Loan and I took a quick day trip to Traverse City to visit Susan. We filled out day with wineries, lighthouses and quaint downtown shops, then passed the night with wood burning stoves, marshmallows and The A-Team (which was a fantastic movie, btw).

And special thank you to Hannah “It’s Go Time!” K. for carting us around during the day. Photo credits go to Loan.

- bang.

Muscles. Lots of big, f*cking mucles. That’s all I saw that night; an unapologetic flesh buffet laid before me. My poor father – all I could think about was the massive heart failure he was going to experience seeing my little sister on stage. In her bikini. in stripper heels.

Amazing what these enthusiasts will put themselves through before a competition – starvation, grueling workouts, borderline self-mutilation. I suppose I can’t really understand – insert “You think you know, but you have no idea” Real Life tagline. In any case, I’m very proud of my sister Melissa for her first competition.

Felt like a perv the whole night, snapping pictures.

Over 17K+ artists contributed to make ArtPrize a smashing success in downtown Grand Rapids. These indoor and outdoor installations numbered more than 190 venues

From hulking metallic dragons to geometric shapes cuddling inside each other to the obligatory photo set of the decrepit Michigan Central Station in Detroit (big fucking eye roll), those installations embedded one truth to unleashing your creativity:

think big and work backwards from there.

It takes a village to raise a child. When the child gets married, the whole village shows up to party. I had a chance to assist Samantha Reyes on Keith and Gillian’s special day.

Shooting this event was especially giggly for me because I got to sling the D300s around for the very first time. Better picture quality at much higher ISO, 12 megapixels, and control over Nikon CLS better than my D60. And solid video recording? Merry Xmas to me!

Possibly.

Rain usually ruins the photo shoot. This weekend, it made it perfect. The wet pavement turned into glassy mirrors, recreating the playground of lights straight out of the Wachowski Brothers’ bizarre vision they called “Speed Racer”.

I didn’t really care that I looked like a tourist, camera permanently glued to my face. All my senses overloaded, my camera siphoned the spillover, allowing me the supreme pleasure of browsing through the memories missed while my brain was out to lunch.

From yakitori to shacks of burgers, the blinding lights and the smelly subways – New York City, I shall return.