samurai photographer's crush (one of many)

ANthrax-God Forbid 269 copy,
originally uploaded by JanDatuPhoto.

I've had a long-term (since high school) crush on Scott Ian, the rhythm guitarist/one of the songwriters in Anthrax. Besides being a Nice Jewish Boy, he's from Queens. As if this weren't enough, he's also really funny and smart. Just what a gal like me dreams of.

When Scott used to live in NYC full-time, I would see him every couple of weeks on the street or in a record store (or the night I collided with him at a show, spilling his drink - I felt awful, offered to buy him another one, but he declined, saying it was his fault because he wasn't looking. It wasn't his fault, but that's the kind of guy he is, I guess) and would always get this litte thrill. Not because he was famous, but because he was a regular guy.

Over the years I sort of became "eh" on Anthrax (when they changed vocalists) but I never stopped liking Scott. Even when he started dyeing green stripes into his ridiculously long goatee. Even when he started waxing (or tweezing) his eyebrows - which works for him, despite it not working for pretty much any male on the planet (well, unless they are Billy Zane or a drag queen.)

For the past few years he's been on VH-1 a lot, as a talking head on those nostalgia shows and also hosting a rock show called "The Rock Show", Which is all well and good, but what Scott really deserves is a sitcom or something.

Well, instead of that, we have VH-1's "Supergroup", which is one of the best shows on TV right now. Seriously. I can get my weekly fix of Scott and his kid-like smile rockin' out. Now I think that Scott and Sebastian Bach should have their own show. I'd watch.

samurai photog's extended family

dan lookin' sexy...,
originally uploaded by samuraiphotog.

That stylin' guy to the left is Dan Goldman. Who the fuck is Dan Goldman? Well, if you don't know already, you sure as hell will know now.

Dan and I worked together last year at a certain pharma company that cannot be named but is the leader in ED drugs. Think Big Blue, but not IBM.

Anyhow, Dan and I stayed friends and I kinda think of him as part of my extended family. We cheer each other on (and up, except I am the one who needs cheering more) and I am astounded at just how incredibly talented he is.

Today is the first day his collaboration with Anthony Lappé, called Shooting War can be seen at Smith Magazine online. You owe it to yourself to read it.

I'm so happy that more people are going to see just how great Dan's work is.

If you're hungry for more, check out ACT-I-VATE, an online comix collective that Dan is part of, along with equally swelligant and talented guys like Dean Haspiel, Rami Efal, and Josh Neufeld.

samurai photographer stalks david blaine.

interpretive dance,
originally uploaded by samuraiphotog.

You heard me.

Every time David Blaine does a stunt in New York I am compelled to go see him. Why? I know I shouldn't encourage him, and after he took my table at a sushi place years ago, I should sock him one in the jaw. I should sock him anyway for having bad tattoos.

But still I go, to gawk, surely, but also to watch the other people who go to gawk. Kids love him. Tourists love him. I bet he loves the attention. I wonder how many women want to sleep with him because he's a "magician".

Hmmm.

samurai photographer versus Mesioangular Impaction

poor me,
originally uploaded by samuraiphotog.

It all started about two weeks ago, maybe three. One of my molars was hurting me, and the gums were swelling up. "It's nothing," I thought. "Just a seed or something, it'll go away in a few days." I thought this because that is what usually happens. A few extra brushes, a few "excavations" with a clean fingernail or toothpick, and the offending particle breaks free of the fleshy prison and enables me to get back to normal life.

Not this time.

It bothered me when I was eating Korean food with Tim, when I took care to not get rice stuck back there. A few nights later, drinking sake (to disinfect it, natch) and eating wasabi squid didn't do anything except burn a little.

So I went to the dentist, and he looked at it and recommended an oral surgeon. Now, I'm not a complete wuss, but the idea of oral surgery pretty much freaked me out. Mostly because of all the horror stories you hear about jawbones getting sawed, infections, and assorted painful stuff. I've had enough teeth pulled to know it's not the needles or the actual act of pulling that sucks, it's the recovery, and this was COMPLETELY out of my ken.

So I spent the days between my dentist appointment and my surgical appointment annoying the shit out of my mother, and a few chosen friends (KW/CM/AS thank you thank you thank you) all of whom pretty much commiserated ("That sucks") but said it was No Big Deal.

The day of surgery, I went to the office with high hopes. Maybe they don't have to go. If they do have to go, maybe they aren't impacted so much that it will take major action to remove them. When I got to look at my orbital x-ray - and by the way, this machine was possibly the coolest piece of medical machinery I have ever had used on me - I saw the awful truth: the teeth they wanted to remove had partial soft tissue impactions (not a big deal) but one of the other ones on the opposite side of my mouth was sort of buried deep in the jawbone, near the nerve, and on its side. I shuddered, and silently hoped that they weren't going to try to extract that one too.

As the doctor prepped me, one by one the other hygenists and the other dentist came in to kind of ooh and aah over my freakish molar. "You couldn't pay me enough to take that tooth," said one, in a tone that was only half joking. I was then informed that if I were a teenager they would remove it without question, but since I was a little, um, long in the tooth, they were going to leave it alone unless/until it causes a problem.

The whole procedure took about an hour, and I was, as usual, a calm and collected patient (sure, I whiteknuckled it through the whole procedure, but at least this time I didn't rip the padding off the chair...) I didn't get to keep the offending teeth because of Biohazard disposal laws or somesuch, but I did get to see the fuckers, and man they were big.

I went home to recover, tried to tough it out on Aleve but decided sleep was a better idea, so I took one of the painkillers they prescribed me and had a decent night's sleep.

The next morning I had an allergic reaction to the antibiotics, but that is a post for another day...