Monday, December 14, 2009 | by nathan

By The Chimney With Care

My walls are neither green nor yellow; they’re sort of a middle gray, but there you have it. This is our hearth, decorated for the holiday. Actually, the wire wall art has been up there for quite some time – almost two years, in point of fact. But it looked odd, all off-center like that, so I ordered prints of a couple of our photos from Flickr (this one and this one, to be exact), bought a couple of white frames from Target, and made a neat little gallery presentation out of them. After that, the garland, stockings, and glass manger scene came easy. But if Santa tries to come down this chimney, he’s in for a nasty surprise: it’s walled up. Sometimes Sam will sit with his nose in there for ten minutes or more, standing there like it’s a corner he’s been sent to for punishment. We can’t build a fire in there, but in its absence – and Sam’s – I think it makes a nice little holiday scene. We’re currently working on a project to hang more of our photos up in the dining room; it should be done in a couple days.

Friday, December 11, 2009 | by nathan

Lick!

Last weekend Brian made a pot roast. It was a thing of sweetness and light, and when he was done and putting the dishes away, he let Sam have a crack at the spoon. He was a happy Sam, but what was formerly a passive habit of sitting at the edge of the stove while we cook, waiting for us to drop something, has become a tendency to push at the back of our legs with his nose, trying to MAKE us drop something. Which I may or may not have accidentally done last night when we made this, which is not only the best SANDWICH! in the history of mankind, but a thing of such mythical proportions in this house that its mere mention is enough to make us salivate. Its status is so elevated here at Casa de Okay City that it is known by only one name: SANDWICH! Not "the sandwich" or "THE sandwich," or even "That really good sandwich" or "Pioneer Woman Sandwich," but just SANDWICH!

SANDWICH!

Thursday, December 10, 2009 | by nathan

Flailure

Another photo run through some iPhone photo filters. This is a photo of the IKEA lamp in my office, turned sideways and … y’know … greened. In this case I ran it through Tiltshift Generator and Mill Colour. I know there are people out there who refuse to use post processing of any kind on their photos, be it Photoshop or simple tricks like these. Those people like to say sweet things like, "I prefer to just take a good photo." Photo editing software are gifts to those of us who can’t do everything right the first time. And I’ll let you in on a little secret – it’s more fun in our camp. It’s fun to flail and fail around, experiment, try things, discard them, and then try new things. Fact is, I don’t know any creative person who gets it right the first time. And some of the sickest people I know are the ones who try. So, I say, have a little fun. Experiment. Go a little crazy and risk ruining a whole day’s work. You might surprise yourself.

Wednesday, December 9, 2009 | by nathan

Spewy

I’ve never been super impressed with the camera on the iPhone, but I have been impressed with the photo apps available. This was run through CameraBag and TiltShift Generator. I was super irritated to have to wade through a freezing lake to get into my car last night, but at least a good photo came out of it.

Monday, December 7, 2009 | by nathan

Collezione

This is the house I lived in for four months on the Grand Canal in Venice, Italy in the fall of 2000. It was the first semester of my junior year in college, and I was fresh off of two months of living in Ireland, so I considered myself an old salt at traipsing around Europe, which I of course was not. Landing in Italy was an entirely different experience. My Italian was still very primitive, and all my attempts to better my language skills were thwarted by Italians who spoke English to me out of a sense of pity or impatience. Still, it was an amazing time – our house shared a roof with the Collezione di Peggy Guggenheim, the only modern art museum in Venice, and we could go there for free whenever we wanted. I didn’t do as much weekend traveling as my housemates, so I spent many a lazy Saturday afternoon wandering around the Collezione with my journal, marveling at the works of Picasso, Miro, and Jackson Pollack that hung there. It was nine years ago this week that I came home from Italy, and I always tell people that if you want to see Venice, Christmas is the best time to go. The tourists are all gone, the Venetians come out of hiding and decorate their city beautifully. Giant Christmas trees stand in the piazzi, and the Rialto Bridge is strung with a ceiling of lights; it feels like being plopped into some kind of Christmas fairy tale. Also, the city is sinking, so if you’re going to do it, you know, make it snappy.

Friday, December 4, 2009 | by nathan

DEER FIGHT!

My dad very much enjoys his retirement in western Arkansas, just over the Oklahoma border. One of his favorite pastimes, especially this time of year, is to sit and watch the deer traipse through his land. For the times when he isn’t able to be out watching them, he has trap cameras set up all over his acreage to catch the wildlife as it passes through. He’s caught a zillion deer, whole herds of turkeys and, occasionally, a bear. I’m still waiting for him to catch a glimpse of the Boggy Bottom Monster on the cameras, but that’s only because I want to meet Josh Gates and stick my tongue in his eye.

