My Blog

How did the chicken cross the road? With four legs

e-n-I-g-M-a — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 04:57:52 GMT

POSTED: 7:59 a.m. EDT, September 23, 2006 Adjust font size: Decrease fontDecrease font Enlarge fontEnlarge font SOMERSET, Pennsylvania (AP) -- -- Henrietta the chicken was living inconspicuously among 36,000 other birds at Brendle Farms for 18 months -- until a foreman noticed she had four legs. "It's as healthy as the rest," the farm's owner, Mark Brendle, told The Daily American. Brendle's 13-year-old daughter, Ashley, named the chicken Henrietta after the discovery Thursday. The bird has two normal front legs and, behind those, two more feet. They are of a similar size to her front legs but don't function. The chicken drags her extra feet behind her at the farm in in Somerset, Pennsylvania. In 30 years of farming, Brendle said, he's never before seen a chicken with four legs. There's no definitive reason why such deformities happen, said Cliff Thompson, a retired professor of genetics at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown. He said it could be an accident of development, akin to a sixth toe on a cat. Brendle said he jokingly suggested to his family that it sell Henrietta in an Internet auction, but Ashley objected. Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

The dog wins (what am I doing with a dog???)

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 12:31:48 GMT

The dog that was so terribly abused by the neighbor and who moved in to the school 6 months ago has officially been adopted and moved to the new school. I'd given her to my father-in-law, but they never really bonded. She got her point across this morning when she killed the one of her pups (she went in to heat over a weekend, and by the time we got her to the vet, she was already pregnant). He delivered her to the front of the old school unannounced, and....ermm....she endeared herself to me when she took after a low level gangster and tried to rip him apart (errrm, she has a private courtyard at the new school the keeps her away from the kids). The WIERD thing is that she LOVES kids. It was a choice between taking her and having her put down, or giving her run of the school (we needed better security anyway) when the kids aren't there and keeping her in a relatively small area 8 hours a day. I opted for the latter. For SOME reason, this dog and I have always had a wierd bond. Of course, attacking a betelnut bubba really endeared her to me :-).

Face, Cameras, and Random Thoughts...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 15 Sep 2006 06:44:47 GMT

As I look down the road, a year or three, and ponder finding myself doing freelance writing and photography (again on the writing), I realize that my D70 is probably going to be at the end of its useful life about then (I've had it 2 years, 15,000 images.....ermm, the shutter is rated at something like 30,000? 50,000? I can't remember). So, its time to start to ponder its replacement. I've always viewed a camera body as a light proof box from which you hang *spectacular* chunks of (hopefully not cracked) glass (or plastic) in the form of a lens. Its one of the reasons I sided ever so slightly with Nikon when I jumped to modern 35mm SLRs. BUT, digitals bodies are far more than lightproof boxes. The sensors are critical, and what seems to be happening is that the type of digital body you shoot is viewed by many as defining how good a photographer you are (the face aspect, someone with a D2X *must* be a better photographer, right?)(wrong). So...the dilema...I realize that with digital cameras, the technology evolves so bloody fast that I *had* said that I'd never shoot anything but the lowest end digital body, because in 5 years it would either have a replacement that was so superior that it made SENSE to upgrade, OR (in the case of the D70 shutter), the shutter gives up the ghost and is makes little financial sense to replace. Then a friend of mine sends me an email "Yes, the shots YOU will get with a D80 will be as good as a D200, but you need to get the D200 for *credibility.*" Hmmm. Face. Credibility. Wierd. The camera makes the picture, not the photographer. I see his point, I really do. *OF COURSE* I'd love to shoot Hassleblad medium format (I'm partial to the banana yellow bodies, tres cool....and seriously bulletproof, my grandkids would probably be able to shoot the same body and lenses). However, I ended up with Bronica instead (1/2 the cost second hand, and to be perfectly honest, the )@#$@#$ Bronica lenses can at time be almost TOO sharp). 35mm?? Yeppers, I'd be THRILLED to shoot F6, talk about a camera that has features and bells and whistles that WOULD make life easier, but....ermm....until 4 years ago, my 35mm didn't even have a LIGHT meter, let alone a battery. To me a camera is simple. A shutter that goes slower and faster, and a hole in the lens that gets bigger and smaller. Simple. So, I ended up with an F80 and a grip/battery pack. Decent price, its the lens that's important anyway. So. This friend replies "You'll probably want to replace your F80 with an F100 (note: The F100 isn't made anymore, but Nikon will probably have NOS of them around for years, lol) *if* you intend to continue shooting film. Errrm. Why? Okay, the F80 IS going to have to be replaced, the shutter is rated, I believe, about the same as the D70, and last count I'd run 500 rolls of film through it, so...ermm...hmm....about 15,000 frames. So, here's the question. Does the body MATTER, or is the portfolio and photograph more important? I've always taken a black marker after the branding and model number of any camera I use (mainly to make it less of a target for theft, but later because I really *hate* the one upsmanship of "*I* have the F80Q Mark 14/GGG Xi, and YOURS is only the X version." People ask "What kind of camera is it?" "Nikon." I reply. It makes people uncomfortable not knowing the exact model. When I point out that the sensors are the same in the D50/D70 series (the D50 wasn't available when I bought mine, or I might have looked at it), they look stunned. When I mention that the D80 has the same sensor as the D200, I get the "Yeah, but the magnesium body could take a BULLET." Errrm. Nope, it couldn't. Yeah, it DOES have better weather sealing, but...ermm....I don't shoot in downpours....correction, I DO shoot in downpours, and I have a US$15 raincoat for my 35mm/digital bodies that works BRILLIANTLY (and actually diffuses the flash nicely if I happen to be using it). SOME people actually recommend using disposable shower caps, so I'm already splurging on a luxury here :-)). So. Do I plan to continue simply using the best tools/price ratio?? Or do I worry about face. Honor. Measurebating. Image. Does image really MATTER in the end?? Have we finally come to *that*??

