The State of My Mind at 10:33pm...

Random thoughts from a blogaholic:

70 degrees, on October 27. It doesn't get much nicer than that.

I want to address something I wrote Friday (okay, Thursday night). I wrote that photographers capture life's moments, and picture takers simply document existence. I stand by that statement, but I worry that I was unclear about what I was saying. I wasn't trying to define what is, or is not, a good photograph. Unless you are submitting your photograph to specifically be judged against other photographs, by judges with a certain criteria in mind, no one has any business telling you what is, or is not, a good picture. Photography is art, short for articulation.

 It is a mode of self expression. So, you say whatever it is you need to say, in whatever manner you feel is best. 

I believe this: If you like it, it's a good picture. The point I was making, was all about attitude, and frame of mind. Did you take that picture to prove that the event happened, or did you take it, to remember how you felt, when it happened? Frankly, I think a person with a camera can do, and usually does, both.

If your number one topic of conversation is yourself, you might do well to shut your yap. While my wife and I were at Chili's for lunch today, we watched some guy try to pick up the hostess -- who obviously was not interested. But, he was clueless. Apparently, he had tried hitting on this particular woman before. She didn't remember him, but he assured her that he had been to the restaurant before, and she had given him a wrong phone number. He was sure she must have just written it down wrong. Uh huh. She was very nice, but he was so busy telling her about how he loves to watch football, that he didn't grasp that 1. She was still trying to work, and 2. She had practically walked him out the door. He stayed and talked to her, the entire time we were there. Some days it's embarrassing to be a male.

 Yes we were eavesdropping, but the guy talked loud. Besides, we're not talking about me.

Braiding a bullwhip out of boondoggle, for your son's Indiana Jones costume, is harder than you might think. My fingers are killing me. Boondoggle is also known as gimp, for those of you, unfamiliar with the ways of the Boy Scouts.

Finally, I need to get this off my chest. I try to avoid politics, here on the blog (I try to avoid it pretty much everywhere else too). So, I'll just say this once: Vote. It is the greatest muscle a free people possess. And understand this, about living in a constitutional, democratic, republic (did I cover all of them?) -- it is messy. The founders, that we adore, understood this. They did  not design a nation where one side always wins, and the other always loses. They did not envision a peaceful political process. That will never happen. What they have given us, is a system where differing views can be heard, a system where we don't kill each other, every time there is a change of power.

Having said that, after the election next week, we will have a new President of the United States. He may, or may not, be your guy. Your guy will not win every time. But, wouldn't it be nice, if we could remember that he will not be the president of a party, he will be the President of the United States. 

That's all of us.

I'll try to get some good Halloween stuff up tomorrow.