ATL 12/10/07 - Xanadu

Christmas in Hawaii, 1980. We had just lost mom's parents that year, so we went to Hawaii with her sister for a fresh start on the holidays. My hair is so styling that you can barely see my eyes, but I've ditched the eyeglasses upon starting my Junior year in High School. I also seem to be at least 75% leg. (Next week - Junior/Senior Prom, 1981).
Walking the Brooklyn Bridge - Manhattan Bridge / The towers / The view midway
Eco/Green windows at Barney's - Xmas icons from recycled materials
Rockefeller Center Rink / Tree / Friends
Bryant Park - The weather gave everyone a runny nose / Tree / Kid's tables
Grand Central
NYC tree stand / Our entire room (really!) at Night Hotel / "Did we like the New Museum?"
Cheyenne Jackson - mega-super-rollerskate-a-licious star of Xanadu - hearts us!

MOVIE/ART/NYC/LOCAL/NATIONAL/WEB NEWS


MOVIE NEWS - "I Am Legend" & "The Kite Runner" are opening this week. In the battle of the tag lines, it's "The last man on earth is not alone" vs. "There is a way to be good again."

I have read both books.

(According to Imdb, this is Will Smith's 3rd movie beginning with "I", after "I, Robot" and "Independence Day". Eight of his other films have "I" in them. "Ali" is his only movie ending in "I". There are two "I"s in Will Smith.)

There are no "I"s in Jeffrey Keesee.

ART NEWS -There is an advanced screening of "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" at the High tonight. Buzz is that it's the front-runner forBest Foreign Film Oscar.

NYC NEWS - What they wanted us to know about NYC - We met 2 types of New Yorkers; the ones who pleaded 'Don't vote for Rudy' and those who implored 'Don't vote for Hillary'.

What they wanted to know about ATL - 'What's the drought like?'

Celebrity Sighting - We sat right behind Miss Angela Landsbury at "Xanadu". T first recognized her, passing the word onto S, then to me, and on to D. As D. started typing into his cellphone to activate the camera feature, he said "OMG, what should we do?" S. sensibly replied, "Nothing. We are going to leave her in peace and she's going to enjoy a nice evening of live theater with her husband." Good answer.

Headlines - Air travel is an issue; the story headlined 'U.S to limit air traffic at JFK' in Tuesday's paper accompanied a 2nd story on a near collision there on Sunday.

Local celebrities - Friends nicknamed a certain national morning news program's weatherman 'Sam Trampoline'.

Overheard - Diner - Yes, I know I'm a control freak & yes I've been called a dictater. 'Me, too, except for the tater part.'

Overheard 2 - Bartender - I'm starting to lose my patience. 'So's Kervorkian.'

Toilets 1 - An article in New Yorker announced the imminent arrival of new pay public toilets. The were contracted out along with new bus shelters and newsstands - the newsstands are in place, but the commodes were late arriving, as it seems the Italians were still tweeking them.

Toilets 2 - At least one company has turned the lack of public accommodation into an advertising opportunity. Who better than Charmin to sponsor free public restrooms in Times Square?

Eco-shopping in NYC - Environmentally friendly canvas shopping tote from Barney's - $295.00. Pigment dyed canvas shoes from Daffy's - $23.99. (Didn't get a lot of shopping done at B's...)

3 day tour of NYC - Toured B'lyn Hts, walked the bridge, saw the 5th Ave windows, "Xanadu" w/ Cheyenne Jackson, show tunes at a piano bar, "The Ritz" w/ Rosie Perez (& Ryan Idol), Italian food with 'Mama' & a former 'Cat', skating in Bryant Park, shopping lower B'way, fabulous party, Lips, and more piano bar. Whew!

LOCAL NEWS -Cool photos of Downtown Decatur.

