Due to recent developments the streets are narrower, friendliness is full-tilt and rock and roll & social extravaganzas have all been rescheduled. Oh, and stray cats are missing and so are the fire hydrants.
Ani and the Goo Goo Dolls (visiting from afar) float about town unable to leave while those unfamous and once from here split asap in rented cars, white knuckling it until about an hour or so away frantic to get back to NYC, Chicago, wherever. The clutches of the darkness, the act of God, breathing down the necks of the leaving in icy pursuit.
My own harrowing tale involves the highly efficient car, me, a tequila buzz and classic rock radio tunes becoming lost in a blizzard a few nights ago. I could not decipher which street(s) I was on or where the grocery store had gone to.
Two carfuls of police officers (sometimes my pals, sometimes the bane of my existence) sent me back from whence I came and then I did so, again feeling my way along and passing stuck trucks. Harrowing moments, adrenalinized.
Last night drove around after the driving ban was lifted and upon returning home went in for a crash landing into the driveway only to get hung up on a small iceberg. A drunk meandered by and wanted to help. He was none. I nearly gave myself a black eye with a shovel but should have instead aimed for the bossy drunk. Get in... turn the wheel... do this... do that. It's an odd thing, the politics of snow help. You know someone might be nincompooping yet you're being helped and can't say Ummmm, shut the hell up. Then they will leave, etc.
The car was rescued this morning and now I'm off again, into the still sunny and ominous early night.

Crackers prevented most of Blogger users to post as they jiggled into our secret spaces like elusive spores of anthrax.
And speaking of crackers I'm still amazed by the Pope saying that war must not be waged on God's behalf.
He obviously has dementia and church history has evaporated from his mind.
God cannot, should not, be named as your wartime m.o., keep that in mind.
God, however, was my writing co-pilot again and I thank God for that.
2 feet of snow + 2 computers + 1 snow-moated mind = a whole lot of work completed.
And now time to venture out into the blanketed middling city to enjoy some cocktails. As it snowed so hardily there was no Goo Goo Dolls show and that's a sad thing.
I'm going to stop by the alterna-music ginmill to see if The Jacklords are made of more titanium stuff and will forge on with their engagement.
Holiday thoughts:
The Eve was good, headed to family event after an Oban fix. My aunt who I haven't seen in a while was speaking in sound poem style coming in a rhythm until she could grab the next batch. It reminded me of an Allen Ginsburg's reading I saw
BOMB we bomb them we BOMB you, you BOMB them... something to that effect.
Faced self-induced word loss the next morn after I organized a caravan out to the exurbs for Marty's annual Norman Rock&Roll-Well (I have to tell him I constructed this term for his fete) party. That meant a 6AM grappling for sugar plum fairy sleep.
Next day, no snow. No skiing, just roast beef with a bunch of artists and then a pathetic movie starring a certain actor accused of being gay all the time, and then points beyond.
The Jesus & Mary Chain's Stoned & Dethroned sounds still solid right now.
Note to self: buy the new Hope Sandoval. Sometimes Always jogged that.
Photojournalistic memory: elusive Reid Bros. under dimmest of light.

Next big rock shooting is the Goo Goo Dolls on the 27th, a short set for charity at the historic joint that they sold out 3x in '99. One of the bearded boy colleagues wants to gather up all of us photographers for some sort of group shot or something or other. Talked to Robby Goo a couple of times this past five or so days as he has been back in town and prowling about in the downtown music venues. He actually looks good, thinner and ferocious manic panic red stripes in his hair. Allegedly he's bought or is buying a recording studio here.
Christmas is tomorrow and I am not giving a grand flying phlegm. Every year it feels like a lullish zone which disrupts the work flow. The partying for us regular revelers reaches feverish levels at moments and that's a damned good thing. One annual complaint: people who wait until about 12/21 or so to place a holiday order. You can last-minute shop at a plastic-coated mall but your photo pal is not the mall: no food court, no extended shopping hours, no minimally-waged servants and no oversized holiday decorations for your amusement and general feeling of well-being.

A pair of sex dice and a pair of jumping boots can spice up any dinner party - during cocktail hour and post-dessert. And that's what happened last evening. Big wooden dice from Niagara Falls, NY (sleazeball honeymoon capital of the world) which show location suggestions and very incognito interpretations of human forms in flagrante delicto. One resembles twirling jellyfish . One only gives its erotic purpose away by depicting one form with dots for nipples = she's twisting away from a man, whose face she sits squarely upon.
Afterwards onwards to a reunion show of middling city punk rockers. How many? I wondered amid the din as an audience member shouted out a request. It's been twenty years and you still shout out requests, get it through your thick heads. He, it might be added, has no front teeth and my dim memory forgets the tale of how these went out of his head.

Well, as the gift bottle of hot sauce from James & Deb says Well slap my ass and call me sally - the link super secret code works and now it's as if a whole new universe opened afore my fingers.
Went to look into ground zero yesterday, and to visit Smithosonian's Museum of the Native American outside Battery Park. I was mistaken, my images on permanent view are in War-shington (as they say in the midwest) and not there. But it turned out that there was a traveling show about Native American beadwork there and I DID have work in that show, a documentary image of Iroquois women doing beadwork.
Before that emo-jaunt I went to my fav jewelry store in SoHo, Me and Ro , and picked up a new addition to the other gold band I wear with the la vérité éternelle (eternal truth) - this one is also gold with a small ruby and it the Tibetan word for compassion dug into it.
After ground zero went to the museum to see not only my work on display but to also see Tibetan monks making their sand mandala in honor of Yamantaka and it was even more intricate and colorful than I could ever have imagined. I watched the monks work on it with their copper tools for hours, long funnels with ridges along the sides and copper sticks to rub against them to make the sand grains come out slowly or quickly, depending on the rub. It's a mesmerizing, musical process.
I talked with one of the monks and asked him to look at my new ring.
He held it in his holy hands and pronounced that it did say compassion, pronounced neen-jay in Tibetan.
I was relieved that it didn't mistakenly or brazenly say dogpoop.
Before all of this I bumped into an MTV crew on the Chinatown streets, daring innocents to do things/thinks for cold hard cash money. $50 was offered to a handsome teen to take a raw fish into his mouth and be filmed taking a cab all the way up to Times Square. He said no and scooted away.
They approached another person, next to me. Suddenly the host saw me How about this girl? They offered me $300 cash and I said I WILL barf in the cab (I was x-tremely hungover) and he said GREAT!!! we'll get it on camera. I said But I'm not going that way. A woman said It's the holiday season. I said Then you do it! I was out for the night, knew I'd stink of fish and had ground zero and holiness waiting for me. I said no, the host was wide-eyed and off I walked. I imagined cheezball writers at the middling city's daily catching that fishy whiff and my name sprawled out in the paper: Local Photog and Her Fishy Mouth!!!! abso-fuckin-lootly not.

A former bosstype man in NYC gave me the secret to linking. I now have the perfect power, I think. So here's an experiment:
The other day I noted a woman who was disgruntled and so I said Hey bitch snap out of it.
Let's give this a whirl, Perfect Nancy's World followers.

I'm now going to dispense some Perfect holiday advice:
When shopping for others remember number one. When holiday shopping my mantra is One gift for Them, one gift for ME. It makes the holidays much happier.
You've worked hard, you made your money, it's in your pocket, you're spending your money, you see things you want so why the hell not? And who knows best what you want than you.

Off to NYC tomorrow for a few days and heard about Tibetan monks making a rare mandala sand painting at the Smithsonian's Museum of the Native American near WTC site. It's of a god, Yamantaka, "the opponent of death." I have work on permanent view at this museum and have never been there. So this trip.
Absolute words of wisdom, imparted by H.R. of Bad Brains/Soul Brains who I shot on Saturday night in a crowded venue:
It's okay to laugh, it's okay to have fun!

Shot the nice Jewish boy gone to hell in a smart multi-media hand basket last night, aka Rob Zombie. Me and the boy colleagues were warned before stepping into the pit: There are loads of pyros. You have to worry about the condition of pyros (and your immediate eyebrow safety) when a cranked-out looking roadie is attaching thick cables and wiring moments before the fall of the big black curtain.
I've seen Zombie before and I find him, his music and his explosive stage set meltingly invigorating. As I walked to my car with a boy colleague I said Hey look at my sweater, it's covered with ash.
When I arrived at the security bunker before Rob Zombie I had just missed an Ozzy Osbourne sighting: all the jacketed security guards and the photogs were in a state of mild shock as Ozzy staggered by, ashen-faced, shaking and walking with a cane.
I saw him after that during his meet & greet, I watched through the security door. We all agreed that he had received a boost of some sort.
The tour is sponsored by Mountain Dew, perhaps that's his new chem of choice.
NO PHOTO PASSES FOR OZZY, another helpless victim of Aging Rock Star Syndrome.

I had to chastise a 13 year old boy yesterday night as he had no freakin' clue how to make a scotch & soda - nor a good one. What I told him, pointedly, and in a nutshell: 1. o youngster, there is a huge difference between soda and tonic. Get the fuck away from my scotch with that tonic or I'll karate chop you. 2. sonny boy, when making a scotch & soda remember to add scotch.
The party was fun, even when an uninvited person (guest of a co-worker) was rubbing my leg until I gave him a look which can wither healthy leaves off of trees, burble paint off of walls. He knocked it off and no further near-need for karate chops ensued.
Later we all streamed out of the party and into a series of bars and clubs, including the one where a dj pal handed me a copy of his cd - it's on now, adding a nice even techno vibe.
At some point, realizing I hadn't had enough food for "dinner," I stopped in a somewhat reliable pizza joint and cavorted with the two employees - one pregnant and non-working (lots of sitting on counter) and the other a dough-tossing teen always covered with flour. I looked up and they had not changed my menu embellishment: the (apparently barely-literate) owner hand-printed their menu and their family pack looked as if it cost $2068 rather than what it must be ($20.68). So I was searching for a sharpie (I was with five other people = power in numbers) and then the hardworking teen said here's a black one, a nice stinky fat marker. So I reached up and added the words solid gold to family pack and made it officially $2,068.00. Last night the pair of pizza employees said We like you better when you're not here with your posse.

