the crane thing

So for a while there I thought I was doing a project on construction in the city. In the end, I decided it was boring and abandoned it, simply because I wasn’t getting close enough to the subject. You can only shoot one or two kinds of pictures from the outside of a construction site. I did a passable job getting photos of the early parts of the construction of the transbay terminal, since that was right on the walk from where casual carpool drops to the office I worked in at the time.

No, though, the real problem with the photo essay on cranes is it does nothing to talk about what the cranes mean, in terms of the growth and change of a city; the gentrification of large swaths of the people that have lived there; or the political forces that allow such things to happen. It’s hard to make pictures that are about YIMBY and NIMBY. My take: doubling the density, going from 3 to 6 stories for most residential properties, would be amazing, but only if the city started doing mixed-use zoning again, allowing for ground level retail and restaurants; how are you going to live without a car if you can’t walk a block to the bodega to get a sixer of beer and then a slice from the place next door? I am not an urban planner, but I do miss NYC sometimes.

poetry then wolfhound then a little walk

Didn’t have much time at the reading; we got there a little late. I was inexplicably tired, and was thinking about bailing, but came at the last second anyway. I think Sophie might have encouraged me to come. This was Christine’s thing, I think; at least, she was MC’ing. It was really quite fun, and I ended up liking more of the poets than I thought.

I seem nice, but I’m a hater when it comes to art. Come correct or don’t bother me.

kareem's onesie party

My friend Kareem throws these every other year or so, always a good crowd of people there. This was mid-January, so it was still a bit chilly outside. Appropriate weather for onesies.

wildcare bird sanctuary

This was a super brief visit to WildCare, where things were pretty chill at the end of a Saturday. Looking at the Pelican, and having spent no small amount of my younger years staring at dinosaur skeletons, drawings, simulations, and the movie Jurrassic Park, I don’t know how anyone can not see that these are 100% dinosaurs. They don’t move like reptiles. They’re not even shaped like reptiles.

The photos of the bird were taken through the cages; none of them save the last one was in the open. The trick to getting photos that aren’t completely blocked up with fence is to get as close as you can to the wires, open your lens all the way up, and find a hole. Pay attention to the viewfinder, and move around until the picture looks the most clear. It should go without saying, but here I am saying it anyway: don’t do this in the case that it might put you in danger. As Clayton Cubitt said on twitter:

Famed war photography Robert Capa once said "If your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough" but he also died at 40 when he stepped on a land mine, so "closeness" is not always what it’s cracked up to be.

https://t.co/4LZtkL0nTo pic.twitter.com/INWxIDrk2d— Clayton Cubitt (@claytoncubitt) April 3, 2018

I’ve gotta say, though: Capa was making important pictures; he knew that; he also knew the stakes. Vitam impendere vero.

Peregrine Falcon; if and when I ever get a bird tattooed on me, it’ll be on of these. The aforementioned pelican before feeding. Pelican, getting fed. Owl doesn’t give a shit. This guy was a former resident, nests in the nearby woods now. Always comes back at feeding time, even though they haven’t given him food in a long time.