MARTA stopped running the closest thing we have to a "trolley", the Tourist Loop Bus. What distinguished that bus from any other MARTA bus you'd see on the street? Not a damn thing. It didn't have a distinctive look (like San Francisco's open-sided cable car), it didn't have an easy way to identify its destinations (like the big, graphic map on the side of each Parisian autobus), and it didn't seem readily available (running only every 30 minutes).

Hopefully the proposed Atlanta Streetcar could overcome those obstacles. MARTA claims they just didn't have the demand for the dedicated route, but I have to wonder - which came first, the rider or the bus?

NATIONAL NEWS -Mudslides in Oregon, ice storms across the entire Midwest, heat wave in the south...by all means, Mr. President, let's send a non-cabinet member delegate to the enviro-talks in Bali...

FRENCH NEWS -The french used to dominate the cultural world...under Sarkozy they are trying to play a little "catch-up". Many French believe the country and its culture have been in decline since — pick a date: 1940 and the humiliating German occupation; 1954, the start of the divisive Algerian conflict; or 1968, the revolutionary year...former French cultural attaché Frédéric Martel marvels at how the U.S. can produce so much "high" culture of lofty quality with hardly any government support..

WEB NEWS -I can't help thinking I should be looking for a job like this guy is - "One Week Job". Week #31 is the Georgia Aquarium!

Go vote for your favorite Christmas photo! Atlanta Insider.

...and view your favorite local volunteer group in action (starring my sweetie!)

...the rest of the story...

ATL 11/26/07 - New Orleans

Christmas 1979 - We all pitched in stringing popcorn, but it was Mom's job to put the tinsel on the tree - piece-by-piece (which she removed, piece-by-piece, to save for the next Christmas). For good or bad, that bathrobe (and those light-sensitive eyeglasses) have met their maker, but we still have the same stockings! (...and I wish we still had that ceramic cat!)
The Pat O's pic is for Mom...the place she had her first sip of alcohol...on her Honeymoon! And look at those rockstars crossing in front of "Cafe du Monde"!

NEW ORLEANS/MOVIE/ART/LOCAL/WEB/WEB NEWS

Had a terrific Thanksgiving with S's family in New Orleans - from happy wanderings through the French Quarter to a sad tour of the neighborhood nearest the 17th Street Canal levee breach.

The last pic is the most poignant; it is in front of Aunt S' elementary school, announcing the beginning of the school year that never happened. More than two years later, the letters are still there and the school is still boarded up; no one ever came back.

NEW ORLEANS NEWS - Fashion - It's not T-day in N.O. without someone wearing a Saints baseball cap to the table.

Disaster tour - Every city has its blighted areas; in some of the less Katrina-affected neighborhoods, I was afraid to say anything like 'oh, how awful', only to be told 'that house wasn't flooded...'

Renovation - There is one bathroom in Aunt S's post-Katrina, rebuilt home that hasn't been renovated; it still has a pre-fabricated plastic shower/tub with seashell shelves molded into it. Climbing in was like being in the Little Mermaid's FEMA trailer...

Cajun Food - We ate shrimp-stuffed mirliton for Thanksgiving. They kept making fun of me for calling it "melatonin", but it's really a "Vegetable Pear." The insides are cooked like squash, mixed with shrimp and spices, and stuffed back into the vegetable.

Weather Report - The newspaper reported Miss. River level changes along with the temperature. The river was up .64" at St Louis, up 1.0" in Memphis, & up .38" in N.O.

The "K" Word - Everyone spoke of events on a timeline of before or after 'the storm'.

Exercise - We went running on top of the levee around Lake Pochartrain.

Nightlife - Question: 'When do bars close?' Matter-of-fact answer: 'After everyone goes home...'

Family videos - We watched the most recent wedding & the video of the first day back at the house after Katrina. (The house we stayed in was flooded with 2 ft of water; they weren't allowed back in the neighborhood until 6 weeks after "the storm").

Local thinking - In a Letter to the Editor re: sending a thank you to Congress for relief funding - '...we're supposed to thank the people who work for us for sending us our money to fix something they caused?'

