You are currently browsing the monthly archive for August 2010.
The Plane
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 21st of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is on my way from my home, New York City towards Topsail Beach, North Carolina for some fun under the sun. Here are the almosts, Day 21 – My Little Jet That Could.
Good times.
-Cara
Good morning love…
stretching…
I look and see it’s beautiful out.
-Cara
The Dance of Dinner
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 20th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
I am not in love with any of the shots I took today or I should say I am unsure of my love for them. This is the first time I have felt this way during the year in pictures. I won’t be too dramatic since I just started, but… :] I need to make sure this doesn’t happen in the future. I personally like this picture because they are my friends and this is them, but structurally I am just not sure I feel it. I don’t know. Maybe I love it… :D
Here are the extras, Day 20 – Blah.
-Cara
Un deseo sutil que temblando me viene a buscar.
-Cara
Naba
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 19th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
Naba and our shadows hanging out on a roof in Brooklyn…shooting the shit.
Here are the extras, Day 19 – On the Roof.
-Cara
Some Pita
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 18th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
We went for lunch today at the Bedouin Tent on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. This is the Pita for their great sandwiches. :]
Here are the extras, Day 18 – Al Leon.
-Cara
Eyelash
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 17th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is Jennifer who always seems to have an eyelash in her eye. :] Here are the “almosts” from that day, Day 17 – At Work.
-Cara
Outrageous
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 16th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This was a great afternoon on the west side of things. Check out the guy right before the “Outrageous” shot. It is funny, but not the better of the two. Here are the rest of the shots from that day, Day 16 – The West Side.
Sometimes I love this place.
-Cara
Thinking
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 15th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
Once I get up in the morning there is no room for me to ever go back. :\ Those cats are always chilaxing. Here’s some more action shots, Day 15 – Those Two.
Meow.
-Cara
Jo and Zoe Look Away
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 14th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is a shot of Joanna and Zohara, both tired of me taking pictures all the time, showing me their disapproval. Not really…maybe. :] Here are the seconds of the day, Day 14 – Jo and Zoe.
This taking and cataloging pictures for everyday turns out to be a lot more work than I thought!
-Cara
Going Home
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 13th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
First off, 13 is my favorite number. I was super worried I wouldn’t have a shot worthy of said number 13, but it turned out fine. I really like this shot. It is around 6:30 or so on the 4 or 5 express train (I didn’t notice) going uptown on my way home from work on a hot Friday night. People always seem so tired at the end of their work day on the train…but it’s Friday!
Here are the rest of the shots that almost made the cut, Day 13 – All Aboard.
Smile.
-Cara
That’s right… I can not get enough of roller derby. I think I finally understand what it means to be a sport’s fan. This is great!
Anyway, here is one of the videos I shot from that night (Saturday, August 7th, 2010, Queens of Pain vs. Bronx Gridlock). It was so fresh. I recommend it to all, but I don’t want it to become too popular and get ruined… a conundrum. :\ Oh world!
I have the rest in any format you may want to use… I love them all!
Enough, enjoy the show!
-Cara
Junior's Cheesecake
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 12th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This cheesecake from Junior’s was to celebrate Paola Chica’s birthday. It was delicious. Here are the cool shots that didn’t make the cut, Day 12 – Pao Pao’s Party and Dessert. Most are of Paola’s party and one is having coffee and dessert with Chavisa at De Robertis Pasticceria and Cafe.
A great day.
-Cara
The Mall
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 11th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is The Mall a promenade that leads up to Bethesda Terrace in Central Park, which I had just walked through a few minutes earlier. It’s like another world in there, especially early in the morning. It was a very nice walk to work today.
If you want to see the runners up go here, Day 11 – Walking to Work.
-Cara
Downtown Brooklyn
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 10th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is Downtown Brooklyn where I work as the IT Phenomenon for a few community organizations in the area. This photograph is of a banner promoting Downtown Brooklyn for its great shopping experience in front of the many empty storefronts for rent. Except for a tax center and a hair braiding place that are thriving downtown businesses.
The silhouette of the bike rider is implying that Downtown it is bike friendly I presume. I will admit that hey have put up more places to lock up your bikes, but then the street vendors don’t let you use them. They installed these newly art designed bike racks and the vendors lean or sit on them and no one stops them, so it’s pointless. This not unlike the bike lanes on the street side always blocked by Lincoln Town Cars. Bike paths should always be between the sidewalk and parked cars for the safety of all. Come on!
If you’d like a better understanding of Downtown Brooklyn you can also check out the runners up for today at, Day 10 – Getting Down(town).
