More from Johnathan’s Senior Pictures.
More to come…
Johnathan – Day 1 Part C
Johnathan – Day 1 Part B
More from Johnathan’s Senior Pictures.
More to come…
Johnathan – Day 1 Part A
Some pictures from Johnathan’s Senior Pictures Day 1 photo shoot. I didn’t exactly select pictures that I thought were great Senior Pictures, but pictures that I liked.
Day 1 was productive and I look forward to Day 2.
Window Project #1
Last Monday I finally completed Window Project #1.
It has been several years since my mom got new windows for her house. I had her keep all of the old windows because I thought that there would be a point in the future where I would be able to use them.
I gave a few to Monica. I gave a few Rebecca. The rest have mostly sat around and collected dust.
The previous Monday (to last Monday) I came to a point of stasis with the Friend Wall. There is still room for more pictures and there are still a few people that aren’t represented on the Friend Wall, but I feel that the wall has adequate coverage for now. I can stop for now and move on to putting holes in the other (naked) walls in my house.
The windows will be a big part of what goes on my remaining walls. I finally got one of the window projects done.
I don’t really have a name for the completed window project, but for now it will be called Window Project #1.
Window Project #1 started with this picture of Jill’s hand.
The rough image.
After cleaning this image up, tweaking it and converting it to black and white, I came up with the final image.
The final image.
I measured a window and ordered a print.
I don’t really trust my own ability to cut straight lines, so I discussed the project with Teresa. She agreed to cut the picture down to size and actually came up with the idea to mount the picture to foam board.
Initially I was going to glue it to the back of the window. I was going to do that even though I had no clue whether or not that would ruin the picture or stain the picture or even hold the picture to the glass.
The foam board was definitely the wise way to go.
Before bowling (actually the greatest bowling night of my life) Teresa came over and cut the foam board and picture. I mounted the picture to the foam board, placed it in the window and put it on the wall.
Window Project #1
After looking at it, I think I might need another picture to go with it. Another body part.
I’ve thought about an eye…
But I think that might be a little bit uncomfortable for some people to look at. Plus, I think I am going to work on an eye project in the future that might be a little bit more ambitious than one photo.
I think the answer is rather obvious. The complimentary picture should be of a foot.
It seems I’m in need of a foot model. Monica has graciously offered up her foot in exchange for me paying for a pedicure for her. I think I can find somebody that will work cheaper than that. I am, just a poor, starving artist after all.
If you hear of anybody wanting to offer up their foot for art, let me know.
But there are also a couple of other window projects on the horizon. I have a set of garage door windows I got from my Aunt Linda that I’ve always thought about using as a frame for flower pictures, but instead I am going to use it to hold family pictures and sit it in the corner of some yet to be determined room.
I am also going down to Salon 908 to measure some wall space on Saturday morning. I am planning on hanging a window up there before their Grand Opening. I don’t have much turnaround on that project though.
I hope my designated cutter is available.
Tenderloining It! 2009
On Sunday Scott, Melissa, Austin and I loaded up into their truck and headed for Prairie City to visit Goldie’s Ice Cream Shoppe. The winner of the Iowa Pork Producers Best Tenderloin in the State of Iowa for 2009.
This could very well be blog 5 of the 5 groups I’m in with matching shirts, but it isn’t. We have yet to make our shirts, but we do have a motto to put on those shirts when they get made:
“Tenderloins Don’t Eat Themselves!”
Truer words will never have been put to cotton.
I have actually been to Goldie’s once before in my life. On the famous 2006 The Road Trip, we stopped there after visiting the Neal Smith Prairie Reserve. It was not open, but Jesse posed for a picture in front of it.
But since that day, the business has come under new management. A few pictures from the trip:
“Beautiful” Prairie City
The new fancier Goldie’s sign.
Goldie’s
The state’s reigning tenderloin champ!
Scott displaying the state’s reigning tenderloin champ.
Scott’s last bite of the champ!
Scott and Austin basking in tenderloin glory.
Austin surveying the menu.
Even though Melissa begged to come on the trip with us, she embarrassed us by ordering a Chef Salad.
Scott and I with the proprietor of Goldie’s and the creator of the state’s reigning tenderloin champ.
We certainly took down lots of data and we did come to some conclusions, but I can not release that information until we finally crown our State Tenderloin Champ. If you contact me directly, I will release to you some of our findings, but you will have to sign a NDA.
Samhain
I was dreadfully unprepared for this year’s Halloween. Including not buying pumpkins and candy until Saturday morning, not running firmware updates on my Blu-Ray player until Saturday night and not doing any decorating at all. Truth is that the lack of decorating was a conscious decision that I plan on repeating for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Although I have a feeling that a Christmas tree is going to show up in my house when I am not home.
