I hate dolphins.
 
What?  Why do you hate dolphins?  Everyone loves dolphins.  I'll bet even Kim Jong Il loves them. Maybe he has posters of them up in his missile silos.
 
Dolphins are dicks, dude.  A dolphin mugged my uncle once.
 
You are lying.  You are totally lying right now.
 
I'm not!  He was walking through Central Park, minding his own business, and this dolphin hit him in the head.  And demanded a herring.
 
It was probably a hobo in a dolphin suit.  Actual dolphins wouldn't mug anyone.  They're too busy flipping around in the air and saving Timmy from the well.
 
What?  That was Lassie.  Lassie was Timmy's dog.  
 
Well, how would Lassie save Timmy from a well?  Sounds like a job for a dolphin to me.
 
Whatever, dude.  Point is, it wasn't a hobo in a dolphin suit.  That doesn't even make sense.  Why would a hobo do that?  What's the hobo's motivation in that situation?
 
I don't know.  Chicken?  A ball of plaid yarn?  23.7 World of Warcraft figurines made out of electrum? Who knows why a hobo does ANYTHING?
 
Well, hobos, presumably.
 
Apparently you've never met any hobos.  I met one once who carried a little drawer around with him so he could slam his finger in it whenever anyone said the word "charcoal".
 
How the hell do you know that it was the word "charcoal" that made him do that?
 
I sort of followed him around for a week and kept yelling it at him.  He became a very interesting combination of annoyed about the finger pain and flattered by the attention.  Also, I'd just broken up with my girlfriend, so I figured that some casual hobo abuse was preferable to being arrested for stalking.
 
Ok, I can see why you might think that the dolphin was a hobo.
 
Maybe we should just agree that it was a hobo dolphin.
 
And its motivation was...
 
[TOGETHER] CHICKEN OF THE SEA! 

In this case, it totally is.
So here's the deal.  Since last we met, I've:

1. Obtained a second job as an IT Dude/Photographer
   • At a shop that makes drums
   • Yes, drums.
   • Not just any drums - WEST AFRICAN drums
   • I've discovered that my issue with drums is not with the drums themselves - it's with the idiots who don't know how to play them.  Which is mostly everybody.
2. Picked up a lot of new wedding photography work, which is pretty sweet.  Most of it came from the Bridal Expo in January, which is a whole post in itself.  For now, let's just say that people get CRAZY about weddings.
3. Saw my first banana slug since moving to Santa Cruz.  I named him Norman.  Slimy Norman.
4. Filed corporate taxes for the first time.  All I have to say about this is as follows:
   • Thanks, Turbo Tax
   • Try not to do your taxes in the same month that you:
5. Moved.  This was an ordeal and a half, and I didn't really enjoy it all that much.  But I'm out of the place that turned out to be The Place Where College Students Decide to Live Immediately After Living in a Dorm/Immediately After Moving Out of Mom's House.  This feels AMAZING.  No longer do I need to listen to the sound of Britney Spears pumping from an open door 10 feet from my front door at 2am.  No longer do I need to attempt to navigate the bags of gross, split-open trash bags that have been flung from balconies in an attempt to hit the dumpster.  No longer will I have to yank the door open and yell at a pair of dumbasses who think it's an AWESOME IDEA to throw beer bottles against my wall.  

The worst thing I've encountered in the new place is something the census worker told me when she stopped by this evening.  Apparently she'd visited a neighbor earlier in the day, and was legally obligated to ask him if he was male or female.  To which he replied that he'd happily show her.
Sigh.  And EWWWW.

Click the photo below to see the slideshow - there are 10 photos in all!

These were all taken sometime in December using a Canon 7D and a variety of lenses.

I love my Kindle, but I won't be doing that to the screen anytime soon.

How about a few shots of the famous Steamer Lane to get this blog started off right again?