Week down the Jersey Shore

back from the beach!! i spent last week down the jersey shore with my mother, her boyriend, my boyfriend ricardo, my cousin vincent and my best friend andrea. lindsay stayed over for a night too. :) we had a lot of fun and i took a lot of great shots. everyone was getting testy about my compulsive photo taking but everyone always wants copies of alllll the shots i take... which is kind of uh, hypocritical. i took a lot of photos, but i wish i took even more. you can see some of the photos here.

here are some highlights of the trip: buying boogie boards and only using them once; lindsay and vincent doing sake shots; getting kicked off the beach at night; having an audience at the photo booth; some drunk lady asking "are you going to put these [photos] on youtube?!"; playing tennis for the first time in over a year; buying over $200 worth of groceries at the beginning of the week and then continually buying food every day after that; honey straws; getting kicked off the playground at night; suntan lotion back massages; seafood fest night; my italian cousin and his irish drinking songs; the ghetto shot glasses i made; vincent and rick quoting movies alllll week long; my mom's boyfriend thinking someone stole one of his flip flops; begrudgingly going jet skiing; embracing the octomat; heckling anyone who might be "doing a stinky poo-poo"; our new found love for the game of life board game; buying painted sea shells for 50 cents from the kids down the street; and the tan line the "hulk out" removable tattoo left on rick's arm.

i will be in new jersey for a month, visiting friends and family and taking lots of photos. :)

MY TRIP HOME

four days of sunshine, ten days of rain; baking a VERY LARGE cake shaped in a 5 and a 0; surprising my mother on her 50th birthday; going to walmart far too many times than i'd like to admit; mother's day eggplant parmesan; shopping with lindsay; calvin the beta fish; visiting nicole and talking for four hours straight; my cousin's graduation from the police academy; best friend foot and back massages; skateboarding; playing cranium (andrea and i won of course); grocery shopping at 2 am; bowling with andrea, justin, zac, my mom and donald; becoming the scrabble champ; fortune cookies; scanning loads of old photos; ice cream/art outing; babysitting my cousin's kids; ginormous rainbows; eating an obscene amount of utz pretzels.





















due to the crappy weather, i only took 15 polaroids (7 of which are utter garbage) and i bought a lot crap i don't need... like picture frames, fabric paint and more summer clothes.

movies watched: the letter, waitress, 13 going on 30, ghostbusters 2 and charade.

more writing, more work, more back massages.

my grandmother always tells me all these interesting little stories about our family and how she could write a book, but she never writes them down. :( i told her she should email me a page every day and then i'll put them all together.

gma: where do i start???
me: as far back as you can remember...
gma: i can remember things from when i was three years old...
me: well then you'll have a lot to write!!

hopefully this will inspire her to start typing soon. (*hint *hint)

yesterday aldo took rick and i to IKEA (it was my first time) and i bought some frames and something really kewl for my grandmother and one for andrea as well. (i can't tell you what it is because they read this). last night i finally finished editing an environmentally-friendly-how-to craft video i filmed this weekend while rick was at his parents' house. i'm pleased with the results and will post the final product on youtube. more info about it later. :)

as for work, i'm seeking a more reliable part time job. (as you've read, i sometimes have issues with scheduling/my boss). my boss told me yesterday that i can assist him at weddings, but he can't pay me because i don't produce enough quality images. ouch!! i would take this as conscructive criticism because i KNOW i could use more experience on the technical aspect of photography, but i don't think i was ever fairly represented. first off, i've only assisted him three times and twice i was handed a camera i've never used before. during my third assist, there wasn't a flash for me to use and we were shooting people dancing in a dark venue... so i was pretty much useless. i was always hesistant and weary to shoot reactions to what my employer was capturing because i could never predict his next move. i assisted two of his colleagues on seperate occasions and had a much better experience because neither ran around like a nervous gazelle. i'm not quite disappointed because i know i'm not cut out to be a wedding photographer anyway (too much ass-kissing), but i was still pretty bummed. luckily i've been receiving some awesome compliments in emails from people who are fans of the work i post on flickr. :) i'd much rather receive credit for my photography than to take wedding photos and not be attributed in somebody's wedding album. so onto bigger and better things...

cute story: i woke up with rick's alarm the other morning (6 am). Rick got up, showered, got ready for work and then came over to the side of the bed i was sleeping on, leaned over and challenged me to a game of scrabble (to be held that night) loser gives the other person a back massage!! hahaha. very random, but i loved it. and guess who won by 49 points... ME. :)

my progress report.

