Notes and Motes - Long
Apr. 18th, 2011 10:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
This is where JJ sits down and finally plays catch up from last week and makes plans for the next few weeks ahead.
The Lancaster House
As noted very briefly, I have a new tenant in my house in Lancaster. She’s paid in the full security deposit and first month. This lady seems nice and very thoughtful. It’s nice having the income coming back in again. Now I can start catching up from the bills “Josephine” left me with. The final tally for the previous tenant was $5000 for the judgment, plus nearly $250 in unpaid utility bills, $300 for cleaning and $700+ in repairs. I’ve gotten none of it – yet. I’m going to go find the biggest, nastiest, most aggressive debt collector I can find.
The Huntsville House
Tammy and I have started seriously looking into moving. We’re looking at either getting into another rental or buying a place. I’m not entirely comfortable about buying given the instability in the contracting situation, but I know I don’t want to spend another year in our current place. The place we’re both the most interested in is a 3000 sq ft., 3 bedroom, 2 bath house a little further south of our place. We already know the bathrooms need to be enlarged (& modernized), carpet replaced in several areas, and we need to modify a room/garage into an additional bedroom. It certainly has the space plus some to spare. All told the house has 6 garage spaces (2 car detached garage, 2 car attached but remote entry, and 2 garages in the house with direct entry). The place has immense potential but will require substantial modifications and repairs.
Shows and Events
Last week was huge for the kids and I for events. Last Monday, Brenna and I drove down to Birmingham, tosee, hear,.. experience Beats Antique live. About a week or two before the show, I contacted the group’s tour manager and asked if I could shoot the performance. They gave me an all access pass to photograph the show. I provided my ticket to
leliel and
sabre0link also joined us. Before it was over, I’d gotten over 800 images the camera. Without a doubt, it was one of the most amazing and incredible small venue acts. Zoe, David and Tommy are great people and I was very happy to work with them. If you happen to have the chance to go to one of their shows, GO!
On this past Saturday, Chris and I drove up to attend Iris Faire (SCA event) in the Nashville area. I didn’t quite know what we were driving into on many levels. The weather that had battered the region on Friday had spawned extremely high winds and more than a few funnel clouds. As we neared the event site west of Nashville, we saw damage and trees down everywhere off the sides of the road. As the very strong cold front was centered on central Tennessee, it stayed windy and very cold throughout the day. I was happy to chat with Don Njall and Lady Allesaundra at the event. I’m glad that I did, because he clued me in further on who the “former ex-” was who was spreading foul rumors – Vikki (my ex- student). More on that later in the notes.. I also learned that by some manner I’d offended or bothered someone at a previous event, so I sought out the right folks and made apologies and begged forgiveness. I still don’t entire know the what, when and how I did anything, but I felt awful that there was any misunderstanding.
Event wise, I fought in the rapier tourney for the Silver Iris. I lost my first bout because I was more than a bit distracted. After refocusing, I fought my way to the finals where I lost. After only one practice in four months, I felt slow and sloppy, but it was a great tourney none the less. I opted out of the second (“Poison Iris”) tourney and spent time with Chris so he could attend the Chainmaile class they were holding. It was a fun event.
We left the event around 3pm and drove back to Huntsville in order to attend the performance of April Smith and the Great Picture Show. The Huntsville Swing Dance Club brought April and her band into town for the first time since I had helped host her last year. The show had close to 100 in attendance and many of those folks danced during the three live sets. I was stunned when April publicly thanked me alongside the organizers of this show. She explained to me later that she really appreciated that I’d introduced her to Huntsville and the incredible art and music scene here. Sadly, don’t expect any photos from me from the show. The Swing Dance Club had already contracted a photographer and videographer, plus the show was at the Flying Monkey. Nuff said about that venue.
Photo stuff
This is going to be a very busy 30 to 45 days ahead. I have three or four model shoots coming up. Two are catalog sets, one is fetish and there’s a newcomer TF set. Sometime in May, I’m also trying to get a weekend trip to Gulfport so I can work with Doll again. Brenna graduates on the 20th of May and I expect to shoot a few frames of my daughter getting her diploma.
