Picture Essay - Spin Cycle

This week's Spin is Photo Essay and Gretchen offered up a photo out of her own personal stash for everyone to write an essay about. I took that as a dare. Go read what she wrote...go on, I'll wait. See? It was a dare; wasn't it? Yeah, I thought so.

Here's the photo. Followed by my essay.

After the day that the girls had in the steno pool they really felt that they needed to blow off a little steam. That Mr. Roberts was on a tear again and when he is there is not fast enough shorthand in the world to appease him.

With their fingers aching with cramps the girl popped open a few beers, lit up a few smokes and let down their hair.

Beatrice or Bea to her friends was regaling all the girls with the latest on dit about Gloria in accounting and her new boyfriend. Bea was the fashion plate of the bunch. She was the one that all the other girls looked up to. Her, with her rolled down stockings, pill box hats, and brightly flower tops made all the others feel just a little daring by just being with her, inside she was a huge ball of insecurity but the girl's would never know. She was just to the left of the wild side and a little on the right of tawdry. The others loved her for it.

Janice was the joker. With her unfashionable long dark hair which all the men loved and her bright and bubbly humor, she charmed everyone around her. Using her hair as a mustache, who would think to do that? Janice would, that's who. She's always clowning. The only problem with Janice in the girls eyes was the fact that if you got a couple of beers in her, which was the case tonight, Janice became a little sloppy. Not in a bad way, just in the fact that you had to pour her into bed, way. It amazed the gals that the next morning Janice was once again bright and chipper while they all had sore heads.

Betty, (gawd, how she hated that name, could her mother have named her Elizabeth? No! It was just Betty. Plain ole Betty. Straight up boring Betty, gawd! Did it get any worse?) sat slightly bored or maybe just a little drunk (maybe she shouldn't have indulged in that second beer) watching the antics of Bea and Janice. Her day had been particularly bad. After getting chased around Mr. Thomas's desk by no less than Mr. Thomas, the old goat, she caught a snag in her last pair of hose. This, of course, turned into a major run. At that point, even rolling them down like Bea's wouldn't have worked. Not that she would have rolled them down. She wasn't near as brazen as Bea. While she knew that she would never be a flashy as Bea or as madcap as Janice she was smarter than both of them. It was an acknowledge fact among the group. Betty was smart. How else could she have risen to the rank of steno pool supervisor? Not by getting chased around a desk that's for sure.

Linda and Carol were sisters and as like as two peas in the same pod, even though Linda was the older by 10 months. Linda and Carol had an inside joke about how THAT happened. Anyone seeing their parents would have wondered how they were ever conceived in the first place. That Pop was a sly one. They loved hanging out with the girls after work. Bea and Betty had a place of their own which meant that the girls could kick their heels up without their parents knowing. Their parents were always safely tucked into their bed when the girls rolled in late. Then again their parents must have spent a lot of time in bed considering that Linda and Carol were just 2 of 12 children.

As the evening rolled on Linda and Carol helped slightly sloshed Janice to bed (she was once again crashing at Bea and Betty's place. Really, she might as well move in and help with the rent), walked to the nearest bus stop to catch the #59 to their home, where undoubtedly Mom and Pop were busy making number 13 of their ever growing brood. Just thinking about THAT made them queasy.

Betty (boring Betty, *sigh*) crawled in next to where Janice lay softly snoring, thinking, "why is it that Janice always gets put to bed in my bed? Why not, Bea's? Oh well, at least she doesn't take up much room."
 
Bea locked up the apartment, checked the windows, turned out the lights and went to bed, knowing that the other girls would never realize that for all her panache she was still that insecure little girl.

Good Night.

So there is my Photo Essay. Nothing like killing two birds with one stone. What a horrible adage but it makes my point. I've fulfilled Gretchen's photo essay dare (don't tell me it wasn't, Gretchen) and Jen's Spin Cycle for this week.

Have a lovely day everyone.
Love,
M

5 Random Things because I can't think of 10.

When you don't have anything to write about do a list.
A list that has no context or order.
Then call it your Random Thoughts post because really who's going to call you on it?
It's random it qualifies.
You want non-lame?
Un-lame?
You'd have visited The Un-Mom for that.
Here's her new button.
Press it for Un-lame posts.

1. Like the new banner? It's from a 1950s wine list. I do find the oddest things or maybe they find me? Here is something else from the same wine list.

in vino veritas = in wine truth

A girl bathing in wine. I feel pretty comfortable with this. It looks like a white so there shouldn't be too much skin staining.

2. My iTouch loses it's charge in about 2 hours. It's really pissing me off.

3. Coffee = consciousness. I'm just saying.

4. I could do this:

Then I fall flat on my butt managing along the way to suffer abrasions and contusions. Most of those abrasions and contusions in places where I didn't actually land.


5. What the......?

I'm not sure where or should I say when the USDA is living but if the top 2 home activities are "building a fire inside" and "butchering animals" I'm pretty sure I've been sent back to the 19th century. Maybe, someone should mention that they need to update their database. Don't look at me....I'm getting a kick out of looking for obscure activities. What's next, ironing a petticoat? Maybe, cooking Indian bread on an outside stove, oh wait that is one of the options.


6. The title may say 5 but I can't seem to stick with any kind of order today. I have owned a lucky bamboo for over 1 year that I haven't been able to kill. This is a first. My usual kill-time of lucky bamboo is 1 month. Does this mean my luck is changing? To the good?




Thanks for droppin' by, ya'll come back now.
Ya hear!
Now, Go! Visit!

Love,
M

This is what I've been up to this week - updated

In 1955, the yearbook staff at the University of Houston produced a vinyl 45 record to go along with the yearbook. They had a sleeve made in the cover of the yearbook and everything.

As we were scanning the yearbook we found it. My first thought was "AWESOME, let's digitize it." This may have been accompanied by happy dancing and maybe some fist-bumping. All in a totally dignified way, of course. I am a librarian. After I settled down I got on the phone to the music librarian to ask about whether she had the equipment to convert vinyl to digital. The answer was "Hells Yes!" In a dignified way, of course. She is a librarian.

While the music librarian and I were digitizing it I had another brainstorm; let's make it into a video to go with images in the yearbook. Once again, the music librarian was on-board with the idea. More fist-bumping and happy dancing may have ensued. In a dignified way, of course. We are librarians.

So yesterday morning for 3 hours we produced 3 minutes of video. More fist-bumping, a couple of high-fives and some happy dancing in our chairs could have happened. All very dignified, of course. We are librarians.

Side A is 6.33 minutes so we are only half done but I am so in love with this thing I just had to share. (we as directors have made the decision to cut the last 30 to 40 seconds for artist reasons. Okay, not artistic. It is the orchestra playing White Christmas and we didn't want to get sued)

We finished the whole thing.
Here is your sneak preview of:

Birth of an Idea
images produced by the 1955 UH yearbook staff,
audio and vinyl produced by KUHT, KUHF & Universal Recorders, INC.
Music by Ed Gerlach and his orchestra,
Voice of: Jack Bailey (I'm pretty sure this is the same guy)
Audio Digitizing and technical editor: Katie (the music librarian, she knows how to use the Mac software while I'm stuck using the crappy PC software. No more! I will learn it if it kills me)
Image digitizing and choice, directing, producing, and promoting: Yours truly



We have time set up to finish the remaining 3 minutes today. We'll upload the whole thing into Youtube this afternoon. It shouldn't take 3 hours because we have all the images already chosen, loaded into the software, and I've got a quasi storyboard thing going. See, how I threw around a technical term. (Gretchen? That is one, right?)

I, now, know how much work Ken Burn's goes through, though to be honest, once you have the images lined up and the text recorded a Mac computer can kick out a bitchin' video in no time. Or in our case an hour for one minute. So never mind, it's nothing like what Ken Burn's does.

I hope you enjoyed it. If you want to watch the whole thing let me know and I'll post the link.

Love,
M


PS: this will be produced under a creative commons license. Cuz, we are all about sharing.
Side B will be done in about a month or so.