Tunga

I suck

at maintaining a blog. Sorry.



But to make up for it, here's an update. A new feature that probably won't last long: taking pictures of wierd stuff i find outside of work. Today, a rubber breast with a face drawn on, stuck to the fence.
enjoy.

I almost finished a project!

Some of you may remember my plan to build a theremin. well, we'll see how it turns out over the next few hours, but here's where we are now




A few things to note:

+ my soldering iron holder is the perfect length to allow th super hot tip to rest comfortably on the surface of my desk

+ measuring is important

+ if you substitute one part of a kit for something else, the directions don't really help anymore

+ soldering fumes make you feel funny

Nurses

This is one of the first photos I ever found. I don't know why, but I think it's become one of my favorite photos. It's why i always stop to pick up photos from the ground and steal film from cameras in the thrift store.

The Dental Hospital Slides

Scotland, April 2005:
On my way to the darkroom in the mid morning, I walk past a dumpster. Acting on reflex, I glance in and notice that it is filled, to the brim, with sciency looking things. I resist and go to the studio, but am unable to concentrate. I have to go back, and I find a few friends to come with me. It turns out that this dumpster is filled with things from a lab in the dental hospital across the street. The lab is closing down. After about an hour in the dumpster, we are invited up to the lab to take what we please. Here is what I found:
-boombox with tape and radio, working
-2 binders full of negatives and slides (see below)
-1 binder of "Skull Loan Forms", blank and filled out
-rolls of exposed but undeveloped slide film
-3 glass eyes
-1 old wooden first aid box, with old first aid
-wire rack filled with glass bottles and tubes (later hopefully turned into an ant farm by a guy named tim)
-Immersion chiller
-Lab coat with dental X-rays in pocket
-Dozens of boxes of slide mounts (for microscopes)
-dozens of boxes of tounge depressors
-nice family photo album filled with pictures of something that looks like a detatched finger (but is probably a tooth)
-Dentist's mirror 9the kind they stick in your mouth)
-Industrial knife sharpener/grinder
-1 box (300 count) of new 60 ml specimin jars
-1 box (700 count) of new 7 ml vials
-new box of vinyl gloves
-2 tubes of diamond compound.
-bottle of "Dilap Fluid", pressurized, with unicorn on lable
-8x loupe with mm gauge
-plastic sculpted gums with real teeth imbedded, apparently used to practice fillings
-nice little plastic sticker that posed the question "pH electrodes getting thirsty?"
-leitz wetzlar 5x4 camera back looking thing.
-Eluant control panel
-bunches of other things that we were not allowed to take, including 2 fridges filled with tooth samples from dozens of different species. someone else did get the dentist chair though.
Later that night i went to see Oi Polloi, but it just couldn't live up to the morning's activities.

For Rose (and Jen)

Mike

Good luck Maine

Now that's a good sandwich.

Well, open faced sandwich. Toast, Riblet, fried egg and cheese. Don't bother with condiments.

Mermaid Parade

I didn't really like any of the photos I took at the Mermaid Parade at Coney Island this year. So instead, here's a selection from a memory card i found on the subway. It looks like something happened to a lot of the files, as they are pink. If these look like your photos by the way, send me the make and size of the memory card and I'll return it.

Atlantic City!!!

Rose drove me to Atlantic City for the days before the 4th of July. We took some sort of old-timey road with old timey things on it. I made friends with a giant cow:



While Rose prefered the Cowboy...



We passed a huge roadside shrine, right after the frozen yogurt shop / driving range.



Despite some initial hesitation, the room turned out to be sort of nice, complete with mini kitchen, multiple styles of free soaps, Comedy Central and a pretty decent veiw.

More Atlantic City

We discoved a gang of wild cats. they live on the beac, get fed regularly and, at least in my head, sometimes join forces and hunt seagulls.



Rose met a giant crab-type thing and befriended it.



Later, Rose is overwhelmed by bright lights in a casino.



In the end, however, she got used to it, and things worked out well for us.

SilverDocs: A Photo Essay

That fails to show anything SilverDocs related:

First off, an artsy style picture of windows! At Night!!!


French Toast! MMMMMMM!


Man Wig! Scraggily moustache wig as well!


Finally, a cat with no ears...

What could be better...

...than a bike mounted camera?




Kind of a lot really. Happiness that doesn't come through possesing material goods, trustworthy leaders, a national healthcare plan, not thinking that everytime you ride your bike you will probably be hit by a car, etc, etc. But to stay on topic, a decent bike mount for a camera. this isn't one. I'm working on it though, and one day soon, it'll work out.....

