Occasional · Flashes · of · Brilliance

I was going to put "Happy Independence Day" in big red, white, and blue letters up here, but realized that if you had a white or light background, you'd be wondering why I wrote "Happy Day." (Or, like Matt aka justjack900, have a red background, in which case "Independence Day" would be sitting there totally out of context.)

So you'll have to accept my Independence Day greetings sans patriotic color scheme, but with a nifty picture:

Happy Independence Day!
Originally uploaded by travlarkboston

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I'm fortunate enough to work in the building where Boston Celtics coach Glenn "Doc" Rivers lives.  I promise, I'm not bragging.  I'm just giving background for the next few paragraphs.

The Celtics won the NBA Championship this year, and Bostonians (a sports-obsessed lot) are very pleased.  My doorman Ennio said he wanted to get his photo taken with Doc (a consummate gentleman, I might add), and when Doc agreed, Ennio took my photo with Doc as well.  Doc was also gracious enough to inscribe the photos when they came back from the photofinisher.

Other residents who met him in the lobby over the next couple of days asked to have their photos taken with him as well, and he's kindly agreed.  The girl at my local Ritz Camera kept seeing the neverending parade of Doc Rivers pics and said, "Gee, Travis, what is this?  A cottage industry?"

Of course, the important thing is that I did something nice for people.  They all loved the pics.  :-)

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Back in April, a mama bird made a nest in our porch light.  When our landlady moved the nest (it was a potential fire hazard), she realized there were eggs in the nest.  She's a nice lady, and on the off chance that the porch light hadn't fried the little eggs in their shells, she made an enclosure for the nest high up in the corner of the porch and transplanted the nest.

Then we (me and the landlady) worried.  Would the bird be spooked?  Would the "human smell," cause her to abandon the eggs?  Were the eggs even viable after their prolonged incubation?  Turns out that it worked out fine.  Birds don't have a strong sense of smell, so "human smell," isn't an issue.  They are suspicious when their homes are moved, but wouldn't you be, too?  After all the worry, it was so nice to hear chirps and see fuzzy little birds alive and healthy.

Photos below; the quality isn't great, but I didn't want to get any closer to the nest than I had to.

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Sometimes I like to indulge in a little graphic design.

I mentioned a few entries ago that most of the residents where I work like me.  We have two residents who are preparing to move to Florida soon.  In preparation for the move, they kindly gave my doorman Ennio and me several bottles of alcohol (whiskey, vodka, and a lot of chardonnay).

One of the small bottles, obviously a souvenir from some trip to Costa Rica, just tickles me.  It has a little fellow hanging on for dear life.  I always try to write thank-you cards for gifts received, and this won't be an exception.  I decided that he needed to be on the thank-you card Ennio and I will give them tomorrow.  The front of the card is below; the inside, with the punchline, is behind the cut.

( The inside of the card, with punchline. )

I've read about these ladies before, but seeing this really makes me smile:  Lesbian couple of 55 years ready to say 'I do.' - Yahoo! News  These women have been together for as long as my mother has been alive; it's about time that society recognized their commitment to one another.

So I've seen regular headsets, bluetooth headsets, and even the idiots with the Nextel phones chirping one another who share both sides of their conversations with the annoyed people sharing their space.  I've also seen -- and regularly make fun of -- current fashion trends such as shorts buckled to hang around the thighs, tank-top shirts under T-shirts, and short-sleeve shirts under long-sleeve shirts under short-sleeve shirts.

This fellow*, however, managed to hit both categories simultaneously with his creative solution to hands-free cell phone use:

I admire ingenuity as much as the next person, but walking around Boston with this particular bit of genius strapped to your head borders on the ridiculous.  With the abundance of art students in Boston, it's not beyond the realm of possibility that this was some kind of performance art.  Alas, I think this boy's fashion sense is shared by few others.