Swimming through a room of artists at a party last night I came upon one of my newspaper colleagues, in his cups. He was telling me a story - a challenge to follow over electronic music, talking everywhere and his thickening British accent. He told me about picking up novelist/theory guy Umberto Eco at the airport and how customs was giving him a hard time and he was growing angry and that he spotted Eco but thought it was a lookalike and I'm following along when suddenly I realize this is a piece of fiction he's working on not reality so I help him embellish with other essential details. Eco is going to be kidnapped and driven to San Diego via Chicago by the tipsy Brit who has been wantonly post-flight drinking at the airport. And he's also trying to screw over the woman who is really supposed to be picking up Eco for a talk at the universtiy. So she's in hot cross-country pursuit after the kidnapping. Or not. My embellishment: the car picks up a troubled teen girl who asks for a ride. His embellishment: she is carrying a small handbag and is always changing her clothes at rest stops. My embellishment: Eco secretly realizes what is happening but is digging being in this chaotic moment with the Brit thinking he's pulling a fast one on him. His embelllishment: Eco is carrying a duck-billed platypus in a pet carrier and suddenly realizes it's the wrong platypus. My embellishment: suddenly Eco is obsessed with the idea of going to a dude ranch that he's read about in Oklahoma where they custom-style your cowboy hats (bending them to and fro) to fit your personality. The person at the dude ranch has a helluva time figuring him out and the brim is steamed and resteamed and bent and rebent. For hours. His embellishment: suddenly you realize that the teen girl has an acoustic guitar and then a double bass. My embellishment: Eco has been furtively calling in details to his assistant in Italy because this will become his next novel, thanks to the tipsy Brit. I told the ex-pat that this could be a screenplay and the last scene would be a black screen for a while and then the voiceover of Eco stating that this was all his story.
Best part of the party: the Brit, growing ever-increasingly difficult to understand à la Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (or whatever the hell it was called), stating that the nearby Portuguese guy who speaks 4 languages speaks none of them very well.

I went to CNN.com today and had every intention of downloading the US govt-ok'd transcript of OBL's found tape and my computer lost the connection. I took that as a sign from disgruntled and maybe even pissed Allah that I should not read this at this time. Either that or it was high time to complete my AOL deadlined work at hand. So I got back to work. And spared myself further Tora Bora thoughts. For now.
I've been on a mad frenzy to travel as much as possible. I was trying to squeeze two more trips out of 2001 but will only make one, I think.
2002 is the Year of NJP Making Art, for certain. I will be so art-focused that it delights me. It's getting into emotion, thought, fear, voice, intuition and the powers of self-made adrenaline. Off to events. And their worthy photo documentation. By Yours Truly. xox

I've just, as we say in the paper biz, filed and I'm glancing at the photo I took of some foie gras yesterday evening at a local finery eatery of expensively preparedly foodstuffs. Late as always, my paper called for the request and, having worked in the other biz which makes the world go 'round (the restaurant biz) I knew to call and schmooze the chef de cuisine, which I did. Upon my arrival I silently walked up their grand staircase to their upstairs banquet room. I set up lights and the shot and went downstairs to ask the hostess to tell chef de cuisine that I was ready. I had wondered upstairs how many joints I could walk in silently and set up lights and all unnoticed or how long I could hang out without anyone caring. Maybe bump around and have some free snacks, take some photos and move along. I am skillful at being invisible when need and want be.
So chef comes up with the to-be-shot food and it's foie gras with truffle-whipped potatoes, pomegranate, pea tendrils, fried salsify, shaved white truffles, and lavendar and honey glaze. Et voilà: the most expensive little plate of foie gras for miles around. I shot it, I must say, sumptuously. He and I talked as I shot and he asked if I'd like to take the food. I said yes. But I was amid a juice fast and took it anyway. Upon arriving back chez moi I gave the expensive snack to my outdoor-living cat friend named Extra - now he thinks I absolutely rock. I didn't tell him that they force-feed the goose to make the liver swell to make this treat..

My health and beauty regimen recently included the Snapcase show on 12/8 whereby every dirt molecule nestled into my face's pores was vibrated out of my face and into oblivion, wherever that might be. Before they took the stage with ferocious abandon they had a tape loop of searingly loud percussive machine noise which was beautiful. It went on for fifteen minutes. In that span of time I wondered if my lungs might collapse, or my face would freeze in a permanent grimace, or if I might faint - as I was much closer than other humans at the venue, being in the pit. Recently Snapcase's management bought images of mine for a British mag and other bandly purposes.
A final thought, emanating forth from this middling city (tossed in for lead fan who pondered if my novel will be called This Middling City) Tora Bora - was that name made up for this war, a spunky truncated name easy for Westerners to pronounce?

Among last night's journalistic forays was a stop at a lighthouse, newly constructed by a family with enough money to fill a lighthouse with custom heart-shaped tub, parquet floors, library with winding stairway, etc. The progeny of the family is a photographer and, fittingly enough, had an art opening for his cross-processed work documenting geewhizz lighthouses. yawn. I explained cross-processing to a handful of his guests. It: shooting slide (positive) film and processing in negative film chemistry - or the inverse, processing negative film in slide chems. It's all about positive + negative vibes. Onwards to cohosting the cable accesss show which nobody sees and later still a party where there was enough booze to fill a lighthouse and, suddenly, a pal decided it was high time for crossdressing and the hostess helped him into her sad and lonely bridesmaid's frock. One of those expensive dresses which a bridesmaid promises to herself that she can wear again, but never does.
Until a man decides it's high time for crossdressing.

(Thoughts on last evening's festivities)
A girl, maybe aged 13, was sobbing at the sight of her favorite O-Town bandmember. Her two friends, one on either side, were hugging and consoling her. Backstage were more teens in packs holding homemade signs and being shuffled about by teen handlers so they could participate in meet & greet and be moved along, tearfully.
Photographers were penned in to the security area between photo ops and after about 2 hours of that crap I left. Three "acts," two people pictures and I had enough. Had enough of the non-hospitality, not the documentation. It was half an hour of sitting in security area entrance, a guy with a headset shouting the act name, trotting backstage and into the pit, shooting one or two songs depending on what the artist requested and then returning to security area. That makes for one drab evening.

Tonight is the annual po(o)p music festival downtown when "musicians" and "singers" take the stage for truncated, lip-synchful "sets." There is always a parade of bands that I've never heard of, not listening ever to the station which produces this event. Why, you might ask, do I cover this fiesta?
Because there are going to be 13,000 or so shrieking fans of the station there and more who could not make it and who the fuck am I to say their coolwhip-topped, spandex-sporting stars aren't worth documentation in the middling city's alternative weekly?
Plus I get to see several of my boy colleagues backstage and that's always pleasant.
Last night I had a few cocktails with a bevy of musicians and one of them, a bass player no less, asked what I ever did with that goat head.
I told him it's in my freezer and only now am I remembering how he knew about the goat head: I was leaving the Arabian Food Mart with a double-bagged goat head around my arm and saw him on the street. I must have excitedly told him about my gift from the store, after I was brought into their Witkin-esque walkin cooler full of animal carnage and wreckage (a much earlier blogpost from when I was writing a story on international food joints).
Like the cow heart before it, it rests in the freezer, awaiting a thaw and visit into the photo studio.

Thanks to yoga I did not have my own personal meltdown after the harddrive on my computer was wiped out. What a way to begin the day. I could have been more upset but really, why? Dealing with technical computer crap reminds me of chemistry class - which sadly brought down my fine average in h.s./hell-hole. If I believed the answer in chemistry class was decrease, it was increase. And so forth.
Firmware, software, updates, extensions, files - my head is reeling.
Or was.
The Vegas piece is behind me... hey, there it is, and is fine. And a mere 1,300 words over what they wanted. It's a world unto itself, the way I like them to be.
2002, I have realized, is going to be my Year of Art Making and Ass Kicking.
There are so many art projects and exhibitions coming down the pike I'm very excited. All.

Today I was not a solid rock girl team player.
I completely forgot to meditate at 430PM EST as directed by Olivia, George's widow. Exactly at that moment I was trotting into an office building at the university with my bundle of joy - images made of the mediocre (yet way serious) dance troupe.
George's ashes are to be scattered, it is reported, atop a sacred river in India. The Ganges. I pondered what I will direct others to do with my ashes after I depart for the big photo assignment in the skies.
Idea 1: (nature theme) toss them into the wind at the upper rapids of Niagara Strait (technically not a river) which is the most gorgeous green, my favored color. Then they will swoosh over the Falls into oblivion until they float under the bellies of trout down a few miles in Lewiston.
Idea 2: (rock theme) flush them down one of the hard-working toilets at The Continental, site of many fine memories, where I had my nose broken one time, where I have seen many fine rock shows and where I fell on a bottle and acquired a really impressive leg scar. And where, many times, whilst dancing on the dark and encompassing dance floor, I received fine ideas for art projects. And still do.

Who dyes the eyebrows of aged rockstars? That was my lone thought as Marky Ramone took the stage in the overcrowded downtown club last night. He looked so detached from his drumming, which he did after muttering This goes out to my other Ramone brothers, naming them for our erudition. The Misfits, despite Marky's distracting dye job, rocked. Bodies flew through the air. A shirt was ripped from Jerry Only's sweaty torso. Black Flag songs (.5 of the band are Black Flag men) were grunted. Afterwards, some mediocre & neck-vein-popping local metal. I was greeted at the door by a bandmember who couldn't believe that I was there LAST night when HIS lame pop band performs there tonight. That is shameless self-promotion of the worst sort.

Lest you think the life of a photojournalist is all fun and games and non-stop deadlines here's a tiny tale of woe: today, mid-press conference early afternoon was caught in a rainstorm and was, as were other media types, soaked. So was my camera which is now recuperating nearby.
Melissa Etheridge never happened and all media were sent away from the venue that night. Two wimmin at the fan club table greeting concertgoers who had shelled out their $75 per ticket informed me that there were no media creds to be had - which I didn't believe. As someone wisely pointed out later that night an artist on tour and hawking a book should be welcoming all media with open arms. Oh well, I say to that.
A second Beatle has passed away. I imagine John Lennon was waiting for George at the big recording studio in the sky. He died of throat and lung cancer and I'm wondering if anyone will mention his heavy smoking and use this as an anti-tobacco platform.
Now off to several places concurrently and with documenting in mind.

I had a pretend chastisement today after I used a flash to capture the middling city's orchestra playing behind a group of signing & singing students at a school for the deaf. The leader of the musicians approached me and berated me for nearly throwing her off course during the classical rendition of "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" or some other such carol. I pretended during the pretend chastisement by my orchestra pal that I was rubbing very real tears from my eyes.
I left and moved onwards to a cover shoot with five individuals - one about an hour late, diva style.
A phenom: people can be upset with one another but a photographer can become a conduit for aggravation and it's part of the gig some days. Now I am leaving to shoot that Kansan, Melissa Etheridge.

