Soup and Gold Stars

Yes, if you know me you know I am kind of obsessed with soup. I would eat it for every meal if I could... well maybe not breakfast, but only because I usually eat that in the car and it would be hard to eat soup then. Anyway today I was with a friend at his culinary school talking to his instructors about how they grad their students using Rubrics. My friend and I were talking about it on Friday and he said that he'd get a copy of this great grade sheet from his instructor and before I knew it we were at his school talking to his instructors. It's all art, just a slightly different way of going about doing it.

It was a peculiar situation, but I'm all about networking. So I talked with my friend's instructor about grading, chef to artist. As I was looking around his office/cube I noticed a bunch of recipe books on his shelf, not a suprise, but one of the cookbooks was, "The Soup Bible," I have that book! He's got to be a good guy now!

Anyway I have been grading my students in a way that I think is not subjective and that is fair, and I use gold stars on their quizes. Yes, another friend of mine gave me a "back to school" bag of usefull things, and among them was a pack of star stickers - they were for my students. So on their quizes, if they get an "A," they get a star on their quiz. When I passed back their first quizes one of the students said, "What's with the stars?"

"You're never too old for gold stars."

"They look red to me."

And true, they were red as my friend got me the multi-pack of colored stars. It's okay though because the quiz I turn back today will have actual gold stars on it. And even the quizes are hard for me to grade, sometimes the answers are kind of right! Ahhh art and grading!

I'm just Making a Photograph... Now Leave Me Alone!

I tend to run into… colorful people while photographing (I have some good stories about it saved up for later), although that is not what this story is about, but I need to tell a colorful person story to get to the point. So, as I'm sure you have surmised, I was just out photographing... at 11:00 at night in Minneapolis near the U (hey, I have class till 10, it’s the only time I can make night photographs!). I have had an interest in night photograph and have spent many hours in the dead of winter in 30 below weather making photographs - not a pleasant experience. So anyway I continue in the summer, much nicer, but more people are out and about - imagine that. I was photographing a house less than a block away from my studio using the 4x5 (for those of you that don't know, it's a camera that makes 4" x 5" negatives, and while getting the photo ready you need to look under a dark cloth to see the image). So there I was, on the sidewalk getting ready to shoot with this big black cloth over my head.

I hear someone coming on a bike, some guy swearing about something, I submerged from the dark cloth, he drove by (biking on the side walk my tripod and I were standing on, might I add). Then he stopped, turned around and asked what I was doing. I said, "Oh, Just making a photograph."

"What?"

"Making a photograph."

"What?"

He obviously had no idea what I meant, "Taking a picture."

He asked for a cigarette, none of which I had, stared at me for a minute, (and I stared right back at him mind you - I sure wasn't going right back under the dark cloth while he was right there) then he turned around and left, swearing some more. I finished getting the photo ready, made the photograph, and left.

So the whole point of this story, especially for those non-photographers out there: is the phrase "making a photograph," an acceptable way to say I'm taking a picture, and don’t want to talk about it, GO AWAY? Although he seemed fine, perhaps this person was not in the right state of mind to be able to think about words (with all that swearing and such), so perhaps this encounter is not the best situation to gage the response.



I was interested in being able to see into the house with all the lights on at night, but the tree obscures the potentially voyeuristic view. So the picture turned out okay, it is no masterpiece though, the story that goes along with it...priceless...

My Artistic Career in Trouble?

I’ve been teaching away, every night of the week, well, I teach 2 nights a week and TA 2 nights a week at the U, both for Photo I classes, but I digress. Last night I was TAing and we had lab time, 4 hours of printing in the darkroom, and they were all printing because there is an assignment due in 2 days. The darkroom was full because there were also students from my class printing because their assignment is due tomorrow. So I was answering questions all night from students in both classes, which is fine, it’s part of my job and it’s one of the reasons I’m going to grad school, but by the end of the night my eyes were pretty tired of looking at photographs and I was having trouble giving advice, I couldn’t tell if the photos were too dark, too light, needed more contrast, etc. So I was exhausted, but did a quick e-mail checked before I went home. I received the forward that is below. Now I’m usually not so amused by forwards but because of my mood, artistically exhausted, it was hilarious to me, so I thought I’d share.


Coffee Bean Test - Read this First!!!

Find the man in the coffee beans.

Doctors have concluded that if you find the man in 3 seconds that your right half of your brain is better developed than most people.

If you find the man between 3 seconds and one minute, then your right half of the brain is developed normally.

If you find the man between one minute and 3 minutes, then the right half of your brain is functioning slowly and you need to eat more protein.

If you have not found the man after 3 minutes your right half of your brain is a mess, and the only advice is to look more for these types of exercises to make that part of the brain stronger.

The man really is there. In fact, once you find him, you cannot miss him afterwards.

Time yourself.
Good Luck ...GO!





As I’m staring at the picture I’m thinking about left/right brain thought. Incase you don’t remember which is which, the left half of the brain supposedly controls logic, rational, analytical thought, etc, while the right half is all about random, intuitive, artistic thought. Since I am an artist, theoretically my right brain should be well developed… but according to this test, not so much.

I stared at the picture, moved closer to the computer, then farther away, looked, looked, and looked. I tried to find a shape of a man in the coffee beans (and was slightly concerned because I wasn’t sure if it was a dirty joke or not). I did eventually find it and now I can’t not see it when I look at the picture (like that double negative I used right there?). But since this was on the Internet and since doctors say that my right brain is not functioning at its peak I’d better pack in that protein to save my artistic career!

Super MacDonalds

About a week ago I went to MacDonald's with a friend, for some dinner. I haven't had MacDonald’s in about a year or so, I try to stay away from the greasy food that leaves me feeling only less hungry and full of grease, but it was unavoidable this time. I parked and noticed outside the store was a large red booth, upon a closer inspection I saw it was a DVD renting kiosk! Go to MacDonald’s and rent DVD's from a machine - well, there are super Targets where one can do grocery shopping and Target shopping at the same time (which took me a while to realize that buying Milk at Target was okay) - so why can't MacDonald’s be the one-stop shop too?

Anyway, I went inside to order food, and noticed classical music playing on the speakers! I was amazed that there was no pit of balls (or pit of balls perhaps containing questionable objects) with lots of young kids jumping about or running around the store (but it was 8:00 at night, so perhaps it was past the peak of little kids coming to get dinner).

Renting DVD's and playing classical music at MacDonald's... it's just not right!