Erin Extras

Here are a few extra pictures from the shoot with Erin that didn’t make the front page. Look for more posts like this in the near future.

Gustav Diary Part 1: Commentary

This is the first entry in my audio diary of Hurricane Gustav.

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August 30, 2008. Three years and one day after Hurricane Katrina turned my life upside down, and here I am, packing my bags again. Hurricane fever has gripped the entire New Orleans area, but especially St. Bernard Parish, where I live. As each hour ticks away, Hurricane Gustav draws nearer, and this place sinks deeper into madness.

The old timers say it’s nothing to worry about. They rode out Hurricanes Betsy and Camille and have been braving these storms since they were named things like Betsy and Camille. They say Katrina has just got everyone so worked up that we’re now panicking over a hurricane we wouldn’t otherwise have given much attention.

They’re partly right. But Katrina now has me jaded. Gone is the time hurricane parties, of sitting near the window sipping a cocktail and marveling at the wind and lightning. In its place, we now have panic and the sobering reality everything you’ve broken your back to build and rebuild can, in an instant, be washed away.

I spent the anniversary of Katrina in an inexplicable haze of red and orange satellite weather maps and the grinding and clinking of heavy machinery making last-minute fortifications to roads and levees. And despite ongoing bustle of the remembrance ceremonies and the chatter of local talk radio hosts jabbering about lessons learned from three years ago, I’ve been zombified in a stupor of disbelief.

This isn’t happening again. This can’t be happening again. If I close my eyes, it’ll all go away.

Just a few minutes ago, as I was driving home from my mother’s house, I heard perhaps the most fitting song for the occasion: Santa Monica by Everclear. It’s a song about escaping one life to try to build another. In the chorus, Art (alex AH kiss) Alexakis sings about living on the beach and swimming out to watch the world die from afar. That’s exactly how it feels every time a hurricane slithers into the Gulf of Mexico and city officials begin to issue evacuation orders. We get scattered across the country and then glue ourselves to the nearest TV to watch clips of the wind battering our houses, skyscrapers and everything else in sight.

It seems that mother nature is not through menacing the Gulf South. After Gustav, we might have to contend with Hannah. After Hannah, who knows?

I’ll be evacuating to Houston. I know it’s not quite out of Gustav’s path, but I don’t have a choice. I have family there willing to take me in. My mother’s company has already set up shop in Houston, so that’s where she’ll be going as well.

Maybe I’ll New Orleans permanently. Maybe I’ll meander my way to Chicago or Denver or some place like that. Someplace where I won’t have to uproot my existence once a year. Some place where I can buy a little house with a white picket fence for my wife and 2.5 children. Some place where I’ll finally have the chance to try my hand at the American dream.

I support Lithium Picnic.

If you’ve never heard of him, Philip Warner, aka Lithium Picnic, is one of today’s leading fetish photographers. His work is amazing and serves as an inspiration for all the lowly peons like myself who can only fantasize about being so well-known and liked. He’s a staple of deviantart.com’s photography section, and was (until a recent nightmare) the best photographer on Suicidegirls.com, as well. His work has appeared on and in countless fetish magazines and he’s shot the likes of Marilyn Manson and other like musicians and celebs.

Well, he’s under attack. Has been for a while, actually. Before I tell you by who, we’re going to play a game to see if you can figure it out yourself.

The name of which uber-popular “alternative pinup” site rhymes with “sewer slide world?”

If you said Suicide Girls, you’ve won!

Anyway, SG’s founder, Sean Suhl, is suing LP for a breach of contract. They’re making outrageous claims like that they taught him photography (which is a lie, because of my favorites of his work dates to 2004 and his SG contract is dated 2005), and that his wife’s site, apneatic.com, was in direct competition with SG. Funny thing is, Apneatic.com is a single-girl personality site, which was explicitly mentioned as being exempt from the no-competes that LP and Apnea signed.

None of this factual information matters to SG. As a matter of fact, we’re all pretty sure that SG knows their claims won’t stand up in court. This isn’t about that, though. This is about ruining Philip, financially and emotionally. Suhl is afraid that his man-made empire, built on near slave labor of 20something-year old girls, is being out-shined by a single man, whose livelyhood he’s now bent on destroying.

If you don’t feel like standing idly by, you can help by buying a shirt or print or donating to his legal fund. Also, spread the word.

Every person who knows the truth is one more voice that will stand up against SG. Do this with me: I refuse to work with the Suicide Girls or anyone who has worked for them, including models, photographers, stylists or designers.

Here are some links for you:

http://isupportlithiumpicnic.com
http://www.myspace.com/freepicnic
http://community.livejournal.com/lithium_picnic/119922.html
http://public.fotki.com/lithiumpicnic/prints_for_sale/
Click the “Make Donation” button at the bottom.