As an experiment of sorts on Sunday I went to a 300+ cat show in the exurbs. At one moment I actually saw cat hair floating through the air - a non-treat to one with the most Perfect cat allergies (Yours Truly). Rows and rows of cat cages decked out with colorful blankets and whimsical cat toys. Eight judging rings and I photographed the grand champ of the premiership, whatever the hell that means. It apparently meant any cat that is inactive, caged, oversized and way fluffy.
Tomorrow night I will (hopefully) be shooting Melissa Etheridge who I've photographed probably five times thus far in my lifetime. I think back in the day (her pre-makeup and pre-failed marriage days to Julie Cypher... and pre-faux-impregnation of Julie C. with David Crosby) her shows had more pizazz.
Back to deadlines du jour.
My plumber pal asked if I'd like to adopt his dog Henry, who was my visitor/pet for two weeks in September. I think the answer, given the epinw lifestyle, will have to be a sad and sorry No.

Time slowed to a non-rock & roll crawl as I watched two underfed Cutty (as in Sark) girls roll duct tape in their hands, stick them to the bottoms of tiny goldfishbowl-type candle holders and affix them to the tops of amps and other onstage electronica at the Cold show last night. Like other somewhat frenzied roadies they took their tasks very seriously, as if the awaiting crowd or sound men were watching and judging them. Rolling. Sticking. Affixing. Moving. And then the lighting of the little onstage candles. Cutty Girl #1, in cowboy hat, before the band lumbered to the stage, announced that if the crowd "drank a shitload" of Cutty then they could meet the band. I wondered if the band knew about this. Cutty Girl #1 chewed her gum and talked. One of my security buddies commented that collectively the Cutty Girls were "not the brightest lights in the harbor." Which harbor, I wondered. The band came out and it should be noted that they drank Molson Canadian and crappy bottled water - not a glass or bottle of Cutty Sark in sight.
Today I shot a fun and happy wedding. I was booked via a brotherly referral and correspondence but when I saw the bride I felt like I knew her and gave her a kiss on the cheek. A whole bunch of Mexicans were at the wedding and, as luck would have it, I mentioned to one of the groomsmen that I'd do a shot of tequila with him at the end of my gig. Word quickly circulated that this photog indulges in tequila and then I'm talking to the Mexicans and I mention that I dig Herradura but I say it like a Yankee and they say OHHHHH!!!!!! Herrrrrr------ahhhhh-doooooo-rrrrrrrrrrahhhhh.
Then, next thing I know, I'm doing shots of some primo Agave with the lot of them - and the bride. Did I mention that I told them and the bride I don't drink a drop when shooting a wedding? Well then we all did another Agave shot. Life is good.

In honour of my wondrous and childish ways I'm redubbing this hardcore American holiday ***SPANKSGIVING***: a day whereby each person expresses gratitude and happiness and fledgling consternation via either lighthearted or full-throttle SPANKS to posterior regions of those worthy and deserving.
No non-manual implements are to be employed on ***SPANKSGIVING***.
Although they're so handy on a day devoted to food & hearth, no spatulas or any domestic devices may be utilized. Hands. Butts. Spanks.
Spank you and happy epinw-sanctioned holiday.

A shockingly gullible epinw reader queried So you finished your story for the magazine, Perfect Nancy? Do not believe everything that you read. Especially when it comes to deadlines for magazines and you read that I'm flailing away.
I had a gig tonight documenting a party held in honor of last year's blizzard which had most of this middling city shut down and buried and looking for good times.
Non-ironically I was in this very spot, with this very same mid-article-write feeling washing over me, when the skies farted open with thunder, lightning and snow. I was here. I was fed a surprise chicken dinner and .5 bottle of wine by Nate who had surprised me that he was in this house, waiting for his upstairs and stranded beloved. I was deadline stranded - for the first time in my life happy to be stuck.

The most arousing, spiritually, music I own is playing as I work into what will be the most wee hours plus. The track is off of a compilation of contemporary Japanese music and if I knew how to link I'd send all ears to it.

A happenstance: I spoke with a blind blues guitar player a few nights ago. I asked if it bothered him. To be blind? he asked. Yes. He said sometimes and then said You know we all, no matter how rich or good or bad, talk about other people behind their backs. Twice I've been talking about someone and didn't know that they were standing next to the person I was talking to. We were standing at a bar and he pulled money out of his pocket to order a drink and asked me what sort of bill he was holding. I wanted to ask him if he knew that there was a super-special way that blind people fold their money to tell the 5's from the 20's and so on.

A few days after I was called to a last-minute gig at a blind school and had to gently lead my subjects around for a group photo. They were embarassed and/or worried that they would knock my lighting over and I told them not to be worried, that plenty of sighted people knock them over.
Maye the blind blues guitarist would ask Hey, Nancy, did you every hear that they sell little sandbags so's your lights don't tip over?

In Charlie Hunter's direction I arrived, unannounced. And it was swell.
Thinking This is an artist who is of the tapers-friendly genre, I wung it.
The last time I photographed Hunter - as part of the quartet - I was practically in his lap in a much smaller venue and was asked by his road manager to not use a flash - which I had thrown on for a few frames as the club has annoyingly uncooperative light and I'd rather get a wrist slapped and get something for publication than not.
Last night's venue is a cavernous mod stage where lighting is usually dim at best. The opener, Motet, was losing my huge interest until they did a number which was so deliciously drummed out into the primitive and then one which had two bandmates double drumming - very Japanesearific.
Charlie Hunter was fab and his happiness at the enthusiasm rushing towards him was visible. For Hunter I was tight tight on face and hands and instrument - not breathing. The light was that poor. Finally, flash time. All set up and waiting waiting anticipating and then (knowing only one flash looks like an ardent fan with a point & shoot to a backstage road manager and inhouse security) one frame explosion for insurance purposes.
One negative from the show: his concert shirts are lame.
Also, the unshaved rim along the jaw beard and sideburn connector borders on the country & western.

Much like a Perfect Nancy dream the rich voice of Neil Diamond floated out of the façade of a pizzeria as I walked by. There's nothing quite like the Zen of a song matching a mood in a public aural venue - a soundtrack moment. At lunch table today I asked what kind of movie our various lives would be.
It was decided that mine would be shot with a hand-held camera. I said it would probably be all jump cut and after a half hour or so people would either be diggin' it or saying Ohhh, I feel squeamy with all this non-stop.
Last night, whilst in the epicenter of a party, someone asked Do YOU still write, Nancy? To which I responded I write every day.
Someone said, No, she is the sort of person, Nancy, who thinks that writing is solely poetry and fiction, non-commercial expression.
I then said Yes, I do still write.
And why isn't it public? Because there's no public forum in this middling city whereby I would be happy to plan to stand atop a stage reading emoting effusing dissecting.
It would have to be the right sort of event, not a barfly-infested (yum) poetry event typical of here.
I told the questioner that I write pieces, print them out, scotch (yum) tape them to the wall and look at them periodically until a new one comes.
Off to yet more points beyond, including a sale of beloved John Lennon objets d'art. I have an inkling that tonight a JL piece will be hanging in my happy barely live/majority work space. Onwards.

What is that low moaning like pained ghostly presences I hear rushing at me from each direction? Oh, it's you, Nancy Nancy Nancy where are yoooooooooooo?

Well nope I did not perish back & forth from Plasticville = Las Vegas.
I did my thing there, wandering the strip and into a selection of wedding chapels with camera, tape recorder and beloved legal pad - and ideas abrew. I witnessed two weddings on Wednesday, one featuring Elvis in the role of officiator.
Here's an insider's fun fact: when a couple is married in Vegas they are first actually married by a judge in robes and then Elvis does a ministerial thing "for entertainment." Three songs is the norm and a certain Elvis of the Elvis Fleet gives the new bride a complimentary satin scarf atop his usual $100 fee. Anyone can have Elvis show up at their nuptials if they throw a little Ben Franklin luvv about.

At wedding #1 I was one of five people in the chapel - b&g, reverend so&so, photographer and Your Fav Nancy. At wedding #2 I was one of ten. At wedding #2 a girl who was shooting with a funsaver until the official photographer told her to stop, told me in a near whisper before the ceremony that she hoped to exchange vows with her honey, the best man, one day at Viva Las Vegas Chapel. But she wants a goth wedding. That means the reverend pops out of a coffin at the center of the altar to begin the proceedings. Dracula and Bride of Frankenstein-esque apparel are optional.

What is Vegas? A fantasy strip of plastic and scads of money tossed into the wind in the wrong direction: casinos are the gas-guzzling fuel of the city which rests in a prehistoric bowl of mountain and rock and long-gone critters. Casinos spend billions on the right faux looks, fabrics, dusky sky ceilings, training for employees to effuse whichever themed jubilance is necessary and not more than a smittance goes to anything an uppity Easterner might refer to as culture.

I did manage to sniff out the only bit of major culture in the joint, The Art of the Motorcycle, at Guggenheim Las Vegas - and I have the bitchin' $38 t-shirt to fuckin' prove it. What gorgeousness $20 million can be gleaned from the brain of Frank Gehry. Why is there not more of that? I wondered that a lot.

I took snappy photos of the backstage crap going on - with lovely Diana and with an unobtrusive Olympus.

Being me and loving the idea of tesing fate in a smirky way, I pumped some bills into the slots and second ass-hitting the front row seat doubled my ca$h. Did I stop? Silly question. It took about two hours of up and down before I was over and out.

So now my head is swilling with impressions and facts and near-facts and off-record back-stabbing accusations of wedding chapels and tomorrow is designated as Barf Out the Story Day. And I know it'll be grand. Like the Grand Canyon, another desert point of interest.

And let's move on to last night, which followed the morning of my return flight which led into immediate work, and Madeleine Albright's visit. MA = well-dressed and hates the photojournalist. Her assistant was a nuisance and at one point, as I kept gently nudging her out of my goddamned frame, she said You're KILLING ME with the camera. I had not a nanosecond to look in her way (as Albright was working through the crowd steadily and had but 300' of floor before she was leaving via back door) and kvetched out I'm just doing my job. Then she abated her press hatred. Only I was not press at that moment but a paid photog to document glad-handing of former Sec.of State and High Rolling university donors.

