Wow, this is such a distracting background. . .it must change.  I'm getting a bit frustrated with Godaddy.com about my domain name and the registration of a forwarding address.  They say it could take an hour or more for that type of request to process, but I've still got my eye on it and have my doubts.

Anyway, not to whine, all else is very good and the rain has finally stopped here in the Carolinas on a Tuesday.  Sad news however, our cat Louise is no longer with us.  She got very sick and at age 22 (that's people years) she is now gone.  We love her and miss her, especially since she was my office mate for all of those years.

Miss you, love you . . . Lulu

First Communion time again!  Lovely boys and girls all dressed for the Mass with family and friends.  Steve and I do portrait photography and also live "action" from the Mass.  We have a great time at St. Philip Neri every year and love to see the church grow, one child at a time.  Two more weekends and we will be done with this project.   Thank you to all of the parent and children who come by to see us for a portrait.  Peace.

been a few months. . .

New virtual address, new blog mission.  New mission = food, and maybe fun.  Stay tuned for more action sports fans.

Ok, I haven't posted in a bit. . .

Hello again! Very sorry to have been away, but a lot has been going on for Steve and I.
We're still running www.usphotolab.com and www.fotoop.com is still going strong. Here are a few highlights from the past 8-10 months:

• we bought a new house, and finished the basement for an 1800 square foot studio(still in Tega Cay, just down the street from our old house)
• we just sold our old house to a nice guy from the Czech Republic.
• attended Little Feat concert, that was rock'n!
• had great photo shoot with 2 models, see prom examples on www.fotoop.com
• I made it 1 year working for Steve full time, gave up and got a fun job at Muzak as a voice consultant. I write marketing materials and do some voice work. Nice people and more music than you would ever want!!
• studio will be opening (officially)at the first of May!

I promise to do a better job at posting. . .promise!

I hate people.

Koko enjoying the winter sun. 

First day of class

Thursday night was my first class in SLR Digital Photography at The Light Factory. (Spirit Square) It was really cold out, and I was in day 5 of this flu bug that S and I both have right now, so I wasn't feeling 100%.

Right off I met the woman who is going to be teaching the portraiture class that S will be taking in a few weeks. She was really nice and she found out where our class had been moved. I also met another student, Gary, and he was really nice as well. He recently retired from being an air traffic controller after 30 years, but he didn't really look that old to me. When I told him that I had also retired from MS in October, I thought that the woman sitting next to me who was apparently eaves-dropping was going to swallow her tongue. (serves her right)

Anyway, Gary seems to be really sharp and is doing this as a hobby. The really scary part is that there are 2 or 3 folks in this class who are planning to do this for a living, and one of them is going to photograph a wedding in a few weeks. (keep in mind this is a beginners class) Well, I do hope that they do not charge the wedding people for their work! Once lady didn't even have a camera yet, she is going to borrow one.

Everyone else had their own equipment, but I was the only one who actually had pro level equipment. That's a bit scary as well, since some are going to do pro work apparently.

Ok, Louise is licking my leg, and it is really starting to get on my nerves. Smelly cat had her check up this week as well, and doc says she's in good shape for an old lady. She's even lost a bit of weight, and that's good. He does want to clean her teeth however, so I'll have to save up the $150 and maybe take her back to the vet in February. (she does have bad breath)

Back to class. It started out a bit slow, talking about data disks, using your computer, formatting and deleting files. . . so I took a little nap. Then we got on to the good stuff and talked about f-stop, and white balance. Brian gave us some homework to do with bracketing our exposures, and we got a chance to learn a bit more about our cameras.

Turns out that I know a bit more than I thought that I did about photography. There's another lady in the class that seems to be in the same boat, and I could tell that she was also glad to get to the more interesting topics as well.

There is a helper in the class who helps people with their cameras, but he doesn't know anything about mine, and isn't really a help to me so I just look it up in the book. Besides, he's a smoker and has that fragrance issue if you know what I mean.

Anyway, first class was fine, but it really would have been better if I could have been able to breath better. We were in a nice gallery, and the temperature was good, so I was mostly comfortable and I made a friend or 2 so that's good. They all want me to bring card for them from the lab, so that's good.

Ok, well Louise has started chewing the network cable again so I better go for now. I want to check out that new show tonight after the football, Numb3rs. It looks like it will be good, and kind of goes along with a dream that I had last night. I'll have to fill you in on that one another time, it is a bit complicated and involves calculus.

400 germ buckets

Over 400 basketball players between the ages of 4 and 14. . .so of course we both have the flu now. We both started feeling bad on Sunday, and by Monday we were just staying in bed and comparing our aches and pains.

