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Bob Tait invited me to his Halloween Party and I was excited to one, try a costume, two see Bob Tait for the first time in several years. Since last we saw each other, he switched jobs, got married, rented a house, and apparently developed a love for high end bourbon. Suzie was an impressive zombie Pikachu, I was Spiderman, Jeff was… Jeff and we headed over.

The theme for the party was Arnold Swartzenegger movies and roughly half of the costumed attendees met this requirement. A few people picked up on the fact that I was Spiderman including a couple dressed as characters from The Hangover. We got talking and they commented on my costume.

Him: Hey, you’re a camera guy, what do you think about having a wedding where we just pass out disposable cameras?
Me: That can turn out well, but it’s usually good to have someone there dedicated to getting certain group shots.
Him: But I don’t care about those.
Me: But your family does.
Her: See, listen to Spiderman.
Him: But photographers are so expensive.
Me: How much are you paying if I may ask?
Him: .
Me: I’d do it for about $500 less and that includes with my assistant.
Him: You have an assistant?
Me: Zombie Pikachu.
Her: We could have Pikachu and Spiderman as our wedding photographers?
Me: Yes, here’s my card.
Him: What are you doing in this picture?
Me: Riding a concrete sheep. I look forward to working with you.

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For the first time in 16 years, when last I was a refrigerator, I made a Halloween costume. The idea came out of attending comic book conventions and not being much able to get into the spirit of the event as I was just a civilian. So who combines comic books and photography? Peter Parker.

The costume consisted of a dress shirt, slacks, a press badge, and my camera all on top of a standard Spiderman costume. I think it turned out well.

From 2012-10-26 Bob Tait’s Halloween Party

I got to remove an item from my “Reasons I’m Tired of Being Fat” list: Fit into a store bought Halloween costume.

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I had my first chewing out today.
Boss: Terry, can you step into my office?
Me: Yep.
Boss: You said to tell you if I felt you were letting me down or not fitting in. Something has come to my attention that we need to fix immediately.
Me: *heart pounding* What is it?
Boss: I don’t know how to say this, but I need you to wear leather shoes. Those sneakers are nice but they just aren’t up to snuff, I’m sorry.
Me: Will do.

Whew.

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The Cobb salad is an invention that defies its own name in the usage of the world “salad”. At DiBruno’s today I had a Cobb “salad” where the lettuce seemed to serve mostly as a bumper for the bleu cheese, turkey, and bacon. By my math it had about 1100 calories in it after dressing or about two big Macs. I’m fine with that. My dinner that evening consisted of a hot dog.

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After the wedding, I took care of household things which lasted quite late and I went food shopping well after midnight. I was still in my suit and was pushing a cart through the baking aisle while wearing headphones when a woman tugged on my shirt and asked where the marshmallows were. I removed my headphones, looked at her, took my hands off my cart, and asked her to repeat herself. She said “oh, you don’t work here, do you?” What gave it away? I found a store attendant and asked where the marshmallows were. He told me, and I relayed this to the lady who had asked. She was delighted to know and gave me a fervent thank you. She walked past me and said to the attendant who I had asked “that suit man is so helpful”. Suit Man, the best dressed and most useful on a day to day basis of the superheroes.

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My assistant and I left for Erin Healy and Sam Lodise’s wedding at 11:45 and we made it to the Kimberton Inn by 1 PM. Suzie was tasked with taking pictures of the ladies, bearers, and babies as they dressed. I took pictures of the venue and the men as they paced about and talked with a jittery calm.

The rings became a bit of a football being passed from person to person until it paired up with the ring bearer a few minutes before the ceremony. The ceremony itself was short and simple. Erin and Sam had written their own vows and Jeremiah worked out well as the officiant.

Posing the group shots was harrowing but was soon enough finished and we moved on to the cocktail hour and the wedding reception.

I took 84 gigs of pictures today, some 1500 or one about every fifteen seconds. This doesn’t count the pictures Suzie took. The tendons on the back of my hand are killing me as lifting a camera + flash arm + flash seems to be the most effective way of destroying them. The day was hard but satisfying. I may have been a volunteer but the next time I charge double.

 

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Sam Lodise and Erin Healy are getting married tomorrow and I have the honor of being their wedding photographer. Today was their rehearsal luncheon at the Kimberton Inn in Phoenixville. The proprietor was a fellow by the name of Jeff who exuded polish, the Bruce Lee of event management. We received a tour of the facility and did a walkthrough of the ceremony. The run-through ran 20 minutes. Weddings are short.

We retired to Valerie and Teejay Green’s house and caught up while staring wide-eyed at equally wide-eyed children. I can see why I don’t always get replies to the texts I send them. I took pictures and slipped out the back after saying I was leaving. Erin stopped me on the stoop to give her thanks and to ask if everything was ok.

This was my response: You will get married tomorrow and I am very happy for you. You and I didn’t start off on the best of terms but now we’re good. I have rooted for your happiness and you have rooted for mine. But tomorrow you will share more in terms of life circumstances with Sam’s mother than me and that’s a switch I’m keenly aware of. I’m better than ok, in fact, I’m doing damn well.

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Baking with yeast is new to me. I don’t like depending on another organism to do my work in the kitchen. Yeast doesn’t play by the normal rules of quick breads. There is a biological element I need to wait for. Baking powder is governed by the Arrhenius equation. If something is 10º warmer, the reaction doubles in speed. Not with yeast, 10º means death if the temperature goes much above 115º. If this rule held for organisms, we could speed our children to puberty by putting them in a sauna.

I also don’t like the fact that the expiration date on the package represents the date on which the ingredient, well, expires. I am an actuary and need no additional reminders of morbidity. The milk was microwaved to 112º, I added a teaspoon of sugar to the milk, and then added yeast. I waited 15 minutes for froth and saw nothing. Rather than thinking I had dumped a packet of dead yeast into milk I prefer to think there’s a yeast union. At 5:20pm, Yeast Local 219 was simply on an mandated break.

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I took some mandatory new hire training today which contained two gems:
1) A screen that said “Please press the BACK button to continue with this cell”
2) A session narrated by someone who sounded like an Irish soccer hooligan. I couldn’t stop laughing.

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Restaurant week in Philadelphia had hit me straight in the wallet so I went for decidedly cheaper fare this week. Today was warm so I stopped at the hilal lunch cart two blocks from work to see how their spicy chicken salad was I had previously spied. At 11:48am I walked up to the cart and in a firm loud voice said “chicken salad, spicy” in response to “next”. Only “nice” people say “how are you?” and “may I have?” and other such speed bumps. While I may be slowly turning nice, I have no interest in being… “nice”. Also, all modifiers go at the end much like adjectives in Romance languages. Failing to follow these rules marks you as a stranger in a strange land. I hate being the outsider.

What followed was a sequence of bottles raised by the truck operator which I had to either nod yes or no to like some sort of cylinder identification exam. I nodded yes to the white cylinder, no to the green one, and yes to the dark yellow one. The cart operator gave me a visible nod of approval at my selections and I was proud. My salad greens were streaked with color and he said “soda?”. I said “nope”, he said “TAKE A CAN”, I took a can and gave him $5.00.

I returned to my desk and considered the bouquet of what appeared to be masala sauce, taheeni sauce, and ranch dressing. Yellow and white on chicken was a good choice. Next week, I try green and white on lamb, and remember that the can comes with the salad.