Given the amount of fun (and wine) I had last night, I should probably feel worse than I do. Our two closest friends came over to see in the New Year, who are leaving IN TWO WEEKS for Malawi. For a year! I've referred to her around these parts as Banana but she's finally gotten her own blog for the trip and has come out as Janna. Which is much nicer than Banana. Her partner also has a blog, supposedly, but I haven't seen it yet. I just barely managed not to get maudlin and weepy last night by just not thinking about the whole long year stretching ahead with no Janna. I'm really quite unsure how I will maintain my sanity, as she's pretty much my only real (life), close friend. Anybody feel like moving to G-town?!?

On Cake

Janna very kindly brought me a specially decorated carrot cake (my favourite!) with my name and flowers and everything. AND brown icing -- how special is that?!?



I also need to mention that my mother baked me a cake too this year, a chocolate carrot cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting, all from scratch, which my sister witnessed herself. I believe this was the first cake she made me since I was six and asked for a store-bought cake. (What was I thinking?)

I can't remember if I blogged this last year but because my birthday falls on a stat holiday if someone forgets to get me a cake they can't fake it and run out and buy one at the last minute. This has happened twice in the last seven years, so I'm a bit sensitive. I don't need much in the way of gifts or anything, but I DO want a cake, and I make my expectations known in advance so there's no misunderstanding. This year is by far the best for cake.

This morning we've been pretty much snowed in again, which is kind of nice when you're just a bit hungover and still lethargic from the holiday gorging. I've spent a good portion of today working on my photos and trying to learn more about photoshop and thinking about how I want to do my online portfolio. My goal is to have it up and running by the end of March, early February if at all possible. I'm going to try to sell prints, and maybe cards or something, with at least half of all proceeds going to the Stephen Lewis Foundation. But we still have to work out the technological details. I'll keep you posted...

I know some of you wanted to see my birthday photos. So here you go...



While shooting this place, I came upon a dead cat. It looked like it died horribly with its head stuck in the chicken wire fence, and its body was stretched out tautly, I suppose trying to break free. It was orange and white, like many of the friendliest cats I have known (and I've known a lot). I also think I've seen more orange and white cats dead than any other colour. At first I thought maybe it was still alive because it was so fluffy, but then I remembered my brother's cat preserved in his shed until the ground softens in the spring and back when I was in high school the friend's boyfriend who kept his cat in his deep freeze until spring. I couldn't just pretend I hadn't seen it though, and as wrong as it felt, I had to make a photo. I felt disgusted with myself, wondering what it meant that I would make a photo of a creature who had obviously died in agony. Obviously, though, I can't post it on the Web. THAT would be disgusting. There's something about pictures of dead things that I can never quite look at or believe they're actually dead. I do feel ok now that I made the image. It was really the only way to honour his or her passing.



And the cement factory:







I felt 17 again, speeding down the highway from the cement factory to the burnt out old house, which just happened to be right around the corner from the factory I worked at for two summers around my first year of university. That freedom of just driving, without anxiety, without a schedule, just driving... it was rejuvenating.

I was inspired by Sugar D's birthday gift for me, a book of photography by Rudy Burckhardt, who I hadn't heard of before but whose photos are great and I was so touched that Sugar D picked it out specifically because his photos reminded him of mine. So I also shot some still lifes at my parents'.





I would never have thought about trying to sell my photos without your encouragement and support. This online community is so strange and beautiful in the way it can change lives.

(Aarggh! I keep forgetting that blogger cuts off a significant portion of my photos... it really does make a difference...)