Perhaps the biggest photo event is coming up next week. I’ll be shooting as a staff photographer for Frolicon in Atlanta, this weekend. It looks like there’s at least 8 other photographers covering the event so this should be a bit less stressful / exhausting. As mentioned in the previous message about Frolicon, I guess I will let one other cat out of the bag. When I was originally offering my services to the staff, they asked if they could use one on my art photos for the event badge. If things have gone well, one of my photos and models will be seen and worn by all the attendees.
The Lancaster House
As noted very briefly, I have a new tenant in my house in Lancaster. She’s paid in the full security deposit and first month. This lady seems nice and very thoughtful. It’s nice having the income coming back in again. Now I can start catching up from the bills “Josephine” left me with. The final tally for the previous tenant was $5000 for the judgment, plus nearly $250 in unpaid utility bills, $300 for cleaning and $700+ in repairs. I’ve gotten none of it – yet. I’m going to go find the biggest, nastiest, most aggressive debt collector I can find.
The Huntsville House
Tammy and I have started seriously looking into moving. We’re looking at either getting into another rental or buying a place. I’m not entirely comfortable about buying given the instability in the contracting situation, but I know I don’t want to spend another year in our current place. The place we’re both the most interested in is a 3000 sq ft., 3 bedroom, 2 bath house a little further south of our place. We already know the bathrooms need to be enlarged (& modernized), carpet replaced in several areas, and we need to modify a room/garage into an additional bedroom. It certainly has the space plus some to spare. All told the house has 6 garage spaces (2 car detached garage, 2 car attached but remote entry, and 2 garages in the house with direct entry). The place has immense potential but will require substantial modifications and repairs.
Shows and Events
Last week was huge for the kids and I for events. Last Monday, Brenna and I drove down to Birmingham, to
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On this past Saturday, Chris and I drove up to attend Iris Faire (SCA event) in the Nashville area. I didn’t quite know what we were driving into on many levels. The weather that had battered the region on Friday had spawned extremely high winds and more than a few funnel clouds. As we neared the event site west of Nashville, we saw damage and trees down everywhere off the sides of the road. As the very strong cold front was centered on central Tennessee, it stayed windy and very cold throughout the day. I was happy to chat with Don Njall and Lady Allesaundra at the event. I’m glad that I did, because he clued me in further on who the “former ex-” was who was spreading foul rumors – Vikki (my ex- student). More on that later in the notes.. I also learned that by some manner I’d offended or bothered someone at a previous event, so I sought out the right folks and made apologies and begged forgiveness. I still don’t entire know the what, when and how I did anything, but I felt awful that there was any misunderstanding.
Event wise, I fought in the rapier tourney for the Silver Iris. I lost my first bout because I was more than a bit distracted. After refocusing, I fought my way to the finals where I lost. After only one practice in four months, I felt slow and sloppy, but it was a great tourney none the less. I opted out of the second (“Poison Iris”) tourney and spent time with Chris so he could attend the Chainmaile class they were holding. It was a fun event.
We left the event around 3pm and drove back to Huntsville in order to attend the performance of April Smith and the Great Picture Show. The Huntsville Swing Dance Club brought April and her band into town for the first time since I had helped host her last year. The show had close to 100 in attendance and many of those folks danced during the three live sets. I was stunned when April publicly thanked me alongside the organizers of this show. She explained to me later that she really appreciated that I’d introduced her to Huntsville and the incredible art and music scene here. Sadly, don’t expect any photos from me from the show. The Swing Dance Club had already contracted a photographer and videographer, plus the show was at the Flying Monkey. Nuff said about that venue.
Photo stuff
This is going to be a very busy 30 to 45 days ahead. I have three or four model shoots coming up. Two are catalog sets, one is fetish and there’s a newcomer TF set. Sometime in May, I’m also trying to get a weekend trip to Gulfport so I can work with Doll again. Brenna graduates on the 20th of May and I expect to shoot a few frames of my daughter getting her diploma.
Perhaps the biggest photo event is coming up next week. I’ll be shooting as a staff photographer for Frolicon in Atlanta, this weekend. It looks like there’s at least 8 other photographers covering the event so this should be a bit less stressful / exhausting. As mentioned in the previous message about Frolicon, I guess I will let one other cat out of the bag. When I was originally offering my services to the staff, they asked if they could use one on my art photos for the event badge. If things have gone well, one of my photos and models will be seen and worn by all the attendees.