Petty Therapy

This is stupid, but living in a cute place makes me feel better when I want to have a nervous breakdown about staying here for a while.  The runner girl in me is still very much still wary to commit, but the inner Nate Berkus likes table linens and wall maps.  It's a work in progress, will post more soon!  Love Love Love.

Free Fallin!

If there is anything I love more than taking risks and running mad, it's a friend who is willing to run alongside me.  Every friend I have gets asked to do so, so when Stace decided to spend the bulk of her (f)unemployment in LA LA Land with me, I of course presented her with this:

"Oh, come over!  We should go skydiving."

See, I have been trying to get up to Santa Barbara to jump for months, and Stace's visit from the ahem, Texas was the perfect excuse.  She actually didn't even take much coaxing at all, but see, that was all part of my plan. 

When I'm about to make you do something I don't think you'll do, I scheme for days.  I will mention it in a manner similar to above and then drop it.  You, subsequently think that I have gotten over whatever hare-brained idea I mentioned and also drop it.  But then, the day before or day of, I bring it around again.  This time you don't have time to think about it too much or argue.  It works.  How do you think I got my dad to pack up my stuff for me in Spokane?  When you don't give people time to think about it, generally they will say yes when rushed.  I'm not saying it's right, but it works.  

Stace and I had a lovely drive up the CA coast to SB that morning.  I told her to call her parents and brothers, just in case.  Know what she did?  Left a message on her parents answering machine with the main message being "Burn me, don't bury me."  Lordy, this girl. 

We crawled into the tiiiiiiiniest plane ever that barely fit us plus our tandem divers, and the pilot.  Twenty minutes later, we were two and a half miles above the earth and up went the plexiglass garage door.  (there has to be a name for that?!)  Stace had been in pretty good spirits up until then, and I felt pretty good about dragging her up here to participate in my ridiculousness.  However, as she approached the door, the look on her face was horrifying.  She was  ashen and likely not breathing.  My stomach dropped out of my rectum, thinking she was going to back out.  My mind was racing with things I could say to her to calm her down.  Instead, all I said was: "Jesus will carry you!  See ya!"  I know, not the most eloquent last words.  

But I was right!  Stace dropped out of that plane like a pro and I followed soon after.  Perhaps I should have been more concerned with my own welfare, instead of hers.  I have a suspicion that my tandem diver had to pull the "oh shit" chute.  See, once you fall to a certain altitude, he is supposed to pull the parachute.  If it doesn't deploy, there are two back up chutes, just in case.  I suspect we had some trouble because we free-falled (sp?) for a looong time.  Mind you, I loved it, but it was considerably longer than I remembered.  Plus, we were the last ones out of the plane and the first on the ground by a lot, which means we spent much more time falling and less time with a deployed parachute than Stace and her tandem diver.  After the chute deployed, I was looking down for Stace and she was actually still waaaaaay above us.  I'm not saying..... I'm just sayin.  

Ain't life grand?  Jump out of airplanes, people.  This is the hokey pokey.  Go right meow.  

Love Love Love.

Vogue?

I guess I'm not sure what I was expecting exactly, but the first headshot session I endured was.... weird.  I didn't really put that much thought into it, and perhaps I should have.  There was an issue before I even started.  So backstory:

I went to a party thrown by/for some industry types way back in January.  I inevitably had a few too many glasses of wine.  I met this guy, a photographer, chatted him up, talked about how eventually I needed some shots, blah blah blah.  Afterwards, I remembered meeting him and nothing else.  Life went on.  Cut to last month, I'm finally cleaning out my car after months of clutter build up, when I come across his business card.  I already have an appt to shoot with one of my favorite photographers on earth up in Seattle in May, but wanted to just see what he said, and maybe get some commercial shots taken before I do the session in Seattle.  Plus, he had offered to do some shots for practically nothing, which was pretty tempting.

I email him, and he immediately offers to meet me to chat.  We arrange the time, and when the time comes I get to the venue and realize...... uh.  I have no idea what this guy looks like.  Being quick on my feet and ever so cool,  I call him.  You know, so I can look around for someone on their phone and sniff him out that way.  I am so smart.  Turns out he was standing right behind me as I dial, and crap.  He's attractive.  We proceed to have coffee, chat, and talk about our lives.  It oddly felt like a blind date; and I was not doing well.  I had my arms folded tightly across my chest and shoved my body so far back into the booth we are sitting in that it looks like I'd left room for my imaginary friend.  I wished I had an imaginary friend to sit in that booth with me, so that I didnt have to look at this attractive man anymore.  Can't take it.

The denouement of my awkward encounter is when he is talking about shooting pictures for characters and he tells me that I have a good commercial look.  Well, I look friendly but am pretty standoffish.  WHAT?!  I don't know what anyone has ever used that term referring to my demeanor.  I mean seriously.  The crasian? STANDOFFISH?!  I suddenly realize that I am totally out of my comfort zone with this guy.  Great.  Furthermore, I cant tell him that I'm not being myself because he's attractive and the idea of him staring at my face for two hours makes me want to bury myself in a hole.

Guys, this is why there is no Mr. Ming.  I apparently can't interact with attractive people of the opposite sex effectively.  I'd like a crowd of adoring fans, not a gorgeous audience of one.

A word on the shoot itself:  it's awkward.  I, apparently was anticipating a broadway production.  In the real world, it consists of me standing in front of a guy with a camera, analyzing my face.  I couldn't take the silent posing.  I asked him to sing me a song.  He was concentrating, and thus could not oblige.  He even offered to go get his car so that I could have some music, but dammit, I couldn't be that girl.

..... Let it be known that, after all of this, I was rewarded with uh, maybe five good shots out of about 300.  My weak mental capacities can't take this part of the industry.  Gulp.

Headshot finalists here.  See for yourself.

Guys.

Remember this rant?
I hate Bikram. I hate what it stands for.  Im so annoyed by the culture.

I cant stop.  I craaaaave the heat.  Despite the fact that Im so frustrated while I'm in class and leave a disheveled mess (exhibit: A), I still find myself crawling back into the dank, smelly heatbox for another round of pranayama breathing.  I need an intervention.  Is this considered masochism?

Love/Hate: LA.

Rant:  In LA, there is no quiet.  On top of the constant stream of ambulance, helicopter, car horns, etc that you hear, everyone else is making noise, too.  I have had to leave a coffeeshop because the hip hop music they were playing was too loud for me to hear my own thoughts.  Every place you go, people are blaring music.  Grocery stores, restaurants, even KINKO'S has their tunes turned up to seizure inducing volumes.  I have found that when I come home, I cant get myself to turn a damn thing on.  I dont watch TV, no radio, no itunes even!  I just want quiet.

Rave:  Being that this is a town full of performers and artists, there are also lovely sounds to be found everywhere.  Everyone I sit next to in church has an incredible voice.  The guy beat-boxing on Sunset Blvd has real talent and the kid drumming on the counter at Chipotle will probably be the next Biebs.  J'adore.

honest desperation.

Do you ever read the 'missed connections' section on craigslist?  oh, it's endlessly entertaining.  Have a glass of wine, they get even funnier.

This poor guy sounds hilariously pathetic.  I would probably even let him drunk dial me, as long as I could blog about it :)