In the meantime, this is probably the best trap camera photo he’s ever sent me. To paraphrase my dad, this is basically a deer bitch fight. Doe, a deer, a female deer, taking off her earrings and putting a bitch in check. I mean – to paraphrase. That’s not *exactly* how my dad described it. But you get the idea: Lady Deer is pissed at Other Lady Deer and wants her to get her Other Lady Deer Hooves (paws? Hooves.) off Lady Deer’s man and out of Lady Deer’s territory. It’s sorta like that one time in New York City when I saw that hooker getting beaten up by that other hooker.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009 | by nathan

From The Air: An Open Letter to Mrs. Kathy Mattea

I’ve been meaning to post this photograph forever. It’s from the beginning of November, when we flew from Raleigh/Durham to Nashville, then to Kansas City, then home. This was our landing in Nash-vegas. Their airport greeted us well, despite the fact that I was sick with Alien Flu From Hell and felt like a total douche for getting on a plane at all, but hey, a guy’s gotta get home, AMIRITE? And so to all the passengers on all my flights, including one Mrs. Kathy Mattea, who, my iPhone informed me just before I was legally required to shut it off lest it single-handedly send our plane face-first into a mountain or Opryland, was performing THAT VERY NIGHT in Kansas City and probably didn’t need to be trying to belt out "Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses" while feeling like her sinuses were being raked across an industrial cheese grater.

So – I’m sorry, Mrs. Mattea. I’m very, very sorry. I hope you didn’t catch my AFFH. I don’t believe in bothering the famous in inescapable places like airplanes, bathrooms, or their dressing rooms. Also, I can’t imagine what it feels like for someone to hear "I used to listen to you when I was a kid!" It must sound something along the lines of, "Wow! I didn’t know you were still alive!" or "Hey – you know you look like Kathy Mattea? What the hell ever happened to her?" So I didn’t say anything to you on our flight. And I don’t have any of your music on my iPhone, but I listened to "Love at the Five and Dime" when I got home. Only, I listened to the original version by Nancy Griffith. I’m sure your cover version is fine. But that Nancy – wow. Which is another thing I would never say to a "famous" such as yourself. "I like you – but you know who I really like is that Nancy Griffith. Do you know her? Do you have her number in your cell phone? What about Reba? Do you know Reba? Boy, she sure is something. But you’re great, too, you know. In your own way." 

All that is to say – break a leg out there on the road, Mrs. Kathy Mattea. I really did think "Time Passes By" was a good record.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009 | by nathan

Snow Glowb

One of our big projects this weekend was to hang Christmas lights on our house. This is especially daunting in our neighborhood, as people really take a whole lot of pride in their holiday lights, creating pieces of visual – and occasionally performance – art that should be installed in some major museum. One designed by Frank Gehry. One house in our neighborhood was featured prominently on UglyChristmasLights.com one year, though for the life of me I can’t find that photograph now.

All that is to say, there was some Jones-keeping-up-with that needed to happen this year, as our previous attempts at Christmas decoration have bordered somewhere between "pathetic" and "Christmas is so fucking canceled, nerds." So we went all out, spending four hours hanging lights on our front porch, which drew positive comments from our neighbors and the current residents of the International Space Station, as well as a couple alien civilizations, who have begun to worship the new light that has appeared in their skies. It’s possible we went a little overboard. It’s possible we almost killed each other. And while it’s still not as grand as some of our neighbors’ homes, we’re pretty proud of the finished product.

Monday, November 30, 2009 | by nathan

Son and Father

I hope you had a great holiday; I did. A gaggle of our extended family gathered at my mom’s house in south Oklahoma City on Thanksgiving, where we wrangled dogs and children, planned mischief for the Christmas season, and frequently teased my grandmother, who is on a Caribbean cruise right now, about which bikini she was going to wear on the beach in Jamaica. When she told us – with no lack of certainty – that she wouldn’t be wearing a bikini, we said OH I GET IT GRANDMA, WINK WINK WINK. Then she tried to act like she didn’t think it was funny, but she did. We’re on to you, Pearl.

All that aside, this photo is my favorite of all the ones I took on Thanksgiving day. It’s my little brother, John, and my dad. I love these two guys, and my entire family, more than life itself, and I’m glad to have captured this.

Monday, November 23, 2009 | by nathan

Mfg. Co.

I wrote about it the other day, but the revitalization of downtown Oklahoma City via the Core to Shore projects and MAPS3 are very, very exciting examples of urban renewal in a city that, for too long, has been defined more by life in its suburbs than in its heart. Flying over OKC recently on a flight to Kansas City, I got my first good look at where the city’s development is heading geographically, and it thrilled me to no end. This plaque is on the Fred Jones Building I wrote about last week; I was down there recently and got to walk around Main Street and the new Film Row district taking some pictures. This is one of my favorites.