Project365, #62: Sheep. Head. Tacos.

Today my friend Jorge introduced me to sheep's head tacos. Allow me to take you on a journey:

Upon arrival to their house, I was immediately ushered to the oven by the young, electric Boots, where I was introduced to my meal. He tried to hide in his ramshackle house of tortillas:

After a few minutes of judging an impromptu gymnastics exhibition I was told it was time to eat. Inside I came, LITERALLY, face to face with it:

Jorge began carving, a difficult task.

First to come out was the eye. I was assured this was the tastiest part. I admit I was skeptical at first, but let me tell, no joke, one of the tastiest things I've ever had:

Further dismantling (read tearing the bottom jaw off) revealed more to eat. You'd be amazed how much meat you can get off of this thing.

Next up: brain meat. After many frustrating attempts to scratch the meat out a less grace method was used: a hammer.

In short, looks gross, taste delicious. Now to cross-breed a spider and a sheep so I can eat all the more eyes.

R.I.P. you delicious bastard

Project365, #61: Time Travel #6 (Washington Memorial Gardens pt 3)

Last cemetery update...

As I alluded to in the previous post, while I was just using the cemetery as an opportunity for photos, I ended up having some odd feelings come to the surface. I disgust at Western/Christian funeral rites was further confirmed by what I saw as posthumous pride via oversized statues and obelisks. As a gut reaction to that initial impression, I decide to wander through and look at the simpler, less imposing graves.

A common theme throughout were large family or couple grave stones with multiple names, where often one would have a death date and the other a blank. Married couples where one spouse had already died and the other secured a spot next to them. This is when it became a somber walk rather than the planned relaxed stroll. My mind began to create stories for each name I saw. I started calculating the age at which each one had died.

Here are some memorable stories I found:

Mr. Ivery intrigued me. As you can see, there is no date of death, yet he is by himself in his plot. No-one seems to be waiting for him. I wonder if he, in his elder years, has become so preoccupied with death that he went ahead and reserved himself a seat.

 Christian was only a year old. Possibly less, as no month and day are given. The area immediately around the stone made it clear no-one visited often or, at the very least, never tried to clean it up. In this story, I imagine the parents found it too difficult to come by and stopped altogether. Soon after Christian's death they had another child who knows nothing of his or her brother.

(Sorry, I know. Things got dark towards the end of this morning's walk)

 I have no idea. I imagine the family couldn't afford a gravestone and the caretaker of the grounds allow the family to make one our of plaster or by crudely carving into rock. I can barely make sense of most of what's written here.

 Nothing to say, really. Just different than all the others.

Okay, bummer time over. Last bit. This outdated crypt sat in the back corner of the cemetery. I'm curious as the the sporadic placement of placards though. Were people concerned about their remains being left so close to someone else?

Street art Jesus watches over these folks.

Project365, #60: Time Travel #5 (Washington Memorial Gardens pt 2)

So on one side of the gardens there were grave markers level with the ground (some of which will be in the next post.) Across the way though, there were headstones as expected, but also obelisks, mausoleums, and a crypt. It seems some people (and their families) had to show their monetary worth even after passing on. I understand that graves are for the living, not for the deceased, but many of these pictured below were just sprinkled in right never to modest pieces. It just seemed, I don't know, rude to me. As if to say "this person is more important than that guy over there."

In short, this seemingly harmless photo op was emotionally complex.

Kendall is compensating for something.

 Guss with two s's. Fantastic. I don't know you, but I miss you. Also, if this is correct, Bell is still alive and 113 years old. Best family ever.

 See? Some people really made the others buried here seem like plebes.

Cemetery. DEADwyler. You get it.

 TOUCHDOWN JESUS!

Soon...Soon

I am almost a week and a half behind on photos. I've got a few I might use, but I really have got to play catch up. Hopefully I'll be able to update en masse soon, but likely not until finals are over / I have moved.

...excuses, excuses.

Project365, #59: Time Travel #4 (Washington Memorial Gardens pt 1)

Just down the road, across from the old church is Washington Memorial Gardens, a quaint, poorly tended, massive cemetery. I wandered around for about a half hour and what I can surmise, these memorial gardens opened in the late 50s. As much as anything, I found the variety in grave markers interesting, gaudy, hilarious, and so sad.

This update will be in three parts because, well, there are a lot of pictures and I got a telephoto lens and had to play around with that a bit.

 Gross, Jesus. Gross.

Project365, #58: Time Travel #3 (Meth City Border)

Time traveling from late May...bzzzzrt...

My neighborhood in Decatur is often known as "Hindu Village." I'm pretty sure I reside on one of it's borders. Take a right out of my place and you are at the highway and minutes from a tons of amazing food. However, a quick left and you find yourself on the most peculiar road, populated by clearly newly built houses right next to some of the most decrepit shacks (literally) that I can all but assume are for cooking meth. Either way, I love where I am. This is by no means a condemnation of the Solitude of Fortress or its surroundings. If anything, this just goes to show how damn diverse Decatur can be and I fucking love it.

The road just behind my place.

 One of the many abandoned, overgrown homes/lots in the little area just a quarter mile from me.

This was the first one I saw a few days ago. From the looks of many of these places, I (and others) assumed they were empty. Much to my surprise today, someone does live here, boarded up window and all.