New Camera!

DC Photographers

Is there anywhere in DC aside from Chrome that's trustworthy for B+W film? Should i just buy chemicals and do it myself? If so, how do i avoid all the dust?

BLAST!

So i know it's been a while that i've posted something here. it'll be a while longer now. my digital camera fell out of my pocket whilst riding my bike past union station. i failed to notice till a few hours after i got home. luckily, it was somehow still there when i realized and went back for it. unluckily, it was raining kind of hard that night, and so the camera had been sitting in the wet gutter for a few hours.

needless to say, it won't turn on anymore.

and i don't have a card reader to get the images off of it.

Does anyone know someone who wants to trade a new working camera for an old, broken one?

Review!

Those that know me know that I enjoy a good glass of whiskey. So, upon seeing this bottle, I knew I had to get it, An American Single Malt! Fantastic, right?
First off, let's discuss color. It's actually quite nice, a light greenish gold. Color has a fairly large effect on whiskeys that i buy, and this one passed the test.
Unfourtunatly, it goes downhill from there. I suspect this is mostly due to their "secret" ageing process. Typically, a decent whiskey is aged around 8-10 years, the older it gets, the better, up untill around 30 years or so, when it begins to taste moslty of wood. This "chip and barrell process" used by Copper Fox is , I suspect, is something akin to what many american beer and whiskey makers do to save time. The liquid is forced through wood chips at high speeds. The point of which is to force the liquid to pick up as much of the charicteristics of the wood as possible, withough having to age it for years. A good idea, if it actually worked. The problem is,whiskey is aged in wood because wood is porous. Extended ageing allows the harsher parts of the alcohol to evaporate through the wood. Outside air also works it's way in, imparting the area's "flavor" into the whisky, along with the flavor of wood. This "flash" aging (the bottle states this whisky is a whopping 4 moths old), imparts the wood flavor, but doesn't remove the harsher flavors of alcohol. That being said, let's move on.
The nosing processs (smelling it basically), can be one of the best parts of a good whiskey. This one, however, fails miserably. Imagine if you mixed some imitation vanilla extract with rubbing alcohol. That's what it smells like. No sublties, no layered scents, just crap.
If you somehow manage to get past the scent and get the whisky in your mouth, you are instantly punished for your good efforts. Remember drinking Aristocrat Vodka from a plastic handle back in high school? Remember how as soon as it got in your mouth, it set your tastebuds on fire, so you soon learned to just drink it fast to avoid having it touch the inside of your mouth? That's what the "body" of this makes me think of. Adding a bit of water to cut the alcohol burn is a waste of time however, because the actual flavor is god awful. Because it isn't really aged, the whisky is increadibly harsh. There are applewood notes, but the flash ageing makes it seem artificial and much sweeter than it should be.
The finish is almost tolerable at first, but unfourutatly, the cherry flavored toffee taste never seems to go away.
On a final note, while it may be a bit nit-picky, they have no right to call this whisky instead of whiskey. Only Scotland and, according to some, Canada can do that. It's not a "law" really, but it's just understood.
So, to the good people at Copper Fox, I have one question: "What the fuck?" Did you actually taste this and think, "Hell yeah! this is good as hell, let's sell it!" Have you had Scotch, or any other whiskey before? Jack Daniels even? Again, those that know me, know that I don't like to waste the alcohol. Especially whiskey. But it looks like this bottle is bound for the drain. I just can't do it.

PhotoRama.

I've got some work in this upcoming show. As does the infamously talented Thomas Micheal Corcoran. come to the opening, or come later so you can look at and purchase the work with far greater ease.

...it'll all be ok

One step Closer to Hell

I recently aquired a negative scanner. While it means that I've become that much more dependent on computers and technology, it will also hopefully mean that I can shoot more film, and do something with it afterwords.
Start looking for Found Photos here. soon. Whenever I get around to it.

Drunken Pupppy Dance Party

We over prepared a bit.



The punch was here.







People actually danced.

Stupid Blogs

This has become exactly what I didn't want it to be; photos of what I did over the weekend. Which is also, incedentally, what my photography has become. I suppose that just means that I need to start shooting "real" photos again...

More NYE

Something was funny.


For the first time in years, the UUHC was all in the same room. I didn't take a picture of that.

NYE

Carytown was no fun.



Except that Rafiya was there.


So we went back to the house party and sat upstairs.


Seth acted pretty