philly

So, I'm off to DC for the weekend. Tomorrow I leave at 11a for my cousin's wedding. Hopefully I'll be able to watch the colossal 3p Brasil v France match before the ceremony which starts at 6p. I gotta find a TV! I'll be staying overnight with the fam at a hotel about an hour west of DC and on Sunday, I'm headed into DC to hang out with my college buddy KT for a couple of days!

This will be the first time I've been to DC this year, chroist. I last went down for the September 2005 peace rally which was good times. But this time around, it should be more mellow with the only "causes" for the weekend being drinking and catching up. We won't be able to catch any World Cup games together as the next matches are on the 4th and 5th. I think I'll be taking the Noon Chinatown bus back from DC. That should hopefully leave me plenty of time to get home for the 3p Semifinal match which I predict to be Germany v Italy.

As of right now, the weather forecast for DC looks good. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way for a nice and disgustingly humid DC weekend.

I hate packing. Even if it's for all of three and a half days. Blech.

Woohoo! Tonight, at 10p, is the premiere of season two of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Lady and I very much enjoyed season one. It's on the FX channel. It's always fun to try to guess exactly where the outdoor scenes are shot.

They love going to the Philadelphia Java Company on 4th St between South and Lombard Sts [Gaskill St], right across the street from TLA Video. They're also fond of staking out the table in front of waht I think is Anthony's Italian Coffee House on 9th St by Montrose St.

I just hope that the addition of Danny DeVito doesn't mess things up. But apparently, he's an Asbury Park guy, so that's almost Philly.

Shot #2 from the series I shot over the weekend [mentioned here] which has undergone a color to black and white conversion. I use the Rob Carr Photoshop action which I absolutely love.

This is shot "from the hip" meaning that it was taken without me looking through the viewfinder framing the shot. It gets a little getting used to, but after doing it for awhile, you get a feel for the focal lenghts and can have a good idea as to what the shot will look like. And of course, sometimes you just get really lucky.

This flood is an incredible example of what nature is capable of.

Riding my bike to work these last two days, I can see first hand how the Schuylkill is dealing with the excess water; it's being spilled up onto the eastern shore. The wall protecting the western side and the expressway is high enough for now. At least it was this morning, the waters are supposed to crest later today, I've read. Yesterday morning on my bike ride over the Walnut St bridge, I saw the waters creep about ten feet onto the eastern shore, not qutie reaching the benches. When I biked back across the Chestnut St bridge around 4.30p, the CSX tracks on the eastern shore were completely submerged; they're a solid twenty-five yards from where the river is supposed to be. This morning, the river was back where it was yesterday morning, about ten feet over the eastern side.

Plenty of great coverage from the Inky and Daily News complete with a photo slideshow. Matt put up a great photo essay which he starts off with this post on his blog explaining what he saw up in the streets of Manayunk. He also put together this post on Philly Future with links to other blog posts and photo essays from around the region.

In preparing for my interview with Valerie McDonald Roberts, one of the candidates for Lt. Governor here in PA for the May 16th primary [she lost], I learned that one of the main duties of the Lt. Governor's office was to serve as chair of the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency [PEMA]. I haven't heard a peep out of Lt. Gov. Catherine Baker Knoll. The Hoagiemeister, a.k.a. Gov. Rendell, has declared a state of emergency in forty-six counties - including the Philly ring counties - but nothing from Knoll.

No damage in my kneck of the woods. I hope everyone else fared okay. I do have a photog friend up in Wilkes-Barre though, I hope everything's okay with her.

I've never been in the armed forces and I don't plan on doing so [but of note, the enlistment age was recently raised to 42]. I have no idea how things are normally done under "normal" situations of war, but this war we're in over there just feels wrong and I don't think I have to be a seasoned soldier to feel that way. I think torture and espionage happens everyday and in every war, but the way this administration has gone about handling just about everything is the coarse salt constantly rubbed into the gaping hole of a wound we have on the face of our nation.

Reading this NY Times article about how our dead soldiers are airlifted out in bodybags under the cover of darkness just got to me. I understand that in this instance, the area where Sgt. Terry Michael Lisk, 26, of Zion, IL, was killed is an intense area where air traffic is limited to the cover of darkness. But I still get angry over it. Angry that Sgt. Lisk died. Angry that the tears must be shed in the dark. Angry that more like Sgt. Lisk will die. Angry that the tears were shed in silence.

Of note in the photo above [click on it for a larger version hosted on NYT's servers]: you can actually see the bodybag. And it is partially open so you can see Sgt. Lisk's 26-year-old face. Eyes closed. Head slightly tilted to his right, probably jostled a bit as they placed his lifeless body on the cart as his fellow soldiers, taking on the role of pallbearers, paid their last respects awaiting the transport helicopter.

America has lost well over 2,500 now. There is no official count for the Iraqis, some estimates well over 150,000.