There is a lot of post production work, but we should have all of that done and in the mail by Wednesday. The pictures came our really nice this time since S added a hair light to each setup. I think that the parents will be pleased. Some of them were disappointed that they didn't know ahead of time that we were doing the pictures this year. Last year we only did the older kids, but this year we did them all. Since some of the parents didn't know in advance, they weren't prepared to spend a lot of money on our photos. (which is what they prefer) Many parents have told us that they no longer buy school photos, since our image quality is so much better. They would rather spend their money with us. That is so good to hear!!

This will be a very busy week. Getting the images ready for the print lab on Wednesday, shipping that out on CD's, and then getting ready for the next shoot. Thursday is Louise's check up, and we hope that comes out ok. Then I start photog school on Thursday night. It was delayed by the light factory due to illness, so we will get started at Spirit Square this week instead.

Friday night there is a gallery crawl, and an opening at our friend's gallery in NoDa. That should be good for a relaxing evening in the art district. This weekend will be a time to catch up on laundry, and sleep. I'd also like to do a bit of experimentation with paint for our bedroom. I have some wallpaper to take down in the bathroom, and am planning to try some paint treatments in the bedroom to see how that looks. I'm thinking about putting beams up on the ceiling in the bedroom as well. S thinks it is a good idea as well, and it should create a cozy feel for such a large room. (26' x 18)

It was good to catch up with the redneck guru the other day at Carmel Baptist. It looks like we are definitely going to participate in the summer program, so that will be exciting for us this year. Our neices and nephews are getting older, and it isn't such a big deal for them to visit their aunt and uncle anymore, so we'll have plenty of time this summer.

Well it's time to do my accounting for the week. Lots of entries to make, and books to balance. I also have to send a few emails to some of our larger accounts and remind them that yes, they do have to pay us! We're not running a charity. . . at least not yet.

Koko's Gone Nuts Cake

She's such a dear little cat. . .right! At least she is until she has a random synapse fire, and she just goes crazy. That's what happened the other night when I tried to put together a "real" cocoanut cake.

For about a month I have been craving coconut cake, the real kind that mom used to make with the cooked 7 minute frosting and all. I've had the cake in restaurants recently, but it just hasn't been the same, so the other night I baked 2 layers and got them ready for the frosting. Mom and I went out to dinner and a movie, and when we got home I started on the frosting. It is quite a complicated process, difficulty level of 10, and it went really well for me that night.

It involves a double boiler, a hand mixer, and some really funky chemistry that involves eggs whites, salt, a lot of sugar, almond extract, orange extract and vanilla.

I had just finished putting in the apricot filling, completed frosting the top and was moving down to the sides when it all started. I needed to move my kitchen stool over to the other side of the counter so that I could frost the sides, and at the same time Koko was stealing a bit of cat food from Thelma's bowl that was under the butcher block table. When Koko saw the stool coming towards her, she freaked.

You know how when there is a tragedy everything goes in slow motion? Well this was nothing like that. It was more like a roadrunner cartoon, with the "woop woop woop" music and all! It went so fast. There was Koko, she ran straight up the side of the kitchen cabinet, landed in the cake and just stood there spinning her legs at 90 miles an hour. Cake, frosting, apricots were flying. Then she just flew across to the other side of the countertop, and the frosting bowl and a large ceramic bread bowl fell from the countertop to the floor. Nothing broke. . .except the cake that is. Not a drop of icing fell from the bowl. It was sort of a miracle. The ceramic bowl was intact but I was a total wreck.

Of course I screamed, 3 cats disappeared for the next 12 hours, and mom just yelled from upstairs, "what did you break now?"

Well, I was able to salvage some of the cake. I just cut off all of the parts that Koko had ruined, and ended up with about half of a cake left, so I frosted it, applied cocoanut and had a slice. I thought about putting the pile of wasted cake in the cat's food bowl for the next 3 days, but thought better of that. Don't want them hyped up any more than they already are on sugar.

It was so like living in a cartoon there for a split second. Much later that night Koko had the nerve to jump up on the bed and "meow" at me. She's got nerve for someone who weighs only 6 pounds. We both curled up and went to sleep.

Cruise Pics

I've posted all of the pictures from the cruise that mom and I took. Some are ok, but most are pretty bad. Almost all of the Key West pictures were taken from inside of the trolley, so you can see that. All of these pictures were taken with my old Olympus Camedia C-2000Z 2.1 megapixel camera that I have had for over 10 years.

Find cruise 2004 pictures at: http://www.photoreflect.com/scripts/prsm.dll?EventFrame?event=09KR0003

this boat's a rock'n

but not in a good way. . .tonight at dinner mom got seasick again, and this boat is moving around a bit as we left Grand Cayman and headed to Mexico. I think that we spend tomorrow at sea, and then spend Thursday in Mexico.