Albright was preceded by a big psych-out. At dinner with two pals my caller id on cell showed a Chicago-area number. It was not. It was Artist Kenneth from Amsterdam, who is an epinw FAN.
Albright was followed by a big freak-out. After attending a warbling and disconcerting Music Awards ceremony felt a need to be with My People so headed to the local gin mill where I sporadically find myself behind the bar as celeb guest bartender, which again transpired. Another night, another fresh bottle of Cuervo. Me and the bargirls did our best to evaporate that liquid refreshment and it was good. It was also a night of 3-D on-velvet paintings which I looked at with one of the bargirls.
Tequila + 3-D goggles + 3-D paintings - disconcerted feeling x82 jubilance = big yes.

Courage is oh-so many things but I don't think it involves arriving at an airport the day following a crash in one's hometown state.
Near-quote: You are a brave woman to travel tomorrow.
In a matter of small hours I embark for Vegas, armed with camera(s) and old-school tape recorder called a shoebox style (not those ridiculous voice-activated micro-recorders) and of course a yellow legal pad.
Hi, I'm Nancy and I'm here to document your bizarre behaviour. Thank you, have a nice day, carry on.
The story. The story. The story. 3K of my trundling-forward words.
At this time tomorrow I plan on finding myself alongside Karen stumbling along the strip under the influence of a sushi feast and god knows what else. Rock on. And love.

Last night. And what a night.
An all-star band in a dark and smoky lounge, an amalgamation of solid players culled from the top of the heap of the crop played. Their name is completely forgettable, Odiorne, and they are a former member of Mercury Rev et al. They're opening for Merc.Rev. in Spain and their drummer was nervous to fly. My Perfect advice? Whatever way you have to be sleepy on the plane - sleep deprivation beforehand, copious amounts of substance - do it, and sleep the flight away. The end. More Perfect advice dispensed from this region's most Perfect Nancy.
Any other question?
Today I'm meeting with a curator to discuss what of my brain will be on view for a superstar show upcoming. Art career? And who the hell in this mad whirlwind of a deep and wide chaos has time to even think about standing in front of her enlarger in the comfy darkroom, music softly playing and the bottle of scotch at the ready alongside the other helpful artful chemicals? Oh, how I yearn for a day when I can be there, making and doing and still (after all these centuries) marveling at the miracle of images floating up on sensitized paper in sloshing trays of chemistry.

Photographed Harry Connick, Jr. (HC, Sr. is a judge - not a hunk) last night at the landmark venue where staffers are always a landmark pain in the arse to do business with. The man with the headset welded to his head who never has a clue was there, in all his officiousness. He's the man who told lead boy colleague and I that he didn't think it was going to happen that we would be shooting BB King at his engagement there, even after explanations of faxes sent and agreements signed. So then I went to the stage door and found the tour manager who I had talked to earlier and who told Mr. Headset to back off. So Harry comes onstage and the women are a-titter. He did look pretty hot save for the embarassing bed head he had. The head of security told me and a boy colleague that when the crooner played Syracuse forty "drunk as skunks" women turned up and called for him outside of his tour bus after his show. Reportedly he preferred his tour bus to spending the night in a luxe suite at a nearby hotel and that meant that security had to keep a watchful eye on the bus all night - and the drunks as skunks. The opener, whose name (thank god) escapes me, was an odd choice - a man who wanted to show off that he could play solo guitar in just about any style. I leaned over to boy colleague and said I think the real opener stiffed Mr. Connick, Jr. and he sent someone over to the Holiday Inn lounge and grabbed this guy. Then onwards to a punk rock extravaganza where me and one pal decided to get some good old fashioned stage diving going but we were the only two - I jumped and he'd catch me. He'd jump and I'd sort of catch all 6'2" of him.

Note to self:
When you are photographing that tough-looking broad named Madeline Albright on the 15th REMEMBER YOU NINCOMPOOP TO HAVE A FEW FRAMES made WITH HER for your collection on the wall of yourself and the likenesses of famed others. Thanks, in advance, for your attention in this matter.

An interaction today (thus far) which was notable:
Me walking down street and ahead is a woman who had a piece of hemp tied around her waist, over her thickly-knit and dirty sweater. At her feet was a straggly mutt who resembled Toto a bit. As I approached the dog kept looking over his left shoulder and we connected and I asked if I could pet the dog before I lost my hand in a muttish freak-out. Woman tells me that the dog is a "pound dog" and is of indeterminate age. The dog's name is Girlfriend. Are you from around here? she asks. Nope, I say, I'm from Buffalo. Oh, Ani Country, the woman says, confirming my impression that she's a lesbian. I tell her that I know the little folk singer and that I have photos of her from the dark ages/pre-Spin mag era, etc. I did not share info that I painted houses with Ani, or that I have a photo of us dancing together cheek-to-cheek. The woman listened to my quick, fun facts and said Oh, I'm sure. In that tone that bespeaks of a distance - namely your assumed distance from reality or the truth. So now, there is woman telling her pals about a crazy woman dressed in black who bent down to pet her dog who thinks that she is a friendly acquaintance of thee Ani. Ani.

One beautiful thing I saw today, no two:
Art gallery visit in a strange new place and 1. Amid a show of spiritually-inspired images a Joel-Peter Witkin print, a photo gravure, of a corpse resembling J.C. and so it's a post-crucifixion image - replete with dead dog with wings and his scratchings; 2. and a 19th-century Japanese screen. Two six-panel paintings of crows in trees. Left side shows five crows in a willow tree. There is white space, three panels, between the five and a lone crow in another tree. The crows were made with brush strokes, no lines made, and they show such energy.

Tattoo concept: (derived from archetypal office humor fliers)
"You want it when?"
Image is a cartoon person bent over in uproarious laughter amid stacks of work.
This tattoo will be inked onto my upper left arm. No, on my left forearm. No, on my neck, the front. That way everyone will see it better. And I'll have the nose of the cartoon person filled in with a crimson to show that the laughter is real.
Two bad things:
1. Neil Diamond is not coming to this middling city on his new tour.
2. Luna has a song called IHOP so I went to the new IHOP in town and nearly barft.

I am filled today with such utter regret.
And regret is the pale flat-chested first cousin of lust.
I bumped up against, was hired to photograph and interacted with the large Irishman they call(ed) Bush's DRUG CZAR and didn't get a portrait made of me alongside him.
Whatever was I thinking?
One super thing he revealed during speech: he calls his wife CZARLING.
So intent on my gig I forgot me, ME.
No ME and William Bennett on this studio wall and I'm now going to kick myself in the arse all about the city block upon which I live.
Live and learn.
Live and shoot.
Live and plunge.
Live and exploit.
Live and ironicize.
Live and let live.
Live and let go.

Other special thoughts from this past weekend:
1. Derek Trucks, blues guitar prodigy speeding towards adulthood, doesn't sing and I think that's great. There can only be one Jonny Lang.
2. Last time I mentioned Johnny Depp in epinw I spelt his name as Lang does.
3. Does anyone but me see that Bob Dylan is morphing into a bat? The new RS cover is still giving me nightmares and I resent it.
4. Las Vegas will enjoy my presence soon so I can make up a story about people who do it (get married) there. Me + Las Vegas + notebook + tape recorder + a little scotch = who the hell knows!!!
5. Radiohead has now surpassed REM on my list of perfects.

go to
www.pce.net/pubaccss/sterlace.html
for fun.

Of course you will have the piece on the 17th I said in my best I-am-so-utterly-indignant voice.
The suburban editor reiterated repeatedly, unnecessarily, that in no way would the shiny happy magazine pay for my travel to & fro.
I repeatedly, and necessarily, stated that the demi-reason for the voyage was to visit Vegas friends - and to investigate the wedding chapel thing.
And I feel it my duty to throw myself yet again on an airplane as a collective gesture of defiance and bargain connoisseurship.
And to show that all the ominous mind-fuck statements (last being that the big T and the big Q know the cracks in the Western economic systems as well as they know the lines in their own hands - wow, good imagery!, A-) issued forth from the cave in Afghanistan leave this hellion journalist nonplussed.
Come Hell, come high waters, come Allah-exploited chaos, the shiny happy editor will have her piece on Allah knows what on the (what was that again?) 17th.

Saw a bit of Fear & Loathing with mmmmmmmmslurp Jonny Depp last night in a drum & bass-infused nightspot, sound off. Much of it takes place in Vegas. It got me to thinking that perhaps in only a short while I will be writing my shiny happy magazine piece on weddings à la Hunter S. Thompson... in Vegas. Maybe not so many mind-altering substances of the illegal genre, however.
Mag piece due in virtually minutes.
Panic?
Me panic?
I feast on adrenaline like Halloween vampires feast on any type blood under full moons. Tonight is a full moon and adrenaline, caffeine, tides, blood are teeming at the gates of Hell.
Love and chocolate kisses from your abso-freakin-lutely fav Nancy, plotting a self-jettisoning into Vegas wedding chapel madness. It's one of those moments where I know. I know.

I tried to call a pal a bit earlier and turned 3834 into 3438 and a woman answered the phone Praise the Lord!
My pal does not live there, I think the Lord does.
In honour of all people who think Halloween is a Satanic plot to turn children and adults down the path to eternal damnation and candy-munching I will now answer my telephone:
HAPPY BEGGARS' DAY - TOMORROW IS HALLOWEEN... REJOICE!

I realized that I owned Roxy Music only on dusty cassettes and today bought the greatest distilled hits in compact discationalized format and this sates the desire.
I also bought the new Ryan Adams and a local jazz blower was in the record shoppe as I was looking and said Bryan Adams? in ironic squeakiness. To which I karate chopped him in the head. Then we stood around for a quick moment and attempted to warble out a few Bryan Adams gems - or non-gems, whichever the case may be.
This AM I was in the throes of secret service/VH1/Adelphia/Hillary Clinton swells of freelance activity and shot everything in sight, as they say out in the beer-drenched autumnal woods.
There was one hot secret service guy and somehow I was distracted away from photographing him for my "Hunks of the S.S." collection.
A fab femme from VH1 dropped a deadline bomb on my lap by stating that she needed jpegs of selected images - ASAP/NOW/PDQ - so most of my early evening was tied up with scooting/editing/scanning/naming/jpeging/emailing.
Life is a delicious deadline and don't forget it.

