As I continued to shoot, I heard a woman’s voice immediately to my right: Stop shooting! I ignored the voice and kept shooting. Stop taking photographs this instant.
Category: Elbow
The category, Elbow, is for posts that make us laugh.
Lost Toy Monkey
$200 is a lot of money for a toy monkey, probably more than the purchase price of most toy monkeys. What is so special about this toy monkey that it warrants a $200 reward? Is there a flash drive sewn inside with sensitive intelligence reports? Or drug-filled condoms…
Story: Insurance Policy
I was taken aback. We had been loyal customers for years, paying thousands of dollars in premiums. How could they deny our claim—not even our claim, but the right to make our claim—based on what was, after all, a simple technicality?
Last of the Brat Tribe
The System woke the Agent twenty-four hours before it woke the President. That was the protocol. Twenty-four hours would give the Agent time to secure the bunker and to become clear-headed enough to serve the President’s needs.
Story: Recursions
Fenton pulled off his belt and shoes and dropped them into the plastic bin along with keys, spare change, wallet, and reading glasses. In another bin, he laid out his carry on, a small backpack in which he had stashed a T-shirt and underwear, tooth brush and deodorant, and a discreet baggy of cocaine.
Story: The Gentleman’s Club
— I’m looking for a man who knows me so well he could finish my sentences but loves me so much he keeps his mouth shut.
The Discovery of Nehru
In Geoff Dyer’s Otherwise Known as the Human Condition, there is a piece called “Jacques Henri Lartigue and the Discovery of India.” It opens with a Lartigue photo “Cap d’Antibes, August 1953”—a woman in a bathing suit…
Bedroom Eyes
This photograph raises too many questions for me to let it alone. Given that I discovered it as an insert in a book about romance, my initial supposition is that the book was intended as a gift to the woman’s lover; she was using the photograph to indicate that she came as part of the package.
A Handmaid’s Tale
When I need to clear my head, I go for a long photo walk. I use my camera as a tool to silence the interior chatter by shifting my attention to the visual field. It’s the mental equivalent of splashing cold water on my face. I had just such a need on Friday, and hatched a vague plan to take a photo walk that would end at the mouth of the Don River. For reasons I could not possibly have anticipated, I never reached my destination.
Ass Detection Software
I have a great idea for a new tech startup and am thinking I could finance it with a kickstarter campaign. Maybe $10 would do. I want to develop ass detection software. A specialized algorithm would scan digital photographs and identify all asses. Once the algorithm had learned the generalized task of locating an ass, it would go on to the more specialized task of identifying the “owner” of the ass. I’m proceeding on the assumption that each person has a unique set of identifying markers: shape, roundness, proportions, depth, that sort of thing.
Instagram Photos & Mental Health
“Your Instagram Photos Speak Volumes About Your Mental Health”. So says a study by two researchers who are, like, you know, reputable and stuff. Using a computational diagnostic tool, the researchers analyzed 43,950 photos posted by 166 individuals and compared those results to the diagnostic opinions of human mental health professionals who examined the same photos. The upshot is that the computational tool was more successful than the humans at diagnosing depression based on posts to Instagram.
Photography Betrays God’s Creation
“To fix fleeting images is not only impossible, as has been demonstrated by very serious experiments in Germany, it is a sacrilege. God has created man in His image and no human machine can capture the image of God. He would have to betray all his Eternal Principles to allow a Frenchman in Paris to unleash such a diabolical invention upon the world.”
Speaking Scottish
While (or is it whilst?) visiting Glasgow & environs last week, I was introduced to the sitcom, Still Game (available on Netflix). It’s about two widowers who share a council flat on the outskirts of Glasgow. They frequent the local pub where they round out their geriatric adventures with a few pints and, like all Glaswegians, the more they drink, the broader their accent. There is banter that, to my North American ear, is incomprehensible.
Beyoncé, Gomez, LeBron
You suddenly realize you’re middle-aged when you’re standing by the Rogers Centre and say, in a big voice, geez, girls these days sure are dressing up for the ball games, totally unaware that the girls are there for a Beyoncé concert. Last evening it was busy in the 6ix with a Beyoncé concert at the Rogers Centre, a Selena Gomez concert at the ACC, and the bars full of people watching the Raptors take a beating in Cleveland.
Singapore’s Arab Town
I’ve already noted the disneyfied feel to much of Singapore. Arab Town is no exception. When I first saw the Sultan Mosque, I expected Iago, the parrot from Aladdin, to swoop down from the roof.