I'm feeling fine, but mom has always gotten motion sickness when we took car trips. Had a great time on shore today. Saw the turtle farm (Los Tortugas), went to Hell (and back), saw 7 mile beach and then did some shopping. While in Hell, I had just enough time to send Steve an actual "Postcard from Hell" with the official post mark and all. I think he'll understand the sentiment behind that jesture. :-)

Tomorrow I will be relaxing on deck, with or without mom. Tonight I am going to try to find that couple that I met last night. They are from Rock Hill and are a lot of fun. Saw them at the pool this afternoon and they came over and said hello. The comedy show should be good and I'm sure they will be there too. Then I may go up to the pool party at 10:30, but that all depends on the weather. Too much wind and they may not have the party.

That's all for now from the Gulf of Mexico.
Adios amigos!

Merchant "services"?

Wow, they really need to think about changing the name of that offering. . .service really doesn't seem to enter into it at all! We've been dealing with a problem between Wells Fargo and Innovative Merchant Solutions, and boy what a mess.

I finally got all of us on the phone today on a con-call and we got it fixed. . .but we'll see when the statements come out. Cross your fingers. Bidness. . .ain't it fun?

Guess I'll never understand

Ok, I just don't get it. The most grotesque person in the world can walk by a child on the street without any reaction from the child. But put someone in a Santa suit, sit back and wait to hear them all scream bloody murder!

I don't get it.

If I never hear Ho Ho Ho again, or see one more running nose, it will be too soon. So glad that Santa session is over. And I swore, on my Martha Stewart cookbook, to never work a Santa shoot ever again. . .unless I get to use real bullets.

I mean it.

There was one couple that just couldn't seem to manage to make a decision about anything! I later found out from Santa. . .who truly does know everything. . .that she is on medication and has special "issues". Go figure!

Made one couple NOT laugh. They were on opposite sides of their child, each yelling "smile" so the child looked confused. All I said was "well it won't be the first time that a child will be confused by its parents." What?? I wasn't trying to be mean. . .just honest.

Oh well, NEVER, mark my words I said NEVER will I do that again. Santa and Steve got together and decided to plan some kind of event for next year, but I'll have no part.

Merry Christmas. . .Bah

So I'm not even in the room. . .

and he's still talking. Geeze! Rant, rant, rant.

Yippy skippy!

What a day. . .we met with a large dance studio today and they were very pleased with our work and want us to handle their photography for this year. This is very exciting for us. After using the same photographer for over 10 years, they switched last year and were not happy. Since we have built up our portfolio and our experience with large groups and dance schools, they seemed comfortable talking with us about their experience with the other photographers and about their needs.

So, after 1 1/2 months of calling and bugging the fool out of them, we were able to meet face to face and close the deal. Persistence is certainly your friend in sales!

To top it off, we had a very good portrait session today with a lovely family of 4. They were a young family with LOTS of energy, but we all had a great time. We're really adding to the portrait portfolio with this family, so we are going to open up that business next year. So far we really haven't gone after the portrait market, but Steve thinks he is ready now, and is very comfortable with session planning now. I'm going to school at The Light Factory beginning in December, so that will help as well on some of our bigger projects.

Steve and our partner have been kicking around some ideas on the digital signage stuff lately, so SteveD is coming down next week to work with Steve and a contact at the Bobcats, and some others from the Breakfast club. I hope they can get that going so that SteveD can help me with the lab sales. I'm a bit behind on signing up new photographers, but I hope to really catch up in New Orleans at the show.

I finally got the fliers done for the trade show, and the flier will also go out in the monthly checks to all of the PhotoReflect photographers. With that much "touch" we should get a few leads. . .I hope!

Funny thing that Steve did the other day. He was messing around with the order data from our website, and he sent out thank you emails to all of our October online customers. . .well that generated more sales on the website!! Very cool. He offered holiday cards, and several folks took us up on that offer.

This weekend is going to be quite busy. We have the Springmaid 5K, the Tread & Shred at Renaissance Park, and then it is the Christmas Tree lighting and Santa at Baxter Village. For the rest of this week, I'm working on a proposal for the White Water Training Center and getting all of my paperwork out of the way so that mom and I can go on our cruise. (I'm very excited about that!)

Just finished up a really cool book the other day. It was a very fast read, but I took my time with it. . .the book is called "My Naked Journey" and I was so impressed by it that I bought a copy for my best friend for Christmas. The trick will be to get Steve to read it. . .think I'll tell him it's porn, then maybe he'll take a look. . .heeheehee. Anyway, an excellent read. Guess I'll have to find something to read for the cruise. . .any recommendations, just let me know.