My Halloween, in a nutshell:
Last night, for the sake of documentation, began at approx. 830PM backstage at Kleinhans Music Hall with Midori warming up five feet away from me in designer photo print gown and metallic shoes (prior to my Bflo.Phil.Orch. gig and shooting the violinstar) and ended with a parade of Halloween parties until 4AM or so with me and five other members of the posse (Janet Reno Fan Club) storming in and out of various parties in bad-ass style. Highlights:
1. Your fav Nancy running, rolling, and coming up shooting faux gun in style at premier party stop in a very expensive house on the wall-to-wall.
2. Members of Fan Club collectively driving and entering next party in bad-ass fashion, creating some exotic limbo moment, helping ourselves to the rest of a bottle of Cuervo and leaving "to bring this orgy elsewhere."
3. Visiting a hot tub party and one member of Fan Club, partially nuded up, getting pushed into hot tub by bitchy bad-ass "Rachel" - usually known as Allen.
4. Whilst walking back to vehicle and passing party mentioned in item #2 "FBI" bad-ass suddenly inspired to streak through that party by entering back door. So, being the fab photojournalist that I am, set the camera on sports setting and got ready mid-living room to shoot his wantonness. Somehow we got in each other's way and there was a profusion of sequential flashing and I'm not sure what will come out of that moment. Oh, and what the photo lab will make of those tangled frames.
5. Next party was at thee famed Coatsworth Mansion and there we also left our bad-ass mark(s) by stripping one of the host's clothes off as he played onstage in the multi-level living room, destroying a shower curtain rig as one of the four girls sat tubside mid-group-pee, finishing up a bottle of whatever as Mr. Streaker/"FBI" bad-ass made "manhattans" for the Fan Club, "Rachel" barfing into a bucket up in the cupola beauty attic ruining the couch amouressness of a couple in heat, and then members of the Fan Club taking over the bandly activity onstage.
6. Going to a local joint and taking over a corner of it for more mayhem, etc.
7. Stop at a nearby diner where one of my cop pals, Eddie, had to come over to our table to: a. tell us to pipe down; and b. to keep our faux weapons on the table. (Two members of the Fan Club fell asleep at the table, very un-Bad-ass.)
8. This AM we reconvened for our weekly cultish brunch and only one of us had Partyer's Remorse and here's a hint, it was not me.
Love from your favorite Nancy/bad-ass.

ps: And to the woman at the gas station where I stopped between Midori and party moment #1 for some of that tricky lemon-flavored malt liquor, who told me that I didn't look like a bad-ass because my face looks too innocent - "fuck you, I am the baddest of bad-asses."

Last night I taped another episode of the infamous and highly improvisational Greg Sterlace Show and it airs on Friday November 2nd (November already? who the hell's idea is that?) at 8 or whatever on the landmine-rich cable access station and it features your Fav Nancy and one of her "pet bands" - Last Conservative. What a treat it was to walk into the building and see those four rock & roll 21-year-olds (*sigh*) and their case of beer. I have to say it's one of the better guest co-hostings yet and it was a fun dip in post-adolescent pheromones. I ended up bringing one of the LC boyz to a party after wisely purchasing some of that hard lemonade that has the world in a whirl, and then we (and another rock st*r = Allen) traipsed down to a joint for excellent music crafted in this middling city. This was the same LC boy who I took to his premier gay bar for his first-ever night of gay bar hopping with me and Crazy Jen.
This blogging, this visual flogging, is a pit stop between freelance gigs to be followed by Halloween moments. I'm trying to break in a green leather mask which was given to me today. It smells great but it hurts around the eyes. Wow, that sounds like a way to describe oh so many things.

Advised a pal tonight to not fry out his brain cells and try to determine a pat plot for David Lynch's latest textural treat, 'Mulholland Drive.' I dug it and was still haunted by images from it - his framing is exquisite – when I received a call on cell phone from one of two(some) Troy friends. They saw it and so we talked talked talked about it.

Note to self: When you make a rule that when a police officer is approaching your vehicle you have a story at the ready, please remember to do so.

Punchline: motoring along deserted biway was suddenly in the crosshairs of two bored officers of the law armed with ray gun.

Special thought: there is no correct or smart response to the question "Do you know how fast you were going?"

Halloween - delightfully confused mix of religious iconography, pagan ritual and candy (like Easter and Christmas, too, for crissakes). But spooky faux webs, jointed skeletons, hand candles and lifelike skulls THRILL.
Although I participate by documenting the big H happenings all over hell's half acre, I prefer not to costume myself materially. Instead I have always chosen the conceptual costume and for many years (before the unfortunate Princess Di Thing in the Parisian Tunnel) went out as a French papparazza.
Then that, then that idea went the way of so much flotsam and jetsom.
Back in college days, when I was grappling with my fortitude, I would pleasingly go to parties obnoxiously costumed. There was the (I shudder) woman's KKK auxiliary member with floral sheets and floral hood, and then the Roslyn Carter as Assassin costume fashioned from a Newsweek cover.
That featured a perfect Roz dress and an unloaded handgun.
This year, after much thought, I've got my costume.
I'm to be a bad-ass. A bad-ass photog which means I'm going to push people all night and yell at them. Yell their names if I know them. Get really close to their faces and POOOOF will go my flash.
And I'm going to wear my most bad-ass ensemble. No Ms. Nice Guy that night. Nope.

I found myself at one point last night backstage at an all-star (to this middling city) guitar player x-travaganza and one guitar x-travagant was saddened that I didn't know who the hell he was. But Guitar Star, I said in my best and kindest soprano, I have never seen you without a Harley-Davidson leather cap on your head (and in so much backstage light) so how in blazes could I know it was you?
This is true and made him oh-so-happy.
The x-travagant guitar ego, example #34,776.
Surprised today to see that at the airport curbside check-in has resumed. So much for anti-American in-convenience.

Today's Bloggal theme: "Technology, Friend… or Foe?"

1. Lead boy colleague, fed up with cell phone nonsense with employer complaining about his work-issued phone bills vows tonight (like right NOW) to let said phone sail from his fingertips out his speeding car's window and through the air and off of a high steel bridge.
I am despondent that I cannot be there to photographically document this event.
Technology - pure foe, leading to exciting yet x-treme behaviour.

2. My so-called rag employer (being freelance I view the universe as my employer) wants to quibble/nickel&dime about an equipment fee of $50 for a pager which I use for the newspaper gig. My first pager was provided by Yours Truly. This so-called employer of your fav Nancy wants to provide me with another pager turned in my a sensible employee seeking employment elsewhere. And then, after a dozen years, I would have a new pager number. This so-called employer doesn't drop one drop of gas in my gas tank, hasn't come up with a digital camera which was a condition of new era of this job (and not leaving to go elsewhere), hasn't provided me with a raise ("salary" = abysmal) in a number of years. Oh, after a dozen years I got health insurance and he yelled at the person who works at the newspaper who gave me hard facts about who has h.i. at this establishment. I have been consulting mentors about leaving this job for forever.
Technology in this case - friend, it's inciting productive thought.

3. Camera is a machine, responsive and durable. It's a helpful tool.
Always a friend.

4. Through a bank of technology next week I will appear on television as a co-host on cable access, yet again. Single malt scotch prior to the appearance is a tool to help words spill out in a cascade of lyrical brilliance.
Scotch, a techological marvel.
Friend or foe?
Silly question.

Being the lovable scamp that I am I'm pondering how to get the editor friend who never learns her lesson(s) and keeps assigning me stories for her shiny happy mag to fly me to Las Vegas for a piece I dreamed up. It's for their wedding issue and again I'm a contributor to the trillion dollar wedding industry - and wedding fact dissemination machine. Just doing my share. And so the piece is to be about ten of the weirdest most x-treme weddings that ever were. I'm thinking Hey, wait a minute, why not fly off to Vegas while it's still really cheap and interview people in the midst of the hurricane of love and vows and paperwork and cheez whiz? And then I can go to the all-you-can-muster sushi bar Karen keeps telling me about.
Always thinking, always thinking, your absolute fav and industrious Nancy.

I bought the new edition to one of my fav photo textbooks from my formative college era. It was, back in the day, referred to as Upton & Upton but since the divorce it's London & Upton. If you can't admit that you're always learning you are an arse.
Stopped on way back to home office hovel/work shack in the scary version of a locally-owned record emporium where an armed man stands guard unsmilingly. Can't one be armed and peppy? They had Macy Gray filed under some stupid new hits section at the front of the store, not under G in pop/rock. As I was meandering and lusting I overheard a great disc on the pa and asked the gangly record shoppe boye what it was. And he told me it was a used cd from a great NYC label. The disc he snapped onto the counter and it was $6.49 and then he said if he sold it to me he couldn't enjoy it so he turned me onto that label and another, Ninja. No compilations were there so I took a $15 plunge off a 300' cliff and bought a double cd from Ninja featuring 3 dj's doing their respective and respectable things. I might have to return to tell him he ROCKS but I sensed an already healthy record store boy ego. So no mo ego flo.

On Friday The Donnas performed in shitty lighting in front of the requisite boys watching them with the respect they'd shine on The Ramones - with the bonus of being able to watch boobies bobble up and down. Singing Donna is now not the cutest Donna, drumming Donna is. And, quite frankly, I'm way too busy this lifetime to memorize their appropriate post-Donna initials. They're a good antidote to the surging corporate rock in the world. Now the phrase corporate rock is making me think of Kurt Cobain's RS cover t-shirt "Corporate rock still sucks."
On Saturday, mid-day in the sun in the middle of an exurb of the middling city, I was surrounded by lady bugs. Usually, in the city, in my garden, I see one and maybe it's one which has departed for the big azalea in the sky and its legs are dried up but its red is still shining on. These were hundreds of living, buzzing, flying lady bugs.
On Sunday an evening meeting in a faux jungle cave with a gathering of favorites. And then there was the faux boxing. Me in the ring with a faux opponent not in my weight class and not in my sexual or racial category. And I beat him down. And I was dripping with real sweat and triumphant and did a non-faux boxing move I've seen so many of my boxing brethren do: punched my faux gloves together as a symbol to the faux opponent to bring it faux on.

Sleep, a waste of time.

What a marathon last few 24 hours. I can't even begin. To tell you.
Money-making, people-schmoozing, fun-ingesting = my perfect perfect world.
REM Perfect Circle kind of night, back in the work/live space and it's now programmed into the cd player to play meaningfully, consecutively, ten times.

Heaven assume, shoulders high in the room.
Try to win and suit your needs, speak out sometimes, try to win.