Tainan’s Massive Labor Trafficking and Rape Case

e-n-I-g-M-a — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 05:52:29 GMT

Mr. Hong Minh Du, the owner of the broker company in Tainan, and his father Hong Khanh Chuong, have raped over 100 Vietnamese women within 3 years, according to numerous victims’ testimonies. ------------------------------------- On March 23 of 2005, VMWBO received a phone call from a distraught caretaker. Mai told VMWBO that she was forced by her Taiwanese broker to go to the mountains near Tainan and farm for his father. Moreover, the elderly man demanded that she performed sexual acts for him, otherwise his son will not find her work. Mai began to describe how the broker systematically beats, rapes and forces the women under his care. He threatens them with immediate repatriation if they tell anyone about the abuse. Mai refused and resisted his numerous advances and she was severely beaten for it. Mai spoke of many other women who have been raped and who are still living under the broker’s care. VMWBO immediately arranged a ride for Mai to our office, 350 kilometers away. Once there, Mai helped VMWBO contact another woman, Thanh, who had been repeatedly raped and beaten by the same broker. Thanh has endured these atrocious acts since her arrival in February. VMWBO contacted Thanh and helped her and two other women escape from the broker. The women recounted horror stories of how they were beaten, sometimes with metal objects, and forced to serve as sex slaves at the whim of the broker. Some nights he would take some medicine then rape four, five women, one after another. Other times he would force one woman to watch while he raped another. Or he would force two of them to perform sex acts with each other while he watched. All the women felt helpless and were terrified of the broker, since he has the power to find them work, as well as to send them on the next plane back to Vietnam. He was also their only contact in Taiwan. All four of the women left Vietnam with a legitimate contract to work in Taiwan, and paid on average US$1300 to a Vietnamese broker in the process. These women are desperate to remain in Taiwan to work since most of them have mortgaged their ancestral home to pay the brokerage fee. Legally, they should only stay with the broker for a few days to process paperwork and get a health check. In this case however, the broker kept many of these women for days at a time to serve as his sex slaves and to do labor for him and his father. Sometimes he would leave them at other people’s homes to work for a few days, a few weeks or a few months, then collected them as well as their salary. As the case unfolded, two more women came forward and were taken by CLA to a government sponsored shelter run by another broker in Tainan, which houses male migrant workers from other countries and had no interpreter. After a protracted battle, VMWBO finally got permission to shelter them. There are also a number of victims who wrote to VMWBO from Vietnam, recounting the same horror story. Many told the Vietnamese broker what happened upon their return, but he refused to help them. Since then, the VMWBO has unearthed dozens of other women who have been raped by the same broker. Over 20 have agreed to testify in court about their abuse. They are being represented by a pro bono lawyer via the Legal Aid Foundation. In May, the broker and his father were arrested. A search warrant was also issued at the broker’s company and his home, where many of the abuses took place. Both were eventually released after bail was posted. In the meantime, VMWBO got all six rape victims living at our shelter to change from caretaker to factory work since they were all traumatized by their experiences working in the broker and other strangers’ home. But the victims had to wait 8 to 10 months before their employment paperwork was finally approved. Also in February, VMWBO flew two Tainan victims from Vietnam to Taiwan to appear in court. They were raped and forcibly repatriated only after a few months in Taiwan, and faced extreme hardship upon their return. Both are losing their homes due to the debt they incurred to come to Taiwan to work. Unfortunately, this case, though large in scale, is quite common. Many brokers – and employers and their extended family – routinely enslave migrant workers with no repercussions. Brokers send people back and forth across borders with relative ease. Once a worker complains, s/he is routinely beaten into submission, or when that does not work, forcibly repatriated and silenced. Even when the CLA gets involved, many of the victims are sent back to the brokers, who routinely force them to sign paperwork to drop their charges. Or if they are “lucky”, they are sent to government sponsored shelters where they languish for months waiting for their case to be resolved. These conditions create a big disincentive for victims to come forward. For those who are brave enough to do so, they continue to be victimized through the system. VMWBO and many local grassroots nonprofit organizations have been advocating for years for the Taiwan government to include caretakers within the Labor Standard Law. This will at least provide them with some protection, such as set hours and minimum living conditions. This law currently applies only to migrant workers in other industries. The failure to address the abuses at the systemic level has caused innumerable pain and suffering to thousands of migrant workers, as well as their dependants back home. http://www.taiwanact.net/article.php3?id_article=56

Dao Thi Quynh: a Survivor’s Story: From Temporary Work to Trafficking

e-n-I-g-M-a — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 05:49:00 GMT

http://www.taiwanact.net/article.php3?id_article=15 Ha-Thanh Nguyen From a distance, it is hard to imagine that the same young girl who loves to sing along to Phi Nhung songs while drifting off to sleep next to me, chatters away about her lifelong dreams of opening up an orphanage for homeless children in Vietnam, and gets excited about eating pizza is the same young woman who has endured a type of pain and suffering most of us will never encounter in all of our lives. Up close, one can see the physical deformity of this young individual’s left hand, right foot and leg, and the pain that comes from not knowing if her hand and leg will ever be the same again. Innocent yet fearless, maimed yet full of life, Dao Thi Quynh is a former Vietnamese foreign worker to Taiwan who has touched many lives, including mine through her amazing strength, survival, and bright outlook on life as she optimistically says things like, “ever since the second grade, it was my dream to open up an orphanage for the homeless children I saw on the streets where I lived”. Regarding her as my own little sister, the most difficult part of telling Quynh’s story is imagining that something so horrific could realistically happen to another human being, let alone someone I have come to adore and admire with the greatest affection. At first glance, Dao Thi Quynh is like every other Vietnamese victim of Taiwan’s foreign labor exporting system that walks through the doors of the Vietnamese Bride & Migrant Workers’ Office (VBMWO)- exploited, cheated out of wages, misinformed, abused and finally forced to be repatriated back to her country. Aside from the physical damages that have left a permanent impression on both her mind and body, Quynh exemplifies an extremely common case of human trafficking in Vietnamese laborers arriving in Taiwan since 1999. In brief, Quynh came to Taiwan in December 2003 under contract to work as a domestic helper after paying an employment agency a brokerage fee of $1,000. Instead of finding her employment as a domestic helper, Quynh was taken to the broker’s home to work as a caretaker for the broker’s father. This was the first violation of her contract to work strictly as a domestic helper for an employer, rather than the broker. Thus, the violation of the contract constitutes as human trafficking according to the U.N.’s definition of “trafficking in persons” as “recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of...the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability...for the purpose of exploitation...[including] forced labor or services”. The second violation of her labor contract occurred when Quynh was taken to her new employer’s home to work in their plastics manufacturing factory. In addition to being trafficked and forced to labor in a factory rather than as a domestic helper, Quynh was also working excessive hours with very little information on how to handle the plastics machinery. Laboring from 5:30 am until 8:30 pm everyday without rest and forced to eat while working, Quynh continued to work for a full month and 17 days without pay. These conditions of fatigue and abuse led to an accident, in which her hand was caught in the machinery crushing her middle and index fingers, and thumb on her left hand. Her employer brought her to a doctor who performed a poor surgery on her hand, cutting off her toe from her right foot and meat from her right leg in order to repair the hand. Before her surgery was fully completed, the employer and broker intimidated Quynh and forced her to sign papers agreeing to return to Vietnam. After appealing to the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) in Taipei and Taoyuan County Labor and Human Resources Department, Quynh’s employer admitted to forcing Quynh to illegally work in the factory and sign papers agreeing to return to Vietnam. Verbally abusing and starving her, the broker harassed, threatened, and forced Quynh to return to Vietnam claiming she volunteered to be repatriated. Almost a year after the surgery, Quynh’s hand, foot, and leg continue to cause her pain and she is now in need of further micro-surgery to enhance the aesthetic appearance and alleviate the physical pain she experiences. VBMWO also found legal assistance for her through the Legal Aid Foundation to press charges. Quynh is now back in Taiwan suing for additional compensation for her injury, medication, and loss of future income due to an injury that has left her physically maimed. While she is currently awaiting her next court date, Quynh is in urgent need of medical care and microsurgery in order to repair the damage done to her body. Recently, Quynh revealed her story at a press conference in Taipei where many other foreign laborers, anti-human trafficking groups, and NGOs gathered to discuss Taiwan’s foreign labor issues. As Quynh told her incredible story between gulps of tears, it was apparent that there was not a single soul unmoved by her words, strength in character, and fearless spirit. Straining to hold back the tears myself, I realized in that moment that the host of intimately painful challenges Quynh and many other victims of trafficking face everyday include problems beyond simply the physical ones, such as loss of friendships, emotional stress, depression, post-traumatic disorder, and isolation. In addition, victims also endure the heavy burdens of financial, legal, and political ramifications of battling for their due rights. Not unlike many others at VBMWO’s shelter, Quynh often says in a matter-of-fact way: “When I go back to Vietnam, many in my neighborhood do not care to have anything to do with me because they say I am like a foreigner going away to work and of course because of my hand. But it saddens me because I can’t help my mom and dad, and I don’t have that much money to show for anything, I don’t have any work, and the friends I had before- there aren’t that many left who still want to talk to me.” As one of the most vulnerable members of our society, trafficked brides and migrant workers are denied the most basic aspects of human rights and individual entitlement to freedom. In the overwhelming pile of other cases like hers that come through this office, Quynh’s story is not uncommon among the sea of other victims in that they all suffer from the lack of uniformity of Taiwan’s policies on foreign laborers and brides. For most of the brides and foreign laborers that come to Taiwan seeking a decent wage and a better life, many have chosen to endure the abuses of modern day slavery, while other trafficked victims seek assistance from offices such as VBMWO. Yet on both sides of the coin, there are disadvantages that restrict victims from achieving the goals they hoped for in coming to Taiwan. Many victimized foreign laborers endure illegal deductions from wages, domestic violence, abuse, trafficking, and a host of other human rights violations due to insufficient knowledge on their rights, pressure to send money back home, and fears of being repatriated or discharged from work. Thus, trafficked foreign laborers are often further entrapped into illegal working conditions for fear that assistance from offices such as VBMWO will cause them to be repatriated back to Vietnam, further abused, or incriminated by government authorities. With over 300,000 foreign laborers in Taiwan, Dao Thi Quynh’s story exemplifies an explicit case of human trafficking and violation of basic human rights that cannot continue to be ignored. Beyond just a victim, Quynh is a survivor with hopes, dreams, and aspirations for helping others like herself as she says, “If I could tell everyone in Vietnam something, I would urge them not to come to Taiwan, there is no need to leave your homeland, just work and study hard there and you will be better off”. Yet unfortunately for those seeking temporary work in Taiwan to feed their impoverished families at home, the prospect of being trafficked into a position of extreme vulnerability and human slavery seem to be the furthest thought from one’s mind.