On a sad note, our poor kitty Thelma is very sick. She has been throwing up several times each day, so I took her to see Doc Willoughby. He had to sedate her, take some blood and also took a look at her teeth. It was quite sad. She has 2 loose teeth, and one that looks rotten and her gums are swollen. Not a good thing when you can't hold a toothbrush. Anyway, she is schedule for surgery next Wednesday, and for a 90 year old, this will be a big deal. After this she will have to switch to soft food, and we do hope that she recovers well. Doc seems to be doing well with all of his animals and kids. Was good to catch up with him and hear the latest on the robot that he is building. (MAC based at that!)

Well, that's all there is for now. . .hopefully my 1 reader will appreciate the effort. :-)

Happy Holidays from the Lyons Family!  

It's a difficult life as a smellycat.  

Louise is looking at me

This cat thinks that she is the center of the universe. If I can't sleep, then I must certainly be up so that I can pet her, right? Louise is most definitely my cat.

So I can't sleep, and this cat is just looking at me with those eyes and I'm eating jelly toast and drinking milk. My friend Suz made the best peach preserves, and I still have half a jar left. They are so good!

Steve woke up while I was still deciding if I wanted to get up and get a snack or not, and he said the most brilliant thing. "If you didn't stay up so late, you wouldn't sleep in every morning." Duh. Some people really shouldn't try to be brilliant at 1:30am.

Anyway, I've been thinking about a couple of my friends, and wondering how they are doing. I'm also very excited about the trip that my mom and I are planning. We have booked a cruise and will be leaving in December. (Steve's staying home with the cats!) I've also been thinking about how we're going to manage our booth at the trade show, and about our apres show event that we will be hosting at the Hyatt. I guess I should make some notes so that I don't have to walk around with all of those plans in my head. I'll have to order the printed materials very soon as well, but since we are the print lab, that shouldn't be much of a stretch.

Steve seems a bit down lately, so I've been worried about him as well. Not sure how to help him exactly, but he sure is offloading a whole lot of account stuff on me, so I guess that helps him. The books really don't take much time since he did such a great job setting them up initially. The only piece that is missing at this point is payroll. We have to get that going so that we can show some earned income next year. Greg us supposed to come over and help us get that setup, but he's really hard to pin down since the new store is opening in January.

I haven't had a chance to work with our lab customers yet, but now that I'm doing their billing I should be able to meet them over the phone. I'd like to start calling some of our accounts that have slowed down a bit just to see what's up and to introduce myself to them. I think it will be a lot more fun for me once I get to work more closely with the photographers. I'm also excited about going to school at the Light Factory in Charlotte. That should start in January.

Well, I'm starting to get a little sleepy so I think I'll call it a night.

today is one of those days

Yes, this is one of those days when I wish that I had my old job back at Microsoft. I might even go so far as to say that I miss my old job at Microsoft.

I had great news yesterday. . .was able to get a particularly difficult account to agree to meet with us on Tuesday and then have lunch so that was very good progress. And I was told that if I close all of the business that I have in the pipeline for Steve Lyons Photography, then I have met quota and can stop. (otherwise he'll have more than he can do)

Yesterday was also a banner day for USPhotoLab. Plans are coming along nicely for the trade show in NO. We have hired a model for the booth, we have shirts and hats being made with the USPhotoLab logo and I had some ideas for apre show activities that we can do to generate more business for the lab. All in all a very productive week.

However, the rage must stop. If anything goes wrong, there is a rage. (and I mean ANYTHING)

Can't take this. . .I'm not used to it and don't want to get used to it. Humm. . .at least at MS no one ever totally lost their marbles with me.

. . .and if he "misplaces" just one more battery. . .and these are your really expensive items, that you just can't pick up at the CVS.

Anyway. We'll see how this weekend goes with one horse race and then a cheerleading competition on Sunday.

US Photo Lab is up and running. . .

Well, at least the website is up and running: www.usphotolab.com
But it's a start! We did sign up 2 new pro photographers this week, and have a prospective customer in the pipeline. The show in January should help a lot, plus we are now on the public network at PhotoReflect.com so we'll get more "browse up" traffic in the next few weeks.

My job for the next 2 months is to get the member only content ready for the site, and also put together our marketing plan for the PPA show in New Orleans in January. We've hired a model for our booth, and I have to come up with the materials for the booth and coordinate our "after the show" event at the Hyatt. This should be fun, but there is a lot of work to do to prep for the show. I'm excited! . . .except about the whole "flying to New Orleans" part of it.

Well, gotta go, we have 3 events this weekend and lots to get ready.