-Cara
Yes I Am Precious is a Livestrong campaign that bicyclist Janeen McCrae came up with to raise money to fight shitty cancer. The journey begins on the Atlantic side of this great country and three months later, she and her bike Precious, should arrive on the Pacific end. It is the 15th day of the ride as of this blog post, a rest day in Berea, Kentucky, the folk arts and crafts capital of Kentucky for those not in the know. :]
As the video below will show you, this isn’t just your regular ride, it makes raising money for a great cause a whole lot more cool and interesting. You can check out how many roadkills were seen along the way, how many time Janeen has been honked at, how many dogs have chased her on her long journey across America with Precious who is tweeting along the way what he is “feeling”.
Check out what they’ve done to Precious to gauge speed, incline, decline, temperature, etc, etc…
…and yes you can follow them on Twitter, Precious or Janeen, or go to Janeen’s blog about her ride, No Direction Known, and don’t forget Team Fatty, check out their About Page, good stuff.
Last but not least here is the donation page for this awesome ride.
I love biking and cool people.
-Cara
This is a re-print of an article, “What it Says About Us When a 17-Month-Old Boy Is Beaten to Death for “Acting Like a Girl” , by Michael Rowe of The Huffington Post. I want to have this article reach as many people as possible, so pass it on. It gave me chills. I was so sure a woman wrote it before I looked. I think because of his depth of understanding and the connection he sees and acknowledges between society and what this man did to this child…or maybe just the sensitivity and sincere beauty of how he wrote such a sad piece. Saying this I acknowledge makes me a sexist. I also need to be aware of the affects of American socialization on me. I appreciate when people push themselves to see what not one of us wants to. The inconvenient truths of the society we live in.
Please read the whole article.
-Cara
At approximately 8:25 p.m. last Sunday night, the New York State Police on Long Island logged a 911 call about a toddler in cardiac arrest. The boy, 17-month-old Roy Jones, was rushed from the Shinnecock Indian Reservation in Southampton, N.Y. to Southampton Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 9:11 p.m.
According to authorities, the toddler had endured a savage beating. His tiny body had been repeatedly punched with closed fists and grabbed by the neck. By the time 911 had been called at dusk, he was already in cardiac arrest from the sheer brutality of the assault and it was too late to save his life.
Charged with manslaughter in the first degree and held without bail is the toddler’s mother’s live-in boyfriend, 20-year-old Pedro Jones, who was babysitting. The pair lived together on Shinnecock Nation tribal land, though Jones himself was not a member of the tribe. They were reportedly to marry, and Jones called the toddler “my baby,” though Roy was not, in fact his baby.
“I was trying to make him act like a boy instead of a little girl,” Jones explained. “I never struck that kid that hard before. A one-time mistake, and I am going to do 20 years.”
He told troopers that the little boy had been too feminine and that he’d been trying to toughen Roy up by literally beating the life out of him.
“I’m sorry,” he said “That’s my baby. I loved him to death.”
A nominally civilized society such as ours can only recoil in horror at any news of a child’s death at the abusive hands of an adult. Infanticide is the ultimate forfeiture of our humanity, rightly seen as a perversion of the very essence of the natural order and the circle of life. The act is a declaration of such abject monstrosity that is very nearly beyond forgiveness. But it happens every day, and we guiltily avert our eyes to these stories when we read them because, on some level, we realize that the children could easily be our own and the pain is too much to bear. In 2008, in the U.S. alone, the Department of Health and Human Services reported 772,000 cases of child abuse, resulting 1,740 fatalities–a sharp rise from 1,330 in 2000.
But there is an added and significant dimension to the tragedy. The reason given for the beating is that, even at 17 months, the toddler was perceived by his killer to be effeminate. Madhouse logic indeed, but to Pedro Jones there was a way that little boys should act and a way little girls should act.
While Jones is a tragic example of the paradigm taken to deadly lengths, society’s discomfort with gender variance permeates nearly every part of the national dialogue and runs through every part of the culture.
It’s present in the heightened male objectification of women inherent in certain types of music videos that present them as “bitches” and “hoes” who crave an answering violent thuggishness from their men. It’s present in advertising that teaches young women that they’re essentially a life support system for their physical assets, that the ideal woman is a weak-willed, mindless consumer of frivolity, whereas a “real man”–stronger, but stupider–is waiting for nothing more than the arrival of the Swedish Women’s Nude Basketball Team with cold beer.
There are coded echoes of it in the leading and prejudicial questionnaire put to servicemen and women this spring by the Pentagon regarding the viability of openly gay soldiers serving side-by-side with heterosexual ones. The document is mined with phrases that seem crafted with unease on the part of straight male soldiers as a goal, fears that their gay counterparts might not be “real” men but something inferior, less masculine, less reliable in a firefight.