Third Feline????

e-n-I-g-M-a — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 02:03:29 GMT

Yep....third cat has started her integration into the dynamic duo. I was up in Taipei and saw a pet store. Pet stores are usually safe, they usually only have Persians and Himalayans, and they are usually incredibly expensive, with all the cats available free, INCREDIBLE cats, I've never bought one. And, I didn't start this time. There was this GORGEOUS female adult Persian. We looked at each other, and I started to scritch her through the bars of the cage. The pet store owner came over and asked if I wanted to try and hold her. What a question. Of course. So, I hauled this purring mass of hair out of the cage. The owner asked if I wanted her, and I told him that I already had two, and that I didn't want to spend money on a cat with so many incredible strays, and needed a cat like I needed a hold in the head. "Free," he says, "this one is crazy, and you are the only other person who has held her without being bitten." So. After getting to know her over the next two hours (and seeing how quickly her mood changes from incredibly sweet to incredibly vicious, I realized that this was a cat who had been abused, and was also a cat who would need people who were incredibly familiar with reading kitty signs. And, I realized that almost NO one else would want her. After 3 days under the bed, she finally came out yesterday. The sweetheart was back, the skittish terrified cat was gone. I think this may be the first time in her 5 years that she's been out of a cage, and last night I peeled her off the drapes....found a NEW bowl, she was playing with the water dish, batting it all over the place. She may be a little nutz, but she's a delight :-). Meet Buffy the Vampire Slayer :-)) (updated snapshots of The Dynamic Duo are in my pictures section)

Tagged - 4 Things

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 15:07:07 GMT

Tagged by Firemaid...hmm, lessee... 4 Jobs I've Had in My Life... Mortician's Assistant Reporter for an NPR affiliate Musician University Instructor 4 Movies I Could Watch Over and Over... Johnny Mnemonic Betty Bleu Le Femme Nikkita (French Version) The Matrix 4 Places I've lived... Puerto Rico Dominican Republic U.S. Taiwan 4 TV Shows I Love to Watch... Okay, this one is tough. I have cable in Taiwan, but...errr....there ain't much on it...they don't actually HAVE much regularly scheduled....well, they tend to schedule things for the same time for a month or so, then move them to a different day/time Mythbusters (a moving target) CNN International (different, actually pretty good) Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (okay, so they do marathons of these it seems) ummm....and until they cancelled it, The Simpsons 4 Places I've Been on Vacation... Kentin, Taiwan Jomtien Beach, Thailand Lord, the big rock thingie in Wyoming that was used in Close Encounters?? What is it called? There. Port Townsend, WA 4 Websites I Visit Daily... Tribe Flickr Photopoints MyYahoo 4 of My Favorite Foods... Steak Just about anything that I cook in my cast iron dutch oven, be it soups, stews, or those odd one-pot meals that defy naming Sushi Anything made from or with potatos 4 Places I'd Rather be Right Now... Only 4? This is gonna be tough... -On any beach in Thailand -Sitting in The Alamo (a pub in Hsinchu) doing the tall tale swap with a buddy of mine (I think he's up to telling stories about single handed elephant wresling, I think I may revert to Paul Bunyan....seriously, we sit there and come up with tall tales, its soooo much fun, hehe, his best was the tale about single handedly capturing the mythical flying cobras of Thailand and swapping them for raw opium, hehe...I swear, we oughtta write these down and do a book, great stories) -Working on shooting my environmental nudes project -Anywhere in the U.S. exploring possibilities for exhibitions Okay...who do I tag....ha! Starfish, §t®ngV◊i©e, Wyoming, david

Secret CIA flights stopped in 2 countries

e-n-I-g-M-a — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 10:21:10 GMT

What is amazing to me is how this is usually pushed so far down in newscasts/web pages as to be unimportant. I tend to discount reports like this, until they have enough merrit to be picked up by AP or Reuters or some other news organization at that level.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ By JAN SLIVA, Associated Press Writer 14 minutes ago PARIS - The head of an investigation into alleged CIA secret prisons in Europe said Wednesday that evidence suggests planes carrying terror suspects stopped in Romania and Poland and likely dropped off detainees there. Swiss Sen. Dick Marty's final report, however, offered no clear, direct proof that CIA detention centers were set up in Europe — an allegation made by a human rights group last year. Marty said Romania was part of what he called a "renditions circuit" and was used as a stopover by CIA-linked planes carrying terror suspects. He also said an airport in Poland was likely used as a detainee drop-off point, and accused a total of 14 European countries, including Britain, Italy and Germany, of violating human rights in connection with CIA activities. "We believe we are in a position to state that successive CIA rendition operations have taken place in the course of the same, single flight circuit," Marty said in a report commissioned by the Council of Europe, the continent's leading human rights watchdog. The report is addressed to the 46 Council of Europe member states and will likely be used by the group to put pressure on the countries implicated in it to investigate the allegations. The report relied mostly on flight logs provided by the European Union's air traffic agency, Eurocontrol, witness statements gathered from people who said they had been abducted by U.S. intelligence agents, and judicial and parliamentary inquiries in various countries. In his report, Marty put airports in Timisoara, Romania, and Szymany, Poland, in a "detainee transfer/drop-off point" category, together with eight airports outside Europe. Marty analyzed a flight pattern of a plane with tail number N313P. He said the plane arrived in Timisoara from Kabul, Afghanistan, on the night of Jan. 25, 2004, after having transported Khaled El-Masri, a German who said he had been abducted by foreign intelligence agents in Macedonia, to the Afghan capital. El-Masri claims he was imprisoned for five months and tortured there. Marty said the plane with the crew that accompanied El-Masri stayed in Timisoara for 72 minutes before leaving for Palma de Mallorca in the Mediterranean Sea. "Having eliminated other explanations — including that of a simple logistics flight — the most likely hypothesis of the purpose of this flight was to transport one or several detainees from Kabul to Romania," Marty said in the report without elaborating. Marty said that based on the information at his disposal, he deduced the Szymany airport in northeastern Poland was used for a rendition flight in September 2003. Neither country offered immediate comment, but both have denied involvement in the past. Marty's investigation runs parallel to one by the European Parliament, which has said that data from Eurocontrol shows there have been more than 1,000 clandestine CIA flights stopping on European territory since the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States. But officials said the data does not make clear if there were detainees were on board the flights, nor does it shed any light on allegations of CIA secret prisons. Allegations that CIA agents shipped prisoners through European airports to secret detention centers, including compounds in Eastern Europe, were first reported in November by The Washington Post. Human Rights Watch later identified air bases in Poland and Romania as possible locations of the alleged secret prisons, but both countries have denied involvement. Clandestine prisons and secret flights via Europe to countries where suspects could face torture would breach the continent's human rights treaties, including the European Convention on Human Rights. The Council of Europe, the guardian of the treaty, has no power to punish countries for breaching it, other than terminating their membership in the organization. The European Union could theoretically suspend the voting rights of a country found to have breached the convention, however the evidence would likely have to be proved in court. In his report, Marty said that most European government "did not seem particularly eager to establish the alleged facts."