I'll never forget the time for the first time those words hit my awaiting mind. I was typing on a portable typewriter in spring in the middle of Japan. I was writing poetry and I was alone with the music of another and then Perfect Circle.
There was nothing like Perfect Circle in Japan, and the scent of night-blooming jasmine hitting the face while walking down an ancient and curving quiet street.
Japan in Buffalo and vandals: to halt a soft memory train, today I took my freelance gig people to the Japanese Gardens in Buffalo and was sad to see that vandals destroyed expensive and spirit-housing items. Why are people imperfect.

This night is full of warm breezes.
This weekend is full of delicious rockstar moments.

Some great new Nancy helpful hints to print out and scotch tape to your bathroom wall over the sink, atop your dashboard, or on your fridge. Or in it, if you prefer.
1. When and if you fly Vanguard, BYOBB (bring your own barf bag). They fly small planes where other airlines might go bigger. In cloudy weather the small planes bump up and down. Up and down. When your stomach rises and falls it might need a respite from working on (think waitresses who crassly asks Are you still workin' on that? but perhaps in this case she's floating like those people in rafts in volcanoes upon your stomach acid asking that question to your stomach) things and you find yourself reaching into the pouch in front of you and cheapskates!!! No barf bags. So you hightail it down the aisle, airplane pitching, to you know where.
2. When making a jack-o-lantern be careful how you hold a small serated knife. All.

Returning from a foray into the night world that is my new year. Met people out for frivolity, cake, and the other party thing = cocktails. At one point I proposed a toast, to John Lennon. A chocolate chip-encrusted cake appeared with some candles and the requisite song. As the evening wound down a band from Seattle was setting up in the back room of the bar where we were hanging out. They were a three-piece. It appeared as if they were anticipating rocking out into every square inch of a stadium and we left before they were close to being finished setting up the drum kit, atop an imported carpet. For this gig the bubble hockey game was precariously lifted up into a booth in front of the television. I anticipated a slip, a knocking into the t.v., and a small popping/explosion complete with sparks. No. Just a sad bubble hockey game perched in a booth. And three boys from Seattle setting up carefully, ploddingly, langorously, as we all slipped away into the night.
It is the perfect anniversary of me.
Happy me to you.

what is up with blogger the past few days? I was thinking perhaps there was a block against any posting whose theme is anthrax.

Today is John Lennon's birthday, he would have been 61. Yoko made a statement, at the time of the twentieth anniversary of his death last December, that she prefers to remember his birth and not the yang. I always wished that my birthdate was his, but my mother swished me into the world tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow is my happiest day, the day I became me to the world, in the world. It's like one's own personal Mardi Gras, a chance to truly bust loose and it's all OKAY.

bacteria = bad.
Today I kept wanting to hear more about the anthrax scare (no, make that 1 death, 1 scare) in Florida. Enough already with the focus on the new declaration and formation of the snazzy new Inpatient Security led by the former PA governor, no, Incountry Security, no, well, whatever the hell it's called, I wanted to hear more about journalists inhaling gravely bad things. Doctors or clinicians put q-tips in your nose and then see that you have evil spores lingering in there and then you are Doomed. After online research and NYTimes perusing I've learned one thing: if it's your time to go, you go. Maybe antibiotics will help you, maybe not. (Sad: people selling, and buying, sixty-year-old gas masks) With some of these viruses and bacteria your muscles relax to the point of not just retiring but careening down a sunny highway in a gigantic recreational vehicle with a brick under the brake - if you catch my news-drenched drift. Peace. Say it Loud.
homework assignment to get your mind off anthrax (for me and you) go buy new music for not only will your mind delight in wrapping around a new thing but our president will personally slap you real hard on the back for boosting our economy.

Accidentally just purchased six cd's, including Live Phish cd featuring my photographs. There are only 4 photos on accompanying paperwork in case and they're all by your fav Nancy - one for each member. The packaging is extraordinary, usual paper foldaround enclosing a nylon 3-cd & paperwork container that you must unfold, unfold, and unfold and VOI-fuckin'-LA. Happy. Excellent purchases:
1. Tori's new cd (more literate Tori stories); 2. Live Evil by Miles Davis (heard a drum & bass track yesterday and had to have this immediately); 3. PowerPuff Girls soundtrack (blips, bloops, etc.); 4. Aforementioned Phish; 5. Oysterhead (side Phish project feat. Trey Anastasio, Les Claypool, & Stewart Copeland); and 6. Say it Loud!: Black Music in America (with 20 super-hitz from Louis Armstrong to Grand Master Flash).

Things are not as they seem, usually. Two pieces of evidence.

1. Cult members in white with bright red sashes around their waists walked en masse down the street at 10PM the other night. They were all women, about the same height. And they were all wearing white shoes. Upon closer inspection (necessary so many times in instances of the bandying about of evidence) they were waitresses, classically dressed, leaving the old-school Italian (eye-tail-yun) restaurant called Chef's.

2. A fire burned brightly in a fireplace last night. Logs a-cracklin-, flames a-jumpin' and the scene screamed for marshmellows. But, dig this, this was a faux fire in faux fireplace in a limousine owned by CAESARS limo co. In I crawled, with two friends, into a stranger's limo. He was sitting in the limo. His girlfriend was in the bar where we had been, talking to the limo driver. I smelled trouble for this relationship. The guy was friendly, non-plussed by the sudden appearance of three strangers as his love interest was schmoozing the limo driver. There were also three crystal decanters of bright blue liquid and I said to my self Nance, that's a whole lot of blue curacao. And guess what, epinw people? It was not what it seemed - it was blue water. I know, I made jilted boy sniff it.

Micro pit stop between freelance shooting and journalistic shooting. And yippieyahooaroonies there was a message on la machine that an editor from a respected pub(lication) would like to have me do some writing for him - I'm filled with silly giddy elation, always a pleasant feeling before hitting the streets in search of perfect moments, smiles, and notes hanging in the air.
Is it me or does the fall air have the faint scent of fourteen year old single malt scotch.
A parting thought for this perfect Friday: a pal just about fell off her barstool with oddness when I self-mentioned this blog. You know that thing people do when they are not along for the ride with whatever you're espousing? She threw herself into implosion. Gasoline on epinw bonfire of fun, I say.

I'm so certain that I won tonight's $6,000,000.00 Lotto jackpot that I've been phoning realtors in Manhattan to inquire about purchasing a condo, preferably on Central Park West. And then I'm going shoe shopping. And then charities. And then sushi.
Heard from my long-time friend and fervent art curator that I'm to be part of an exciting collaborative project which funding just came in for. Just when I was forgetting that I'm an artist, too, the art poop hits the proverbial fan.
Long live art poop and the people who make it, including me.
Time to be out and about.
Fear not.

Power to the people. Power to the people. Power to the people.
Power to the people right on.
I've been listening to the John Lennon tributary night wailing away in the other room as I've been flailing away in here, for deadline peace & unity.
Heard Dave Matthews singing John Lennon, almost as perfect as Neil Diamond singing the Christmas Song on a ND collection.
Nearly missed the grant deadline today, as luck would have it I was talking to a friend who happened to utter the word deadline. Terror set in. Then high-speed slide collecting and rapid bio-amassing set in. Told Mr. Mailman about my near-deadline fiasco to his great Going Postal amusement as I handed off the hopefully lucky packet.

Long hair phenom: the smell of people sticks in hair long on length and now I'm sniffing the scent of someone's perfume and I am not so sure who...oh, got it. While at the absolute last outdoor festival of season - Snowjam - a woman of same name embraced me. Was on half-pipe and yesiree those will be gorgeous images. Goldfinger headlined, but before they arrived onstage all the x-treme athletes lined up in all their Molson-sponsored tipsiness and buff glory, many of them hurling (no, not chunks) their novelty oversized check money checks into the throng.

Good deed for the day/month/season: arriving at a backroads countrytime crossroads en route to cornball smalltown art & craft fest I spotted a sign which read: PUMKINS FOR SALE. So I sez to daytrippin' companion: I'll be right back. I grabbed an ever-handy black sharpie and jogged back to the sign, adding a helpful arrow notation and the necessary P. And I drew smiley faces into their two poster pumpkins, adding some friendly zest. Mid-P some lost people from Pennsylvania pulled up in an enormous SUV, having lost their way to the Bills/Steelers game. At the art & craft fest I had a hankering for a caramel apple and nobody in that godforsaken place had even heard of caramel apples, let alone fashioned one. So I headed to a small Masonic Temple (fueled by my lifelong fascination with secret societies). Inside I purchased a slice of apple pie and one of the universe's weakest cups of coffee. Oh, but it was so worth it: for inside, in the kitchen at the rear, were two ladies of the Star, I was told. One was extremely busied with her 120mm cigarette, swatting flies madly. The other was of the white acrylic sweater-wearing genre and she was most kind until I started pumping them both for info about passwords and such. One was a Star member since '42, the other since '73. At that point my thoughts zoomed over to Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon but I didn't think they'd understand. While I was making nice with the sweater lady, smoking lady was swatting out into the middle of the Masonic Temple. She unleashed one giant swat which sent the temple's Star clock made of various colors of plastic at each point crashing to the floor, shattering it. The people inside the temple went silent. I offered helpful advice: 1. superglue would fix everything...and 2. perhaps they might want to shut the temple's front doors to keep more flies out.
As a non-knower of secret passwords my advice was lite.
One weekend highpoint: listening to Hüsker-Dü on vinyl with pals.
Another: hearing how the FBI (as in thee FBI) forbade the Molson Snowjam from acquiring tons of farmpoo/manure to make fake snow from the woman who scented my hair. It all goes back to hugs and hair you see.
Peace for now, perfect oNe.

Next door neighbor of blazing KMart-style lamp called me this AM. She started saying something about the light and I'm thinking it's going to be Sorry that you're getting sunburnt whilst you sleep. But no, it's We installed that light on Tuesday and someone popped open the window again, they didn't take anything. So...nice huge light does no good. Actually, we are both certain the window popper is the post-juvenile hall kid across the street whose home is a study in disaster. Mom with an indeterminate number of children who all look the same - maybe six or seven - mom is a bingo and sex addict and the kids are alone all the day long and don't go to school. Sometimes I look down the driveway and see one of the younger ones running in the front yard, which she's been doing since she started walking. Nobody to keep her away from traffic. So this kid who goes into the building next door doesn't do anything when in there - he's bored. Somehow someone in the house has their shit enough together that they actually managed to hang a few patriotic signs (right-side up) in the windows.

