Create like God, command like a king, work like a slave."

matrixleap @ 2014-08-20T22:58:00

2014-08-21T05:58:08Z

My cat, Simon, has pancreatic cancer.

Fuck.

A year...what is it?

2011-12-10T00:15:40Z

Tomorrow marks 1 year from the car accident on the freeway; my back is still recovering and will for a very long time.

January 5th is the 1 year mark of being "officially" single, although, I was was pretty much single long before that...just sleeping in the same bed with a roommate basically; emotionally and, let's be real honest, physically single.

January 16th marks the 1 year of me leaving for Phoenix to get my head straight and make a little...

It's weird how things drastically change over a year. But for good.

post

2011-11-23T14:52:11Z

Originally posted by kylecassidy at post

Via Citykitties (emphasis mine):

A good samaritan found this cat today in a gutter by Clark Park, half dead. He is now at the Cat Doctor with a body temperature of 90 (normal is 102) and blood PCV of 8. The Cat Doctor housecat, Diamond, is currently donating blood to save his life. During the exam, the vet found that this cat has a microchip. When called, his "owners" reported that he was acting sick, so they put him outside. If this makes you as angry as it makes us, please channel your anger in one of two ways: visit our website at www.citykitties.org and make a donation to help us pay for his care, or share this post and encourage others to do so.

Click to donate.

Add me: [LiveJournal] [Facebook] [Twitter] [Google+] [Tumblr]

"Buddy"

2011-10-16T07:12:21Z

The people that lived next door to me, the ones that are accused of breaking into my place, vandalizing and robbing it whilst I was gone, have abandoned their Siamese cat. "Buddy" as I began calling him last year, came to my back patio earlier tonight looking for food. I happily gave him some...he's scared and skittish, and ran off after a few moments. I'm hoping he will come back.

I thought they took him when they abandoned their townhouse, but, when you abandon one thing, you abandon lots of things, I guess...

It breaks my heart and angers me at the same time.

Almost to the new me...

2011-05-31T01:08:25Z

So this is what a 50lb loss looks like -

That's a size 44 on the jeans (I had sneaked back up to 48" at mid January) and that's a shirt that I couldn't fit into...even to wear around the house. This is me, at 300lbs...January 16th, 2011, I was back up to 350-ish.

I still have a ways to go, but, damn...it feels GOOD to be ALMOST back to my lowest weight of 289..but I'm not going to stop...I'm continuing until I'm somewhere between 225 lbs and 255 lbs.

=)

~Dusty.

matrixleap @ 2011-02-13T10:38:00

2011-02-13T17:38:10Z

A friend of mine has some really awesome and beautiful pieces of jewelry (custom made)

If you're in the market for something gorgeous for your significant other, THIS is the place to go...

go HERE!

=)

From a friends' post in CA

2011-01-21T04:19:55Z

Posted for a friend...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This pup was brought to the vet to be euthanized , simply because his front leg is broken. Our vet declined, as he's a sweet young dog. They are temporarily caring for him and will fix his leg if he has a home to go to. Please contact Gateway Animal hospital in Glendale if interested @ 818 244 2934. We'd love to save this pup's life. Please share with friends and cross post. Thank you.

edited to add: Just spoke to Gateway and they say no cats. He won't be available for 2 weeks and they are accepting donations to offset the cost of the surgery as well as toys, blankets and other means to make him more comfortable. You will be put on a list if you want to contact them and he will be re-evaluated after surgery as it makes some dogs aggressive or sometimes super shy after being in that amount of pain.

Laptop question.

2010-12-26T18:15:12Z

I have an older HP ZV5000 laptop...

Does anyone know if there is a connector piece for this older model that I can connect to a TV? I'd like to be able to stream the netflix instant view and such while I am down in Phoenix for work next month.

Thanks!

matrixleap @ 2010-11-22T17:23:00

2010-11-23T01:23:35Z

You really are a huge fucking asshole.

matrixleap @ 2010-10-11T13:24:00

2010-10-11T20:26:25Z

My girlfriend is teh awesome!

She picked me up a pair of Batman gloves last night for no reason other than she knows he is my favorite comicbook hero!

They are black with the emblem on the top of the hand and full of awesomeness win.

matrixleap @ 2010-09-03T00:18:00

2010-09-03T07:17:55Z

Fuck you LJ...fine, you want to be all weird? No post tonight.