Side affects - Uncle J described having 'Katrina Cough' for a year following the mold clean-up.

MOVIE NEWS - Not much new coming out in theaters this weekend following the big Thanksgiving releases of "Enchanted", "This Christmas", and "The Mist". I'll be heading out to catch up and see "No Country for Old Men".

ART NEWS - "Curvy Widow" - Cybill Shepherd stars in comedy about love, sex and online dating thru 12/16 at the Alliance Theater.

LOCAL NEWS - For those folks who think nothing goes better with drinking than "Toys", the annual "Toy Party" folks throw a great fundraiser for anyone donating a new toy or $15. All joking aside, they are expecting 4,000 eager Santa-wanna-bes at this annual Atlanta event.

The 'New Oxford America Dictionary's word of 2007 is 'locavore'. In honor of trying to eat only food grown within 100 miles of where you live, here are some tips:

Here is an online listing of where to pick your own vegetables.

Your Dekalb Farmer's Market labels bins of fruits and vegetables with their country or state of origin. Last week, I found collards, yellow squash, and habinero peppers from Georgia.

The State Farmer's Market has fewer local growers represented than I thought; the stalls were mostly reselling a mix of local and wholesale produce. I got a personalized tour of the whole market from Martin, who told me that the local farmer's drive their truckloads in at 3:00 AM on Fridays and sell to restaurants and the resellers (and Martin).

NATIONAL NEWS - NPR reports that the CDC figures $1 of every 10 spent on health care in the U.S. is to combat the effects of obesity. I don't care if you are going to sit there on your fat ass and eat doughnuts all day - in fact, I'll just go by Krispy Kreme stock - but when I have to pay for your coronary bypass because of it, that really pisses me off!

FRENCH NEWS - Because of the weakness of the dollar against the Euro, part of Airbus' aircraft production could be moved to those parts of the world using the dollar as the currency standard. The worldwide airplane market is based on the dollar.

DROUGHT NEWS - Local businesses have different reactions to the drought. Home Depot sells rain barrels. Pike Family Nursery declares bankruptcy.

WEB NEWS -This show must have been terrible, cuz I don't remember it at all...and I loved the live action show...Partridge Family AD 2200

...the rest of the story...

ATL 10/22/07 - Metropolis, TA

Me and my little bro, October, 1977. Martha Stewart won't publish her landmark book "Entertaining" for 5 more years, but I've already got a leg up on over-the-top decorating by incorporating ping pong eyes and a potato nose in my jack-o-lantern. Once a dork, always a dork.
Views from Metropolis
Trees Atlanta / Beltline Project - Before and After

ART/LOCAL/DROUGHT/NEIGHBORHOOD/WEB NEWS

ART NEWS - Our own amazing local (and by "local", I mean like downstairs) pianist Jason Sherwin is playing at Vinyl, starting 7:00 PM, Wednesday, October 24th. Check it out!

Lance Bass at Outwrite, Thursday, 10/25. Learn from Lance - if you miss this, you'll be "Out of Sync".

Gershwin at ASO this weekend, 10/25, 26, 27. American in Paris...sigh.

Zap Mama at Variety Playhouse 10/26. International harmonies...something we need more of.

Dia de Muertos @ Atlanta History Center this Sunday, 5:00 PM. Honor your ancestors.

Oakland Cemetery nighttime tour, Oct 26-27, 7-11 pm. Bring your flashlight!

LOCAL NEWS - While the news is full of mortgage woes, the average price of a house in Fulton County, Georgia, is actually up 5% from last year to $258,000. Go Midtown!

DROPPED SLOGAN - "Opening Day" dropped as Atlanta changes pitch. -ajc- While I am against changing changing slogans "mid-stream" as it were, it's not like that "Opening Day" crap ever caught on. The next new slogan - "City Lights, Southern Nights" - is more than a little Glen Campbell, but better.

