In some of the freelance work I do, I deal with digital photography. I have to select and edit photographs for use in heavily illustrated brochures, reports, and pamphlets.

Until about a year and a half ago, most of the photos I dealt with were 35mm slides, and I had gotten working with them down not just to a science, but a kind of jazz-like improvisational art. I would listen to music while I edited the slides, very rhythmical stuff like 40s swing or Al Jolson songs or Vienna waltzes, and I would riff with my eyes with the slides, discovering the story inside them.

But alas! Most photographers work with digital now, a much different medium than film, and that is the wave of the future as well as the present.

Only until recently, I could look at slides on a lightbox, select the best ones in a few minutes, and then spend the majority of the time arranging them in the best sequence. What I most enjoyed was the visceral feeling of working out a visual rhythm in the pacing of the slides. Because I am so into movies, I edit still pictures in a cinematic way. I took pleasure in seeing how I could make one picture after another build steadily and work together toward a climactic punch.

The more I whittled a batch of slides down to a tight and lean perfection, the more pleasurable it became for me, as I felt the sequence come alive and make its points. I would frequently be tapping out a mental rhythm on the floor as I finished my edit.

The editing of digital photography, done by checking off images on often murkily printed contact sheets, or looking at them on a computer screen full of files and weirdly numbered images, and then dragging them into folders, is not the same. The technology has taken away a lot of the spontaneity for me in dealing with photography. Perhaps with practice, I eventually will be able to get my groove on with digital photos as well, but I miss editing the old 35mm slides.

Additionally, because photographers don't have to pay for film, they shoot hundreds of additional images on digital cameras, so there's a lot more junk for a photo editor to plow through.

I'm sure that more than one person reading this out there has been bored to tears by someone's endless digital vacation pictures, which no doubt are equally bloated in number since paying for prints is no longer a necessity! People just upload their photos, make a slide show, and then--voila! Mind-glazing tedium follows for the spectators.

Editing one's photos, like editing one's words for publication or just casual reading, is not only a craft. It is a matter of courtesy and etiquette towards the viewer or reader.

A long day...I'm beat. I wonder if the commuting I do between New York and New Jersey is, in reality, a leap across dimensions, like something out of The Outer Limits. Because it certainly feels that way sometimes in terms of the discombobulation I feel afterward.

Of course, the linguini carbonara I had for dinner tonight has contributed to my exhaustion...I enjoyed it, but I find it one of the heaviest of pastas.

Anyway, I was on the Web earlier tonight doing a little research, and on a retro culture site called Java's Bachelor Pad I found a 1957 article by a guy named Frank Thistle, who wrote for men's magazines for many years. I've seen his byline in a lot of vintage magazines. The article was called "Stripdom's Sexiest Strippers" and it talked about the top ten peelers for 1957. The guy wrote about the dancers of his era with the same kind of delight that I feel when I'm writing about the dancers I've seen, either in person or on DVDs, and his words reminded me of how timeless a pleasure it is to sit back, have a drink, and enjoy women peeling off their clothes to music. Even though the piece was written fifty years ago, I felt as if Frank had written it yesterday, and put a note on it, "Hey Cranky, read this." So check out Frank's piece yourself if you want an authentic taste of the ecdysiasts past by a man who obviously appreciated them. The link is below.

Hey, maybe New York to New Jersey isn't really a leap across dimensions, but I guess I got to do some time travel thanks to the observant Frank Thistle!

JavasBachelorPad

I saw a particularly lovely young woman in the Union Square Walgreen's on Sunday, and her image has been going through my mind ever since.

Women are definitely starting to wear more dresses in New York this spring--believe me, I've been keeping tabs over the years, and the change from slacks is noticeable--and this woman, whom I would say was in her late twenties, was wearing a light frock with patterns that were the color of Snapple's Kiwi-Strawberry drink, kind of light red-pink. Her complexion was tawny and she looked Hispanic. Her hair was a lustrous black and it looked as if she had just washed it. Yes, she exuded the aura of the freshly bathed. She wore high heeled backless sandals with cork-like wedge heels, and her toenails were polished a color to match her dress. When I first saw her, she was nibbling on her fingernail thoughtfully as she tried to decide about some hair product to buy. She wore little makeup, and her eyes had a kind of tired look to them, slightly dark circles, but that made her seem more natural, more sexy. Maybe she'd been up til the wee hours...maybe she'd been having sex all night and well into the morning, and she had just parted from the lucky guy, and she was stocking up on sundries...

When she was standing in line at the check-out right in front of me, she moved her hair off her shoulders, revealing the back of her neck. It was very alluring. Like the Japanese, I greatly appreciate the eroticism of the nape of a woman's neck. Ah, I wish I could have found an opportunity to talk to her, but I was with my platonic lady friend Diana, a very attractive girl in her own right, and it would have been kind of awkward. Still, I could have said that Diana was my niece or something, since whenever I'm out with her in the city, people look at me like, "What's this middle-aged bald guy doing with this beautiful girl?" I guess people figure I'm her uncle or some old lech. So I could have pretended to be Diana's relative, albeit a sleazy one, and tried to pick up this other girl while in Diana's company!