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*Apologies for the poor quality of the photo.  I was taking it from the passenger side of my car through a window in bright sunlight; it had to be cropped a good bit as well.  --Perspicax

The British are a very expressive people.  They have a way with words that I admire and sometimes try to emulate.  One particular phrase that comes to mind is "can't be arsed."

Arse is the British colloquial spelling of ass, referring to one's rear end.  When you can't be arsed to do something, it implies you're too lazy, indifferent, or uninterested to get off your arse to attend to the situation at hand.

Keep reading; I promise I have a point.

For some reason, I've been feeling particularly stressed out by life of late.  It isn't like there's one giant shark circling me in the water; it's more like being nibbled to death by guppies.  When I'm too overwhelmed to deal with everything, I start letting stuff go.  The house gets messier, my journal doesn't get done, I don't take photos, and so on.  I concentrate on the most important, most urgent, or most immediate problem at hand, while the rest of my responsibilities go to hell.  I'm rapidly approaching that point.

I thought having the yard sale and getting rid of some stuff would help.  Unfortunately, we -- rather, I, since I was the one who sat through the whole damn thing in the 95-degree weather -- didn't get rid of enough stuff to make a difference in the chaos that is our house.  I've had a plan for a little while to empty out the dining room, strip the wallpaper, paint, and then move my office back in there.  That would free up space in the living room (where my desk and bookshelves fill an entire wall), and clearing out the stuff that we're storing in the dining room would be helpful.  But first we have to find space for the stuff currently in the dining room.  It's like my house is a paradigm for my life; too full of crap to get things organized the way I want them.  And it's like I can't be arsed to begin the project.

See?  I told you I'd work around to the point.

Now, having indulged in a little whine, I feel a little better.  We'll see how everything else turns out. 

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Saturday was yard sale day.  Several neighbors and I set up for a yard sale on what turned out to be the first really hot day of the year -- 95 degrees, after a damp and cool spring.  Not many people dropped in; the general consensus among the yard sale participants (many of them swigging Samuel Adams Light from the bottle, the rest of us tempted but sticking to lukewarm lemonade from paper cups) was that everybody decided to go to the beach.  Despite the weather, though, most of us managed to get rid of a bunch of stuff.

And we sold a couple of things, too.

After the yard sale ended, I piled everything into the car and took it to a couple of local thrift stores to donate it.  The only thing that came back in was boyfriend's five-disc CD changer -- he wouldn't part with it even though it's not worth the $20 price tag we tried to sell it for.  Our neighbor came up with the plan, and we all latched on to it. Sure, we could have hauled all the crap back into the house and tried again, but really ... we didn't want it, so why hang on to it? It really was an inspired notion.

Boyfriend had to teach a yoga class and managed to miss the entire thing, which meant I got to stand outside in the heat for six hours.  But he did make some very pretty signs, and went around hanging them before the yard sale.

Our downstairs neighbors asked us to dinner afterward; they cooked steak and chicken on the grill, and Boyfriend stopped on the way home from teaching to get corn on the cob and salad fixin's (those are salad ingredients to those of you who grew up north of the Mason-Dixon line).  I didn't want us to show up empty-handed, after all.  The neighbors loved the salad (the watermelon was an inspired touch, the tofu less so, IMO), the food was good, and I introduced them to a sauce I learned about in Illinois on my last trip there.

So despite lingering sunburn and a less-than-full cash box at the end of the day, it turned out not to be a bad day after all.  And after the heat of Saturday, the first thing I did Sunday was put the air conditioner in the living room window. In fact, that's probably the accomplishment I should be proudest of.

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It's been a busy couple of weeks, but I finally had an entire day to do the little things that I wanted to do.  Admittedly, this was at the cost of some other stuff I should have been taking care of, but it was nice to forget about them for a little while.

Boyfriend and I went to see the new Indiana Jones movie this afternoon.  I wanted to love it as much as the other three movies, I really did.  Don't get me wrong -- the movie was OK, and I would buy the DVD without hesitation -- but it was just OK as a movie.  Of course, there was one thing I couldn't get past:  Shia LeBeouf just looks peculiar to me.

