bitterdiva

Lovcraftian Hudson

Hudson, NY

One day for my job, I was called down to Hudson to photograph an event. On my way to the waterfront, I saw out of the corner of my eye a skull sculpture right along the side of the road. I couldn't understand why on the front yard of a building would there be something so gothic, so (as Andy would put it) Lovecraftian, to warrant exhibiting to all the passerbys in this town.

In the little section of the city I was passing through, I found quite a number of gems. An old wooden bridge overpassing the train station was my first scene as I headed for the parking area of the waterfront park. Out in the middle of the Hudson River, was a lighthouse on some manmade island. I was wishing that I was partaking of the river cruise because the picture opportunity was golden.

Across the street from the train station, was an abandoned building, but housed an industrial crane that was rusted from lack of use. Weeds started rising up in the parking lot in homage of the giant crane. Along the way back, another corner of the eye moment stopped me. It was a stencil on some random plywood that was nailed to a an abandoned storefront. I didn't realize that urban decay was so popular in this town to even warrant a stencil of an indian cowboy.

My main mission for the return trip was to capture the skull scultpure, it somewhat reminded me something of the Dark Mark from Harry Potter. A block before the sculpture, another photographic opportunity was before me: another abandoned building, with barred windows and an atmosphere of a jail. After snapping shots of the building, I finally arrived at my destination.

The columned building read: "Community Tennis". I didn't bother to walk further towards to building to find out if tennis was really occuring on the other side of the stone wall. I was more concerned with the sculpture. It was surrounded by other lawn-decor rejects. Iron benches, fencing, lampposts, laid out before me perhaps a construction job inventory before or after the job. I found it ironic that inside the sculptures' nose was a nest from yellow jackets hanging like a booger.

I must bring Kris there for a photography session, and if my gps is ever fixed, a little caching.

1 prayer | 01:24 PM

Belgium and mofos go to Cooperstown

Kris and I traveled down to Cooperstown yesterday for the Belgium festival. The day started off inauspiciously with torrential rains from Friday evening until Saturday morning. I was anticipating arriving at the festival and being told to turn around and go home, probably the karma of the weekend past still hovering over the capital region.

Continue reading "Belgium and mofos go to Cooperstown"

3 prayers | 09:59 PM

Excelsior Acting

I manage to accomplish two things today, the first is registering for classes. I never managed to matriculate in this summer, there's still time tho, I think. I am taking Visual Basic and Acting (out) I. I think the people in my office are somewhat frightened of the thought that I would be more random and loud, I already "Super Star" around this place like Mary Catherine Gallagher. I bypassed the requirement of Programming and Logic II for VB. I never took the class but I feel somewhat confident that I can conquor VB.

The other accomplishment is reserving a hotel room next month. It's right near the Museum of Natural History, actually it overlooks the museum. I'm looking forward to this trip because it'll be the first time Kris and I are staying in a hotelroom by ourselves that isn't somewhat involved in a family function. So I won't be feeling guilty over the shenanigans that will be occuring Thursday evening.

01:32 PM

Cursed, foiled again

It seems that everytime I attempt anything near Yale, New Haven Green, Skull & Bones, and Grove Street Cemetery something weird happens. My GPS is kaput, I haven't a clue how to go about fixing the damn thing, it keeps giving me an error: "There are currently no maps, initiating map upload".

I had a ton of opportunities to cache, and great areas too but nope... I feel so lost without this device. A piece of me is gone and I don't think I'll ever have any direction again. I can't find any info on the site about it either, perhaps I'll post something on the message board.

1 prayer | 02:32 PM

Bad Juju update

Last evening whilst eating dinner, I received a phone call from my brother. He informed me that my mother is in the hospital and is okay, but she'll receive a stress test today and they scheduled a catheterization for Thursday should she need it.

The Gloucester whale watch is called off due to some bad karma involving me and there. I'm starting to believe that that area is my Europa in 2001/2010, attempt no landing there. In previous years, I was stuck in Gloucester for a night while my boyfriend's (at the time) car was locked in the lot. To make matters worse, I was unable to find a hotel room since it was the 375th anniversary of the city and no frat brother in Boston was able to come and get me.

This weekend, I will go home and relax for three days, celebrate my father's birthday, and perhaps redo the cache I missed along with hitting Fort Hale. Now I just have to get through the week, finish up some work on the big e-commerce project, and not attempt to kill anyone.

08:45 AM

Questioning questions

If there’s one thing I’m good at it is that I know a little about everything to get me into trouble and not much about one thing. It often feels like my life brings ADD to a higher level. Forget about working on a project and seeing some shiny happy thing and saying, “ooh! Shiny things!” and running to play with it for several moments before realizing you have to take out the trash. My life is more like being a chemist and then saying, “ooh! Pharmaceuticals!” then running to study them for several years then running into something else and saying, “ooh! Graphics Design!” only to be deterred by a lack of money and program at college and saying, “ooh! Web Developer!” only to be discriminated against, continuously be dumped on with more work than one should be forced to do, and burning out like an imploding white dwarf. Which next phase of my stellar life would bring me to the supernova level, this will be my life’s career path until death, the black hole.

I believe I now understand why many people in this organization only stay a few years before moving onto the next level. It’s extremely frustrating for the amount of work required and the lack of pay or the lack of vacation. Or both. The lack of pay to afford a vacation.

It’s become quite a custom to find me sitting at my desk with my headphones on so that I can find some semblance of tranquility and productivity to produce some output that people really enjoy. I’m all for status quo here, I can produce status quo; I thought that I would bring to this position some good insight and creativity. Right now all I see that I’m bringing is a handbag of junk, my desk is cluttered with excess crap, my toys have stopped bringing solace (except for Snape of course).

I used to think that I was Peter in Office Space, but I think I am that other guy, who continuously thinks he’s going to be fired and nearly gives himself a heartattack every time things change. “I bring the specs to the developers so the clients don’t have to.” Though, every day that you see me is the worst day of my work life, including today. I need to find not the fountain of youth, but the fountain of inspiration, or the fountain of confidence. Because momma is lacking some serious esteem in this cubby. Call it frustration, call it discrimination, call it dead end layout, but I have a feeling that I was meant to be in this position – to learn something about this universe and each planetary being revolving around within its confines. I just pray that I don’t burn out faster than some of the other stellar workers.

1 prayer | 11:36 AM