know . . . I don’t know of any big city that has truly figured out how to do both at the same time . . .

*I’ll end today with a poem, which I haven’t done for a while. If you like the poem you read here, do try to check out the poet’s other works . . . once, a poet I featured one day actually e-mailed me thanking me for finding her work. That was so awesome! (And I really need to write her back . . .) Always remember, these are folks like you and me, just trying to get their voices out there. I’m happy to help any way I can.

Something About the Stars
Keith Althaus

They are blind,
but you knew that.
All those years,
there,
not seeing,
but listening
to voices,
the way a satellite
overhears a conversation
in a car
miles below.
Do you remember saying . . . ?
But it's not like that,
what you said,
but how
it lives out there,
where heat and cold
are interchangeable
with light and dark,
where metallic hisses
and whistles die
in the dark
like numbers
divided by zero,
and we become
what we are
without the skin,
without the weight
of words to hold down
what we mean,
and something in us weeps,
and something in us sings.