Creepin

Got to Hannah's too early today (traffic wasn't horrible, streets weren't too dangerous, and my gps actually worked! who'da thunk? So the extra hour and half of travel time I included were entirely unnecessary) so I'm just creepin on her computer.

Cannot wait for dinner with my lovers tonight in Rochester.
Also sounding like there's a dinner with the HomeLovies tomorrow night for our gift exchange (must pick something up tonight) - I've missed everyone so much!!

PS

Went to a most wonderful Christmas party thrown by the Jarvis Family & Miss Gracie Lou - I've missed these kids so so much (including Caroline's boyfriend Nick, who hid for the goofy picture) and it had only been about a week of break from them. This is hands down the hardest break from school of all time. Only one semester left, I'm mentally geeking out and trying my best to keep it all together.

Show me whatcha got

(image-heavy - you've been warned)
Happy post-Holidays everyone!!
I know Christmas is a lot of people's favorite holidays, and I don't mean to come off all Grinchy, but Christmas exhausts me and honestly causes quite a bit of stress for me - I rarely just enjoy the holiday. Presents to me don't matter much, what I give other people and seeing my family are what matters most to me for the holidays.

That being said, Photobooth gift time! These are shameless self portraits, as I curled my hair for the first time since cutting it, and it holds rather nice -- the lightness of my layers must have a lot to do with it.

Bracelet from the Doyle family
Perfume from my love <3
Canon 10D (used, but now mine) from my Daddy
Along with a "big bitchin lens" - it's the size of my head!!?
The Elsie*cake 2010 calendar from Mommy
21+1 is so soon! I don't want to grow up but...
when you do, you get to buy Christmas gifts for yourself - tequila was a gift to me (it was a giftset with a flask! How do you pass that up!?) and the Capt'n is from my bff Miss Katie Sann.

What wonderfulness did you all find under the tree? And I hope everyone had family, friends, and good food & drink for their holidays. I've been internetMIA so I need to now go catch up on everyone else.

I've also officially decided to become a red lipstick wearer full time. I feel like this is a lifestyle change.

Last night was date night with my love. We've been really rough lately (a lot of which was holiday stress and my fault for bottling up so much for so long) but we're going back to the way we used to be, not rushing anything and enjoying the *now* together. I have too many plans and goals for the new year that we needed to prioritize what we were looking to do together.Nosebleed seats? Huge beers? Awesome guys singing the Canadian National Anthem & cheering in perfect unison next to us? Each other? It was a delightful date night indeed, much like we used to and stopped doing. Many many more date nights in the new year.

So looking forward to this new year, I can't even contain my enthusiasm for everything. I'll end up doing a meme or a list of some sort in the very near future I'm sure. That will all have to come after I hang out with Jill tonight, Casey tomorrow, Hannah Jill Stacy and Ashley Tues-Weds, Dan&Bri (the boy and I are cooking them dinner) on Weds night, my cousin Lexi on Thursday, and all of my hometown*loves on New Years Eve. Packed week with all of my favorite people, I couldn't be more thrilled!!

New Hairs

I dyed my hair on Friday.. and I've gotta say, I was not thrilled at first. The reds were blazin cartoon red, and the blond (which was supposed to be light brown) was bleach blond.
I have since let it fade a few days and styled it myself, and I think I'm finally warming up to it.


I'm finishing Christmas shopping today and visiting my high school. It's going to be a strange one, folks.

Roomie*Love

Miss Manning got me fingerless lace gloves (gotta love Etsy) for christmas, they are beautiful, I am on cloud nine, I've wanted a pair for like a year now and I couldn't find a decent pair anywhere. Hand-made trumps all

Just got done with my last final - everything went so smoothly afterall. I need a shower, 3day coma, a big meal, & a cold beer. Then I can start up again with being a decent human being.

Have a wonderful winter break!
Miss my loves already <3

Almost there

My 21 pages of capstone are done. All that needs to be finished is one last proofread & printing.
One 5page paper (& getting my powerpoint to finally work) left for Tony {Weds}
10+page paper and ppt for Pepper {Weds}
Large Format is all printed & awesome and ready {Thurs}
and all that's left for jewelry is to buff my treasure chest {Thurs}

Moving into a different room in the suite tomorrow night / Weds after Casey leaves ((My roomie grew up too fast and graduated early on Friday)).
Staying busy, with just enough time to procrastinate in between without having a heart attack.