On name changes and changes of direction...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 10:36:24 GMT

An enigma to myself and others... These days, I'm more of a hermit than anything else, really only going out to shoot. Recently I spent several months not shooting *anything." Not even the cat hanging by her claws from the top of the door (one of those rare snapshots that should have been worth its weight in gold). I took 3 steps back and looked at what I was doing. Why I was doing it. And I discovered something. I wasn't shooting honestly. I was making photographs that were my perception of how others thought I either viewed them or should view them. They were plastic. They weren't honest photographs. Does this mean I will not and do not retouch? Absolutely not. I do and will continue to retouch things that were not appearant at the shoot (moles, the occasional scar that didn't appear until I had the time to peruse details as you only can in a photograph, temporary belmishes like pimples, but even those....I tend to want to leave in on certain models, because they are always there, simply moving around a bit...they are part of the visual experience of the model). Is the direction I'm going now more aesthetically pleasing? Probably not. But. In a world filled with dishonesty, fake images of plastic people held up as the standards of beauty and eroticisim, I hope that people find aesthetic value in my current trend. How long will I keep this up? Who knows. Until I feel that I've finally captured life, people, and things as I experience them. Or. Until how I experience them changes. That could be months, or it could be never.

Okay, until THIS article, I thought I'd heard of pretty much everything....

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 08:30:54 GMT

And I will completely refrain from commentary, this illicited riotous laugter and serious cringing at the same time.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ouch! With sex injuries, love really hurts Broken penises, lodged foreign bodies give new meaning to unsafe sex F.Birchman / MSNBC.com The British erotic retail chain Ann Summers recently released a poll asking people if they had ever been injured during sex. One in three said they hurt themselves somewhat routinely, though the injuries were about what you might expect: rug burns (to, ahem, the knees), muscle pulls, a conk on the noggin from, say, banging into the headboard. But at Sexploration we hear stories, sometimes from emergency room doctors in bars. By the third martini, the stories often begin with, “You wouldn’t believe what I saw last night…” And so I decided to call around to emergency rooms and ask sober ER docs about the things they see, and, more importantly, what advice they might have based on their experiences, not only how to avoid the damage, but how to handle the delicate task of seeking help once the damage is done. I didn’t have much luck. One prig in a Phoenix ER became outraged and hung up on me — twice — before I could even explain the context of my questions. “This is a very inappropriate topic,” he shouted as he slammed down the phone. Inappropriate? Tell it to this guy, who I read about when I started scanning the medical literature: "A 29-year-old man heard a snap during sexual intercourse followed by immediate detumescence and a swelling of the penile basis and scrotum, due to a penile fracture." I’d call that an emergency. In fact, as much as I wish it were, breaking your penis isn’t rare. Guys do it when they get all pile-drivery and they miss the bull's-eye, or when she’s riding Bronco Billy and slips off the saddle. Bend a penis past the breaking point and you can snap the inner chambers, releasing blood into surrounding areas. Ouch! One guy, whose girlfriend made an awkward landing in 1994, underwent emergency surgery and subsequently sued her claiming that years of sexual dysfunction resulted. He lost in court. Don't try this at home But men don’t need women to help them break their penises. It’s amazing what guys do to the poor thing. They “incarcerate” it in steel rings, attach radiator hose clamps, play mumblety-peg with it and a staple gun. From another journal report: “We report removal of heavy iron (barbell) and steel (sledgehammer head) items incarcerating the penis with a heavy-duty air grinder provided by the fire department.” If there’s an imaginable way to masturbate, some man has tried it. “In the hospital the patient reported that his penis got caught in the hose attachment of an old Kobold vacuum cleaner…” Have you experienced the big hurt? Women are no slouches either. “We present the radiological findings of a healthy young woman who presented with acute onset of abdominal pain and was found to have extensive pneumoperitoneum.” That means she had air in her abdomen. And where did the air come from? It was “Jacuzzi-jet induced.” Many sex injuries happen simply because somebody gets a little carried away. “A 64-year-old Italian woman presented to our department with a three-week history of sudden, severe lower back pain…” Turned out she had fractured her pelvis. “We were enlightened as to the aetiology [origins] of the fracture by a nuclear medicine technician who spoke Italian, to whom the patient had explained the nature of her complaint. The severe pain commenced after a rather physical sexual encounter with her husband.” Aside from the old saw about having a heart attack during sex (which isn’t really all that common) going aerobic in bed can cause other problems you’d never suspect. “Six patients presented with a precipitous decrease in vision in one eye with no apparent predisposing factors. After obtaining a careful history, each patient revealed that he or she had been engaging in rigorous sexual activity…” In these cases, the patients popped blood vessels in their eyes, perhaps from screaming during orgasm. You can hurt yourself even when you’re trying to practice safe sex. “A 27-year-old lady presented with persistent cough, sputum and fever for the preceding six months … history also confirmed accidental inhalation of the condom during fellatio.” As this case proves, the sex injured wait far too long to seek medical care. “People often do not seek treatment as soon as they normally would for other injuries,” says Dr. Ted Chan, an ER doctor and professor of clinical medicine at the University of California, San Diego. “They fear the embarrassment, but there is a lot of privacy in the ER. Their privacy is protected.” “During the orogenital contact, the patient noted intermittent searing pain, which he subsequently discovered was the result of superficial trauma from dental devices (braces) that inadvertently scraped the glans. After two days, he developed multiple erosions; these rapidly coalesced into an extensive, extremely painful ulcer covered with necrotic debris.” Call me crazy, but the “intermittent searing pain” would have been a tip off. Had he sought medical care sooner, he could have avoided “necrotic debris.” Why feel apologetic when totally normal sex can cause serious damage? The same air-in-the-abdomen syndrome, or pneumoperitoneum, can occur during cunnilingus if your lover’s a prankster and decides to blow in your vagina as if it were a balloon. Women have died as a result. No kidding. DIY dangers Of course, it’s a big sexual world out there and people are always looking to try something new. But again, perhaps from embarrassment, or just to save money, they don’t want to walk into their neighborhood erotic boutique and buy the proper gear. So they DIY, and that’s just not a good idea. “A prospective database and photographic record of patients who presented with retained colorectal foreign bodies…The foreign bodies included a pen knife, an aerosol deodorant spray can, a blue plastic tumbler, a plastic bag containing two bank notes and some marijuana, a plastic packet containing fish hooks, a penlight [flashlight], a broomstick, a battery-powered vibrator, a primus stove, a cap of an aerosol can, a piece of wire, a piece of hosepipe wrapped with wire, and an iron bar.” Seriously, if it’s possible to put it up your butt, somebody has done it — everything from tennis balls to samples from all four food groups. But they get stuck up there and then you find yourself in the ER lying face down. Sometimes the DIY has tragicomic consequences. “We report two cases in which men used the hydraulic shovels on tractors to suspend themselves for masochistic sexual stimulation. One man developed a romantic attachment to a tractor, even giving it a name and writing poetry in its honor. He died accidentally while intentionally asphyxiating himself through suspension by the neck…” If you’re going to masturbate with the help of heavy machinery, for crying out loud, use the buddy system. Sex isn’t a minefield of danger, but accidents can happen. So when you’re imagining how good it will feel, also try to think of how bad it could feel if something went wrong. And if it does go wrong, do not allow embarrassment or fear of snarky questions from ER personnel to keep you from seeking help. In most cases, says Chan, even your regular doctor doesn’t have to know. So you won’t get any questions about how that zucchini got up there. Brian Alexander is a California-based writer who covers sex, relationships and health. He is a contributing editor at Glamour and the author of "Rapture: How Biotech Became the New Religion" (Basic Books).

