Well, now you know… gross.

Apologies for the missing week in photos this past week. My beloved Powerbook has keeled over and died. She’s currently getting an autopsy done and should be back in my hands soon… or at the very least, I should have the remains (my files). I really hope we can save her. Having just bought a brand new car, I really can’t afford to get a new computer too. But things without remedy should be without regard. What’s done is done. Let’s just hope it all works out in my favor.

I’ll post two weeks in photos this coming Friday… and (as always) random crap until then.

I met Lindsey in the first grade. We instantly became the best of friends (and by best friends, I mean best friends). But as fast as we became friends, we could also unfriend each other, since these were in the days when it was acceptable to call your friend a “butthead,” but calling them a “butthole” could end your friendship faster than you can say the word. We’d make other friends, call them our “best” for a week, then make our way back to each other. We were so close, she even took to calling my dad “dada,” as he was like a second father to her.

When I was 9, my mom remarried, we moved away, and I switched schools. Lindsey and I were devastated. We were determined not to let my move get in the way of our best friendship, but we were young and idealistic. I moved, we drifted. I saw her a few times over the next couple years, but then it was done.

Then one day, near the end of our high school careers, I took a drive. I needed to get away, so I just drove, and then drove some more. I ended up at Lindsey’s house. I hadn’t seen her in over seven years by then, but I rang the doorbell and she was home. We hung out in her room and reminisced, because reminiscing was all we could do. We had nothing else to talk about. We had nothing in common anymore. We were simply two people who used to be friends.

Fast forward several more years and the two of us native Minnesotans both find ourselves in Park City, Utah. As a 2002 and 2006 Olympian, she’s on the U.S. cross-country ski team, training here a few times a year. And of course, I’m a photographer at the newspaper. She’s in town for a few weeks (from Michigan, where she is now married, with dogs) and we met up for dinner last night. I’d only seen her once in the past 12 years or so (that day when we were 17), but she looks exactly like she did when she was six. The gap between her front teeth is gone and she’s about two feet taller, but I could still pick her out of a crowd. She said the same of me.

We were best friends as kids, complete opposites as teenagers, and last night found ourselves back where we started. We sat at our table until the restaurant closed and the waiters were putting the chairs on top of the tables. We could have talked forever… but this time, we weren’t just reminiscing. And after this one night, I no longer consider her someone I used to be friends with. Lindsey is once again a friend… not a best friend, but a friend nonetheless. We’re hanging out again on Sunday.

Whitney and I took a drive up to Jackson this past weekend. Good times ensue.

PS: More photos will be added when I get them.

(awesome photo by Chris)

Yesterday, I took photos of the pouring the rock for Miner’s Day. Miner’s Day isn’t until September, but they have to pour this gigantic block of cement several months early. I took photos, got splashed with cement, and didn’t realize a list item was begging to be checked off. But then I did. And I was dying (I repeat, DYING) to write my name it… seriously, itching to do it. But I just couldn’t bring myself to ask. When someone jokingly said I should go write my name in it, I piped in. “Ummm, well, actually… you see, I ummm… I really, really, really want to.” I told them about the list and they insisted to smooth out the pavement for me, hold me up there, and even give me a stick to do it. So I did. And I can now check off #40. Yee-haw.

PS: if you hadn’t noticed, #33 has also recently been checked off. I am on a roll!

Not my best week (photographically), but whatev. You win some, you lose some. Still had a fantastic week (non-photographically). Yee-haw.

I’m leaving out the cheap kid shots this week.

I guess it’s my new favorite past-time. Went up in the Uintas this weekend. And I didn’t screw up my neck this time.

Small week this week. Took a fair share of photos, but not ones I really feel like posting on here. I think I’m getting lazy at blogging. This laziness will likely only be short-lived. Guess it was just more a week in the mind rather than a week in photos. My mind is outside of photography right now. This is a whole other blog post.

Originally I had about 800 photos to post here this week (very, very busy week), but I decided to be super-duper selective instead. So if you want to see the other ones, you’re gonna have to head on over to me Flickr page.

Yes, it’s true, it’s only July 3rd, and not really a holiday, but for me, it’s my holiday. My job requires me to work practically all day on the 4th, and seeing as we put the paper together a day early, I had no work to do today. I also had nothing to do. This post is about what I did when I had nothing to do. Terribly interesting, I know, but I feel like being lazy and writing instead of going for a hike or cleaning. So when I have nothing else to write about, this is what you get: a spectacular day in the life of a spectacularly uneventful day.