Still, if I hadn't been with Diana, would I have tried to talk to this woman? No. I probably would have talked myself out of it, as I usually do these days. But damn, there was something so attractive about her to me. Her frock was also one of those fashionably low-cut ones, so her cleavage was somewhat displayed--but it looked classy on her, not trashy, although I did notice when she got up to the cashier, she adjusted the bodice somewhat since I guess it was slipping down a little.

She left the Walgreen's before Diana and I did, but when we got outside, she was standing at the Union Square subway entrance, as if trying to decide where to go. I wish I could draw or paint you a picture of this girl. She really was something.

A lot of pretty girls on the street this holiday weekend. I could go on in detail, but what's the use? It's just a passing parade that delights my eye but makes my heart wistful for the gift of easy gab I've never really had, and the youthfulness that is long past.

I read a couple of good noir novels this weekend, and saw a fine new film called Waitress--a drama-comedy about a young woman who works in a diner specializing in pies. It was about her marriage to a real jerk, her unplanned pregnancy, and how she eventually turns her life around. Definitely worth checking out.

I'm trying to decide if I should go work in New Jersey tomorrow at my freelance client, or stay in the city and wait until Wednesday to commute instead. I always have work I can do in the city, too.

The problem with these long weekends is that they get me into a vacation-mode, and then wham, bam, they're over. And what I really need is a genuine vacation.

I was tempted to stop by a stripclub this afternoon, but I decided to get a Haagen-Daz vanilla-almond ice cream bar instead.

Sometimes I wonder if the effect of a lapdance and an ice cream are equivalent for me. More than once, my urge to hit a club has been diminished by a good meal instead, or a sweet snack. I think indulgence in the strippers or the sweets must set off the same set of endorphins in my system, or whatever natural brain substances make me more docile and less restless.

Maybe somebody should open a gentlemen's club that has an ice cream parlor instead of a steakhouse or sushi bar attached. Then again, ice cream doesn't go well with beer, which is the primary drink in most tittie bars that I've been in.

Or maybe what somebody should do is open a psychotherapy clinic attached to a stripclub. Now there's an idea that has some merit.

I think I better quit while I'm ahead...

Yesterday started out weird but ended most pleasantly. After blogging about my sleepless Friday night into Saturday morning, I spent the day in a jittery fog. I was tired, and I took three semi-unconscious cat naps through the day, but never fell into a real sleep. I had planned on doing some housecleaning--the monumental task of organizing my books, videos, and papers, a job that never ends and never continues to daunt me--but all I had the energy for was to read the newspapers, drop off my laundry at the wash-n-fold, browse at the newsstand, daydream about tits, and take a shower and shave. As I was staring at my VCR and wondering where last night's fist-sized spider had hidden himself after I woke up from my nightmare (see yesterday's entry), the phone rang and I got a call from my writer friend Moe, as he and his writer wife Betty were just spending a lazy day too and wondered if I was up for a beer. That sounded like a good idea and after catching up for awhile on the phone we decided to make it a dinner instead.

I dozed for awhile and then started reading another noir novel, John Lutz's 1971 The Truth of the Matter--ironically with a protagonist who looks like John Wayne and capitalizes on this resemblance to get over on people. I say ironically because yesterday was what would have been the Duke's 100th birthday, so it was strange that I should pick this particular novel to read out of all the books I have in my apartment. Or maybe not so strange...you see, I'd first read the book in 1988, enjoyed it immensely, but lost my copy in subsequent years. Only recently did I find another copy, and planned to re-read it. So maybe my subconscious remembered that the character had this Wayne angle, and so I purposely decided to pick the book up on Big John's centennial, for the irony value.

Yes, I'm reading a lot of noir fiction...maybe reading about people whose lives are really screwed up is somehow consoling to me and makes me feel like I should be grateful I'm not in their shoes?

Anyway, after taking another cat nap I went down to Moe and Betty's apartment in Soho where we had a nice glass of French white wine, then headed out to dinner. We went to a restaurant called Jerry's, and it's really a sign of how empty the city becomes on Memorial Day weekend that this ever-popular spot wasn't too crowded. I'd been thinking how fine it would be to have a steak, and that's what I ordered--a skirt steak most pleasantly seasoned, with French fries and a salad. Washed down with a German white wine and coffee and accompanied by pleasant conversation about all and sundry, it was just the perfect meal.

I stopped taking the allergy medicine and was able to get a good night's sleep at last, for nine hours. I still had odd dreams, though. I dreamed that I woke up in my apartment, and somebody had come in while I was asleep and installed a video monitor in my bathroom, as well as placing four wine glasses (for white wine) on my sink. I was a little unnerved that somebody could just come into my place like that without my knowing...and then, opening the door, I saw that my apartment number had been taken down, and a message was scratched into the face of the door. Just as I was about to read what the message was, I suddenly woke up...damn.

Well, at least I didn't have to deal with any large spiders.

I still want to do some housecleaning today, but oh I feel so damn lazy...and sleepy, too. I hear the birds chirping on the fairly quiet avenue, and I just want to sit on my couch and doze off to their little chorus...

I called my friend Diana, a writer/musician whom I occasionally hang out with just as a buddy, and left her a message, asking if she wants to see the movie Waitress, a comedy with the comely actress from Curb Your Enthusiasm, Cheryl Hines. Diana had asked me during the week if we could get together over this weekend, so maybe that'll happen...if not, I guess I have plenty of movies to watch here in my castle on the edge of Times Square...or I could just daydream some more about tits.