Anti-simplicity has to come to an end. Simplicity is boring, but practical. This year is dedicated to profit-oriented chill-out. No more, no less. Working all day long makes me happy. And not having a boss in my neck is the chill-out part, which will (hopefully), not work anymore next year. Maybe the year after again then. Possibly in Tokyo. Maybe not. Maybe Birmingham, maybe New York. Who knows. Music is everywhere, and there is not much more than that, and an internet connection, that I need to work and thus, be happy. Of course it would be much easier without the internet connection, but that’s the the way it is now. S’a shame.

_{Listening to: all the Gorillaz songs I have
Eating: no
Drinking: juice
Thinking about: photography, snow, European city planning, Tokyo, two girls.}

Somehow it’s also a shame how much is going on. Except for this last weekend, I don’t really have any “spare time” at all, and several things don’t quite work that way. Most of all, my attempt to make a portrait series in the snowy city. Let’s hope that at least Monday’s shooting goes as planned and that some snow is still around till then. You might of course argue… why do I have the time to update my blog? First, it doesn’t take long. Second, my workflow involves a lot of waiting. Mostly waiting for one or two minutes. And because I have to keep my hands clean, I can’t cook or paint or eat while at it. So yeah. I am looking forward to summer more than ever before. I could actually get some work done, then do a shooting, and then do some more work later. Awesome.

Ten more rolls to develop, and four more test rolls to shoot, develop and scan. And in ten days, I’m off for a month. Although I will most probably be able to blog a little bit… photo free, probably. Well. There is a chance that I’ll do some strange stuff and might be able to post photos.., but as of now, I probably won’t. Hah. Gotta talk to Marc about that. Or something.
Only two photos today. I just don’t feel like posting stuff right now. I want to see all of them first, anyway. Didn’t develop all the rolls from last weekend yet. Man, now I am really looking forward to that funny little journey. Writing concepts for it next week, and then I’m off. Yaaay.

And yes, I do. It’s a certain kind of…. motivational skill. Self-motivational. Strange word. And a strange concept it describes. Lately, I find some of my memories to be rather strange. Or maybe it’s actually the way they present themselves to me (in my head) that I find strange. I guess I do remember stuff that most people wouldn’t ever remember. Vocab I can’t keep in my head at all; but how I felt, when and where, and how the weather was at the time…. easy. Coordinates and street structures… yes. Smells. Check. I am actually able to recall the smell of burnt skin, although I’ve “only” smelled it twice (And I do know it’s a yucky example). The way I remember it is by trying to remember details about the time when I smelled that strange scent for the first time. I once watched a heart surgery. Ninth grade I think… I was sixteen. It’s a vivid memory (well, would be a shame if it wasn’t)…. I had a short internship at a heart clinic near Unheimat… in the “reha” section of the hospital. Rehabilitation. So I got to give a massage to someone whom I have looked into the body. Pretty strange if you ask me.
Another thing is the smell of oil, mixed with old paper. The buildings I mostly broke into around 2005 all smelled like that. Strange really. Maybe oil doesn’t play such a big roll in it. Anyway. That smell I don’t remember at all. And I even once broke into a building, just to smell it again. And just so y’all now; I don’t break into buildings anymore. Well maybe I will again… if something really interesting crosses my path. But I doubt it.
Where was I… right. It’s the little things I remember most vividly. Like… I don’t really remember what the mammoth I saw looked like exactly. A young mammoth which had been frozen for a few thousand years, dug up, and put into a deep freezer with a big fucking window at the Expo 2005 in Aichi. I do however remember exactly how the booth looked where we got the ticket to see it. Was the same ticket we used to get into the SHD presentation…. gosh that was quite something. I even remember where I sat.
I dunno. Just seems weird how fully I recall some things (mostly unimportant stuff, stuff I’ve not told many people about)… and don’t remember moments of much importance. I won’t name examples (and I don’t have a lot of them anyway, as I don’t friggin remember).

I feel strange. Since yesterday I think. Something is going on… I can’t quite put my finger on it. Has something to do with…. well no, I won’t tell you actually. Who knows who will read this. Shit.

_{Listening to: Aphex Twin – To Cure A Weakling Child
Eating: nothing
Drinking: uhm.. something.
Thinking about: someone, someone, someone, someone, someone…, and… music.}

So now you know what I was going to say. Anyway. Photography. This is all I plan to do with the next three hundred and forty-three days. Minimum, really. I’m not really sure what’s it about. Commercial photography is a whole different thing. It’s not like shooting for fun. It is fun, but it’s for something else. And it’s not my actual style, but my commercial style. It’s like the difference between talking to old friends, and talking to a prospective employer. It’s just fucked up. If you’re good at one of them, you’re good at both of them. But you gotta learn about the details to really leave an impression. Photography is impression-only. It’s a one way street. Once a photo is published, there is no turning back. Even once you shot a photo (with some cameras I believe, this might even be true for digital shots..), it’s forever there. It’s been made. If you burn it, or delete it, it’s still been made. It’s a part of history, just like any other action. It’s just so strangely adapted to humankind. Don’t you think? Photography is an extremely cultural thing. Publishing is like holding a speech. Pretty much exactly, too. Maybe that’s why I like to hear my own voice. Something about power I guess. About the right to express your own opinion. Rights are about power, obviously. So yeah, photography, if published, is power. That is exactly why I’m pretty scared of publishing some stuff. Not in the sense that it might upset people or anything. It’s a question of quality. It’s like holding a speech in front of a big audience. I don’t know how I imposed that mental backflip on my mind, but I sure as hell did.

This is taking me nowhere. And that’s not where I wanna be right now. Goodnight. Especially to that someone who doesn’t at all know that I mean them… but I’m pretty sure they read it. I actually kind of wrote this for them. Hmmmmm.