unrelated thoughts that together make one long post
And now a series of random thoughts that would make good Twitter posts except they’re about three times too long, if not more.
I saw this woman today in the caf, who works for one of our other companies in the building, and she said, “Hey have you lost some weight?” Why yes I have! I am not sure what’s going on and it could be that I have a dread disease but in any case I’ve had to buy three new sets of clothes in the past few months because they keep falling off me. But I don’t feel sick so I’ll just stick with it until something seems wrong. Oh stop worrying, nothing is wrong, I just changed my eating habits.
Also, a couple of weeks ago I went to visit a friend who is moving overseas and the first thing she said was “What have you done to yourself?! You look fantastic!” I don’t know what I had done but it was nice to hear. Although I guess I must have looked like shit in the past. Hmmm.
^^^now don’t think I’m all vain and shit, even though I am. It’s nice to be told one looks nice. I also enjoy hearing “Wow you are smartest wittiest most interesting most intriguing and definitely the most incredibly talented person at X *and* Y *and* Z that I have ever met in my entire life!!!!!! It’s amazing! And my life is changed since we met!!!! ZOMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” But usually people just stop with “Wow you look nice.”
A photographer contact sent me a message asking if I could give him the name of the PR firm that handles a very big band I am shooting soon, because he couldn’t find their contact info online anywhere; and I had to reply by telling him that I didn’t know the PR rep, that someone in the band had set it up for me directly without having to go through the PR or management, which is how the usual process goes. That was a sweet moment and the second time it has happened recently. If only it were always as easy as those two were.
Speaking of photographs: I got an email asking if some online magazine thing could use some of my Nine Inch Nails photographs in an article about “Trent’s retirement from music.” One, he’s not retiring, he’s just not doing some huge enormous tour next year on the same scale as this one that is just ending. (Or so he says. He says after every tour that he’s never touring again and yet he always tours again.) And two, they picked out two curiously bad pictures. I mean of all the Trent Reznor photographs I have done, and there are some GOOD ones, they picked out two that were not that great. I declined their “offer” (they weren’t paying either, and it’s a commercial site, so um NO), for one reason that I wouldn’t have wanted them to use those particular pictures when I shot others that were so much better; and also I’d have to get NIN’s authorization and permission to assign syndication rights and I just didn’t feel like it for this particular magazine. But still, they sent me an offer. Which kind of made me happy until I found out they have sent “an offer” to probably every single person on Flickr with a Trent Reznor photograph, including some TERRIBLE shots taken by crazy people. So my 5 minutes of pride thinking I was all special went away, fast.
Heard recently via Twitter from Demonbaby: if you have an iPhone you know that it has an annoying way of “correcting” your swear words for you in text messages. A helpful little gesture Apple has put in there, NOT. So if you type “fucking” all the time, like I do, the dictionary changes it to “ducking” and if you want to make it “fucking” you have to backspace the whole thing and retype, usually three times, before it accepts that you really, REALLY mean to say “fucking” and not “ducking.” Well, it turns out if you make an entry in your Contacts called “fucking fucking” then in the future when you type “fucking” it stays as “fucking.” This will save me long minutes of retyping, because I type “fucking” a fucking awful lot. I also need to do it for “shit” because the iPhone thinks I really mean “shot.” Apparently the iPhone is meant for the G-rated crowd.
Speaking of text messages, I have a new fondness and respect for them. I had a 200 messages per month plan originally and used that up in about a week, so I had to change to the 1,500 per month. So far that seems sufficient although I’ve used about 200 just since 12/1. I never used to like texting but it’s SO EASY with the iPhone that I am running through them all the time. Plus I have friends who don’t have Internet access at work and so texting is the only way to exchange our extremely important information about what clothes to buy and where is the best place to have an enormous poster printed. Very important stuff.
Am leaving for Las Vegas tonight. Suite at Planet Hollywood, presale GA tickets to what is probably the smallest concert pit in the country–fifty or a hundred people, I’ve heard–and a host of glorious things to do and people to see while there. I got my cameras ready, my new business cards that came out quite well (gotprint.com, check them out), and my secret Operation Huge Red Underpants in full swing (no they are not *mine*! Do you think I’d tell the entire world that I wear huge underwear? Let’s call them part of an art installation to be revealed at a more appropriate time.) Meeting up with my two friends sometime tomorrow night and then let the festivities begin. It’s Vegas, baby!