Archive for January, 2011

Nothing Better Than a Giggling Woman, originally uploaded by CABridges.

Make sure you find someone who laughs. A lot. Not in a sinister way, unless you're into that sort of thing, but someone who enjoys life so much he or she can't help bursting with it.

When we're out and separated, whether in a store or a club or anywhere, I can hear her laugh. I love that.

So the first round of stories for this year's Tweet Me a Story contest from NYCMidnight are in, and in my group, 2 of the 3 I submitted are in the voting for top 25. The Tweet Me a Story contest provides each group of writers with a word, which they must use in a complete story taking no more than 140 characters, including spaces.

What this means: in each group, four stories are chosen by the judges to go to the final round, and an additional story gets picked by you, the voter. Yes, this is where the begging part starts.

If you are so inclined, please head to the Group 7 page and click through to vote for my stories. You can vote for as many stories as you like, so if you see others that tweet your fancy go for it.

(That's me being all honorable, but really I want you to just vote for mine…)

Here's the two of mine that made it, in the format you'll see them in:

"“Imagine an endless void, just nothing for billions of light-years…” “And what does this have to do with your rent?” “I’m getting to that.” by Chris Bridges

"“What could be better than riches, beauty and youth?” “Nothing,” her father replied. It took years to give it all away, but he was right. by Chris Bridges

You can read the other one I submitted, and a few I didn't, here. Vote!

Rockit Fly at Bar Louie, originally uploaded by CABridges.

Just posted a pile of pics from the Rockit Fly concert at Bar Louie in Orlando last Saturday night.

Did you know if you hold up a camera, pretty girls will smile at you? It's amazing. Why did no one tell me about this?

Once again it's time for "Tweet Me a Story," the writing contest hosted by NYCMidnight that asks writers to submit up to 3 stories per round, all containing a specific word, all under 140 characters (including spaces). The first round was last night, and my group's word was: nothing.

And yes, submitting a blank story would have been too easy. Here's what I submitted, with titles added for fun.

Fact-checking

“There’s nothing you can do that can’t be done,” he sang.

Yoko smiled, and ate her own head.

“Bloody showoff,” he said, and started erasing.

On a Cosmic Scale

“Imagine an endless void, just nothing for billions of light-years…”

“And what does this have to do with your rent?”

"I’m getting to that.”

Satori

“What could be better than riches, beauty and youth?”

"Nothing,” her father replied.

It took years to give it all away, but he was right.

I'll keep you posted as I move up (or don't) in the competition.

The sky as I came out of work today. Near as I can figure, either the Justice League was flying by, the Fantastic Four was on maneuvers, a Firefly evaded capture, or a bunch of TIE Fighters broke atmo.

Or else I need to get out more.

You get really shiny quarters.

Last year our dryer motor died, and as we didn't have the ready cash to go pick up another one we called my long-suffering brother-in-law, who can fix anything. He took it apart, I found a replacement motor on Amazon (seriously, on Amazon) and we got it back up and drying in a week.

But while he had it apart, we cleaned it out. Aside from a staggering amount of change in and under it — literally enough to cover half the cost of the motor, which just seemed apt — he found about $4 worth of quarters stuck inside the plastic vanes inside the dryer that agitate your clothes. Plus some perfectly round, tightly packed balls of lint, which were kind of cool.

But the quarters had been tumbled for months, possibly years. The lines on the edges are completely gone, rubbed smooth, and the coins themselves have a kind of black lustre to them. These are much cooler looking and feeling than regular quarters, like really, really cheap Kruggerands. They still register as quarters in machines; we dumped the load into a Coinstar for the Amazon coupon and had no problems.

I kept four of 'em, though, 'cause these are seriously cool. Hey, U.S. Mint? Think about it. Buy a bunch of dryers.

Below is the rest of the pile we pulled out of and from under the dryer. It's an odd savings method, but it seems to work for us.

So what was I doing in 2010, if I wasn't blogging. Well, tweeting, as I said. And reading a lot. And writing more. And getting progressively rounder.

And photographing musicians.