Eh? One of those silly "How To" guides from Wiki actually isn't half-bad...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 09:16:19 GMT

http://wiki.ehow.com/Have-a-Healthy-Relationship How to Have a Healthy Relationship There are reliable tools that can be used to create a healthy relationship, many of which have not been taught in our culture. If you want to have a really healthy relationship, follow these simple guidelines. Steps 1. Tell the unarguable truth. Many people are taught to lie to protect someone's feelings, either their own or their partner's. Telling a lie creates a disconnect in a relationship, even if your partner never finds out about it. Withholding the truth (an issue that's come up three times or more without you saying anything) also constitutes telling a lie. Saying "That shirt is ugly" is NOT telling the truth because it's arguable. Someone else could have a differing opinion and could argue about it. Saying "I don't care for that shirt." is inarguable because it's a personal experience. Here are some examples of telling the unarguable truth: "I felt scared when I saw you talking to her at the party.", "I feel angry.", "I think that guy has feelings for me." 2. Make and keep clear agreements. For example, if you say you're going to meet your partner for lunch at noon, be on time, or call if you're going to be late. If you agree to have a monogamous relationship, keep that agreement and/or tell the truth about any feelings you're having about someone else BEFORE you act on them. Keeping agreements shows respect for yourself and your partner, as well as creating a sense of trust and safety. 3. Be responsible (new definition!! Responsible means that you have the ability to respond. It does NOT mean you are to blame.). There is tremendous power in claiming your creation. If you've been snippy to your partner, own up to it, and get curious about how you might do it differently next time. If you are unhappy in your relationship, instead of trying to change your partner, get curious about how this situation is similar to others from your past, and how you might create a better relationship for yourself. 4. Know that relationships are the playground of life. The most important learning takes place within relationships. Each relationship has important information for you to learn and grow. For example, do you often feel "bossed around" in your relationship, or "powerless"? When a relationship isn't working, there is usually a familiar way that we feel while in it. We are attracted to the partner with whom we can learn the most, and sometimes the lesson is to let go of a relationship that no longer serves us. In order to have a healthy relationship, it is important to learn our own lessons, and share with our partner what we're learning. A truly healthy relationship will consist of both partners who are interested in learning and expanding a relationship so that it keeps getting better and better. 5. Appreciate yourself and your partner. In the midst of an argument, it can be difficult to find something to appreciate. Start by generating appreciation in moments of non-stress, and that way when you need to be able to do it during a stressful conversation, it will be easier. One definition of appreciation is to be "sensitively aware of", so you don't necessarily have to be sugar-coating anything. Here are some examples of appreciation: "I can see that you feel really sad about this.", "I appreciate that you are willing to tell me how you feel.", "I'm appreciating myself for sticking with this issue until it's resolved and we both feel good about the outcome." 6. Lastly, you can either choose to be "Right" or you can have a Relationship. You can't have both. Most people argue to be "Right" about something. They say "If you loved me, you would...". They argue to hear the other say "Okay, you're right." If you are generally more interested in being right, understand that you will not create a healthy relationship. Having a healthy relationship means that you have your experience, and your partner has his or her experience, and you learn to love and share and learn from those experiences.

Caring For Your Introvert (Stumbled across this)...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 05:08:01 GMT

