Of the many amateur hobbies I have, photography is one of my favorites. I realize that being forced to look at other peoples' rookie photography is the second worst thing ever, next to being forced to look at other peoples' poo. This, of course, is up for debate. And obviously, your pictures are always much better than your friends' lame pictures; this rule applies to my pictures in comparison with everyone else's. Capiche? I'm hoping they'll either make you curl the corners of your mouth the way you might if you were to grin at something, or make you cry the way you might when you watch those Visa commercials they play during the Olympics.
This week's Photo of the Week is entitled, "Bobby & Whitney; Caught in the Act"
Yes, these are my turtles. And yes, their names are Bobby and Whitney. You can read the larger story of how they came into our possession in this article, but I'll give you a little abridged version here. Basically, my roommate, Gwen, and I were accosted by an Asian lady in the Bronx who wanted us to "Please, please, for the love of God, PLEASE BUY SOMETHING" from her. It was either these two little turtles or a big trash bag full of Haitian crack. An RA had written me up the night before, and I figured that dragging a Hefty bag full of drug cartel into the dorm would probably do more to taint squeaky-clean reputation. So we dropped ten dollars for the turtles and took them home.
We named them Whitney and Bobby, since in the early months their favorite hobbies were engaging in savage brawls, and then calling the cops on one another. The NYPD began warning Gwen and I that if they had to come and break these two up one more time, they'd be sent to the turtle slammer. So we encouraged Bobby and Whitney to try and love one another.
Eventually, if you can believe it, they did begin to harbor a passionate lust for one another, and soon couldn't keep their claws off each other. They do this bizarre mating ritual where they touch noses and then vibrate their fingers at each other, a tactic I've been trying for years at bars. It hasn't been successful for me thus far, but these two find it undeniably sensual. They even make out from time to time, an event I have been trying to capture on film forever. This photo is a result of my failed espionage, as they always notice when I'm watching them with a four-inch lens, stop mid-kiss, and then glare at me condescendingly. I don't know, some folks aren't into voyeur. I guess that's just one more on the list of things the turtles and I don't have in common. Anyway, that's the story of Photo of the Week.
(Just a side note: I guess this will be good news to those of you who thought this post sucked, but I want to make sure the word "Week" doesn't mislead anyone into thinking that Photo of the Week will be a weekly feature. It probably won't. "Day" obligated me to post more frequently than my self-perpetuated laziness would allow me to, yet "Month" was too restricting, because perhaps I might want to post four photos in a 30 day span. By "Week," I really mean "from time to time, whenever deemed appropriate or necessary." So stay tuned for more photos each week. But maybe not.)