For those who get cas with a credit card

2010-09-02T20:14:00Z

Per my bank -

Effective today, if you run your card at a gas station, instead of cash or running the DEBIT portion, gas stations will no loner run a $1 authorization to run the card and THEN pull the funds. They will authorize / place into Pending status the amount you purchased PLUS up to $100 from your account.

This is to get consumers away from the NSF fees.

So, much like today, I pulled over to get $15 in gas...I used my card in Portland and ran it as a credit...when I checked my account, there was an authorization for $75.00 (It was in pending an unable to be touched)...this will take 2 hours to 2 business days to drop off and clear.

Yes, it's legal.
Yes, they can.
Yes, they are.

A PSA for you, DP

.

Thank you Portland!

2010-08-09T07:18:29Z

Thought everyone might get a kick of this photo I snapped off yesterday.

(If anyone is interested, a Nikon D200 was used.)

~Dustin Eppers

matrixleap @ 2010-08-05T08:15:00

2010-08-05T15:15:40Z

7am came all too fast considering I didn't slide into bed until after 3am.

But, it was entirely, and completely one-hundred-percent, worth it.

Off to shoot the Nissan LEAF unveiling...the Governor will be there too.

~D.

Probably the BEST article on "Airbender", or, as I like to call it...a big pile of stinkong crap.

2010-07-06T07:56:23Z

Read the article on AIN'T IT COOL here... or, just read below for the same damn thing...

M. Night Shyamalan's THE LAST AIRBENDER is a hate crime against those who love movies!!!!

I'm going to speak plainly in a language everyone can understand. M. Night Shyamalan's THE LAST AIRBENDER is a hate crime against film lovers. No one should ever have to endure what I was unexpectedly put through yesterday afternoon watching this murky 3-D shitstorm of a movie that appears to have been shot through unflushed toilet bowl water, which, upon reflection, seems 100 percent appropriate.

Before I launch into why this film is so abysmal, let me make a plea to all studios across the land. Please stop the unwatchable practice of converting movies into 3-D. I have no issues with shooting in 3-D or the array of lovely animated films made in 3-D, but you sons of bitches have not perfected the process of 3-D conversion to the point where it is safe for human viewing. And if you are going to convert these poor, helpless movies, don't choose ones in which 75 percent or more of the action takes place at night or in dimly lit settings. Stop cloaking your films in darkness on top of darkness. And I know this wasn't a projection issue here in Chicago, because I sat through two 3-D movies back-to-back on this particular day in the exact same theater, and the second one (an animated film) looked awesome and fairly bright. There are huge section of THE LAST AIRBENDER that simply don't even appear to be in 3-D, and when I removed my glasses, guess what? I could actually make out faces and action and decently rendered special effects. With the glasses? Everything looked like pond scum. Fuck everyone whose job it is to convert movies to 3-D and the people who hired you. It doesn't work, so just fucking stop ruining my experience going to the movies.

That said, nothing on heaven or earth could have saved THE LAST AIRBENDER from spiraling out of control and making it certainly the worst film I've seen all year so far, and an early candidate for the worst film of the decade. There isn't a single element to this movie that works, and I say that knowing nothing about the TV series on which it is based and as someone who went into this film thinking there was a strong chance I might enjoy my experience.

It's difficult to explain just how far Shyamalan strayed as a filmmaker, but he seems to have entered into this story with a tell-not-show attitude. Huge chunks of this movie are just people talking about action that has already happened or is going to happen. It's as if the production ran out of money to shoot certain action sequences, so the powers that be simply said, "Okay, let's describe the action instead." Who does that? But I know that's not what happened because this movie looks like it cost a metric shit ton of money. All of those wasted funds are right there on the screen in the form of elaborate landscape backgrounds, mythical creatures (like a dragon and a giant beaver-like creature), elements being tossed around by "benders," who I think are people who can manipulate either air, fire, earth or water.

The writing here goes beyond just lame description of action. I could almost see the exclamation points at the end of every sentence in Shyamalan's screenplay. And the words are acted in kind by the lead child actors, who deliver each word with eyebrows raised and voices in full announcer mode, almost as if they thought they were recording dialogue for an animated movie (which would have looking a helluva lot better in 3-D--zing!). I'm sure the tens of thousands of kids who see this movie are going to respond really well to all that…3-D talking.

