Fresh drops.

Taken after a summer rainstorm that disappeared as quickly as it appeared one August evening in Kentucky.

Today was the first day of classes at ASU and it was pretty crazy on campus… This being my third year here, I think this was by far the weirdest first day of classes so far. First off, it was HOT and HUMID today - hot is normal, humid makes suck. Everyone was shweaty and it was overall total grossness.

My first class was a lot of fun, my professor is pretty wacky and the class (Race/Gender issues in Science Fiction) is going to be a lot of fun I think. My second class was cancelled because the professor was in a wreck of some sort, which left a gaping hole of three hours needing to be filled. Sigma Phi Beta was tabling today trying to recruit the young gays for our fraternity so I went to join them only to find that the table was in complete sunlight and after about 5 minutes I just couldn’t take the heat and told them that while I loved them, I would die if I stayed out there any longer. I think they eventually pooled money and bought a tent/awning from Ace Hardware to provide shade, which was a very good idea.

My third class today was the Painting II class I signed up for, but the teacher is no longer at ASU so it was a new teacher.. while the class sounds like a lot of fun, I’m going to drop it and add Photogravure which I was fortunate enough to get an over-ride and permission to enroll in! This pleased me greatly… it will be a lot of work but ASU is one of a handful of schools that teach the process and ASU is the ONLY school in the US that teaches both photogravure and colloytype, which are both older processes. I’m really interested in these two processes as well as daguerreotypes… I’m not sure any school teaches daguerreotypes because the process is pretty cumbersome, expensive and damn toxic - you use mercury vapors to develop the latent image on a pure silver surface. Cha-ching!

Tomorrow is Advanced Photos and Understanding Photographs.

I’m also really kinda screwed this week because my car has decided, quite timely, to break down on me. Currently it is sitting in a parking lot about a mile from my house because I couldn’t shift it into gear whilst driving on my way from dinner to a meeting last night. You can’t get it towed from point A to point B without giving the key over to the tow truck driver, which means I have to be WITH the car when the tow truck arrives. With today being the first day of classes and timing being off every attempt to move my car failed miserably. So hopefully I’ll get it taken care of tomorrow, and hopefully I’ll get a nice rental to drive while they fix my car.

Stupid car.

Homeplace.

The house in this picture is where my maternal grandparents lived for a very long time. My Grandfather was born in this house, and both he and my grandmother died there as well (at different times). This place holds a lot of memories, but since my Grandmother passed it hasn’t been occupied and is slowly deteriorating. I’m not sure what is in store for this house any more.

Lonely Cloud.

The tree in the middle, is actually three trees - two deciduous trees with a pine tree in the middle. Very strange.

Soooo classes start Monday… I’ll admit that I am pretty excited for the up-coming semester. I’m taking Advanced Photography, Digital Photographic Images, Understanding Photography, Painting II -or- Photogravure, and a special topics class called SciFi Race/Gender Issues. IF I can get my concurrent degree status before it is to late add a class and I can get an override, I’ll try to enroll in an online Intro to Interdisciplinary Studies class too. I wont know about the Painting/Photogravure status until I go to class the first day. I hope I get into Photogravure as this will be the only opportunity I get to take it while I’m at ASU because I hope to graduate before its offered again (every other fall).

Sidewalk Kitty.

Water Drops.

I’m back home (home is where the cat is). The visit with the old people was fun and it was good to see them. We visited a close family friend who lives in Cincinnati while I was there, and that was a lot of fun as well. On the way to Cincy I saw a billboard for the infamous creation museum.. I asked to go and they said no. I can’t hardly blame them, but still, it would have been lots of fun to go in there and laugh and make a scene at how dumb it was. Oh well.

This is about the time of the year that I call Bigglesmas, when my silly orange cat sprang forth into the light. He’s now officially gone around the sun 9 times, which makes him 52 years old in cat years. I bought him a present, a self-scooping kitty box. Target had this particular model priced very reasonably - everywhere else they’re $10-20 more than you can find them on the web, which means they were either priced wrong or Target is pricing everyone else out of the running on this model.

And yes its a present for kitty, not for me. It does make my life easier, but primary motivation is for kitty. I promise

Tomorrow the Super Shuttle picks me up at 5:30 am to haul my ass to the airport for a end-of-summer visit to the parental estate. I just checked in online, and I don’t have a seat assignment. This vexes me.

Oh well - if I make the flight - I intend on taking lots of pictures in KY. I need a good photo expedition

Meh. Nuffin much else to say, other than I’m glad school starts in two weeks. I need something to do.