I am so thankful for my roomies and photoloves, they have kept me sane and "focused" and happy during this ridiculously stressful semester.
I'm looking forward to a nice long break, with family, cocoa, naps, boyfriend, besties, and drag queens.
I'm not looking forward to leaving my photoloves, I don't function well without them.

That is all

Success!

Saturday went so well, above and beyond what I'd expected.
I reconnected with a lot of people I haven't talked to in ages, got 3 contact phone numbers, and set up plans to shoot 2 of them later in December / January over break. I couldn't be happier or more excited about this project.

I intend to shoot a frame within a frame within the frame of the picture itself. I can't wait to see how that plays out with my thesis of the uniforms we wear and the layers of acting we use every day before we're truly ourselves. I'm looking for the intimate experience with my models. They can really use the headshots too, so everyone wins.

I'm absolutely shooting Miranda (aka Jordan) as soon as possible, so I'm shooting for the week after Christmas. New Years is on a Thursday, I am definitely thinking I'm going to be hitting up Trash Thursday (the Merlin's drag show) that night.
In other news, I turned in my prints for Tony's final for stacked studio today. I'm thrilled with the shots, I'm not thrilled with the rest of the project requirements because the computers in the a&d were completely shitting on my powerpoint and crashing entire computers left and right. I have to get a working copy to him (and the 5 page paper) asap. I'll post those pictures as soon as a computer stops hating me enough to let me save them as jpgs (silly Blogger won't let me upload tiff.s)

Finals are rolling, 1 week of classes, 1 week of finals.
I'm oddly not nervous yet. I was last week but.. not anymore. That'll probably change tomorrow, but for now, I'm going to just bask in the warm glow of calm for as long as I can.

Take 2

Round 2 tonight.
I feel much better about Thursday night after getting some reassuring emails.
Meeting with Cindy went wonderfully.
I'm nervous all over again, but I'm not allowed to show it. That's my homework.

Well that was disenchanting.
Let's hope Saturday goes stellar+
or else I may be SOL all over again.

Senior Project

I have struggled immensely with keeping up motivation and enthusiasm with this project all semester. Part of this, I'm sure, is because I couldn't get people to stay committed and/or coordinate schedules properly (I have been gogogo for 3 straight months, let's be honest). That's where I get frustrated with the studio art kids - as a photographer, I have to work around so many other people's schedules to get my final product; I can't just sit in my room late at night and work consistently, it is just not an option unfortunately.

I have had more trouble getting started than I ever imagined. I've changed my intended project at least three times, without starting any of them enough to care about keeping the idea and found myself becoming bored with the idea before I ever even set it in motion.

Recently however, I determined that drag queens/kings was the direction I needed to take. I was completely unsure about how to make progress with it or even start, but I finally got the necessary answers: I have a solid "leader" contact that can connect me with a minimum of half the well-known drag queens in the Central New York area. I have her phone number and an in to the bar this week in order to talk with her before the show. My mind is slightly blown.

I have a pro contact meeting with Cindy on Friday, in which I hope she embraces my plan and can overlook that I have no work to show other than all of the leg work associated with finding subjects and a point of view.

On Saturday, I have a completely different drag queen meeting - a benefit for Toys for Tots where I am supposed to be introduced to several of the premier Binghamton queens, which is wonderful since I have no intentions of frequent travel to Syracuse during my winter break. Two locations is far better than just one.

This means I have tomorrow to call Frita, Thursday to go to the bar and chitchat some business with her, Friday to meet with Cindy, and Saturday to have yet another contact meeting. I'm taking Sunday and Monday to do solid Pepper paper and capstone paper work, and Tuesday is a coffee meeting with an independent Syracuse photographer (she's in one of Kim Waale's figure drawing classes and Kim set us up on a little interview date thing - I'm quite looking forward to it).

Of course now I have too much finals work to commit to serious capstone work, but it's such a big start I don't even care.
I am finally motivated.
Only took all semester.