So I chickened out taking pictures of all the ramshackle once I saw cars parked in and around the them. One home in particular, from which99X-era songs were being performed by a band hidden, you guessed, in a shack, had a small, private graveyard. I hoped it was maybe just a pet cemetery, but no. Creepy.

Project365, #57: Time Travel #2 (Solitude of Fortress)

These photos traveled through time, all the way from May 14th 2011. Finally, finally, finally I moved out of the suburbs and back into my dear Decatur. This is my new place, dubbed the Solitude of Fortress:

My bedroom!

The rest of my bedroom

TV Room

the rest of the TV room

Dining Room (where we keep the extra stuff at the moment)

Teeny kitchen

Project365, #56: Mi Madre las Flores

Despite everything you just read, Happy Easter everyone. Spend some time with your family.

Today's Observations: I Fail at Church...

Easter means two things for me. First, despite my age I still get a gift from the Hygiene Bunny, so named for the basket consisting of chocolate, deodorant, shampoo, q-tips, and a toothbrush. Second, it marks the first time in any calendar year that I will be going to church.

My relationship with church, god, and religion as a whole is a complicated one. I am undoubtedly an atheist. Some take offense to this and shout "How can you be soooo certain there is no God?" Well for one what they call god I call math, science, and psychology. Their follow up is typically "But you can't know for sure!" Again, all purported "evidence" that a celestial high power exists I refute is actually statistics, biology, or a coping mechanism. If I felt like getting into an unnecessary and never-ending argument over the existence of god, I would mention that they too cannot be certain there is a God since all they have is their blind faith and biased interpretations (the latter of which I also have) and that furthermore, being agnostic is like owning insurance for your soul. "Oh hai second coming of Christ. I never said your dad DIDN'T exist. I just said I was open to the possibility of... oh." I was born the son of a Methodist preacher and a skeptic. It wasn't in the genes. Frankly I'm not sure where it came from, but all the same, it lead to some complications. 

As I sat through this Easter service I was struck by certain hypocrisies (there are more but these came to mind): This church is huge, nearly epic in size, and with an organ that cost millions of dollars for both its parts and the house in which they put up its builder from Germany. The upside of being a church-raised atheists is a familiarity with scripture. In this case Matthew 5: 5 and  Psalms 37: 11, best known as "the meek shall inherit the Earth." By definition meek is quiet, reserved, and submissive even, yet, as the majority of the Atlanta rich elite congregation will tell you, meek does not pay the bills. There is no acquiescence in this population. Timidity is weakness they might say. 

Easter Sunday is a time to show off. Gorgeous, stunning, captivating beauties in their Sunday best, making what is for many of them also their annual church appearance as a red carpet event than a celebration of the resurrection of Christ. Vanity takes precedence as agonized, tautly stretched face lifts scoot down my row. "Humility and the fear of the Lord bring wealth and honor and life." (Proverbs 22: 4) Hmm. No one hear seems to have checked the humility box, but they seem to be doing quite well financially. Hmm...

Last passage, this one from Matthew 19: 24: "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." I look ahead of me at the million dollar structure, and just below it sits a glorious, burnished gold bible, resembling more an artifact sought by Indiana Jones than an article of worship. Entirely paid for by tithe and offerings from the members of this church, many of which I have been told are millionaires. All this magnificence and splendor in the name of God comes from the wealthiest families in Buckhead and the greater Metro Atlanta area. A misinterpretation or contradiction perhaps?

Okay okay, I will never devalue religion entirely. It gave me a place to live and a loving community that nurtured me. Personally, I find it to be an incredibly flawed manner of dealing with strife day to day, a manner which I do not need. It's psychological importance (even dependence) to many members of my family is without measure, much like my need for the creative outlet and my love for the arts, so I cannot hate it as so many do. I just do not understand it. It is rife with hypocrisy, counter-intelligent arguments, and has molded much of its followers into a state of denial-ism that harms the Earth. For now I will go to church, play the good son, on Easter and Christmas and keep my mouth shut around them. I'm sure some hold out hope that I will change, but I do not see that happening. Until then I will go through the motions and mock grown men in bowties and melt at the sight of children in seersucker suits.

Project365, #55: Time Travel #1 (Records)

DISCLAIMER: Okay, so I'm having to cheat a bit here. This will be the first in a series of updates that are actually from a month from now. Yes, time travel. The short answer is at the time I type this (in May) I am nearly a month behind on my 365 photos due to a combination of final exams and packing/moving. So many of these will be from the new place or surrounding areas. I realize I am cheating, but it's all I've got.

....time machine sounds...

My soon-to-be roommate dropped a giant container full of records in front of me and told me to decide what to keep and what to sell. There was a ton of overlap and mostly a lot I was more than happy to discard, if not for some amazing album art and kitsch value. The follow pictures are of ones worth keeping for irony or genuine love of the music. I will not tell you which is which:

I am in love with Carly Simon now.

Okay fine. I'm keeping this one for all the right reasons.

Project365, #54: Baby Wall-E

Project365, #53: Spin

Project365, #52: Fuck You

Maybe "fuck you" is a little harsh. Perhaps you are not judging me for the number of nature photos I have posted. Either way, I am not entirely content with this blog's content (English is such a dumb language. Stupid homonyms). I have said to before, but here are some slightly different excuses: I'm gearing up for a move and preparing for finals, so time is short and creativity seems to be lacking as a result. So lucky you, here are some more pictures of beautiful flowers from my backyard: