Feeling just Capitol

I fell behind. Sorry.

Had a few weeks of only one day off and that one day I really wanted to spend playing video games and sleeping. I even managed to combine the two activities at one point. Woke up dead, don't try that at home.

I've dropped my WorkinTheFacts qualifier. If I post pictures and am talking about work...assume it's for The Facts.


Last week on Monday, usually a day off, I got to wake up SUPER early, pick up a reporter at his house and head off to Austin for a two day event. It was our county's day to do some minor lobbying and handshaking stuff at the capitol. Mostly seemed like a press event, but it was still kind of fun.

I like traveling for work. I like traveling in general, but I've never really get to travel much for fun. Part of the draw for newspapers when I started was the chance to get to go places. But it turns out if you want to travel really far, you have to have all kinds of experience and work at a huge paper or an agency. Come on! They should do it like Army, send the newbies. No such luck.

Austin is a cool town though and we had a few hours to look around between assignments, especially after we got kicked out of a meeting. I didn't do it, I swear.

Austin is kind of like a big Ann Arbor. A cool town that is washed in hordes of flannel hats, white guys with dreadlocks and unwashed pretentiousness.



My favorite image from the two days:

One of those cool moments you think might happen, and get the pay off for thinking on your feet.

I had an instinctual bell ring in my head, so I rushed through a bunch of people to go back up a floor and shoot down into the rotund. Saw her step out of the group and BAM. Not overly amazing, but just kind of neat.

She said on that spot if you say something straight up no one can hear it, because of the acoustics of the building. If I were a gov'ment man I'd put a mic at the top, in case someone felt like confessing something sinister.

Her view from there:

I did it, I shot the sheriff, the deputy and his wee-doggie too!

The capitol building was quite impressive. I've been in Michigan's and it's nice, but this one just seems grander.

I had to buy a suit to be let down on to the floor of the House and Senate...best $4 I've ever spent

Yep, $4. I have suit coats, but for some reason they didn't make the trip down here. So I went to a thrift store, found a suit that fit me perfectly. Fantastic.


There was some other stuff that happened, but at the end everyone filed out of the building and wanted to get a picture. I guess they usually do it on the steps, but there were protesters. So I suggested moving to a slope of the lawn, so they could get the building in the background.

Opening my mouth on the subject volunteered me to take the picture. Joy. Wanna know what I hate more than posed portraits? Posed portraits of a huge group of people.

My rule of thumb is the more people you add to a photo, the less and less creative it becomes. Just out of the sheer nature of people, their attitudes and quality of light/shadows.

But mathematically, I thought if even a fraction of the people in this picture buy it, well worth the ridiculous amount of time it took to set everyone up and for me to climb up in a tree.


Amount of reprints of this shot purchased = 0

No one has actually bought any from either of the days. Hundreds of pictures, hundreds of miles of travel, horribly hideous hotel room and no damned reprint money! BAH! Might come later, you can never judge the fickle photo ffffff....damn. I was trying for some clever alliteration there, but failed.

Our motel room was ridiculous. Apparently all the rooms were themed. Ours was the "Polka Dot Surprise" room. It looked like a fat hippie ate the 70s and threw it up all over the place.


Have some other stuff to catch up on, but I'll stop here.

Inside Joke for Alex Ybarra Did you find it?