“Happiness, for you we walk on a knife edge.  To the eyes you are a flickering light; to the feet, thin ice that cracks.” — Eugenio Montale.

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Ice Puddle #2, 2007, Dolly Salazar
Ilford XP2 400

Continuing on the abstract theme:

The seasons have arrived.

Last night we had a fantastic thunder and lightning storm, of the house-rattling variety.  Decisive weather!  Speaking-truth-to-power weather!  You go, atmospheric disturbance!  Such storms don’t happen often up here, and it didn’t last nearly long enough for me, but it was fun.  And those heavy clouds lumbering along in the distance?  Don’t look like rain clouds, if you’re asking.  We usually get our first snow around Thanksgiving.

This series of frozen puddle shots were a surprise to me.  I did not expect them to be as indecipherable as they are.  This first one in particular confounds me:  These are rocks frozen in ice in a pothole.  As a normal person, I love the way it looks — that’s ice? — but as a photographer, I’m frustrated that there’s no real focal point; that lack of focal point is like an annoying little gnat.  What happened here?  Or does it matter?  Aaargh.

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Ice Puddle #1, 2007, Dolly Salazar
Ilford XP2 400.   Larger image here.

Cold outside, the first nip of fall.  Love it.

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Frosty Leaves, 2007, Dolly Salazar.
Ilford XP-2 400

A couple of weeks ago  I asked the Lance Corporal about Iraqi women.  I’ve had the usual image in my head of slavery-by-marriage, and thought maybe I was just buying the propaganda.  Not so much, I guess.  Here’s what he described, the very condensed and cleaned up version.

I swear the women could take over that country, if they ever rose up: they outnumber the men, and they do all the work. The women do everything.  They literally carry everything on their backs — I mean household goods, building materials, whatever.   I saw an old lady hunched over with these huge bags of stuff, you know, like you see in pictures, shuffling along.  The women are running the marketplace, they take care of the kids, they take care of  the house, and they do all this shit while wearing a tent.

We’re not allowed to talk to them [women].  We’re not even supposed to look at them; if they get caught “being looked at” by a man, they might get hauled away and beaten.  We’d hear about those stories. They’ll beat up a woman because some guy looked at her.  Fucking insane.  They’ve got some of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen, just, phhhtt, treated like dirt.  You just want to shake the men and say “you dumb shits, what’s wrong with you?”

It’s fucked up.  It Is Fucked.  Up.

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Trophy: Zapped Yellowjacket, 2009, Dolly Salazar.

Ilford XP-2 400

Dziś mówię zza piwa. Fotę popełnił Piotr Pietryga

A teraz przejdę do meeeeeeritum.

A three frame Holga panorama from a roll of outdated Ilford XP2 that I took earlier this year and just had developed.

Inne ujęcie tutaj.

Wlasnie wrocilismy z centrum skad Ula odebrala swoj pierwszy negatyw ze sprzeta minolta dynax 800 si, ktory to Barteczek kupil Uli na dzien walentego w takim fajnym  foto sklepie kolo Henry Street . Piekny to prezent przyznac musze bo od kilku lat taka przyklejona bylam do lustrzanki cyfrowej,  prawdopodobnie z powodu niecierpliwosci w oczekiwaniu na efekty,  to teraz odnowie znajomosci, no i mam nadzieje ze znow sie polubimy z analogami…szczegolnie z tym jednym…;)

Ogromne dzieki moj Ukochany:)

A oto pierwsze plony zarejestrowane na negatywie Ilford xp2.

Troche pozwiedzalismy znane uliczki w centrum, znalezlismy tez kilka nowych….

W Irlandii kryzys nadszedl i demonstracje maszeruja co rusz. Ze wzgledow zdjeciowych fajnie, pracowych niefajnie.