...odd that I've been thinking about these things quite a bit lately, and ran across this (err, literally stumbled on it -- http://www.stumbleupon.com ). --------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200303/rauch Caring for Your Introvert The habits and needs of a little-understood group by Jonathan Rauch Do you know someone who needs hours alone every day? Who loves quiet conversations about feelings or ideas, and can give a dynamite presentation to a big audience, but seems awkward in groups and maladroit at small talk? Who has to be dragged to parties and then needs the rest of the day to recuperate? Who growls or scowls or grunts or winces when accosted with pleasantries by people who are just trying to be nice? If so, do you tell this person he is "too serious," or ask if he is okay? Regard him as aloof, arrogant, rude? Redouble your efforts to draw him out? If you answered yes to these questions, chances are that you have an introvert on your hands—and that you aren't caring for him properly. Science has learned a good deal in recent years about the habits and requirements of introverts. It has even learned, by means of brain scans, that introverts process information differently from other people (I am not making this up). If you are behind the curve on this important matter, be reassured that you are not alone. Introverts may be common, but they are also among the most misunderstood and aggrieved groups in America, possibly the world. I know. My name is Jonathan, and I am an introvert. Oh, for years I denied it. After all, I have good social skills. I am not morose or misanthropic. Usually. I am far from shy. I love long conversations that explore intimate thoughts or passionate interests. But at last I have self-identified and come out to my friends and colleagues. In doing so, I have found myself liberated from any number of damaging misconceptions and stereotypes. Now I am here to tell you what you need to know in order to respond sensitively and supportively to your own introverted family members, friends, and colleagues. Remember, someone you know, respect, and interact with every day is an introvert, and you are probably driving this person nuts. It pays to learn the warning signs. What is introversion? In its modern sense, the concept goes back to the 1920s and the psychologist Carl Jung. Today it is a mainstay of personality tests, including the widely used Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Introverts are not necessarily shy. Shy people are anxious or frightened or self-excoriating in social settings; introverts generally are not. Introverts are also not misanthropic, though some of us do go along with Sartre as far as to say "Hell is other people at breakfast." Rather, introverts are people who find other people tiring. Extroverts are energized by people, and wilt or fade when alone. They often seem bored by themselves, in both senses of the expression. Leave an extrovert alone for two minutes and he will reach for his cell phone. In contrast, after an hour or two of being socially "on," we introverts need to turn off and recharge. My own formula is roughly two hours alone for every hour of socializing. This isn't antisocial. It isn't a sign of depression. It does not call for medication. For introverts, to be alone with our thoughts is as restorative as sleeping, as nourishing as eating. Our motto: "I'm okay, you're okay—in small doses." How many people are introverts? I performed exhaustive research on this question, in the form of a quick Google search. The answer: About 25 percent. Or: Just under half. Or—my favorite—"a minority in the regular population but a majority in the gifted population." Are introverts misunderstood? Wildly. That, it appears, is our lot in life. "It is very difficult for an extrovert to understand an introvert," write the education experts Jill D. Burruss and Lisa Kaenzig. (They are also the source of the quotation in the previous paragraph.) Extroverts are easy for introverts to understand, because extroverts spend so much of their time working out who they are in voluble, and frequently inescapable, interaction with other people. They are as inscrutable as puppy dogs. But the street does not run both ways. Extroverts have little or no grasp of introversion. They assume that company, especially their own, is always welcome. They cannot imagine why someone would need to be alone; indeed, they often take umbrage at the suggestion. As often as I have tried to explain the matter to extroverts, I have never sensed that any of them really understood. They listen for a moment and then go back to barking and yipping. Are introverts oppressed? I would have to say so. For one thing, extroverts are overrepresented in politics, a profession in which only the garrulous are really comfortable. Look at George W. Bush. Look at Bill Clinton. They seem to come fully to life only around other people. To think of the few introverts who did rise to the top in politics—Calvin Coolidge, Richard Nixon—is merely to drive home the point. With the possible exception of Ronald Reagan, whose fabled aloofness and privateness were probably signs of a deep introverted streak (many actors, I've read, are introverts, and many introverts, when socializing, feel like actors), introverts are not considered "naturals" in politics. Extroverts therefore dominate public life. This is a pity. If we introverts ran the world, it would no doubt be a calmer, saner, more peaceful sort of place. As Coolidge is supposed to have said, "Don't you know that four fifths of all our troubles in this life would disappear if we would just sit down and keep still?" (He is also supposed to have said, "If you don't say anything, you won't be called on to repeat it." The only thing a true introvert dislikes more than talking about himself is repeating himself.) With their endless appetite for talk and attention, extroverts also dominate social life, so they tend to set expectations. In our extrovertist society, being outgoing is considered normal and therefore desirable, a mark of happiness, confidence, leadership. Extroverts are seen as bighearted, vibrant, warm, empathic. "People person" is a compliment. Introverts are described with words like "guarded," "loner," "reserved," "taciturn," "self-contained," "private"—narrow, ungenerous words, words that suggest emotional parsimony and smallness of personality. Female introverts, I suspect, must suffer especially. In certain circles, particularly in the Midwest, a man can still sometimes get away with being what they used to call a strong and silent type; introverted women, lacking that alternative, are even more likely than men to be perceived as timid, withdrawn, haughty. Are introverts arrogant? Hardly. I suppose this common misconception has to do with our being more intelligent, more reflective, more independent, more level-headed, more refined, and more sensitive than extroverts. Also, it is probably due to our lack of small talk, a lack that extroverts often mistake for disdain. We tend to think before talking, whereas extroverts tend to think by talking, which is why their meetings never last less than six hours. "Introverts," writes a perceptive fellow named Thomas P. Crouser, in an online review of a recent book called Why Should Extroverts Make All the Money? (I'm not making that up, either), "are driven to distraction by the semi-internal dialogue extroverts tend to conduct. Introverts don't outwardly complain, instead roll their eyes and silently curse the darkness." Just so. The worst of it is that extroverts have no idea of the torment they put us through. Sometimes, as we gasp for air amid the fog of their 98-percent-content-free talk, we wonder if extroverts even bother to listen to themselves. Still, we endure stoically, because the etiquette books—written, no doubt, by extroverts—regard declining to banter as rude and gaps in conversation as awkward. We can only dream that someday, when our condition is more widely understood, when perhaps an Introverts' Rights movement has blossomed and borne fruit, it will not be impolite to say "I'm an introvert. You are a wonderful person and I like you. But now please shush." How can I let the introvert in my life know that I support him and respect his choice? First, recognize that it's not a choice. It's not a lifestyle. It's an orientation. Second, when you see an introvert lost in thought, don't say "What's the matter?" or "Are you all right?" Third, don't say anything else, either.

Service Manual Addendum for the Canercian INFP

e-n-I-g-M-a — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 10:59:35 GMT

In view of the number of returns we've gotten on Cancerian INFPs where owners claimed manufacturing defects, it seems prudent to issue an Addendum to the usual Service Manual for humanoids of this type. First things first. Cancerian INFPs exist in their own reality. In many ways, they are much like cats, but cats actually *realize* that the rest of the world doesn't necessarily exist in their reality. Cancerian INFPs often fail to realize this, and are quite baffled upon discovering that others aren't privy to their insights. Cancerians INFPs often fail to see the humor in Calvin & Hobbes, because this reality seems perfectly normal to them. Cancerian INFPs have a limited supply of emotional energy, and peridically need recharging. Think of them as big cell phones with poor batteries. Without proper and regular recharching, their effectiveness as communication devices falls and "dropped call ratios" increase. The emotional batteries of a Cancerian INFP tend to discharge far more quickly in large group situations, and in fact a full charge can be disipated well before the end of a simple Company Christmas Party. If you have misplaced your Cancerian INFP durring this, or a similar event, you may well find it (if it is a male model) out in the garage with a similar group of drained individuals up to the sleeves of his tuxedo in grease helping the small group restore a Porsche 914. If no 914 is available, you might find him along side similar female models far away from the hubub, or gathered in the kitchen inspecting dishes not yet placed on the communal feeding table. There are several risks inherant in allowing the batteries to drain in your Cancerian INFP. The first is exaggerated moodiness. If this trait is exhibited, it is a good indication that batteries need charging. However, even on well charged batteries, this particular model still can exhibit the trait of moodiness. The best way to swing this model in an upward directron is to point out the reality that either it is looking at a single piece of the whole puzzle, and the rest of the puzzle is just fine, or to point out that a replacement piece for the broken one is on order and will arrive in due course. On the offchance that your Cancerian INFP exhibits the crablike tendency to burrow into a hole in the sand, DO NOT attempt to dig it out with sticks, small shovels, heavy equipment, or high explosives. This simply triggers an instinctual deepening of the hole. The best way to get a burrowing Cancerian INFP from its hole is through enticement. Note: If the Cancerian INFP feels that negative consequences may result from the offers of enticements, it may well refuse to emerge. Consistent maintenance of this model requires an acknowlegement if its inner existance. Even without the full comprehension of others, acknowledgement helps maintain proper battery condition. Failure to follow this addendum may cause you Cancerian INFP to perform and behave erratically. With a proper understanding of the engineering behind your Cancerian INFP, and with proper service and maintenance, you should expect to get many years of uninterupted service from its plethora of unusual and suprising features.

This new Tribe design and nav is so ))@#$@#$ annoying...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 08:37:53 GMT

...I honestly find it less than pleasurable to browse tribe. Unfortunately, Tribe was my refuge from work, and if that refuge is such a pain in the arse to look at and use, I wonder how much time I'll spend here? (not going to go into a detailed critique, but whoever came up with this one needs to lay off the acid). If you don't hear from me for a while, prod me at acearle@gmail.com and I'll check back in....even figuring out which tribe to LOOK at now requires more mouse clicks than exist in Bill Gates' wildest fantasy....

I Wanna Be Sedated (the Ramones ROCK!)

e-n-I-g-M-a — Sun, 01 Jan 2006 09:38:15 GMT

Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go I wanna be sedated Nothin' to do and no where to go-o-oh I wanna be sedated Just get me to the airport put me on a plane Hurry hurry hurry before I go insane I can't control my fingers I can't control my brain Oh no no no no no Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go.... Just put me in a wheelchair and put me on a plane Hurry hurry hurry before I go insane I can't control my fingers I can't control my brain Oh no no no no no Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go I wanna be sedated Nothin' to do and no where to go-o-o I wanna be sedated Just put me in a wheelchair get me to the show Hurry hurry hurry before I go loco I can't control my fingers I can't control my toes Oh no no no no no Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go... Just put me in a wheelchair... Ba-ba-bamp-ba ba-ba-ba-bamp-ba I wanna be sedated Ba-ba-bamp-ba ba-ba-ba-bamp-ba I wanna be sedated Ba-ba-bamp-ba ba-ba-ba-bamp-ba I wanna be sedated Ba-ba-bamp-ba ba-ba-ba-bamp-ba I wanna be sedated

Confessions of a Reformed Adrenaline Junkie

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 30 Dec 2005 07:45:20 GMT

maaaan, was having a PM conversation with someone and was reminded of exactly how incredibly satisfying, if not downright fun things like street motorcycle racing, roller blades with ABEC 5s and 80mm wheels, long sticks of wood strapped to my feet while hurtleing under semi-control down a snowy slope...errr...and the most incredible adrenaline rush of all, having to play music in front of a big crowd... ...getting old is a BITCH!!!!!