It was there in June of this year when the Family Research Council hailed Republican Governor of Rhode Island Don Carcieri for vetoing hate crimes legislation that would have included transgender-identified persons as a protected class. Gloated Tony Perkins, the president of the organization, “[Governor Carcieri] deserves praise for his strong stance for the Families of Rhode Island, and other Governors can learn from his example.” Perkins neglected to explain how excluding transgender people from hate crime legislation had anything to do with protecting families.
It was there in the Hieronymus Bosch-level grotesquery of the lies, distortions, and misrepresentations of the lives of gay and lesbian couples used by the Proposition 8 supporters in their now-failed battle to make their horror of sexual and gender variance the law of the land in California by codifying their bigotry at the ballot box and in the courts.
It’s endemic in fundamentalist Christianity, which claims Biblical authority for rigid gender roles and, more importantly, the appearance of rigid gender roles. Psychologist and Southern Baptist minister George Alan Rekers, co-founder of the Family Research Council and formerly of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) who, until he was caught this year flying a gay rent-boy to Europe to “lift his luggage” and give him nude sexual massages, was best known for sharing his wisdom on how to “cure” homosexuality.
A May 2010 article in the Miami News by Penn Bullock and Brandon K. Thorp reported on Rekers’ 1974 “Feminine Boy Project” at UCLA. The article highlighted the story of a 4-year-old-year old “effeminate boy” named Kraig was subjected by his parents to Rekers’ aversion therapy.
Part of the therapy involved putting Kraig in “play-observation room” with his mother, who had instructions to avert her eyes from her child when he played with “girly” toys. An essay by Stephanie Wilkinson published in Brain, Child magazine in 2001 recounts that, during one of the sessions, Kraig became so distraught and hysterical at what must have seemed to the 4-year-old like the withdrawal of his mother’s love, that he had to be carried out of the room by the staff. At home, the “treatment” continued, with Kraig being rewarded for “masculine” behavior and spanked by his father for “feminine” behavior.
After two years of treatment, apparently “cured” of his effeminacy, Kraig was held up by the psychologist as proof that his treatment worked until, at 18, shamed and scarred by his diagnosis and treatment, Kraig attempted suicide.
Last summer, Carl Joseph Walker-Hoover who committed suicide in his mother’s house after months of taunts about how he acted “like a girl” and therefore had to be gay. His mother had to cut down his dead body from the support beam from which he hung himself. The previous year, a 14-year-old classmate killed 15-year-old old Lawrence King, of Oxnard, CA because King came to school in lipstick and nail polish.
As a society, we equate masculinity with force, with violence, with aggression, with being “tough” and invulnerable. We celebrate it those things as virtues. To a widely-varying degree, we look with disdain, or pity, or condescension, or amusement at too much deviation from the prescribed norm. And we occasionally exact a terrible penalty for stepping outside those rigid parameters.
The beating death of 17-month-old Roy Jones was no less a hate crime because the victim was a baby. Whether would have grown up to be gay, or transgender, or just a gentle, sweet-natured straight boy, was still many years away. More, it was irrelevant.
The attack, and the apparent impulse behind it–that a violent man was made uncomfortable by a even a perceived variation on gender-normative behavior–is exactly what makes transgender and gender-variant Americans among the most vulnerable segment of the population, and children who even appear gender-variant are the most vulnerable of all.
It’s still early in the investigation and there are naturally more questions than answers at this point. Doubtless, facts and details will emerge about Pedro Jones along with the very real possibility that he endured horrors of his own that helped craft what he later became. It’s too early to paint him as a monster, or at least as a one-dimensional monster. With few exceptions, monsters are made, not born. They are still monsters, but they are carved with the hurtful blows of many sharp chisels, over many years.
At the very least, his own violent psychopathology notwithstanding, someone, somewhere, taught Pedro Jones that the worst thing a little boy can do is act like a girl. In the end, it matters precious little when or where he learned it, because a 17-month-old toddler ultimately paid a terrible price for that lesson.
On Sunday night, his little body wracked by agony, blackened with bruises, beaten within an inch of his life, gasping for breath in a world suddenly full of more pain than he could bear, his little light flickered and vanished into the darkness.
Maybe this time, when we read about the death of Roy Jones, before we look away and try not to think of our own children and how truly defenseless they are, not only against violence, but against an adult’s determinant view of who and what they might be, we might examine the way in which we see our society and the complex mosaic that makes up our fellow citizens.
We might say a prayer of comfort for his family, then ask ourselves what his death might say about us. We might ask what our role should be in shaping that world and, by definition, in shaping how our children will come to see themselves as citizens of it.