my mom and i got tattoos.

monday: i went shopping with my grandmother. we went to kohl's and i bought a pair of black leggings. after we ate lunch, we each spent $15 at the dollar store. i found these surprisingly adorable Moroccan-looking frames, a set of pink glass candle holders and a bunch of other junk. a family friend (my former 2nd grade teacher mrs. m), took me, my mom, my grandmother to dinner at a thai restaurant she and her husband recently discovered. the staff was extremely nice and the food was pretty good too.

tuesday: my mom and i got tattoos!! our appointment was at 6 pm and we took FOREVER to finalize what we wanted. my mom (who went to add sommething to a tattoo she already has), wound up getting a really awesome-looking dream catcher and i (who went in to get a libra symbol), wound up with a small heart. the tattoo artist (who did my 311 tattoo... 4 years ago!!) limited my mother to three times to change her design and then told us "you guys are trouble together!!" my mom is going back this week to get another tattoo touched up and i'd love to get another tattoo in the near future, but rick would probably throw a fit. :(

wednesday: my mom and i went shop-shopping. she wound up buying a pair of cowboy boots that look like prop boots (fake) or at least that's what i think. i bought a really awesome lime greenish yellowish dress (on sale for $30) and a pair of black dressy shoes for work. i also bought two more pairs of giant $8 sunglasses. can't have too many of those. i've officially switched over to giant sunglasses. wearing regular-sized sunglasses makes me feel like i still need to squint to keep the sun out of my eyes.

thursday: my friend zac and his gf jess visited. they treated me to dinner at a spanish restaurant. i haven't seen them since... i don't even know when!! maybe last summer. zac and i met in 11th grade algebra class. we used to pass notes. i invited him to a get-together we had at andrea's house on halloween, that was the first time we hung out. and of course i painted his nails and i wound up washing his hair for some reason. hahaha!! andrea and i used to see how many guys would allow us to paint their fingernails and surprisingly, we racked up a decent number. and of course, after their nails were painted, i would take blackmail photos of them. :)

friday (today): my grandmother and i went over my aunt's house. she just got her FOURTH bengal cat. i think she wants to start breeding and showing them. it's a cute kitten and i took a lot of photos of it. my grandmother and i were planning to hang out by the pool all day, but after we ate lunch it started to rain. so i ran out to my grandmother's car to close her windows. riiiight after the door swung shut, i remembered that her car doors lock automatically after you shut a door. and the keys were idlely hanging from the ignition. luckily that's why she always carries a spare key in her purse... but unfortunately her purse was in the car. so i had to call my cousin who was getting ready to leave for work (he works until 3 am). but luckily, he stopped over and got the door open for us. what a good cousin!!

then it STORMED. thunder and lightning and rain and wind. it was pretty bad. i went outside during the storm because roxie had to go to the bathroom and after a LOUD lightning bolt struck, i actually saw SPARKS fly down the side of my house into the ground from the lightning rod wires!! needless to say, roxie and i RAN back to the house. after dinner with mom, lindsay stopped by and we looked at photos and chatted til after midnight. she is planning on visiting me and rick in november. and we are planning on going to las vegas!! :)

and that concludes my week home. now back to the heat, traffic, work, rick and miss gray. <3 (the only one i can really complain about is the traffic, hehe).

father's day.

rick and i went refrigerator hunting with rick's mother because her fridge just broke. :( you wouldn't believe how difficult it is to find an off-white fridge. every one was either white, black or stainless steel. i personally am not into the whole stainless steel craze. i'd much rather have this fridge:

preferably an authentic, old one... but i guess it's safer to go with a newer model. and of course i'd want a teal stove top and sink to match. :) (sometimes i think i was born in the wrong decade, hehe).

so anyway, rick's mom had to pay an extra $125-165 just to get a "bisque" colored fridge, which is funny because at one point all refrigerators were off-white. my grandmother remembers the top three color choices being avocado, mustard or rust. Mmmm!! i'd actually like an avocado green fridge. hopefully when i'm looking to buy a new fridge, the color choices will be different because white fridges look sorta tacky, black fridges show scratches, stainless shows fingerprints and off-white fridges are boring.

after finally finding a decent fridge, we went food shopping, bought A LOT of food and BBQ-ed. rick's neighbors came over and we ate a lot. and then ate some more. and rick and i wound up leaving with an obscene amount of left-overs. we won't need to go food shopping any time soon.

check out my father's day tribute to my dad here and here and here and here.