That's it, home schooling is the only option...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Wed, 30 Nov 2005 12:39:15 GMT

...we flirted with the idea halfway through my son's fifth grade year, but decided that he needed to stay through 6th grade for the socialization. Well, the defication started hitting the rotary oscelator about 2 weeks ago. He started acting out and getting into some minor trouble (really minor, and only once). After a few days of talking about it, it seems that the root trigger for his acting out is a deep anger and hurt at being treated like an animal (which took a good day to work out of him, he HATES to complain). When he started to talk about what the kids have been doing to him, saying to him...he broke down for the first time in a long time. He sees how his anger at the kids who torment him is bursting out in inapropriate ways. The short version is that the school doesn't see it as a problem. In fact, they really are supportive of the students who are tormenting him. "Its just the way that kids treat kids who are different, nothing wrong with that." Bull. Fucking. Shit. At about the same time, my mom came up with the Laurel Springs School, which is a distance learning school. I did a bit of research, and dayum...it seems like it will fit his learning style. Did a little MORE research and found the piece of information to get my wife's buyoff on it. Jennifer Love Hewett is a graduate. Of course, having been here for so long watching B and C grade movies on HBO Asia, I have NO idea who the HECK Ms. Hewett is, but C seemed to recognize her and it gave the entire idea far more credibility in her eyes than me simply saying "He'll go back to that school over my dead body! Home schooling is the ONLY option at this point." So. The enrollment is done. The price isn't terrible, actually, darned good. I'm the primary teacher (so for the next 6 years I will have to choose my photographic shoots and subjects VERY carefully, won't have time to play around, each one has to count). He has full teacher support at the school, which will be very helpful. We still have to figure out the logistics of paying for it, but they are quite flexible...wonder if the Taiwan Visa will work in their system and not get spit back as "High Fraud Risk?"

Odd how on occasion you get a curveball, and it turns out great :D

e-n-I-g-M-a — Mon, 14 Nov 2005 11:59:47 GMT

The owner of the house where we are living tossed us a curveball last week. He's decided to sell the place, which means our lease can't be renewed. Which means a move. The plusses: Its big. Really big. In fact, its underfurnished. And it has a studio, which is just barely big enough to do most of the kind of shooting I like. The minuses. The neighbors. The location (middle of nowhere is actualy a better known location than where it is). It is an 8km drive to the nearest decent grocery store, and about the same to anyplace that serves food (other than 7-11). The pig ranch 500m away. Oh, and did I mention the neighbors? And then there are the neighbors :D, he he. So, we happened across an apartment 3 blocks from the Chunan train station, across the street from a 7-11, upstairs from a McDonalds, and 1 block from a KFC....and 2 blocks from a great morning market, and a fairly decent western style supermarket (only place to get Aussie/NZ beef within a 45Km radius). The plusses (see above) plus...security guard, grounds surveilance system, *Full Japanese style tea room*, rock and sculpture garden in the courtyard....*elevator*....and (this was the kicker)....a private gym, that it turns out hasn't been used in 4-5 months since the last foreigner moved out (treadmills, stationary bikes, rowing machines, universal equipment). The minuses. No studio. Nada. Nuthin. No way to shoehorn one in. So, I'm losing my formal studio with black walls to control reflections. BUT, as I mull it over, I was just on the verge of buying a small livingroom set for my existing studio as props. And I realized that I'm living in one of the worlds largest styrofoam production regions. And....disposable chopsticks to pin large styrofoam pannels together are (ahem) rather easy to come by. So. Portable black walls and ceiling, he he. Another minus is that my darkroom is going from about 3m x 4m to about 1.5m x 2m (if that, I haven't measured yet). And, it ain't gonna happen until the plumber removes the existing toilet and sink. Yep, its a converted bathroom. SO, packing. Negotiating the new lease. Cleaning the new place. Moving stuff now and then, just leaving furniture for the moving company to chew on. Not much time for much else for the next 6-8 weeks. But, I loved my son's comment: "So, does this mean I finally get a TV in my room? If you are going to be using the livingroom as a studio, I'm not going to be able to watch TV during shoots." Smart little linoleum lizard, lol...

You know you are linguistically confused when...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Thu, 03 Nov 2005 06:27:31 GMT

...you are listening to an internet radio station and you get confused as to what language the lyrics are written in, took a good 15 seconds to realize that the song was in GERMAN and that I'm not going crazy and losing my ability to understand spoken English (egad, the last time I had an English conversation was probably 3 weeks ago). It really struck me how similar the linguistic rhythm of English and German are (that's what threw me off). Spoken conversations in Chinese. 40% of email exchanges in Spanish. The other 60% are in English. Linguistic schitzophrenia....

Where o where has Chris gone?

e-n-I-g-M-a — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 08:41:21 GMT

To the darkroom. And the studio. Flowers and playing around with film toys, both medium format and 35mm. And figuring out the quirks of MF enlargement. Fun, SERIOUS fun :-D. I wish you could see the *print* of this, there is so much lost in the conversion to online/digital (the scanning of the print). The tones of the flower, and the details of the "vase" are simply gone through the scanning process :-(.

The wierdest Christmas list you'll ever see...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 06:48:31 GMT

...so, I'm starting early this year, mainly because although I *know* all this stuff MUST be available in Taiwan, I have NO idea where to get it... Here it is: Sodium Sulfite, Anhydrous Sodium Carbonate, monohydrate Hydroquinone Potassium Bromide Potassium thiocyanate Gold chloride solution, 1% Sodium Bisulfite Pyrocatechin Phenidone Potassium Carbonate What is this stuff? Well, some of it is for making a pyrocatechin staining film developer, others for an archival gold toning solution....and a rather nice contrast controlling hydroquinone paper developer. I think I'm going to need to buy some high water slacks and a white lab coat just to make it all visually fit :-D....

Kittens, kittens, everywhere...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 12:07:18 GMT

...the 4th of the summer has wandered into the school, a small 8 weekish old orange tabby with half a tail (congenital mutation on about 30% of the cats here in Taiwan). This is by far the single most hysterical kitten I've ever known (and I've known a lot). Incredibly affectionate, but once gassed up with a can of my cats' favorite wet food, romps (crabs sideways all over the place, attacks things, even things that don't exist...the collapses into a purring mass). Unfortunately, I'm on notice that there will be no more cats, two is enough...and have exhausted everyone that I know who has cats...no one wants him. My wife's suggested solution is to put him back out and let him fend for himself, but she knows there is as much chance of that as there is of him going home to meet the other two. The school is on a very busy 4 lane county highway, and the mortality rate for animals and (literally) people is truly staggering... ...anyone wanna move to Taiwan to adopt a kitten?