DROUGHT NEWS - It's raining! ...and it made the news on "Good Morning America". Dianne told us that even if we get the predicted 1.0 inch of rain, it's only enough water for 1 day in Atlanta. I question their math (surprise!). Our normal, annual rainfall is 50 inches and that gives us more than a 50-day water supply, so I'm thinking their calculations are a touch simplistic. Maybe the volume resulting from 1 inch of rain on the surface of Lake Lanier would be equivalent to a 1 day's supply without outdoor water restrictions, but that doesn't take into account the water falling upstream and coming down the 'Hooch into the lake, water going into the water table around the lake, and water going directly into the 'Hooch downstream of the lake, reducing the need for water release from the lake.

WATER USAGE - S. and I had a shower competition this week, but even before showering, it takes 1 gallon of water running into the tub before the hot water shows up (captured in a bucket to water the plants).

We ran the dishwasher on "NORMAL" and "ENERGY SAVER DRY", using 6 gal. To do the dishes in the sink, assuming you fill each sink about 2/3** (one for soapy water, rinse, then one for sterilizing water) would be 8+ gallons. The dishwasher conserves water...unless you save the sink water in a dishpan and use that to water plants.

Then we washed clothes...yikes!

The tally:

1.0 gal - Running water in shower to get hot water
1.6 gal - Flushing toilet
6.0 gal - Washing dishes in dishwasher on "Normal"
7.0 gal - Showering (S. - no fair...he has less to wash)
8.0 gal - Washing dishes in sink
10.0 gal - Showering (me - 6'3" is a lot to wash!)
18.0 gal - Washing clothes (small load)
40.0 gal - Washing clothes (ex. large load)

NEIGHBORHOOD NEWS - 14th Street Bridge update --> monster large, very cool graphic of the project! - pdf - It looks like:

1) New Ramp to 10th St Southbound - Traffic coming south on I-75 & I-85 will still exit onto the "Techwood" access road. You will stay right to ramp up to 14th, or pass under the new 14th Street bridge to ramp up to 10th. (Currently, you ramp up to 14th, wait at a light, and either turn onto 14th or continue through to 10th.)

2) New Ramp to 17th St Northbound - A new exit from I-75/85 Northbound, after the 14th Street Bridge, will merge with Williams Street and a reconfigured 16th street, to ramp up to a new intersection with 17th Street on the east side of the 17th St bridge.

BELTLINE PROJECT - I took "before and after" photographs chronicling this past Saturday's "First Beltline Project" - the clearing of a 1.7 mile section of kudzu, trash, and mud. -ajc- Every 22-mile public transportation project starts with a single step!

WEB NEWS - This big funny ha-ha <chad vader>

** MATH - ( 8" H x 14" W x 15" D at 231 cu. in. per gallon = 7.27 gallon capacity)

...the rest of the story...

Midtown Condo

I was challenged to shoot a condo building a few blocks from my own in Midtown. It was a less than ideal day to shoot (too cloudy and dark), but I did like these two shots that really get to the heart of this development - multiple towers made of glass.

...the rest of the story...

Thanksgiving in Midtown

I will never hesitate saying "yes" when my neighbor asks me to check in on her cat Oliver...this is the sunset from her living room. I can think of worse things than sitting on someone's sofa, flipping through her magazines while her cat is purring in my lap, eating her ice cream and watching her DVD's.

Thanksgiving was terrific...drinking, home projects, eating, and getting ready for Christmas...and drinking.

Turkey dinner at my brother's mother-in-law's house was very nice and packed with funny, family moments; Nephew B walked up to one of the cousin-in-laws, who has a bit of a tummy, and asked "where did you get that belly?"

Awww, the innocence of autism.

...the rest of the story...

B&W Prints - Metropolis & Fox

A possible, little commission job! I'm halfway through shooting these two buildings - a Midtown condo and an Atlanta icon - to get 4 unique, black and white shots of each. I plan on taking a few more to give the client more choices.

Any votes?

...the rest of the story...