And I don't mean to cap on these poor kids, but they are across-the-board terrible, especially the two white kids who follow the title character (white kid playing non-white) around. They are played by Nicola Peltz and Jackson Rathbone, who plays Jasper Hale in the TWILIGHT films and does so in a far more interesting manner than in THE LAST AIRBENDER. Poor guy has had a rough week. And don't even get me started on the Airbender himself, Noah Ringer as Aang, a young monk who is the reincarnation of the "Avatar," a bender who can control all four elements (with proper training), as opposed to regular benders who can only control one…I guess. Fuck, I don't know. Ringer has decent delivery, but all of his lines sound so clear, they seem dubbed. And while he does get a chance to fight in the film, he mostly just rattles on and on about his history, his destiny, his abilities, blah, blah, blah.

There are a few familiar faces, but they don't really do anything to remove the stink from this production. Cliff Curtis plays Fire Lord Ozai, the leader of the Firemen, or whatever the hell they're called. His disappointing son is portrayed by Dev Patel from SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, while the usually reliable Aasif Mandvi plays Ozai's top military leader Commander Zhao. For all of their yelling and posturing, you would think a little spark might be lit under the ass of this movie, but you'd be wrong. They just talk, talk, talk about fighting, fight a little, then talk some more.

And then there are plot points in THE LAST AIRBENDER that are just plain dumb. See if my logic makes sense. Leading up to the big battle scene between the firebender warriors and the water bender monk-like people, a water dude makes a point to say that everyone in their camp should put out every fire so the fire people won't have anything to…bend, I guess. Fair enough: fire people need fire to do their tricks, water people need water, etc. But it's made very clear that the world in which this story takes place is somewhat industrialized. We see these machines that look like a cross between a tank and a bulldozer driving on their own steam, plus there are these giant metal battle ships that the fire people travel upon that clearly are operating on something other than air. Now I'm going out on a limb here, but I'm guessing that a race of people that possess and operate such devices might also have invented and carry around with them, I don't know, matches maybe. Perhaps even something as sophisticated as a flint-based lighter? Call me crazy. No really, call me crazy. It doesn't take long for the story to inform us that some firebenders can actually create fire out of thin air anyway, so why waste our time? Because they can, dummy.

As a critic, I always try to find one or two positive things to write about every film, even for the most trying movies I see in a given year. But for THE LAST AIRBENDER, I got nothing. No the 3-D doesn't help the film in any way; it actually makes is a whole lot worse. But even without the 3-D, this movie would have been an endurance test. There was a 14- or 15-year-old girl sitting behind me during this screening, and when the end credits began rolling, she turned to the person next to her and said, "Look at your watch. That movie was only 90-some minutes long; it felt like three hours." Truer words have never been spoken. If you still want to see this movie, you're either too dumb to understand why you shouldn't or too young to care. Fair enough. Enjoy spending the rest of your life with the memory of THE LAST AIRBENDER fouling your brain. This summer is beginning to feel like the End of Movie Days. God save us.

Asking for help with the cat...

2010-06-20T03:38:08Z

I'm never one to ask for help but...

I found out today that my cat, Simon the Siamese Wonder Cat, needs to have nearly a FULL extraction of his teeth. More than likely, yes, a complete extraction; there's a possibility of a few that can be saved, but, it's marginal at best. There was nothing I could have done to prevent this as it appears to have been viral and the erosion of his gums and teeth began prior to my adopting him. What bothers me the most is that every vet I had taken him to stated that he just had bad breath and to change his food, which I have done several times to no avail. The vet I took him to this morning basically pried his mouth open all the way so I could see the yellow and green discoloration and also see that he was already missing several of his kitty teeth. Because of this situation, he is having difficulty in eating and because of this he has lost a little more weight than he should. If you know anything about Siamese cats, they are thin and lanky, but he has lost about a pound and a half on the wrong side of things.

Needless to say, this made me feel like a horrible feline parent all the way around.

The procedure itself is going to cost anywhere between $600 and $850; IV drip, anesthesia, X-rays to ensure no tooth fragments are lodged in the gum, extraction, cleaning, pain medication, steroids, blood work, etc.

These are funds that I don't readily have available at this time, but, this is my cat...he's more than a pet, he's seemingly a person unto himself with an awesome personality, demeanor, and intelligence, as well as one of my friends. In light of not having these funds, but, also wanting to help out my cat, I'm asking (Probably for the first time in my limited existence) for a little bit of help. He's an awesome cat and I can't bare the thought that I couldn't take care of him the way he should be. And I also can't bear to think he might be in any pain.

So I'll sell prints from my photography catalog to help offset the high amount

PRINT SALE from the online galleries HERE and THEN HERE AGAIN...