Photo: Joao Silva/NYT

*****CORRECTION:
That is not a body bag. It's a wounded soldier saluting Sgt. Lisk. But the emotions brought up by the photo still ring true.

The federal minimum wage hasn't increased since 1997 when it was set at $5.15/hr which translates to $10,712 working a 40 hour week for 52 weeks [no vacation]. I'm just going to go out on a limb here and assume minimum wage workers don't have health insurance either [just like me!]. Congress, on the other hand, has raised their salaries nine times in the last nine years since the raise in minimum wage.

If you follow this link, you'll see a nice graph of the disparity. I think that it specifically refers to a Senator's yearly salary.

via All Spin Zone >> Pablo on Politics

One of my cousins is getting married this weekend. It's a long July 4th weekend - I have Monday and Tuesday off! It's also World Cup 206 QUARTERFINALS. The wedding is Saturday night… in D.C.! I'm very selfishly annoyed that they've planned their damn wedding on this weekend for two reasons. 1) I usually do something with my college friends over July 4th. 2) Those dopes planned their wedding smack dab in the middle of a sacred quadrennial month-long event for me. Sorta like when people plan their weddings on a Super Bowl Sunday. But I guess since this is the quarterfinals, more like a conference semifinal match, but one that comes along every four years.

Granted, the wedding isn't actually during gametime. But take into consideration travel time, it might as well be.

My sis and bro-in-law are picking me up around 11a - right at the start of the England v Portugal match. I'm not too pissed at missing this match. England has been playing like crap and Portugal will be without many key players and a partially injured Ronaldo. Now, England could start playing some good football and get their acts together after four matches they could have easily lost, but you never know. Portugal could play some inspired football in absence of their big names. I forsee PKs.

But the 3p match is Brasil v France! I should be out of the car by then, but who knows? The fucking NJ Turnpike has been the bane of my existence since I was eighteen and took that damn thing to/fro D.C. for school and then afterwards to visit friends who stayed down in D.C. - the only good time to take the NJ Turnpike is after 10p. It cuts the D.C. to NYC drive to about four hours if you're driving with me. I think the reception starts at 6p, but I can't remember what time the ceremony is and I'm not carrying the invite in my back pocket so I can't reference it at the moment [The ceremony starts at 6p and reception afterwards so hopefully I can watch the full match!]. The reception is at some country club so I expect them to have TVs somewhere, hopefully not tuned into some geriatric golf tournament [holy shit do I hate golf and everything having to do with that stupid game].

Brasil, with a rejeuvenated Ronaldo, is a fun side to watch. Ghana gave them a good run and Brasil were lucky on more than one occassion in that match, but you don't win World Cups and win eleven matches on luck alone; Brasil is in the quarters for a reason and one of them is the man many wrote off, Ronaldo. His breakaway topped off with a blindingly fast step-over to the right and push to the left to beat the keeper was amazing. And I didn't see the Spain v France match, but they look as if they've regained some form. I did watch a couple of Spain's previous matches and was thoroughly impressed by them. France beat them handily 1 - 3 with ZiZou even adding one in at the end. I gotta watch that one, one way or another.

I am not Walker Evans. But his photography has had more of an impact on the way I see things and how/when I click that shutter than any other artist out there. I was fortunate to be able to catch the huge show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art back in 1999. I was in school down in DC and I went back home to NY for a weekend to take in the show and write a report on it [I got an A]. That guy was just awesome.

The shot above and this flickr set is a quick walk I took last night on my way to meet Lady after her final summer class. Shooting from the hip, half the shots automatically metered, the other half manually set, these are the kinds of hazy images I see walking through this city. The flickr set has no post processing so the colors and contrast aren't exactly where I'd like them to be, but a final edit will be posted [in addition to the one above] on my dedicated photoblog in the coming days.

All shots taken with a Nikon D70 and Tokina 12-24mm f/4.

I recently saw, for the second time, that stupid Sleep Over in Philly ad by GoPhila.com. It's just horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible. If I were to see that commerical while living in NYC, DC or Jersey somewhere, I'd laugh. But I'm living here in Philly right now, so I cry and worry about the level of competence at the GPTMC. I mean, come on, that's just horrible. The Broadway show tune theme, according to this Phillyist post, launched on June 11th, the same day of the Tony Awards.

It's sorta like the old eBay ads, but waaaaay worse.

You can watch the video here on YouTube.

Does anybody like this thing?

If it's Tuesday, it's Drinking Liberally

Drinking Liberally tonight for some $1 off drink specials and free wings from 6p - 9p or so over at Tangier [1801 Lombard St]. The rain has been holding up so far today, so the tables outside may be set up, but there's plenty of seating inside otherwise. Hoist up a 20oz. of the good stuff to top off a dreary day.

Not sure if I'll make it over though. It's Lady's final test for her summer class and methinks we'll be going out to celebrate. Thursday is her last class, but this test is the biggie.