It has been pretty crazy in SLC, so far. Reagan and I have been loving every second of it. Here is a little taste of what we have been up to, since we arrived.

^—–Reagan holding our new little niece Clover

^—-Me, holding our new little niece Penelope

While NYC was having a snow day (our firm even closed early), I was having a little bit of a snow day of my own, enjoying all of the fresh pow that had fallen the night before. I took Reagan back country snowshoeing/snowboarding for the first time in her life. She loved it. I was so impressed by her toe touch, while wearing snow shoes.

^—-Looking down at Little Cottonwood Canyon from UT back country.

^—-”Flipping out” over all of the fresh powder. Heheh, I couldn’t resist, the pun.

Yes yes. How many times have I thrown up photos like this one before? Right? As I mentioned earlier this week, my Nike Plus sportband died on me, again. This is the third time it has happened. My cousin Liz suggested that I just abandon the sportband and go with the Garmin. I am almost to that point. I probably would have done just that, if it weren’t for the ever smooth and adept Nike customer service team. That, and the super cool staff at the running store in my building. I called Nike, who quickly trouble shot my watch with me and determined that it was a dud. They suggested that I try returning it where I bought it, before  sending it back to Nike. So I called Urban Athletics, who told me they would trade it straight across, for a new one. So, here we go. Sportband number 4 (pictured above). Treat me right, baby.

Switching gears completely, Reagan and I will be flying out west tomorrow. We have not been to the land of Deseret (yes that is Deseret, not desert), also know as the beehive state, since 2008 for my sister’s wedding. Since that time, one nephew and two nieces have joined the family. We have not met any of them yet. So, we have been anticipating this visit for quite a while.

Reagan and I were having a lot of anxiety about being able to go, because of Piper’s condition. But, it seems like she is on a pretty good plane, at the moment. God willing, things will continue that way, at least until we can return. Additionally, some of our amazing friends have agreed to take care of our car. Our lovely friends, the Alaska/Hofstra missies will be keeping an eye on our pad for us.

We will be taking a notebook computer with us (mostly so Reagan can play the cake building game). But I’m not sure how much posting we will get done over the next week. So, if it tends to be sparse, that is the reason.

I am no a metal expert. I have never really cared for GNR. I think that the opening riff to “Crazy Train” is one of the all time sickest riffs ever… no contests period. My wife and I danced down the aisle after being pronounced man and wife to “The Rhythm of Love.” I have never owned a Metallica t-shirt. One time I dated a girl who had a sister who had an ex-husband who had performed at The Whiskey once. Although I can name-drop many of the greats, I can only pick a few out of a listening line-up. I guess I could be called a dabbler at best.
The band I am thinking about has probably never even owned a cassette-recorder. I am sure that their demo tape was sent out digitally. I do know that they do have long hair, muscle tees and cutoff jean shorts. I also know that since my buddy Matt and I went on a 100+/- mile, 5 store, 2 burrito, and full afternoon search for the album after hearing the single, I was hooked. Behold… Black Tide… my current favorite metal fix. I typically enjoy them at about 5am on my way to work, or pretty much anytime I feel the need to get tough.
Sooo, the question now is what am I talking about? I am talking about what happens when you put together 4 teenagers, lots of hair, rock instruments, a lyric written using barely 35 different words, and record it all about for about 6 minutes… a song called “Warriors of Time.” That’s what.

I met some pretty cool guys, this weekend. They are the guys behind the brand Only New York, a local street wear brand. I am going to be doing a SoJones piece on them, and was able to do a quick shoot on Sunday afternoon. They are definitely cool guys. You should definitely check out their stuff. More on Shotbyjake.com

We took a ride to Westchester pretty early Sunday, so that we could have an extra long visit with Piper. She was really mellow. This was a nice change from her  crazy behavior over the past couple of weeks. The doctors feel like they were trying to ween her too fast from the narcotics, so they bumped the methadone back up and are bringing it down more slowly, this time. Poor little squirt. She still doesn’t really seem like herself. Part of the reason, I’m sure, is because they are giving her muscle relaxers, to try to mitigate the violent cycles of the withdrawals.  She also seemed a bit puffy, today.