Responsibly, I've got all of my Halloween decorations up. Then I realized, Hey, Halloween is about a month or so away. But it sure feels good to have that orange pumpkin head flashing in the upper window, making neighbors cower. I'm not even talking abut the skull which has been up in the front window for two years, or the interior decorations which have been up longer.
For isn't every day truly Halloween in some special way?
As I was working on AOL writing, specifically Medeski Martin & Wood's upcoming gig, I had that in the ol' cd player and realized that I had forgotten how much I enjoy them. Except when they attempt to play free outdoor concerts filled with hopheads.
From there a quick foray down memory lane and plopped Live's first disc, Mental Jewelry, in until I couldn't stand it any longer. It sounds so flat, so freshman-like, but I still recall perfectly the first time I shot them - big Ed still had hair and I ran a photo of him on one knee, hand outstretched. That was 1991. This is now. Good day to you. Your favored Nancy.

Note to self: even though you are not a huge Phish phan, buy the cd upon which your images appear for the proverbial archives. Or, choice B, perhaps the management will supply a copy as part of my comp for image usage.
Someone who read epinw yesterday wondered what I thought of Ray Davies. I was too busy noting wayward drunks and forgot all about Ramblin' Ray. It was delightful but at moments I wanted more music than Kinks or Davies talk. Also, last night was the tenth anniversary of the release of Nirvana's Nevermind and I thought how I could be similarly enthralled with epic tales from the Nirvana world.

Theme of post: nincompoopage.
1. Nincompoop of gigantic proportions at Ray Davies suddenly lost control of an Entire Pitcher of Beer which flowed like the Tears of Jesus over his table and onto my journalistic photo bag and squatting to keep low legs. Mr. N later, during the quiet moments, shouted in communion with the moment. Then I noted to a rock comrade, Robyn, that he was gone and I supposed he had hit his besotted head somehow in the bathroom and was lying, "out of it," on the pissy floor.

2. Next door neighbor nincompoop has installed one of those K-Mart parking lot-worthy lamps of questionable design and outage of light molecules. Wow! I am still amazed, as I gaze at the windows on that side of the house. Wow! It's afternoon on a cloudy day - or dawn all night. Maybe this is a CIA plot to further confuse a person wont to work into the weest hours.

3. Out of Perfect Nancy Sphere but popping into memory via an oldie on the radio was one of the music world's chief nincompoops, Morissey. Or is that Morrisey? Anyhow, onto more interesting matters involving ham sandwiches and biting rock & roll boys.
Moz once had an acquaintance of mine ejected from a venue for eating a ham sub during a techie break before his gig in this middling city. Sent home. Bye bye ham eater. And one time I saw Morrisey, post-Smiths (unfortunately) but still in his solo heyday, at Nassau Coliseum with a boy obsessed with him (musically, not physically). I recall girls with sheets spraypainted with his name, marching around the perimeter of the floor. Later this rising rock star wanted me to bite him, so, obligingly, I chomped upon his lip. Now that's a nincompoop.

Hell hath no fury like the mom of a little folk singer/rock staress angry that she was mentioned as an "Ani Associate" in your photo essay column. The brother of the rock star said Yes, she's really protective.
Protective? Of what? Seems rather silly but nonetheless all happiness resumed and I finished my rock star family gig in joy and exuberance and with typical pinpoint clarity.

Speaking of exuberance, my piece (drawing of grain elevator on a corner along with lines of sitting birds patiently awaiting grain elevator crumbs, a lightpost, and a beat to shit American flag) sold for $200. I busted out of the museum before my piece was being bid on but not before I bought a large piece by my pal Catherine.

Last night more rock action. Tonight is Ray Davies and I'm about to make certain his aged rock self allows the presence of an inquiring mind and lens = me. Photographically yours, your fav Nancy.

Note to self: if every bride were as psycho-bitchy as yesterday's, dear Nancy, you are not only skipping shooting any future weddings, but will lobby hard in our nation's capital for legislation to pass a law banning marriage.

Found myself in a far-flung vortex of local rock gossip this weekend. Firstly, late Friday night (thankfully after escaping a concentrated dose of show tune-toting theatre people) spoke with a departed drummer of the band he and I were watching. He, his tall, & tipsy self, kept uttering things into my ear. For all I know he was speaking Old High Inuit. Loud outdoor rock & roll under a tent + waning hearing in both ears due to a few decades of rock watching and shooting + drunk departed drummer = WHO THE FUCK KNOWS!. What I did catch was this: as one song was about to begin he said, hearing the first note, If I ever played THIS song again I was going to explode. His hands were drumming in the air, as if to help the new drummer, not nearly as deft or handsome.
Next night/last night: while talking to another guy from another band the subject of the band having personnel problems (losing drummer and bass player) came up and he said: Oh I heard they bagged him because of his drinking. Then he had some other misinformation about my friends' band which we both happened to be watching - why they were dissolving.
I set him straight then, sending him off whimpering post-karate chop to the kneecap. The End.
Off to a complicated day. One involving artmaking, a juicy little freelance gig, some event coverage, an so much more.

ps: Heard from a local hippie that my photos are now appearing along with the Phish live cd recorded from near here, a secret I posted a while back right here on epinw which I couldn't tell, couldn't tell, couldn't tell - having been swept into the enthralling underbelly of rock and roll secrets.

Last night Thurston Moore (of Sonic Youth fame, lest you are not acquainted) mesmerized. A drunk comrade, front row, off to the side, caught me as I was passing and was nearly shouting I can play guitar betther than that. Thurston is not only beautiful with the most kissalicious lips, but his solo guitar work was gorgeous pared-down SY-style resonance. His writing was okay, mostly youthful ramblings about the burgeoning and innocent days of Patti Smith-era punk rock. In his early writing he used the phrase raunch & roll - a lot. The readers of writing preceding Thurston were weak and everyone who hit the stage discussed 9-11 and tragedy.
Off now to draw grain elevators for an art benefit so I'm dusting off my pencils.

Voyaged to another land yesterday for a day off of sorts with a friend. Realized I hadn't called my parents to wish them a happy (?) new year of marriage together and phoned them via cell from the car. As I was leaving a typical Nancyesque message Thanks for both being born, for having me, for meeting each other and marrying each other, and then, having me, the most wondrous product of your marriage, my friend's face was priceless as he glanced at me and I burst out laughing. When I returned home way late I had a message from my father What was so funny? There's another phonecall to make - not your marriage pops. . .
So no Kim Gordon tonight, only Thurston et al, and a few poets. Kim Gordon, I learned moments ago, is still in the NYC area as their daughter Coco is still freaking from 9-11. I am thinking now of one of my most fav rockstar images ever - Thurston Moore in front of me, caught in such a moment of rapture with his guitar, head and face gone in sound, it's very very sexy and hangs somewhat prominently on a nearby wall.
I want to find an extra copy and give it to him.
Off to a full late afternoon and night of freelancing, shooting, meeting, and driving driving driving into the wee hours of lively Nancy activity.

Post of shoulds. Not coulds. And definitely not woulds.

Should I admit that I'm now listening to a sonic cure, Deep Forest, from a past moment now frozen in faroff and embellished perfection.
Should I be astonished that the nervous lady at Victoria's Secret referred to my rack as IT when I inquired if she could glance at them and tell me their collective size.
Should I think it's disgusting that I lick the Oban bottle when I'm pouring myself a creativity enhancer and some drips down the side.
Should I refuse to give the two week visitor Henry the Dog back to his errant owner.
Should I sharpie the deadline application for the photo grant on my forehead, which now has a huge bump on it from a workout mishap.
Should I get back to work.
I shoulder deadline responsibility in this perfect world of mine.

One never knows when one will encounter a closeted hipster, now does one?
Had a freelance dropoff today out in the farout suburbs at a private catholically-infused college. My next stop needed to be a post orifice and, not knowing this suburb very well, rolled down my passenger-side window to ask an ultra-average middle-aged guy in the bland american car how the hell to get there, wherever it might be. He rolls down his window, is immediately smirky and ridiculous, and suddenly speaks as if he's a computer searching the internet for information. I'm processing, one moment please, he actually said. OK, got it...make a left then a right, etc. etc. (he was wrong, but after some vulture-style circles, found the damned place). As I'm thanking him he holds up his thumb, Fonzi style, and shouts ROCK ON. I am still amazed.
BSB (Backstreet Boyz/Bootie-Shakin' Boys/Butt Sucking Boobs) turned down my request to photograph them for my column. Oh well, no ringing ears later tonight from a sell-out teenaged crowd screaming their growing lungs out.

Still have the borrowed/dropped-off dog, Henry, and tomorrow is the day that his owner picks him up after nearly two weeks at Auntie Nancy's Spa for Pets. Brita pitcher water, Iams, healthy biscuits, grooming, a flowery yard in which to romp, rock & roll education - it's every canine's dream.
Last dusk's rah-rah-rah Peace is Over candlelight vigil was an odd contrast of iconography. The three fates in the form of habited nuns sat dourly on lawn chairs front & center in the off-limits (except to media, special guests, the handicapped... and the fates) section. Each held a flag, and a candle.
One of my boy colleagues said to me You know you're up for something interesting when even the nuns are out for blood.
At the end of the programme I felt suddenly like I had been jettisoned onto ground zero of a 1950's war-era movie replete with the patriotic chanting, bunting, plump babies, etc. There was one rotten apple which I noted, a drunk kilt-clad veteran who was groaning and shouting hoarsley either THANK YOU or GOD BLESS AMERICA. And we all know there's no way in hell he could shout GOD BLESS MY UNDERWEAR as men in kilts like to swing free & easy.
Walking back towards the vehicle with a small entourage of two, the throng rediscovered a downtown monument to veterans and there left multi-scented candles at the base of it and around its grass triangle, a sight which reminded me of the John Lennon 20th anniversary death vigil which I attended in Strawberry Fields.
All in all, great pictures. Especially the moment when I spotted a stepladder alongside the large stage, climbed up and shot from the side of the platform, my invisibility costume rendering me unseen by politicians, the lady signing, and the onstage troops. HOORAY FOR BEING INVISIBLE.

Mad as a man falling in yoga's tree pose upside down on a sunny day.