I did accomplish one important task for myself.  A few weeks ago, a resident where I work gave me a large picture frame (about 2' x 3') matted to show 16 4x6 photos.  I decided this was the perfect place to display family photos, so I spent this morning selecting photos to be printed, and when I got back from the movie (and from picking up the prints), I put them together in the frame.  It didn't take a whole lot of talent to frame photos, but I have to admit I'm pretty happy with the results.  After I strip the wallpaper in the dining room and repaint it, the photo will go up near my office space.

It doesn't sound like I got a whole lot done, but it was a most satisfying day.

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Through some bizarre twist of fate, I have a day job that is high-end customer service.  Essentially, I have to keep a bunch of affluent tenants and their guests happy.  Through an equally bizarre miracle, I've managed to not only keep this job, but become very good at it over the past five years.  Not bad for an unrepentant smart-ass with a big mouth.

The driveway of the building where I work (the "porte-cochère," a fancy French way of saying "carport") is one-way, with an entrance and an exit.  It's possible to drive the wrong way through the porte-cochère, but it involves passing a prominently-placed "DO NOT ENTER" sign.  At least once a week (and usually more often), I end up walking out there to tell some idiot inattentive driver in an expensive car that he's parked backward in my driveway.

Today's moron directionally-challenged motor-vehicle operator (in an Audi A8/MSRP ~$70k/IQ ~70) shot me an irritated look when I went out, said "hold on" into his cell phone (since he viewed my presence as an interruption of his routine), and when I explained he was going the wrong way, he said, "yeah, I saw the do not enter sign, but it didn't make sense."  My reply  ("So you drove past it anyway.") earned me a scowl from the schmuck gentleman.

It's not only the assholes behind the wheel inattentive drivers who need to learn restraint, however.  Inevitably, idiots people walk into my lobby yammering away on their cell phones, believing they are in the hotel next door and not a private building.  The inconsiderate louts lost cell phone users are annoyed when I interrupt their one-sided conversations to ask if I can help them, and they seem to take it very personally when I tell them this isn't the hotel, we don't have access to the parking garage where they parked their cars, and yes, they have to go outside to get where they want to be.

The tenants in my building are, almost to the person, thoughtful and polite people.  I can count the number of times they've acted as boorishly as the folks described above on one hand.  That could explain why I've been such a success at my job; there is a refreshing lack of idiots renting luxury apartments here.

I don't believe that mobile phones cause thoughtless behavior.  They are, in my opinion, not only the tools of the thoughtless, the oblivious, the self-absorbed, but are also the enablers.  The ubiquity of the modern cellular network allows these idiot shitheads inconsiderate people to annoy the majority of us who are--hopefully--considerate enough not to ignore manners and the presence of other people.

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*By way of disclosure, I do own and use an Apple iPhone.  But in my defense (and because of my utter inability to multitask), I end telephone conversations before entering a place of business, and try not to bore passersby with my half of what are probably boring conversations.  I drive a manual-transmission Nissan, so I need both hands to drive--thus, in the car, I'm using a headset on the exceedingly rare occasions I'm talking and driving simultaneously.  And if I ever get my head as far up my ass as some the people described above, I'll neither be able to talk on my iPhone nor drive. --Perspicax

Today has been one of the best work days I've had in a long time.

One of my residents, Mr. O'Leary, had a double-lung transplant in Pittsburgh a couple of months ago (March 26th).  Mr. O'Leary is a mensch; kind, friendly, and he has a sense of humor that is remarkable.  Over the past two years we watched him decline from an active, healthy person to a man who couldn't function without constant oxygen from a mask because his lungs were failing.  This was tough, but everyone who knows him was hopeful for a transplant and eventual recovery.