We ended up having a really great visit with her. Especially, I had a lot of good one-on-one time with her, since Reagan was taking a nap for part of the visit. It was nice for me, since normally I don’t get to have the kind of visits where I can just hog Piper the whole time. It is going to be tough, not to see her for so long, while we are away. But hopefully, she will be more like herself, when we return.

A few more (similar) shots over here.

Saturday was the first race of 2010 for me. It was a good one to start out the year with, since the weather was beautiful and it was for a good cause (run for Haiti). It was also pretty cool, because it was the first race that our new team “New York Running Club” was listed correctly on the roster/results.

I tried to charge my Nike+ sportband the night before, only to find that it was malfunctioning, again. The display looked like some sort of alien language. Reagan was kind enough to let me borrow hers, since she was sitting this one out. I will be sending it back on Monday Grrrr. The Central Park Races are normally capped at 5000 runners. But since it was for a charity (I guess), they doubled the cap and let 10,000 participants run. It was crrraaazyy. I wasn’t expecting such a crowd, so I showed up at the 9th hour and barely made it starting grid before the gun. As a result, I was way in the back and had no real chance of making it through the pack enough to get a good time. It was ok, though. My friend Mike ran with me, and we just had a relaxing race, and chatted the whole time. It also made me totally pumped for the upcoming running season and nice weather. Woo hoo!

Our Alaska/Hofstra friends also came to visit us, this weekend. Reagan and I pretty much just tagged a long with them through the village to various thrift stores, before hitting Broadway, in SoHo (pretty much Reagan’s dream day). It was a pretty good time, even for me.

We also saw this guy, playing in Washington Square Park. It is the same dude who drags that busted old piano down to the 4th St. A platform in the Subway on the weekends. Pretty awesome.

Last night was a Karen Sabag runway show at the Altman Building in Chelsea. The venue was awesome. The ceiling in their event space is made of paver brick, which I loved. I was able to shoot the backstage, as well as the runway show. No CF card malfunctions Wednesday night. But there was a problem with the lights. Which was a bummer, because in contrast to the iFashion show, Tuesday night, Sabag, was actually properly lit. Luckily, they resolved it, after a few minutes. I was freaking out digging for my flash, for a sec. Anyway, it was a lot of fun. Catch more coverage from the Sabag show on shotbyjake.com.

Last night was the iFashion runway show, featuring 3 emerging designers. I was shooting back stage, as well as the actual show. It was a lot of fun. Although, I was totally punked by one of my CF cards which failed when I as trying to retrieve the images from it. I lost about 300 of the images from the headliner’s portion of the show (and the ones that I was the most excited about). When I realized that the card was corrupted, I almost had a heart attack. All in all, I still came away with some OK, stuff. Stupid technology. Sorry that there are so many photos in this post, and I know that the watermark is annoying. Here they are anyway.

I had a really fun day hanging out with my valentines. Reagan and I work up early, because she has been building pork barbacoa for the last day and a half. She has been making the stuff in the slow cooker, for some burritos tonight. It smells totally delicious. Before heading to Westchester, we took a quick jaunt out to Williamsburg, Brooklyn so that Reagan could pick up her Valentines Day present at Catbird.

We had a pretty nice visit with Piper. She was kind of rowdy. I think that it is just because she loves her mom so much, she can’t contain herself. She was kind of obsessed with my hat, today. She kept taking it almost all of the way off of my head, then putting it back on. Then, tapping the little button on the top. Silly little monkey.

I hope that everyone else had a great Valentines Day!!

For the first time in my life, I did karaoke with Reagan and some of our friends, on Saturday night. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I was definitely the worst person in our group. But, that didn’t keep me from having fun watching everyone else. Yes, there was a kick line at one point.

^—Reagan doing up some Abba (I think).

^—-Richard and Jamie: duet of the Cure

^—–Col, melting faces with Yellow Ledbetter.

After our karaoke session, we had some Korean dumplings, then spent some time browsing one of the Koreatown supermarkets. They has some seriously tasty hard candy. No, it didn’t come in the cool fish cans, above (unfortunately). I liked the fish on the cans because they look so friendly.