A Weekend Of Reminiscing

A spent a large portion of this weekend in downtown Atlanta. On Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday I was at the downtown Sheraton hotel for a photography workshop. Like most Atlantans who don’t work in downtown, I don’t go there very often. However, I used to work downtown back in 1996 so I remember what it used to be — it is not that any longer. Gone are the days Macy’s, Woolworth’s, Mick’s and most recently Dailey’s. Here are the days of panhandlers who swarm like mosquitoes if you stand still for too long. After spending a weekend in downtown Denver and now one in downtown Atlanta I realize that one is fun and has great potential while the other is mired in crap. Pity.

I walked around a bit and did a lot of reminiscing about the “olden days” — walking through Peachtree Center Mall; looking into buildings which were something else, or at least open, back in 1996; thinking of what was and what might have been.

The workshop was good. Per my commitment I plan to write a full critique on Atlanta Metblogs this week.

ITP Flickr Pic
This is a shot from the weekend’s workshop. It’s okay, but not really up to my desired standards.

Unfortunately I thought that we’d be shooting with strobes, so I didn’t bring a “fast lens” with me. Even worse though was the fact that with sixty or more people in the class the scene around the four models was frantic — and as I’ve mentioned in the past, that’s not an environment in which I wish to photograph.

Dinner + Play + Friend_Who_Fought_Traffic_To_Make_It_On_Time = Good
On Friday evening I met up with friend and ITP-Reader Stacy for dinner at the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club followed by viewing the play “End Days” at Horizon Theatre. Coming in from Kennesaw (Woodstock? Tennessee?) on a Friday night on which there is a Braves game is never fun, but Stacy managed to weave her way to Little Five Points with ample time for us to have some brisket sandwiches (damn those things are good!) and beer prior to the play.

“End Days” is about a family, and one neighbor boy, in the mid-2000s who are questioning life. The father, is suffering from massive depression as he was the only one in his office to survive the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. The once-practicing-Jewish mother has found Christianity and is hell-bent (can I use that term here?) on ridding the world of sinners. The daughter is rebelling against everything that her mother represents. The neighbor boy is madly in love with the daughter and wears a much-ridiculed Elvis costume for most of the play. Believe it or not, this is a comedy. Have I mentioned that there is also an actor who plays Jesus and Stephen Hawking?

Throughout the play we see the neighbor boy, who happens to be Jewish and preparing for his Bar Mitzvah, struggle to gain the love of the daughter, work on gaining acceptance with the Bible-thumping mother, as well as work on getting the father to break through his depressive nature. He recognizes the daughter’s love for knowledge and forces her to relent to reading Stephen Hawking’s “A Brief History In Time” and begins to “see and talk” to Hawking when she is stoned. It turns out that the book is what finally brings the two together (ed: And here I went donated my copy to Goodwill).

Toward the end of the play the mother is convinced that the Rapture is coming on Wednesday (or as I like to joke “Jesus is coming, look busy!”) and forces all to remain with her so that they can all be saved. When the Rapture doesn’t occur she winds up questioning her faith, but has regained the love and respect of her family.

The play runs through June 28th so if you are the kind that keeps saying “I really should go see some local theater.” then this might be the play for you.

If A Tree (Limb) Falls In The Forest, Does It Make A Sound?
That I do not know. I do know that it makes a hella fucking racket when it happens in my backyard, however.

A little after 11pm on Saturday night I heard an incredible crash from just outside my opened bedroom window. Living in East Atlanta for the past ten years has conditioned me to think “Holy hell, I think that someone is breaking in!” so I lept out of my bed and started to figure out what the hell was going on.

I raced to the back door where I opened the blinds and turned on a light… nothing there. I looked out the bedroom window… nothing there. And then I stopped to think.

I heard a crash which sound liked it hit the deck.
I heard leaves.
I remembered that last year a large tree limb fell of my neighbor’s tree last year.
I searched toward the fence and saw some new debris.

When the sun rose on Sunday morning I went outside to confirm my suspicion that the neighbor’s tree lost another large limb. Luckily the limb spared the house, when I finally get around to chopping up the downed limbs I’ll figure out whether it spared my fence as well.

Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – okay, but really need to start stepping things up.
Current Music – nothing at the moment
Website Of The Day – Even though it’s called Atlanta Music Guide you can get a wide range of Atlanta event news there.
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing notable

Monthly
Foot Mileage – 0 miles, Wheel Mileage – 0 miles
Consecutive Days Of Bed-Making (Longest Streak) – 8 (8)
Vegetarian Days – 0, Carnivorous Days – 7
Marta Rides – 0

June Goals
– lose four pounds… plain and simple

2009 Goals
– Reduce my weight to 190 pounds (today’s weight was 199.5 pounds)
– Completely read the book 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die
РEarn at least $150 through photography sales in order to cover the cost for the renewal of the Jalape̱o Beach SmugMug account I opened the other day.
– Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
– Attend at least one professional photography workshop

The Unmeasurable
– Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
– Become a proficient programmer in Objective-C (iPhone development) and Ruby on Rails (Black Sheep web page concept)
– Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]