The transplant went well, and he is recovering faster than anyone could have imagined in their wildest dreams.  Tonight is his first night home, and everyone is thrilled to have him back.  Below is a pic of Mr. and Mrs. O'Leary from the little welcome party we laid on for him in our lobby: 

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Oh, the things one comes across at yard sales.  I'm now the owner of an ACU-MATH No. 400 slide rule.  I say it's geeky nostalgia because my father (the rocket scientist) owns several slide rules, and to the best of my knowledge uses one daily, claiming he works faster with a slide rule than a calculator or computer.

There remains the slight problem of not knowing how to use a slide rule.  One of the things you need to effectively use one is a solid base in mathematics.  I was a liberal arts major, of course.  But I do intend to learn how to do some of the more basic calculations with this thing, and perhaps even bone up on my math in the process.  It couldn't hurt ...

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I either need to blog less or make more time to blog, because writing about a week-long trip 11 days after I've returned is a little ridiculous.  I'm going to wrap up with the miscellaneous odds and ends that didn't make it into my other three entries:

• There's a new Arby's across the street from the Holiday Inn Express where I stayed.  I love Arby's, but there aren't any in the Boston area.  Many very filling roast beef sandwiches were consumed.


• I was upgraded from the Chevy Cobalt I requested to a Chevy HHR.  This is a minivan-looking thing that has all the engine power of that Cobalt with the weight, mass, and fuel consumption of that minivan.  It's just plain ugly.  Fortunately, I could fit a lot of people in it; I actually did that when we went to the aviation museum.


• Associated with that Chevy HHR note, gas in Illinois is about 40¢ more per gallon than it is in Boston.  That screwed with my carefully-planned budget.  (Fortunately, Arby's in Illinois is somewhat cheap.)


• I helped my young friend Michael select a new digital camera.  He used it to help me shoot debbers1979's wedding, so it all worked out pretty well.

I'm still trying to catch up on the little things that fall by the wayside when you're away from home for a week -- laundry, for instance -- but it's all coming together.  When something interesting happens, I'll be sure to post about it.  Eventually.

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The famed Route 66 goes through Lincoln, Illinois, and I got to walk through the woods to see a bit of remaining history:  the piers of the original Route 66 bridge across Salt Creek south of Lincoln.

The bridge was built sometime between 1922 and 1926, and replaced with a new bridge built along the alignment of a bypass built around Lincoln in 1942.  For their age, the piers are in good condition.  Much more information about the history of the bridge can be found at this website:  http://www.geocities.com/findinglincolnillinois/rte66atsaltcreek.html

Meanwhile, of course, photos are below.

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It's no secret that I like airplanes.  Ask anybody who knows me about it and they'll shake their heads, possibly roll their eyes, and smile a little wearily.

I took advantage of my trip to Illinois (for debbers1979's wedding) to visit the Chanute Air Museum in Rantoul.  This is the largest aviation museum in Illinois, and I'm glad I got to make the trip.  My original plan had been to take my friend ruthi73's oldest son Michael--a fellow aviation enthusiast--along with me, but by the time everyone who wanted to come had chimed in I ended up with Michael, Shannon (the daughter), ruthi73, and Bill (the kids' uncle).  The more the merrier!

There isn't a lot to write about a trip to the museum, really.  It's all visual.  Thankfully, the hangar holds a lot of the airframes, since it was alternately raining and windy, and I wasn't taking any chances of getting my camera wet.  I did get to play tripod, though.  Michael wanted to see inside the C-130 cockpit (one of the few without blacked-out windows and with windows low enough to make it possible), so I hoisted him high enough to see inside one of the windows.  Look at the last of the pics below to see. 

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I've sat down several times over the past week and a half to document my trip to Illinois for debbers1979's wedding.  It was a very busy, but still invigorating, trip for me, and getting everything into one entry risks losing the best bits among the other stuff.  So I've decided to break it down into two or three entries that cover those best bits.

The rehearsal and wedding went nearly flawlessly.  The minister, Walt, is a cousin of the bride, and this was his first wedding ceremony.  Nobody would have known this if he hadn't said so; his confidence and competence was impressive.  The photo below was taken after the rehearsal Friday night.

