Friday

The Polyester Starfish @ Birdy’s Battle of the Bands. My man Dan from work is their drummer extraordinaire, so a bunch of us came out to support them. I had camera in-hand to capture the action. I’m getting much better at concert photography. I believe these were some of the best photos I’ve taken. They’re a tad dark, but I finally got some decent skin tones sans flash.

I had a spectacular night. Hung out with Mike & Ben & girlfriends. Mitch, Rick, and Hup all arrived later throughout the evening. I spent most the evening with Mitch & Rick, of course, since that was expected of me. I love those guys. One of the best parts of the evening was the way home. I pulled up in to the lane next to Mitch. It was lovely outside so the windows were down, meaning my radio was super loud to compensate for my deafness. Well, I happened to be listening to country, as is my usual post-concert routine. I look over and Mitch is just cracking up. He was clearly embarrassed for me. So we did the routine creeping at the light, but I burned him on the take-off. The little guy was all speeding behind me trying to catch-up. I waved good-bye at the interstate exit. Great night.

The Polyester Starfish came in second behind the Tori Amos-esque lady, Jen Masters. That still gives them a spot in the next round.

Saturday

Robert’s was having a grand sale on Nikon lenses, so I headed downtown for that business. I parallel parked in this really tight spot, only to get out to find the meter is out of order. I was so pissed. A half hour later I found a spot. It’s parking garages from now on. So Mitch showed up soon after me, and we roamed the store. We ended up buying the same lens and got our sensors cleaned. We had a lovely man give us the scoop on studio lighting, so we’re not complete dumbasses anymore.

As we were checking out the lenses, my dream lens that I’ve been on a waiting list for months for appeared on the counter. They had 1, but I did not come with the mindset of buying the $670 beast, so I had a huge debate play out in my head. The man next to me bought it and saved the decision.

I nearly forgot that Rupert of survivor was also browsing the sale, and after we walked out, Mitch informed me that the man that asked me about my camera was actually the Pacers coach. :) I’m so oblivious.

After that, I invited myself along to the east side to visit some antique warehouse. It was incredible! Our purchases for the day came from one of the first spots we looked. We both bought vintage cameras. His is the cool kind with the accordian action, but I got myself a little Kodak Duaflex that I photographed the hell out of that night using my new lens. The film & cost of developing it are quickly going to outway the cost of the $10 camera :) But it’s so damn cool! I did all my research on what I need to do. If only I had access to a darkroom around here.

The store had a lot of treasures, including a massive “The Doors” sign for $100. I had to fight that purchase. It could have completely been backlit by red lights for complete awesomeness. We spent a couple hours there and didn’t even make it upstairs. We found some incredibly cool rings that almost made me wish I wore jewelry. I told Mitch the one he liked would make a great engagement ring, and he looked at me like I was speaking foreign. “You obviously don’t know girls. They’d freak without a diamond.” I didn’t go in to it, but for the record, I’d take a cool, unique antique ring for $20-50 over a $2K diamond anyday. That’s absolutely retarded to drop that much dough on frosting when you’re soon to be the struggling young married couple as is. And I’d never want the pressure of lugging $2K around on my hand. If women really do put that much importance on the existence and size of the diamond, they have no business being married. Plain & simple :)

It was all good times, but I’m exhausted. I still have grand plans to make a starter for Amish Friendship Bread and to do more playing on the new audio software they bought me for work. We’re going bowling for work this Wednesday, and I’m super pumped! I’m in the midst of coordinating a fall league. There’s just not time to do everything cool. Mitch is going to Wyoming next weekend and driving back to help his friend move. I’ve compiled them a list of interesting places to stop on the way back, so maybe he’ll have some cool stuff for me to share upon his return.