Although if I do ending up holding a Friendsmas-Thanksmas-Christgiving celebration between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it is possible that a small amount of decorating might transpire. But that is a pretty big if at this point in time. Mostly because I still need to convince myself that I won’t blow up the house while frying a turkey.
Despite the lack of preparation, Halloween went just fine.
I ended up with 46 trick-or-treaters. I think I would have been able to breach 60, but Jay turned off the light for about 15 minutes, causing a loss of who knows how many trick-or-treaters.
Despite getting a couple of garbage pumpkins, Jay still made two spectacular jack-o-lanterns.
A few pictures from the night…
Jay cleaning out a pumpkin.
The Davis Family. Holden was awesome in the respect that after every picture, he would come over and want to see it. Good thing I wasn’t using film.
Austin was not a fan of the hood part of his sweet giraffe costume.
Holden was a big fan of my front stoop. If he makes it to my birthday barbecue next year, I anticipate I will find him sitting in that exact spot on multiple occasions.
Austin was happier without the hood.
A Howard paying homage to a CBS television show?!?!? Shocker! Saydie is not wearing a wig. Taylan as Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Jay working on a pumpkin for my mom.
Jay’s 2009 Masterpiece!
I think I will have to schedule my social calendar lightly next October, so I can get into the spirit of things and maybe even visit a pumpkin patch. I didn’t get a chance to do that this year.
Confabulation
Entry #4 of 5 of the Group Shirts Series.
I may or may not be a member of a group known as “The Girls”. It seems to be somewhat dependent on the day, but for a long time, I was clearly on the outside of The Girls and then I was more or less told that I was in The Girls.
I had some objections to being placed in The Girls. Not because The Girls are bad people. On the contrary, they are all wonderful people. But the organization seemed to be sexist to its core.
It is possible that I operate under certain gender stereotypes, (girls should smell nice, guys should not drink wine coolers) but I wouldn’t consider myself to be a sexist person. At least not on a meaningful level.
It is for this reason that I can not condone sexist behavior.
Now some of this stuff happened several months ago, so there are gaps in the memories. I will do the best I can.
Before I joined the group, the group consisted of 5 people. Becky, Peggy, Shannon, Terra and Todd.
The Girls plus some outsider at Ames on the Half Shell
Shannon
Becky
Terra
Peggy
Todd
For reasons that I cannot recall, when I was told that I was “now in the group”, I approached them with a rather simple request.
By my joining the group, the demographic would switch from a group that was at one time a “girls only club” to being 33.3% dudes. For that reason, I felt that a different moniker should be applied to the group.
I did not mind joining a group call “The Girls”, but it did seem to diminish the contributions made to the group by its male member(s). I wanted to know who got to decide the name.
Becky responded for the group by indicating that She, Shannon, Becky and Peggy got to make such decisions.
It seemed to me it was rather obvious that Todd was being singled out and only given half rights (if any rights at all) because he was a dude.
When I pointed this out, I was fed some hogwash about it not having anything to do with Todd’s gender, but about him not being a “Founding Member”.
Regardless of their “reasons” for persecuting Todd, I told them that I didn’t want to join a group that treated me like a halfling. I already had a group for that. I was willing to join the group (since they are wonderful people) and work on fixing the rotten core of sexism from the inside, if they made one, very simple conciliatory gesture towards me.
Change the name to: The Super Badass Action Squad
This would serve two purposes. First, I’ve always wanted to be a member of a group called The Super Badass Action Squad. Second, it would show that the group was willing to confront the demon of sexism that is threatening to destroy their group from the inside. Rather than just sticking their head in the sand and acting like nothing was wrong.
My initial proposal was received somewhat coolly. There was the usual recrimination that comes when people are at first forced to look at the light.
Shannon told me that I shouldn’t fear joining a group known as “The Girls” because nobody would consider me to be less of a man. Of course she is right about that. My levels of manliness are unquestioned. They have been unquestioned since the first Marathon of Manliness all those years ago. (Red car. Good point!)
But after the initial waves of resentment receded, the coolest thing happened.
A group float trip down the Iowa River was proposed. Reservations were made. Name on the reservation… The Super Badass Action Squad.
I was in.
Then the day before the float trip came and the weather was a little bit cold. Some emails were exchanged. Discussions were held. Float Trip canceled.
I don’t hesitate to note that if a squad of people were truly super and badass, a little dip in the mercury wouldn’t have stopped them from taking on that river.
A camping trip was proposed to take the place of the float trip.
I was back in.
Ledges was suggested. I left work early on that Friday to try to secure a campsite. This was the middle of the Summer. Every campsite in Ledges was booked for the weekend except for a couple of hike-in sites. I called Todd to clear this with him.
He asked, “How far do we have to hike?”
“A couple hundred yards.”