Drove out to the exurbs Friday night for a concert at the area's most difficult venue where photographers are subject to astronomical obstacles in the act of making pictures. And, as I am wont to say, when life gives you photo-related lemons do your damnedest and make lemonade. Specifically: Saliva and Godsmack at Darien Lake. Lighting minimal. Pyros terrifying. Sight lines difficult. Me and boy colleagues grasped at arduous moments and fading possibilities and I left growling.
But the night's most visually arresting snippets were guys and boys and men and jocks in starspangled jackets à la Evel Knievel and Old Navy shirts and bandannas on heads, waving old glory and hootin' & hollerin' underneath a suspended flag mid-venue/amphitheatre the size of which is only seen in front of that chain diner which discriminates against minorities, has lost court cases, and which serves food never resembling that represented in menu photos. So these guys were chanting USA USA USA !!!!!!! over and over and their fists pumped the air and if they had flags those were in their fists. These flag wavers were drunk, furious, and about to rock the fuck out. Before Godsmack's fairly amazing set a local dj came out, referred to 9-11, said Godsmack is making me do this and then, over the p.a., came the world's scratchiest rendition of the national anthem, so scratchy at first I couldn't tell what it was.
Later in the night, inner-city rambling, a few party stops, more of that rock & roll and party and art opening business on Saturday, and a yet more more more today. Off to another art function before a dinner gathering and then a candlelight vigil afore City Hall, already cardoned off in anticipation of thousands upon thousands.
Radiohead plays on in the background, a lush wall.
Pink Floyd lyrics sprung forward as I drove to a freelance gig this sunny day:
(stop here if you don't dig Pink Floyd, can't groove on their 70's and early 80's pomes, and never come back to epinw, fercrissakes)
So you think you can tell heaven from hell, blue skies from pain. Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil? Do you think you can tell?
Onwards to images in the making, to be made, which must be made, by me, the handmaiden of imagery - your beloved, fav blogging Nancy.

Finally heard from my trader friend. She left me a message last night, her voice not sounding at all like usual. Elba hoped that she never had to go through that again... this lifetime. She was in the World Trade Center, working for Smith Barney, when it was bombed in 1993 and I spoke with her while she was on the rooftop before being led down the stairwell by flashlight by the Red Cross. She's been through, like thousands of others, two bombings. I wonder how many people will be moving out of Manhattan after the dust settles. My friend Dorota was attempting to leave the city to spend time away from the flying debris in her neighborhood. And she's concerned about airborne asbestos. Had dinner last night with three friends and one amongst us had such an incredible America-bashing take on things it shocked (and saddened) me, at one point he sneeringly asked if I am a flag-waver. He soaks in history and fancies himself a tried & tru intellect but is ignorant and outdated. Normally I excuse his eccentricities but will be taking a break from his company.
I bet most of the rock extravaganzas inked into my book will be not happening this weekend. Invited to a soirée this evening and would enjoy not talking about the international tragedy for one night. I've been burning a candle in my house for all the dead. And yes, I am a flag waver.
And so, too, is my friend Kenneth in Amsterdam. Be strong.

Because of the World Trade Center bombing I am, for the first time in my life, not thinking about my perilous fear of needles and blood and am giving blood this afternoon. Terror would be a good word to describe my thinking of the Red Cross visit but it seems like a grand thing to do being cross-state and helpless to do much else to help post-tragically. I'm looking at this foray as a personal challenge Oh, you think you're so tough Nancy, strap yourself in and let those nice people take some nice juicy (wooziness starts now) B+.
Be positive and spill loose your B+.
Canceled excursion to Toronto today as reportedly the traffic to cross is hours long. Aftermath of tragedy, most of the world in a numbed state. And some celebrating in sunny streets as if it were a holiday.
Is this karma? Why do wars involve pedestrians? Will the site of the WTC become a field of daisies? Will everyone in the US know someone or know someone who knew someone who died yesterday?
Will I faint at the Red Cross. Will I keep you posted?
You bet.

ps: went to the red cross and started crying when I saw all their flags fluttering in the breeze and a dozen volunteers collecting money on the avenue and handing out flyers to a line of cars which I was in. The man who handed me the flyer said they were so inundated with blood donors that I should return at another time. Then someone told me that they only want O now and non-first-timers. Off the hook/needle I suppose.

Happened to have the tv on this am in between workout tapes to see footage of the World Trade Center in flames and I thought it was archival from when bombs were driven into the garage and detonated. I realized it was live and in those few minutes the second plane flew into the second tower and blew up. The newscasters were dumbfounded and two of the three regained some composure while the third, a woman, was absolutely beyond comprehension and words. I watched until the tower crumpled and decided I could watch no longer. I thought about putting on my L7 tshirt with the skeleton hands but opted instead for my John Lennon shirt. I'm wrapped in a wish for peace. Yesterday I bought the NYTimes and there was a full page ad from an international Jewish org praising both our retarded president and Colin Powell for their support and rejection of the world council on racism. And today this. Are these related?
Dorota, who lives in SoHo on Broome Street, this morning heard a jet flying over her building and then an explosion and watched the towers collapse from her rooftop.
This is the only time I am glad to be in Buffalo and not NYC.
Moment of silence. Moment of silence. Moment of silence.

What a weekendous cavalcadous as to make even our block-rich lifetime both marvel and amaze. Met up with City of Light authoress Lauren Belfer this afternoon as she sketched with a local artiste and, as we reporters are wont to do, asked about her upcoming project which at first she abso-fuckin-lutely would not discuss. OH PUH LEEZ I wanted to shout into her facialed face, a response to her finishing school dusky come hither voice. Finally: she IS working on something, mucho research involved and it's not about Buffalo as if I would break down that it was not about this middling city. She mentioned the notion of the advance. I asked. Advance? To which her dusky voice responded I cannot discuss that but I will say that I am under contract. She is pleasant, beautiful, dusky-voiced, and cannot draw to save her life.
My Perfect Weekend, in a nutshell:
The Hipster Police patrolled the venue where Lee Renaldo et al performed seriously as mediocre video footage played and stage lights rested, unused. Squonky noise jazz. People, affeared of the Hipster Police, muttered into my small ears that they were unimpressed, that they felt ripped off. I eagerly await the appearance of Kim and Thurston soon, my money's on that being the show to be at, to remember and remember.
Guess Who and Joe Cocker: night of puffball XY rock. I took an informal survey in the security pit as I shot away with the boy colleagues: Burton Cummings's hair, real...or fake? Joe Cocker opened for G.W. (?)
Shot a wedding last night and the video gal was a psycho. Me and the dj and the caterers plotted her untimely death over the side of the balcony. At the reception met a few highly interesting men, and had a lengthly discussion with the groom (of all people) on the dancefloor about single malt scotches that we know and love. One of their guests kept staring at me and so I went up to him and gave him a karate chop in the head. Afterwards went about my photo beeswax and ended the evening behind the bar celebrity guest "bartending" and trying to remember was that vodka and tea or tonic. Had a two hour talk with friends in Louisville as in KY Jelly and nearly, during convo, lost my right thumb to a circa 1940 fan, learned to love the dog and his gang of fleas while sipping Oban, and shot the proverbial shit. And so much much more happened this weekend which will only come out in spurts along this rock and roll highway called my perfect life.
Oh, I think I want to write a novel like every two-bit journalist this side of Paradise. Rented house, coast of Maine, jugs of Oban, sporadic visitors, sushi takeout. Wow. And maybe a novel would usher forth. Maybe not, maybe cirrhosis...or minor misdemeanors instead. Story for future: brushes with law in the state of Maine in states of bliss. All for now, love.

Blasted a harmonica tune into the receiver and, subsequently, the answering machine of Dorota to usher in her birthday today and I'm sure that she had no idea of my special talents in that Hohner field. The rock star's dog has been working away on his cow leg bone still and every little itch I feel on my body I look to see if I can spot a flea as Henry the Dog periodically scratches himself with fervor and the rock star said I don't think he's got fleas but I put flea drops on him. Can one sue another for fleas and necessary fumigation? If fleas are on my person and hop into my imac can they gunk up the works? A full night of activities both artful and musical await me and the camera. My lifetime motto: Veni Vidi Shooti.

Today busted out a tennis outfit, the lucky raquet, and the new high-tech tennis shoes and met a pal over at the public courts where we were neck & neck with good solid rallies for each point. Then his g.f. showed up and she's my pal, too. As I was serving I heard her cheering me on at a volume he couldn't hear over the din of traffic on the expressway alongside the courts. I knew I was going to kick his ass at that point and had one of my classique shit-eating grins on my mouth and then I wiped him all over the court, forcing him into unforced error motifs. Despite all my self-back-slapping we ended tied at five games to five and decided to break for dinner. Photographed a social event this evening at the art gallery and spent a moment talking to Ani DiFranco's mom and hubbie - her mom looks just like her and they have the same effervescent way of shining at you. Her husband Andrew now has manic panic red hair. I got my images, talked to an archaelogist about digging holes here & there, and scooted away into the night - my leather-bottomed shoes slipsliding me down the stairs and into the night.

Last night I did some google self-searching to see if epinw came up and yikes almighty it was the first thing, and my wacky baby photo where I'm poking my finger into my Aunt Marion's shoe. Now I'll really have to be careful not to name names. I'm watching a dog owned by a local rock star and in the middle of the night woke up to him giving my face one fast lick across the cheek and maybe he was tasting me to decide if I'd make a suitable late night snack. I didn't pass with muster and wasn't condimented with mustard. The big Friday night question: shoot Godsmack out in the exurbs...or an I'm still here Joe Cocker in the middling city. Planning a seasonal escape to NYC for debauchery you just can't find in these parts.

To webcam or not to webcam...that is today's techno question.
Mr. X (as in ex-boyfriend, x-tra fine rock guitarist, and ex-patriate) last night phoned late/early and we talked for a long-ass time about his x-pat lifestyle and his outlaw band which plays in parks, and his band's name - Captain Zipper - and what the hometown ferners make of them.
At one point he X-pounded upon how superb it would be for me to have a webcam installed high above the imac to capture myself. (I'm thinking of director Roger Avary's blog and how his Rogercam points downward at his desk chair and when he places his gluts there he is so virtually there.)
I think a webcam would necessitate a Judy Jetsonesque mask to be worn in the event of spinach in teeth, over-Oban indulgence, or moments when I'm wearing my pink fuzzy bunny ears and don't care for errant followers of epinw to know my headgear secrets.
Mere moments ago I gleefully ran towards the hi-fi to spin fine new purchases - Stereolab's "Sound-Dust" is raucously constructed landscapes and the silly compilation "Cosmic Funk" is as cross-over and light-spirited as I had hoped - both excellent for work and parties.
John Cougar Mellencamp has what I've named Aging Rock Star Syndrome (ARSS) and wouldn't let us press photogs within 6 miles of his puffy, incessant gum-chewing, spitting self. Managed to scrape by with an image. Him and Jacob Dylan...what a fuckin' difficult pair.