Birthday dinner with Dana and Jacob, Boulder, CO

Street performer, Boulder, CO

What can be said about this month of August? Its probably been the strangest birthday month to date. Good things…not so good things. Four main parts to this month have been the most significant. First and foremost, I had a birthday. So that was definitely a good thing. Another day above ground is always cool. Along with that, I took a trip to Colorado. This is where it gets a little tricky, but I won’t bore you with the details and specifics. Suffice to say, I didn’t get to shoot any models. I didn’t get to see many of the friends I went there for because I had to cut the trip short. Time was limited for the friends I did get to see. And to really put the crown on the cake, my car suddenly took a dump. It began spitting coolant everywhere.

Street performer, Boulder, CO

It took me about 16 hours to drive back and about 5 gallons of coolant. I went straight to the dealership but they could not even find a problem after keeping the car for a day. It was believed that a gas attendant I saw along the way might have fixed the issue by releasing air pockets through a bleeder valve. Well, I lasted another week before my ride started spitting coolant again. This time, my buddy Felix and his life-long friend Art came over to look at it. Art found a leak in the water pump and thought it might be wise to change out the thermostat as well. He agreed to work on my car the NEXT MORNING. What I didn’t know til after I got over there was that it was HIS BIRTHDAY and we spend from 7am to almost 5pm taking apart, replacing parts, cleaning parts on my car. We took apart the entire coolant system almost and flushed both the engine and the radiator. We replaced all the hoses, installed a new water pump and thermostat, and he made my throttle body look like new again since we had to remove it to get to the thermostat. Sadly the car is STILL spitting coolant. I’m giving it a few more days to see if it may have just been overfilling it or something simple. So the jury is still out on that one. Long story short… Papa needs a brand new ride.

The deaf cat

So yeah, its been a weird month. So much so that I’ve got friends asking me where I’ve dropped off to. Photo-wise, its been mainly catching up on edits. As soon as I got back, there were two projects waiting on me still and the primary one was from a volunteer session for NILMDTS I had done a week before I left for Colorado. I did more edits on that project than any NILMDTS session to date. I didn’t get many shots from Colorado either. Most of my time was spent hanging with friends and when I did try to head up into the mountains, I got stranded on the side of the road while heading up some mountains waiting for my car to quit steaming. And this has probably been the month with the most VA appointments ever!

Street Performer, Boulder, CO

But this month has definitely been a blessing too. Despite the car, I honestly can’t complain. Well, maybe a little with the knee and my back, but other than those things all together, its been a blessing. I got to see 3 friends that I hadn’t seen in 25 years. The only regret was that I did’t get one shot of me with Kev, Jay, or Susie! I spent the majority of my time at Kevin’s house and despite the 3 times we went out… not one shot. I only got to see Jay and Susie only briefly but still, not even a camera phone photo. I also to see two former models of mine that I hadn’t seen in 5 years. I spent the night with one of them, Dana, (another shot of Dana) and since I wasn’t going to get to do any camping, I took my sleeping bag out on her patio that was covered by a big crab-apple tree. Her boyfriend was also a former photo classmate of mine from college in Murray State University in Kentucky. They took me out for a birthday dinner that night.

I haven’t done any more nudes since working with Viki Vegas in early July. So I need to change that. I think my next concept will be a little more edgy and possibly dark. Any takers? I’ve been doing safe and conservative for a little too long so I definitely need to spice it up a little. Come to think of it, I hadn’t been doing much hiking either. Its too friggin’ hot to do stuff locally, but I could easily head out to Mt Charleston or maybe something out to Utah. My last hike was with Aletha and friends in mid-July and that was Mt Charleston’s Big Falls. Before that it was in June where I also camped out and did Little Falls that night and Big Falls that morning. I guess I never posted any pics from any of those hikes.

Well, the month isn’t over so there’s still lots I’ll still have to report on. I gotta finish this thing up quick. Got another VA appointment on the other side of town. Hope the car holds up!

Mary, Katherine… Sorry I didn’t get to drop in on you guys in Gunnison, CO. I’ll be back that way, though… PROMISE!