“I will call Peggy and then call you back.”
I waited.
The phone rang.
I answered.
“That is kind of far. We are just going to camp in our yard.”
Flash forward to a couple of weeks ago.
I get an email from Shannon. She wanted to know what size of shirt I wear. This was a strange request.
I wrote her back: I wear an XXL. I can wear an XL, but nobody seems to like it. Including me. Why?
She wrote back that she would be getting me a shirt on that weekend. She doubted that I would ever wear it, but I would laugh when I saw it.
It was the weekend of the ISU-Baylor football game. It was a weekend where I was invited to 3 birthday parties. Being only 1 person, I could not make it to all of them.
I dropped by Shannon’s on the way to the game to give her Becky’s birthday present.
She gave me the shirt.
Boys are dumb…
… that’s redundant So it’s a good thing I’m one of the girls
I did laugh. Will I ever wear this shirt? Well clearly I wore it for these pictures. I will also wear it if there is ever a group photo of “The Girls” organized.
But that doesn’t mean that I have thrown in the towel on The Super Badass Action Squad. It is still a dream of mine. After all, I am Super Badass. For example…
I can take a punch.
I can deliver a punch.
I am not remotely ticklish.
My vertical leap is 36 inches.
That is only to name a handful of my Super Badass attributes. So I will continue to carry on and maybe some day I will convert this group of The Girls into The Super Badass Action Squad that I know is in them.
The Good Kind of Hurt
“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.”
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
I’m sure every Iowa State fan (even those in denial about their fanhood) has seen this video of Iowa State celebrating after their victory at Nebraska on Saturday. But I wanted to post it here, so I would always have a place to see it.
(Obviously if you subscribe via email or RSS Feed, you will have to go to the website to see the video.)
I don’t want to pile on to Chizik. It is obvious now that he clearly wasn’t the right fit here. Whether or not he succeeds at Auburn or how completely classless his departure from Iowa State was, the only thing that matters is that Iowa State now has absolutely the right guy as our coach.
Paul Rhoads says in that video that he is “So proud to be your football coach.”
I am so proud that Paul Rhoads is our football coach. Passion and enthusiasm are back in the Iowa State football program after a 2 year hiatus. It feels so good to see those two old friends again.
After the 5k concluded on Saturday – Sara, Jen, Karolina & Dionne huddled up to discuss where we should eat.
I asked Derrick what was going on over there. He explained the situation.
I stuck my head into the huddle and said, “You know what is the most important feature of the restaurant we eat at?”
They asked me to elaborate.
“A place where we can watch the Iowa State game.”
At first I thought my point had fallen on death ears, but Dionne also wanted to watch the game and Jen wanted to make Derrick happy, so we ended up at Legends in downtown Des Moines watching the game.
While we were walking to Legends, Jen (the Super-Wife) even offered to go get the car on her own so that Derrick and I could continue to watch the game after we were done eating.
So the 6 of us huddled into a booth at Legends and watched the first half of Iowa State’s first victory in Lincoln since 1977. First victory since 1977 despite missing their 2 best offensive players. Despite losing their nickel back with a broken leg. Despite having to separate healthy players from players with the flu for the ride over. I saw somebody write that ISU beat Nebraska on Saturday with 1/3 the talent and 5 times the heart. That heart comes from having a coach that actually cares.
Watching the first half with us was a good primer for Sara since she is going to go to the Iowa State-Kansas State game in Kansas City with us next year. She is big time excited about this new adventure and is counting down the days on her calendar.
As Jesse Smith pulled down an interception (the 8th Nebraska turnover of the game)I received several text messages. Including one from Tim, who was in Memorial Stadium indicating that it was “quiet” in the stadium.
I got a text from Bill (who lives in Omaha) saying that he was in a Best Buy “full of angry”.
Corey sent me a text message proclaiming that this game reinforced his theory of “The X”. Corey believes that the Kansas-ISU game was “The X”. After that game, Kansas would decline and the Cyclones would rise. Kansas did win that game, but since then they are 0-2. ISU is 2-0. I am a believer in “The X”.
I received a text message from Colleen that said simply: “Wow.”
I got a text from Baier proclaiming it to be one of the “5 biggest wins in Cyclone history”.
I got a text from Jesse asking if I “believed it”. Of course I believed it. I predicted it.
I got a text from Shannon saying that she broke the 1 day Little White Lye Soap sales record. I texted her back that it was a “truly great day”. She asked if that meant the 5K had went well. I responded that it had went well, but more importantly, ISU had beaten Nebraska. She merely texted back that she had “heard that”.
Then I talked to Jason and Derrick on the phone. It was a great day to be a Cyclone. Actually every day is a great day to be a Cyclone, but this day was a little bit greater than the norm.