the rest of my trip: a photoblog.

here's a recap of my trip back home :)

sunday, may 13th: mother's day. ate thai food with my mom and grandmother. played scrabble. found some hilarious notes from high school that i will post on my flickr.

my mom opening her gifts:


monday, may 14th: drove with my grandmother to her sister's house to pick up some polaroid cameras she saved to give to me :) we ate lunch there too. on our way home i stopped many times to take some polaroids. at one point, i even asked a man if i could enter his yard to get a good shot of his tire swing, haha. i also taught my grandmother how to use her digital camera and how to email photos!! after dinner with my mother, we took roxie to the park and walked 2.5 miles.

tuesday, may 15th: went over my mom's cousin's house for lunch (i'm specifying this so it's less confusing for you ;) haha). then went to kohl's so my mother could exchange the bath mats i got her for mother's day (i bought her new bath mats because my cat destroyed her old bath mats. he's an inside/outside cat and for some reason whenever he accidentally gets left in the house, he goes to the bathroom in our bathroom... on the bath mats. this time he even tried covering up his crap by digging up the bath mats. how's that for too much info).

then we stopped at my aunt's house. she got a new bengal kitten!! this time a white one, named lenox. he has the most beautiful blue eyes... and they're going to stay blue when he gets older.

my aunt has two more bengals on the way. she's planning on breeding them. they go for $300-$1000.

that night, lindsay stopped by and stayed til 1 am. she showed me her photos from mexico and i bombarded her with all of my cali photos and then we took some more photos!!

they are HILARIOUS check em out.

wednesday, may 16th: my mom did a lot of yard work and i weeded. got so covered in dirt that when i blew my nose, dirt came out. Mmm!! i can't remember what i did that night. probably played scrabble with my mom :) while i was visiting, she got me hooked on "dancing with the stars." thank goodness rick and i don't have cable.

thursday, may 17th: my grandmother called an old man (who was driving poorly) a "scrotum face." AND i got $100 for eating a tuna sandwich. i will leave you wondering why...

friday, may 18th: went to a fancy bar with justin and lindsay.



lindsay bought me a mojito :) she also got hit on by every guy in the bar. on our way back to justin's, luckily still close to the bar, lindsay realized that she forgot to get her credit card back from the bartender so we had to go back. justin and i had bets on how many guys would hit on her in the amount of time it took her to get the card. it was somewhere around 7 or 8. ;)

i wasn't sure if andrea was even coming up, but she arrived at my house at 2 am, around 10 minutes before we got home. it was rare to have my two best friends in one place (andrea lives in upstate NY) so naturally i had to photograph the event. they came out really cute...


saturday, may 19th: my grandma kitty (biological father's side) and her lifemate tina took andrea and i out to brunch. we inteneded to get together with our friend zac, but it got to be too late and we exhausted. :( the weather was too crappy to take the photos i had planned, so andrea and i watched the holiday instead. then my mom came home from work and started watching it and asking questions about the characters, so we started the movie over for her. (that's right, i watched the holiday a total of 2.5 times while i was home. haha). after dinner, andrea and i went to foodstore to buy some candy. then we picked up my grandmother, brought her back to my house and we all played cranium.

side note: my best friend andrea is a cranium fanatic. so much so, she holds cranium nights at her house. sometimes the attendance is so well they have to set up two boards. with all of this cranium experience you would think she would always win, however that is not the case. rick and i beat her and my mom after new years and my grandmother and i beat her and my mom this time around, hahaha.

sunday, may 20th: busy, hectic day. i took a BUNCH of polaroids with andrea. (one of the MANY reasons why love my best friend is because she likes having her photo taken and she is very patient and compliant when it comes to me directing the shots). they came out really good!! i am in the process of scanning and cropping them.

right as andrea was leaving, my best pal from college, margot, arrived!!



it took her 4 hours to get to my house when it should have only taken 2 hours because her dad's car's navigational thingy was set to the "no-highway" route. (her car is in florida, where she now resides). i hadn't seen her since august!! :( we talked, took photos (of course), i did her makeup, we took more photos, my mom cooked us ate dinner and then we talked some more. we had a lot of catching up to do!!

monday, may 21st: ran a few last minute errands with my grandmother. cleaned out the part of my garage that was full of my crap that i intended to sell in a yard sale, but never did. after that, i went to the chinese resturant with my mom and grandmother. lindsay stopped by too while i was packing.

and there you have it!! now i'm back and busy in california with loads to unpack!!