It started back in 2009 when Teres was preparing for several Bon Jovi concerts in the next year. I had had some success taking pics for her during the concert we went to in Jersey so she bought me a camera specifically for the new shows. After some hunting around I settled on a Canon PowerShot SX20IS. 20x optical zoom, decent in low-light situations, and, vital for picture-taking in concert venues, it did not have a detachable lens.

Then it was time to practice.

We started going out to see local bands, something we'd never really done before (not social people, us) so I could practice shooting them. It ain't easy. You've got people in very dark places, with bright lights focused on their faces, moving quickly.

I took shots of My Generation and some of its members like Donnie Lee and Dominick Loria and their other bands,like Quick Change. Through them we met plenty of others, such as Switch and Rockit Fly (pictured right, from New Year's Eve). And there was Marian Call's Winter park concert in her 49>50 State Tour…

And I did take a lot of shots at the Bon Jovi concerts we went to in Tampa and Sunrise, FL, and I'm even not too disappointed in some of them.

I'm not where I want to be with my photography yet, but I'm having a lot of fun getting there. And we made a lot of new friends. We even sort of almost have a social life, kinda, if you squint your eyes.

I'll post some of what I've figured out in later entries, but the basic stuff is this:

- Take thousands of shots. Eventually you'll get some you like.

- Turn of f the flash unless it's absolutely necessary. You want to see the lights and shadows the way they are, not the way they look flattened out in your sudden bright light. Besides, in most concert situations all you'll do is light up the hair of the person in front of you.

- Respect the band and the other fans. Your shot is not more important than their fun.

- Put the damn camera down once in awhile and enjoy the show.

In an interview with Assignment X, Tim Minear suggested one thing he's learned from his many cancelled shows: avoid the confusing, one-word title.

Well, I knew this going back to – pretty much every show that I’ve worked on has had a terrible title. WONDERFALLS doesn’t tell you anything, THE INSIDE doesn’t tell you anything, FIREFLY doesn’t tell you anything – none of these titles tell you anything. [TERRIERS sounds like it will be] a reality show about dog grooming. On the other hand, I will say this, when I imagined DRIVE, I thought, “Well, DRIVE – that is an active title. It’s one word, it tells you everything you need to know about this underground cross-country road race” – and nobody watched that either. So I have no answers [laughs].

So, if you were going to pitch Firefly today, what would you name it?

Keeping in mind that "Like Star Wars But From Han Solo's Side" is probably unworkable.

(Here's parts 2 and 3 of the interview. Well worth the read.)

Right around this time last year, I vowed to blog something every day. And then, predictably, I barely touched the thing all year.

Mostly because I've been tweeting more, and it's a little startling to discover that most of the things I felt worth saying could fit in 140 characters.  But sometimes they can't, and so here I am.

The first lengthy thing to say in 2011 is: A Browncoat needs help, and by doing so you might get amazingly cool stuff.

Jean Bauhaus' mother-in-law, Gina, died unexpectedly in December without a will or insurance to cover the burial, and her father-in law needs long-term medical care (diabetes, emphysema, schizophrenia). In addition to the funeral and medical bills, Jean and her husband Matt also have to clean up Gina & Rob's old apartment, moving furniture and making it ready for new tenants. There are also legal matters to attend to and creditors to satisfy. Frankly, she can use some cash.

And, in one of the things that I love about fandom, people are stepping up to help. Marian Call donated her copy of her CD "Bootleg," signed and smooched, and proceeds from that handled the burial. Now we have a Seriously Cool Thing on auction and it ends Monday night.

It's a set of the Fruit Oaty Girls bobblehead maquettes from by Quantum Mechanix. These maquettes are limited to 1500 numbered sets, but only THIS set has been signed by its creator Geoff Mandel — the graphic designer behind Serenity (as well as many other movies and TV shows).

Bidding started at list price and will go on till 10 pm EST Monday night. 100% of the proceeds go to Jean. Don't miss out on a great collectible and a worthy cause.

More details about Jean and any other auctions can be found at Erin Palette's blog, Lurking Rhythmically.