Watching
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 9th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is a small window to the inside of the outside of my/the office where I work in Downtown Brooklyn.
Wanna see the rest of the shots? Here, Day 9 – The Office.
:]
-Cara
Laurel's Foot
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the 8th of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
This is at Life Cafe, in the East Village. I was having brunch with my peeps, Joanna, America, and the star of today’s shot, Laurel. Here are the extras of the day, Day 8 – We Ate.
Good times.
-Cara
That’s right.
-Cara
Suzy Hotrod, Lead Jammer
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the seventh of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut.
I went with friends to watch some Gotham Girls Roller Derby on Saturday. Two 30 minute bouts of Queens of Pain vs. Bronx Gridlock. It was as usual amazing. Today’s picture is of Suzy Hotrod, from Queens of Pain killin’ it.
Go here, “Queens of Pain vs. Bronx Gridlock” if you want to check out a fafillion other fantastical shots from that night. :]
It was awesome.
-Cara
IT Phenomenon
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the sixth of those photographs. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut. Here’s today’s, Day 6 – No Quite.
This is a self portrait.
-Cara
Zohara Lurlean and Jefferson Brooklyn
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the fifth of those photos. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut. Here’s just today’s, Day 5 – Nope but Close.
These two gorgeous beings are, up front the diva Zohara Lurlean and looking ever so handsome in the background is Sir Jefferson Brooklyn the 1st. Chilling out in their Upper East Side digs.
The red light district.
-Cara
Duct in Water
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the forth of those photos. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut. Here today’s, Day 4 – Cutting Room Floor.
:]
-Cara
I figure I will just add on to this post. Here is the winner of Day 3, entitled, “Recover”.
- Recover
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the third of those photos. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut. Here are the ones that didn’t pull through but still deserve some love, Day 3 – You’re Out.
It was one of the shots I recovered today (8-4-2010) from yesterdays drama. It was taken on the New York Subway, the 4 or 5 train on my way home from work. I have no idea how I did it. :] Only one other shot was off like this, the other fafillion were normal. Click on the image for the larger size. It’s cool.
Enjoy.
-Cara
——————————————————————————————————————-
I deleted a bunch of pictures off my camera and lost some shots from today. I need to bring the card in to my job tomorrow so I can recover the pictures. I just don’t want to pick one without seeing all the photos first. That’s just me.
I’ll get back to you tomorrow with the chosen photo of today.
:]
-Cara
My Space
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the second of those photos.
Today I realized I seem to have many pictures to choose from, so much so that it is hard to choose just one. I am going to start a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” and put in daily the shots that don’t make the cut. For toady’s almosts go here, Day 2 – The Outs.
I also ran out of batteries on my Canon PowerShot S31S first thing this morning. My batteries are rechargeable so it is not like I would go buy more, and of course the charger was at home. :\ Lesson learned, bring extra charged batteries just in case.
I have a few cameras, even ancient ones that I am looking forward to using. I will state what camera I used each day. For example, some of my shots today were using my myTouch 3G Slide camera, since my batteries went dead in the morning. Which by the way, in the bright light of the sun takes amazing pictures, reminiscent of my Nokia 3650’s camera (Trivia Fact: It was also the first phone with an integrated camera delivered to North America.). I loved that phone back in the day. The only one ever stolen from me…
There are some more shots here from today that did not make the cut. Some are of my desk taking with my Canon PowerShot S31S and some are of this trash art in Dontown Brooklyn, near where I work. To be exact it is this one big tree, a bench I think, cement patch at Flatbush and 3rd Avenue, Downtown Brooklyn. A little art in the middle of nowhere. My friend Paola Chica is standing in the background waiting patiently. I took the outside shots with my myTouch 3G Slide camera. I’m telling you a great camera.
Okay, on with the show. This is a part of my desk at my job. This computer figure is from a Kinder Surprise which came into the states all the way from France.
I am the head of IT which my office represents well as you can see.
-Cara
The Kiss
I am not going repeat what I already wrote here. A quick synopsis, starting August 1st, 2010 I will publish a picture I take that day everyday for a year (well to be exact I will do this everyday until July 31st, 2011). This is the first of those pictures. Also, there is a Flickr collection called “The Awesome Leftovers” where I put the daily shots that didn’t make the cut. Here’s the ones from today, Day 1 – So Close.
What I can say about this first day is I woke up nervous about what I was going to take a picture of. I charged my camera batteries and decided to relax and not stress over it. Something will come.
Here’s what came.
-Cara
The Day After An Inconvenient Truth 
What Did You Say?