I had sent a text message to Jill saying that Derrick and I had evened out the estrogen overload by making our party watch the ISU victory over Nebraska and now I was “so happy it hurt”. The response came back that this must the “good kind of hurt”.
Iowa State definitely put the good kind of hurt on Nebraska.
Conflate
I’ve covered the story of the Beaverdale Night Fever shirts, so it is time to post the pictures that Derrick took at Sara’s birthday party.
It was exciting to meet Clint Eastwood at Sara’s party. I thought meeting Anirban was going to be the highlight.
Alligator Shirt Day
When I posted the picture below, I promised more information on Alligator Shirt Day.
Jill on the day that Alligator Shirt Day was invented.
The truth is that it isn’t much of a story.
A couple of years ago my mom went to Florida to visit some family. Of all of the places that they visited, I think that her favorite was St. Augustine. While she was in St. Augustine, she picked me up a souvenir. A black t-shirt with an alligator on its front.
If you can claim to know me at all, you know I am a fan of alligators. You also know that I have a severe weakness for monster movies.
When I was a small child I watched a movie called Alligator. Very few movies have influenced the man that I have become like Alligator. (Shaft, Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Cannibal Ferox, Zardoz, Smokey and the Bandit, Every Which Way But Loose and The Duel to name a few.)
The basic premise of Alligator is that a little kid gets a baby alligator as a pet at a fair of some kind. The kid’s dad is a big jerk and flushes the baby gator down the toilet. The baby alligator lives in the sewers of a major city. Then after 20 years the gator busts through a city street and crashes a wedding among other venues. It is basically Jaws with an alligator instead of a shark. It is not anywhere as well made, but that is part of its charm.
I watched this movie with my dad when we still lived on West 15th Street.
When we lived on West 15th Street, we had an aquarium in the kitchen. Well, where else would you put an aquarium?
Occasionally we would put newts in this aquarium. The interesting thing about newts is that they have no problem escaping aquariums. This freaked my mom out.
Although I have my doubts that she watched very much of Alligator, it left enough of an impression on her that she was always worried that these escaped newts were living under the house (it didn’t really have a basement, more of a cellar) and growing to monstrous proportions.
Maybe this is where you can measure the greatest distance between me and my mom. She was afraid that there were giant newts living in our cellar. I was hoping that there were giant newts living in our cellar.
That house isn’t there any longer and I never read any newspaper article claiming that giant newts went on a rampage in west Boone after being discovered under a demolished house.
Although the odds are against it, I like to think that the giant newts moved on after we moved out and are living in the woods just outside of Boone. Waiting. Just waiting.
I never wear the alligator shirt. Perhaps it is because when you have something that cherry, you live in a constant fear that if you take the shirt out of the closet something bad will happen to it. A sweet and sour sauce accident at Chinese Homestyle Cooking. A barbecue sauce accident at Battle’s. A bloomin’ onion sauce accident at Wallaby’s.
This brings me to the day of the picture above.
Jill and I were going to go cruising around in her car. But as it turned out it rained that day. This sudden unexpected rainfall was caused by Jill washing her car. She has those kind of powers. We still cruised the car, but with the top up.
We ended up at Jen and Derrick’s.
While we were conversing with Derrick, Jill brought up that their dad had brought her back 3 new shirts from his latest Boy Scout camping trip. 1 of these shirts had an alligator on it. She seemed less than impressed with this shirt.
I brought up the fact that I also had an awesome alligator shirt, but I never have a special enough occasion to wear it.
We struck a deal that we would declare one of the days of next year’s The Road Trip to be Alligator Shirt Day and we would wear our shirts.
When I returned home that evening I looked through my closet and found my alligator shirt. I looked at it and thought, “You will get to leave the closet in about one more year.”
A couple of days later I was wandering the shafts of the Computer Mine, when I ran into Coreen. She was sporting a shirt with a crocodile on it that came from the Vacation Bible School that she ran this Summer.
I commented on how I admired her crocodile shirt and I told her about my alligator shirt and the deal that Jill and I had brokered.
She pointed out that if I wore my shirt to work, she would also wear her shirt and we could have Alligator Shirt Day at work.
It seemed like a magnificent idea. So magnificent we had our picture taken to remember the day.
Alligator Shirt Day was such a success that Coreen and I decided to declare September 2 to forever be Alligator Shirt Day. In fact, if there is a 2010 Photography 139 Calendar, you can bet dollars to donuts that when you flip to September, you will see Alligator Shirt Day staring back at you on the 2nd.
I don’t know that this new holiday that I have invented will take off, but I have a good feeling about it.
Plus, how great is 2010 going to be? There will be not 1, but 2 Alligator Shirt Days!!
By the way, this is journal entry #2 of 5 that are about groups I am in that have matching shirts. The Knocker Walkers, The Alligator Shirt People…