Made with REAL Sugar

OMG. Made with REAL sugar and not corn syrup. And with an archaic label. A student brought me this after a convo about how Coca-Cola made in Mexico is made with cane sugar and not corn syrup and how I prefer natural fibers and ingredients over processed varients. Begging the question "then what they hell have you been serving me?"
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

In a Station of the Metro (in San Francisco)

From our trip to San Francisco this last weekend and another one of my favorite poems by Ezra Pound.

I'll Be Back Soon

So over the last week I know I have been negligent in posting to After Fighting, but I swear I am here, and ready to update my online persona. Excuses, excuses, excuses, but I was getting ready to go to San Francisco this last weekend, then actually being in San Francisco, and now recovering the last few days and getting back into my normal routine the last couple of days. Here I am again, ready to post what I stumble upon here on the web.

On the way to San Francisco

On the Internet
thirty thousand in the air
look what I can do!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

#11 Waiting to get a tooth filled

My mouth is numb. In the dentist's chair. Waiting to get a tooth filled. I probably wont be able to eat until later tonight. Or so the dentist says. The entire right side of my mouth is numb. She says "I hope you had a big lunch."

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

#10 Butternut Squash Ravioli

Butternut squash Ravioli with a brown butter sage sauce. One of my better meals in 2010.

#9 The Peppermill

#8 Laundromat Near My House

The attraction is not hard to understand: there is an interest in solitude, in city life, in the solace of the night. I think Edward Hopper had, in different ways, been unusually alive to the power of the liminal traveling space. His figures seem far from home; they sit or stand alone, they gaze out of the window of a moving train or read a book in a hotel lobby. Their faces are introspective. They have perhaps just left someone or been left; they are in search, adrift in transient places.
But in Hopper’s hands, the isolation is made poignant and enticing. The twenty-four hour diner, the station waiting room, and the motel are sanctuaries for those who have, for noble reasons, failed to find a home in the ordinary world. Others in the room may be on their own as well, men and women drinking coffee by themselves, similarly lost in thought, similarly distanced from society. The woman in Automat seems in such a frame of mind, staring at her cup of coffee and shifting her gaze between the coffee and the view.

#7 How did I get here?

And I was worried I wouldn't have a picture to upload for today. Then, for whatever reason in life, I stumbled upon this at the Riviera. Never before in my life...

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

#6 Pattern on Pattern

Aside from plaid, another hipster trait: pattern on pattern. (I assure you @releaseparty they are all 100% natural fibers.)

I was trying to put my finger in the latest trend in popular fashion. I think it's Vintage Americana. That is the Levi's, Walt Whitman campaign. It's plaid. It's simple pattern. Just enough pattern to be targeted as too boring or plain; pragmatic in its approach. It's at once both rustic (heralding our pioneer roots) and city hipster chic (modern twist).

#5

The last three students to walk into my classroom all had plaid on. At least it’s a (hipster?) trend I am ahead of. Like 6 months ahead. Being a better teenager than they are.

#4 Blew out a tire on the freeway. FML

It's ok. I'm fine. Aside from having to change a tire.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

#3 Trying to Justify an Authentic Experience

Untitled #2 (for now). From a series I am continuing to work on using images from my childhood home (high prole upbringing?). These images are stylistically influenced by a favorite photographer Josef Sudek.

I think with these images I might be trying to justify an authentic experience. It probably stems from a want to be more upper class, not wanting to appear proletariat.

#2

Untitled (for now). From a series I am beginning to work on using images from my childhood home. This one is influenced by a favorite photographer Josef Sudek.

Picture #1

I was recovering from the New Year's Eve. I woke up and decided then I needed to get of the city. I needed to clear my mind from the night (year?) before. I called up Michael and told him I needed to do something completely comfortable and banal, like walking through a casino. (I was not about to push boundaries or explore new horizons.)

So we left the city, to the California boarder. To do something completely Las Vegas, to meander through the outlet mall and casinos in Primm. Only reaction need be involved. That, strangely, is like comfort food to me. Maybe it’s the hub-bub, that constant, canned winning sound. I like taking in the decor, the the casino carpet: at once gaudy and entertaining. Who designs that stuff anyway? I want it in my house. Despite all the chaos ensuing and problems associated with the idea of a casino, it is comfortable.

After Realizing...

I am re-starting After Fighting… again. It will be different. The impetus for posts is the same: the things that come into my life that interest me, spark some sort of curiosity, that I want to talk about and share. I realize now the problem with the way I posted before was in how epic I needed the posts to be when getting across my point. I would have to sit down and compose an essay explaining my ideas. Yeah, that took too much time. So much time that the majority of the ideas for my posts would never see their way to completion. I was over the idea before it got to the blog, and another, more intriguing idea would be consuming my mind.

So what to do about this problem. The blog has been sitting dormant for some time now. And that doesn’t feel right either. I need deadlines. I need to be concise. I want more of my ideas to make it to the publishing step. After Fighting… will be structured on the idea that I will take one photo each day over the next year. Then I may or may not add additional commentary. The things I write about may be directly based on or juxtaposed with the photo I post.

This isn’t one of my New Year’s resolutions. Resolutions are crutches for people who can’t resolve their problems when they arise. I would hope that a person would be able to make ongoing resolutions throughout the year, when it makes sense for them to do so, not when the mass of society is doing the same inane task.

No, After Fighting… is spurred by the same catharsis from its inception: that when after you have wrestled and wrestled with something in your life, all you can do is let go, give into it. To make the best of the future you might have to disregard the tragic past and make things work, because they have to. Make it stupid, banal; turn it around and make it work for yourself. Really, there is no choice involved. Kate Gleason (the author of the poem for which this blog is named) writes: “’After Fighting for Hours’ was the result of trying to write about what it takes to keep a marriage together over the long haul, to go the distance, and how the key to doing that is often of an elemental, illogical, and nonverbal nature, simply letting the dumb animals of our bodies take their course.”

'After Fighting' continues...