Weekend off...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Mon, 05 Sep 2005 06:28:54 GMT

...well, it was *supposed* to be a weekend of, and it mostly was. Spent Saturday night wandering the back alleyways of the Shrlin night market...picked up a couple of shirts (wohoo! this is a big deal for someone my size in Taiwan)...a business card holder....errr, my wife found a whole bunch of things, some very cool handmade jewelry from the Mainland, and modern, not simply a re-creation of what was made a few thousand years ago. Very simple stuff, made with rough cords and simple clay beads. We'd noticed an advertisement for the Taiwan World Trade Center Makeup Exhibition and decided to wander in before we drove back south. It was exactly what I expected, with one exception. It turns out that someone has started importing Kryolan makeup. We bought a full custom palette of lipstick (which can double as eye liner), eyeliner (which can double as lipstic) and watercolor based makeup. The really wierd thing is that suddenly Engima Photography got on the map in Taiwan because, of all things, the single largest makup purchase. Makes me wonder what on earth other studios are doing....probably using radioactive makeup from night markets. In fact, one of my *MODELS* ran into us there, and was slackjawed...saying things like "You don't need to use good makeup, just use the cheap stuff, we don't care." C sat her down outside, did a quick makup job, and then sprayed it with fixative (great color saturation and coverage, but it isn't the most durable stuff without the fixative). The sad thing is that she honestly couldn't tell the difference between the Kryolan and what she had used before she came in, market makeup. To C and I the difference was glaring...smooth colors, perfect blends (it was the first time C had used professional grade makeup, and she was in awe at how well it blends and mixes....she used Shiseido up to now, which is cheaper and more durable, but the ability to get the blending right completely floored her). That's the problem here with art, photography, music, manufacturing, or anything really. People don't understand that when you cut corners the uneducated masses might not be able to articulate the difference, many may not even SEE the difference...but an end product built on a foundation of crap will not be an end product with anything other than a disposable value. Its the reason that anything other than paperclips and pins that is made in Taiwan has been officially banned from Appleseed English School and Enigma Photography. It may have great packaging, it may even look good on the surface, but the cost of chasing after problems, and having to deal with a constant stream of defective products is far more than the savings buying cheaper products generates. Take makup brushes. The Kyrolan set was NT$16,000...errr, about US$500 (we didn't buy them, I told the importer flat out I thought she was scalping on 'em...I'll check the going prices internationally and if it turns out that the prices are in the ballpark, we'll think about it). We were mobbed by local manufacturers who were telling us things that ranged from "Ours are as good" to "Ours are BETTER, we only use the BEST manmade materials, and manmade materials are better than natural fibers." Oh, and he believed that. So, for grins and giggles we checked out a couple of them. The first one that claimed to be as good was laughable. The brush fibers were sticking out at all sorts of wierd angles. We asked how muck: NT$600 for the set (about US$20). He was claiming that for US$20, his company could produce a set of brushes better than Kryolan. You couldn't buy the hair *alone* in the Kryolan brushes for the price of his entire set. I asked him how many people in his small company had worked in theater/fashion. Uhhh. None. What it came down to is that his brother in law thought they could make cheap makeup brushes, knowing nothing about them, based on looking at pictures in catalogs. The second one actually had decent brushes, but didn't have many of the one Caroline needs. They wanted NT$6000 (errr, US$200), but we'd have had to spend another NT$6000 on 3-4 of the brushes she *needs* to work with the waterbased makup for body painting. Its all a big scam. People making things based on looking at pictures in Cosmo or Mademoiselle, knowing NOTHING about the product...putting it in pretty packaging, and incorporating a company with "Paris" "Milan" "Italy" or "France"....or even sometimes "French" so that it looks to the ignorant like it is a product from abroad, then selling it at nearly the same price as the REAL thing...in fact, the one that really got me to explode all over them in public was "Her ******* Cosmetics, Paris, French." They claimed that they were French cosmetics (maybe French food additives, at least from looking at them). When I pointed out that no western company in their right minds would use a name like theirs (deleted because I don't want to promote them in any way)....AND, a European company would know the grammatical difference between "French" and "France" they squalled that I simply didn't know anything about high fashion (this stuff looked like the kind of things you'd buy to paint on your Barbie Doll). I really wonder when Taiwan industry will figure out that they'd do better by producing a quality product than by simply running giant international con games. GOOD things! Diamond Tony's Italian Bistro is STILL one of the best restaurants I've eaten in *anywhere.* And I'm not eating for 3 days to make up for what I ate yesterday....smoked salmon ceasar salad, cold apetizer sampler, followed by lamb fettuccini in an incredible garlic pesto sauce. I *tried* to convince myself that stuffing cherry cheesecake down was going to happen, but remembered a particular Monty Python movie and figured that exploding in public was in pretty poor form, he he he.

Murphy's Law #5,665,344

e-n-I-g-M-a — Fri, 02 Sep 2005 04:29:02 GMT

...is that if you pick the rugs up in the living room, your roof will NOT leak. Typhoon is officially survived, two short power outages, plastic inserts from one of the big signs on the school are gone (someone said they are about 1500m up the road in an rice field, haven't checked) and one of the smaller signs is dangling precariously (with plastic inserts intact) by two screws. The brilliance of my staff who sat there gawking at it for 3 hours until I noticed it is truly mind boggling (the sucker is above a door, and is going to fall and kill someone at any moment). Response from the sign company: We're too busy to worry about it, we have to install too many new signs. Response from me: If it falls and hurts someone because of your greed, I'll inflict the same injuries on you AND make you pay for damages. They will be here in 20 minutes (somehow, I think that persuaded 'em). Really the worst thing was finding my favorite neighborhood cat dead on the school's front porch (she was an incredible sweetheart, who I think found herself outside and came here to see if we would let her in, which was quite common in the past). One of the big flower pots blew over and pinned her, and it looks like the street may have been underwater at the time, I think she drowned. What's scary is how used to dealing with dead animals I've become, between the dogs/cats that are killed by cars in front of the school and the rats that get trapped in things like copy machines, I've lost track of the number of carcasses I've had to deal with in the last few years (funny thing is that I'm the one who all the neighbors now come to when they find something dead, wonder if it has to do with my year and a half as a mortician's assistant...mebbe that's why I deal with it better than most)... My rocket scientist spousal unit decided that the storm was over when the eye passed over (it was 9am, I was still sleeping knowing the entire thing wouldn't pass until late evening) and decided to come in to school. Half way there, the wall of wind on the opposite side of the storm just about flipped her car over. She was close to her father's house, and went there. You'd think after my chewing her up one side and down the other about the stupidity of not even bothering to look at the news channels to see *where* the storm was, she'da stayed put there....but, no....45 minutes later I heard the sound of her car alarm arming in the garage, she'd come out in the winds a second time. This was AFTER watching the news at her father's house. She described weaving between downed trees and live power lines (which should have been an indication that it was a *really* *really* bad indea to be out driving). The amazing thing is that only two people died, and 12 were inujured--all people who had gone out in their cars or on their scooters in spite of the storm. At least no one grabbed ahold of a high voltage power line this time as has happened the last two taiphoons (errr, then again, I think people around here may have learned from watching their neighbors fry). Sorry if I seem jaded, but basic safety is such a foreign concept here that its enfuriating.

Its here, and its pissed...

e-n-I-g-M-a — Wed, 31 Aug 2005 02:46:53 GMT

...the leading edge is just clipping us here, and its far worse that the eye of the last one that passed directly overhead. Dunno how long I'm going to hang around in the office, but people are balking at closing early. Then again, they squall whenever we follow government direction and close for typhoons. Am hoping to hold out until mid-afternoon, but this thing just slammed us with no buildup, have to get out of here before the roads between the school and my house will be under 2-3m of water, when that happens is anyone's guess...