Dilemma? Really?

George Washington was a punk ass bitch. I don’t really care if you think different because you’re wrong. No offense, but let’s face facts. Yes he was the first president of the United States of America. The father of our great country, whatever. Someone had to do it and he was in the mix.

I mean, I don’t know about you but I don’t want to idolize the man who owned slaves and then refused to take a stand about it one way or the other. Much like Puerto Rico, he wanted it both ways, privately thinking that slave owning was wrong, while publicly owning fucking slaves! And when abolition came to the table during the first continental congress he was too much of a pussy to say, “Nah man this slavery bullshit right here is wrong. We should totally put a stop to it.” Probably kept that little gem inside because it would have meant there was no way he could of maintained Mount Vernon and the large piles of plantation money it generated. Instead he was more like, “Well how about I don’t say anything. Sound good to you guys?” The original don’t ask don’t tell. Bullshit.
And I know some of you are saying, “But he freed his slaves.” Nope! What he did was put it in his will that his slaves could go free after his wife died. Not even after he died, after his wife died! What a noble effort from the man who supposedly couldn’t tell a lie after he cut down a stupid tree. And by the way you know how many slaves he owned at the time? Over 300. He got his first 10 slaves at age 11. Who needs 10 slaves at the ripe old age of 11?
I hate the nonchalance at which people blurt out, “Well it was the way things were at time. Everyone owned slaves.” No not everyone: Adams never owned a slave in his life and actively denounced the idea. And let’s get it straight, slavery was not a “dilemma.” It’s not good for a country’s soul to compare one of the great atrocities humanity has ever committed to the inconvenience of running out of underwear. So stop right now and speak the truth, slavery is fucked up especially if it’s en masse and en vogue, and owning them makes you a punk ass bitch.

Flowers

So, plant genitalia. What can I say about them that hasn’t already been said. A rose by any other name would be testicles. Gives new meaning to what you’re supposed to stop and smell every once and a while.

But still, they’re pretty and everyone loves them. Simona and I went to the downtown flower district on Wall between 7th and 8th early one Saturday, it’s one of the few parts of the city that actually smells nice and not like urine.



What did the pistil of the daisy say to the petal when it was about to fall off?

"Stay, man!"
A good stamen joke is hard to come by. Thanks Gorgeous.

Hums the Word

Humming birds get their names from the fact that they don’t know the words to any songs. That’s mostly true because believe it or not humming birds have absolutely so love for today’s modern pop music. Truth be told they much prefer christian rock. I know what you’re thinking, I love christian rock too with its God is so cool he probably has a tattoo and wears a headband that reads, “Who’s the man?” He smokes too. All cool people do: Marlon Brando, James Dean, Charro.

Speaking of song lyrics, what’s with the Beach Boys? Barbershop about surfing or being true to your school. Hey to each his own.

So back to humming birds, they smoke like two packs a day because they are so cool. And to a humming bird, two packs is like Everest man. I mean it’s a sizable chunk of rock.

It’s rumored that scientists named Bill are looking into studying the humming bird for its amazing ability to be so cool. Scientists named Bill rarely score with chicks and need all the help they can get. Their research has proved unfruitful however and so they are now trying to pick up by stating humming bird facts like that they sleep in onesies.

So these humming birds here are the local model humming birds they have in costa rica for hire. They pose for you for nothing more then sugar water. I felt bad and gave them some kool-aid. Kool-aid is like lobster to a humming bird so they were stoked. We hung out and shot some photos, lit up more then a few cig’s and called it a day. Later, Simona, Sunjuna and I ran into them at the bar. They got into a fight with the bouncer because one of them forgot his ID. Wound up in jail. That’s was a night I don’t think anyone in the entire country will soon forget. You know, because of the humming birds.

A Point of View

How we see the collection of the day is how we choose to see it. Good, bad or indifferent, it’s really a Rorschach showing us what we want to see. I decided to document my days in random increments and see what my life's images told me.

I sent out an e-mail to 30 of my closest friends, asking them to text me a short message at random times during the day. Upon receiving the text I would immediately take a photo of whatever I happened to be looking at. Over the course of three and a half days I took 513 photos. For me, the photos tell one overarching story or sometimes they tell a few shorter vignettes, depending on what I choose as my point of view.

(click images to enlarge)

I really want to thank all of those involved for their help. I literally couldn't have done it without you.

Being Patriotic Just Ain’t Cool Man

Can you imagine the kind of balls It takes to move 1000 miles away, into a foreign country where you don’t even speak the language? I imagine it takes about the same kind of balls as it does to follow a man you barely know to said country, illegally, where you know no one, and raise a family. It’s like you or I dropping everything and moving to Romania with someone we met on the plane. And that’s what my parents did, I marvel at that every day, and yet their story is not unique.

I am an American, and one thing all Americans have in common is an immigration story somewhere in their ancestry. Even Native Americans, their parents came from somewhere too. I’m lucky in the sense that I know the generation that immigrated. It’s a real privilege to be raised by them. A century from now, my parents will be known to my offspring as the people that brought us here and really did change our lives. They fought, they struggled, they worked their asses off and now here we all are.

And it really is a great country where something like this can happen. I think we all forget that sometimes. We forget it when we stop thinking of the struggles every new immigrant goes through upon reaching this place, and every new immigrant had the same struggles to be sure. We need to stop thinking of ourselves as natives, with an entitlement to everything this country has to offer us. We have to remember what our ancestors had to do to get us here, what they had to endure, and that the only reason we have what we have is because of that hard work. We need to remember that the best thing about this country is that nothing is promised, and everything has to be earned. I think that when we see the new immigrant with their heavy accents and weird customs we scoff, because we forget these things, and that does all of us a disservice.

So when I see the flag, or hear the star spangled banner or some other cliché like that, I think of my parents, and how what they did made my life possible, and I think that’s pretty cool.