I woke up this morning after a hefty 11 hours of sleep. I credit this insane amount of sleep not only to the day off, but also to the enormous (and incredibly cheesy) meal I ate last night when I hung out with my brand new friend Paige. Not only did I finish an entire appetizer and meal, but I also managed to squeeze down what Paige couldn’t of hers. This explains the massive overnight food coma that followed.

This morning, after writing emails and putzing online, I decided Baby needed another haircut. I’ve been meaning to get her shaved in the lion cut, but I guess you can’t get a pet groomed without all their paperwork (which I do not have). So I gave her another haircut myself, and now the back half of her body is nearly bald while the front has a full coat and a pseudo-mohawk lines her spine. It’s hilarious.

Then I received many unexpected phone calls in a row… one of which was from my favorite fellow informing me of how I still made the Jackson paper (even if only in a photo reprints ad) nearly a year after I left. This pleases me, because I heard it through the grapevine that two of my photos ran in the Deseret Morning News earlier this week. I thoroughly enjoy it when my name still graces the pages of papers I used to (but no longer) work for. The best was when I made the front page of the sports section last month.

Then I decided it was time to get out of the house. I went to the bank to pick up some cash to pay rent. When I exited the bank, $500 richer, I found the car next to me parked way too close to me for me to open my door. I crawl in through my passenger seat and the young girl in the passenger seat of the sardine-can parker apologizes profusely through our closed windows.

Then it struck me that I have not gone to see a movie, outside the library, in far too long. Usually I don’t want to see anything playing, but not this time… because this time, the new Pixar movie Ratatouille was playing. From the minute I first heard of this movie, I knew I had to see it, because my darling pet rat (who I had put down last month) was named Ratatouille Ratone. While watching our animated rat hero toss together gourmet meals, I dined on popcorn and Raisinets in a crowded theater that suddenly felt much more crowded when the two teenagers next to me decided to start making out. Thankfully, just as I was about to yell at them, they got up and left (probably to go fornicate in the bathroom).

Afterward, I headed to the library to re-check out (not renew) a few books on nutrition, climbing, and trail running. I also added a few new books to the bunch… an animal track guide, a book about dwarves, and one about a lady who stalks her dog to uncover his secret life. I return home.

I waste more time online and create a Simpsons avatar of myself. Though the hair is a bit more voluminous than mine, between the blue shoes and the black pants, I’d say I got myself pretty spot on. Also note the obviously vegetarian-inspired T-shirt.

Then I started typing this as I sipped on a glorious 90 Shilling that my roommate recently imported illegally for me from Colorado. I do not understand Utah and their retarded liquor laws. They do not care about there being alcohol here, only that they get money from obscene taxes on it. My roommate got pulled over on her way back from Colorado, two cases of beer and a huge bottle of vodka in tow. Luckily, her importing scheme was not discovered and I am able to sit here drinking this delicious brew.

Then my platonic soulmate decided to finally grace me with her telephone presence after two whole weeks of ignoring my requests for contact. We talked about everything we usually do, which is not at all ever going to be posted on this blog…. though at some point might possibly be made public. See, the past several years, the two of us have rarely ever lived in the same place, and we have emailed our lives to each other (when we aren’t discussing it via telephone). We have grown so much in this time and these emails reflect our evolution in hilarious, heart-breaking, and beautiful ways. Not a bad idea for a book, is it? Look for it in a few years. Names will be changed to protect the innocent (though assholes we’ve met along the way just might be fully disclosed).

And now it’s 10 p.m. and I should probably hit the sack because a busy Fourth of July awaits me in the morning. Parades, and rodeos, and picnics, oh my!

I had a nightmare last night. I’d actually consider it a bad dream more than a nightmare (when I think “nightmare” I think four-headed monsters eating your hands), but it was horrifying nonetheless. I was bawling in my sleep and woke up wet-faced and crying. It took me a few minutes to stop.

But this horrible dream I had does not hurt me nearly as much a good dream I had later does. A few hours after this bad dream, I had a spectacularly beautiful one. I couldn’t ask for it any better. It was everything I want. But when I woke up and realized it was only a dream, that it didn’t really happen, that it probably never will, it hurt. It hurt really bad.

We stood in a big stream and caught fish with our bare hands. Holding hands, we crossed to the other side and stood on a big rock.

Because it radiates massive heat, my cat Stella often sits on top of my laptop. Usually, I come back to it to find an error on the screen, a billion exclamation marks in a row, the letter keys only typing numbers, or maybe just a beeping computer. But I’ve just realized she also renames my files… like the folder of photos from my most recent trip Jackson. And it is just too darn cute (and perfectly fitting)! I love you Stella.