ALL monies to go to the "Simon the Siamese Wonder Cat" and his teeth extraction payment fund!

Any image that is listed from the links ABOVE will be made to the size you wish, at high resolution (.tiff, .jpg, etc...) and emailed to your inbox, and for your printing pleasure, for the low low price of $20. If you prefer to have it printed from the lab I use, the cost would be a little bit more. If you'd rather not purchase a print and would simply like to donate, well, I wouldn't mind that either!

Please help out if you can...I would appreciate it AND Simon would too (More than I could express)!

By clicking on the DONATE button below, you'll be purchasing an above mentioned piece of photo art. Leave a comment below on which image you would like and what size resolution you would like AS WELL and I will happily send it to you THRU THE MAGICAL POWER OF THE INTERWEBS!

Again, you have no idea how much you'll be helping!

A world of thanks,

-Dusty and Simon the Siamese Wonder Cat.

PS - THE FIRST FIVE PEOPLE who simply donate or order a print will receive an authentic extracted tooth from Simon himself accompanied with a letter of authenticity!

=)

.

matrixleap @ 2010-06-19T19:29:00

2010-06-20T02:29:05Z

I found out today that my cat,

Yard sale continuation!!!

2010-06-05T19:49:22Z

Hey DP!

The garage sale is still going on here at 1935 SE Harney (sellwood) in Portland!

We still have a laserdiscs player, an apple G4 quicksilver tower with studio display - clothing, books, movies, stero surround sound equipment and a lot of other stuff!

We'll be here until 4pm! Come by and see us ...

1935 SE Harney st. Sellwood area in Portland.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Negative...

2010-06-03T05:58:39Z

Going thru a box that was in storage, I found a heavy duty ziplock-type plastic bag with 13 rolls of film.

All exposed.

I wonder what's on those rolls...?

I'm looking forward to finding out soon.

Rain? WTF?

2010-06-02T17:21:55Z

Dear Pacific Northwest,

Please, for the love of God, bring the sun out! It's June and you still insist on bringing the rain! Although, I do enjoy the rain greatly, if you could see your way fit to a little sun so I could ride my bike more, I would really appreciate it. I am, as you know, decidedly not a rain rider; please bring me some of your awesome sun!

Thanks in advance,

Dusty.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Photo-Mojo

2010-05-31T08:52:22Z

Earlier today, I made comment about feeling like I had been "losing my mojo" in regards to my photography. While out and about on assignment for "Enzyme Media", I stopped into an antique store on Hawthorne...

Apparently, in my opinion, my mojo had been hanging out with the antiques.

Here are a few from the first batch that I really like...

I've always had a thing for shooting abandoned places or things "out of the way" - I have found that I LOVE shooting in antique stores...they have such wonderful imagery that tells such great stories, in my opinion.

As always, comments and critiques are ALWAYS welcomed - no matter how harsh or glowing.

Nikon D200
50mm Nikkor Lens F/1.8
EXIF data available if requested.

Images are for sale as well. Contact for pricing.

~D.

.

Photography thoughts

2010-05-30T18:12:23Z

Although I am down under Hawthorne bridge working on the very first few images for the first photo assignment for "Enzyme Media", I feel as though I have lost a little bit of my mojo. I'm certain that it's from a lack of getting out and working on more fine art type of shots and/or not making time to ge out to shoot some awesome landscapes, but, I don't know. I just feel as though I am missing something. Almost as if the sound of the shutter is unfamilliar, and that's something I don't like.

A friend and I are going to head up to Mt. St. Helene in the next couple of weeks to shoot, and I am really looking forward to that. Aside from my photo assignments for the media company, I am going to spend a lot more time with my camera in the forest and beach area, as well as downtown. I'm also going to take out my medium format film camera as well.

I want my photo mojo and inspiration back....

-D.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Ok, I'm curious...

2010-05-16T09:48:03Z

"Hey there..."

2010-05-12T07:30:36Z

Funny...thought archmage would get a laugh out of it...

matrixleap @ 2010-05-06T14:54:00

2010-05-06T21:54:47Z

I'm a prick about photography from time to time. I know it and I don't deny it. I'm not the world's best photographer, but I'm not terrible, either.

One of the things that drives me insane in this digital world is someone taking a photograph with their little pocket digis and then 'shopping it and putting your name and "Art studio" name on it...when it was just a snapshot of your friends at a bar, or out at the park.

It drives me...insane.

I'm just sayin'...