So what happens when you're the only out gay man in the room, and you're the photographer?  Jazz Hands!

The wedding day was lovely, but windy.  Like 30 MPH sustained windy.  There went my wishes for portraits outdoors.  But things still went well, and by the end of the ceremony, the couple was married.

Oh, yes, and the most important bit:

Photographing a wedding is always stressful.  Doing it for somebody very close to you is even more stressful; if they're paying you and you screw it up, you can get sued.  If it's for a friend and you screw up, you risk hurt feelings.  Fortunately, I covered my screwups well, and ruthi73 helped me to put together a lovely wedding album for the couple before I left.  The bride and groom loved it.  And in the end, that's the important thing.

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As I wrote that subject line, I realized that, somewhere in the Church of the Holy Trinity, Stratford-upon-Avon, England, The Bard is spinning his his crypt.

April has been surprisingly busy, for all that I've accomplished (naught).  Script Frenzy is clanking along decently, despite only having two people come for either write-in hosted thus far.  At least people are participating, and I only have one other Saturday event to fool around with -- the last Saturday event will be without me, because I'll be in Illinois at debbers1979's wedding.

Fortunately, everything is pretty much set for the wedding.  The planning is complete, and anything that's going to go wrong will happen during the trip.  I am an old pro at suffering consequences that might not happen, but I'm getting better at sitting back, taking a deep breath, and not worrying about those things that are completely out of my control.  That having been said, I'm still enough of a control freak to try to anticipate everything else, and plan accordingly -- right down to the daily to-do list of things I need to get done.

I first sat down and really began planning, in earnest, for this wedding back in January.  It's nice to have things coming together so well in the end.

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When I think about it being April Fools Day, I have to chuckle and think there couldn't be a more appropriate day to start Script Frenzy, the month-long contest to write a 100-page script.

I got started on my stage play -- tentatively titled The Lobby -- right after sending out the initial e-mail to the folks in the Boston Region.  That was uncharacteristic of me; I've never been one of the people who starts these things at midnight.  But I was awake, and I surprised myself by being able to pound out four pages in one sitting.

Is writing a script easier than writing a novel?  Not really.  The only common formatting you have to follow while writing a novel is indenting the first line of a paragraph.  You have to put a lot more thoughts into your scripts, and in addition to dialogue (my strong suit), you have to move people around on stage.  Stage directions take a lot of time to figure out properly, because if you forget to say the character exits stage right, your actor is probably going to stand there until you remember.

I was helped by having thought about my start for a while now.  I fully expect to bog down from here.  Meanwhile, here's to hoping it comes out well. Or at least, doesn't end up here:

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I get the feeling April is going to be a busy month.

Script Frenzy runs all through April, and I'm running the thing in Boston again.  I just put the finishing touches on the participant name tags design; I ask them to wear name tags ostensibly so that others know who's who, but it's really because I'm bad at remembering names.  People actually liked the name tags enough last year to ask to keep them at the end of the month, so I'm treating them like little souvenirs -- especially since I'm not going to a lot of trouble for this event.

Boyfriend's birthday is also coming up soon.  I bought him a DVD and I'm going to pick up a little scented oil thingamabob for him from a shop he frequents near Kenmore Square.  Money is going to be exceptionally tight the next couple of weeks, so I'm glad I got at least one of his gifts out of the way first.

And of course, Debi's wedding is just a little more than a month away.  That is an entry in and of itself.  I've looked at it from every possible angle and I think I've made a budget as comprehensive as I possibly can.  Now it's down to making sure I get good photos for the album (and for my portfolio).  My current wedding-related project is reading Posing Techniques for Digital Portraits by Jeff Smith.  Yeah, it's a lot of work and study and hassle, but it's for a friend, and I'll do a lot for a friend.

Speaking of photography, I've purchased a domain name:  http://www.tkphotographix.com  It's obviously still under development, but I hope to have some photo galleries posted before I take off for Illinois late next month.

Like I said, a busy month with many projects.  Here's hoping it goes smoothly.

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