It is still a work in progress, but feel free to check it out at jakesmag.com

Vague blogging is the worst. So, I apologize in advance. I can just say that the last few days have been a series of ups and downs that have left me with a general feeling of blah. It seems fitting that it is like 9000% humidity today and spitting rain. I’m just glad that I have Reagan and a solid group of friends to keep me sane.

Moving along to the more positive side of things:

Despite the title of this post, we are actually past midweek. Only one day until the weekend. There was a big winner in the Manfrotto Giveaway. I really enjoyed reading all of awesome stories about the future possibilities of that bag. I seriously wish that I could have fired a new kit off to every single person who commented. Ultimately, Dan R. was the lucky individual. Apparently it pays to procrastinate. He was commenter 210 of 214. Congratulations, Dan!

Other good things going on:

1. I’m working on a pretty fun project with a friend of mine and Reagan’s involving the top photo in this post. I can’t really say what it is, yet. But it will potentially be very cool.
2. Speaking of projects, our friend (and now neighbor) Joe is going to be working with me on the project mentioned in #1. He is the same friend that I am doing ear full of gold with. I mentioned the project a while back. Joe actually has a pretty good design idea going on over there right now, feel free to check it.
3. Reagan is taking a weekender to Chi town this weekend with our sister-in-law Mel. They seem pretty excited about it. And, I am excited for them.
4. Just from making this list, my spirits have been lifted a bit.

More positivity to come, later this week.

I’m back in NYC. I’m totally underwater. Unlike Europe, while away this time, I was no where near a computer for most of the vacation. In addition, both of my blackberry batteries died (and I wasn’t around outlets long enough to charge them [plus I kind of didn't really want to]). So, I’m super behind on email and everything else. While I’m trying to get caught up, here are a couple of quick relatively randomly selected shots from Arches Nat. Park.

Try to spot Mike in the shot below.

There will be a proper vacay report coming later this week. Happy Tuesday.

Reagan and I are both crossing the Atlantic ocean for the first time today. Seems a bit ridiculous, to have lived in NYC for nearly 10 years and still not have spent even a long weekend in Europe, I know. I have had a hard time being excited about it, because I get hung up on the logistics and stress plays a large role in my life. But, now that we are underway I’m really actually very excited about what adventures await us. Reagan is bouncing off  of the walls excited. It tends to be a bit infectious. We have some awesome friends who are now our neighbors, who have agreed to hold down the fort for us and even visit PJ. They are seriously the best.

I have queued up a few posts for when I’m away. But, hopefully I will have a minute to update from the EU while we are there. I just wish that we would have timed it a little bit better so that we could have hit the Moto GP race at Le Mans or Catalunya. We miss both of them only by a couple of days. Bob, we may be joining you to watch at the Brickyard instead.

So, hasta luigi, and happy upcoming Memorial Day weekend.

Where to start? We had a fun albeit brief visit from Reagan’s friend Stefanie on Friday. She flew in Thursday evening, and out again Saturday morning. Friday night we did the Korea town Karaoke thing and got back out our pad on Saturday morning, just in time for her to shower eat a snack (below) and for me (while Reagan slept) drive her to the airport. I’m not going to fault Reagan for not coming on a ride to airport, though. She was laid up all day Saturday with a head cold. Luckily she was feeling much better today. We had a great visit with Piper. It was raining pretty much all day, so we just kicked it inside and watched some movies/let her climb all over us. It was a pretty uneventful visit, and I didn’t even snap one photo. But, if you want to see some super cute shots of Piper playing outside on the playground on Friday morning, check Reagan’s page.

In other news, we have a banger of a week ahead of us. We are still trying to get ready for our little trip across the pond. We have really not done a great job of prioritizing our preparations. Reagan has been taking inventory on her collection of sunnies (top photo). I have been talking a lot about thinking about packing, etc.. It is going to be interesting to see how things play out.

Even though I insinuated that Mondays are sinister in title of this post, it is probably going to be the easiest day for me this week. I’ll probably be spending my free time on Monday trying to queue up some blog material to post while I’m off the grid in the coming weeks. I’m shooting two things Tuesday. Wednesday, I’m shooting some product early, then I’m going to try to juggle the Hugo Boss party at the Guggenheim, with an extra super dope and kinda secret event involving Pharrell taking place on the LES. Thursday night there is a gallery opening, and Reagan’s family arrives. Ok, now that I’m listing things out, Friday should be relatively mellow too. I always enjoy hanging out with Reagan’s fam. Saturday is Piper’s Birthday. Since I’m on a roll… Sunday: visit PJ/Hangout with Reagan’s fam. Monday– a sendoff for Reagan’s fam/plan a trip to Europe. Tues-visit to the dentist/pack. Wed- vacation.

So, yeah.

I haven’t really been shooting much, for the past couple of days. So, I thought I would post a leftover from Sunday (above). Reagan is headed out of town today, to attend her grandmother’s funeral. I only met her grandma a couple of times, but I really liked her. She was a really sweet lady. I wish that I could have gone along, but it was more than we could really arrange on such short notice. So, Piper and I will be holding down the fort for the next few days.

In other news, I have been busily working on redesigning my photog site for the last few days. The old version had some flash elements that I wanted to get rid of. Plus, I just felt like the whole look was a bit outmoded. I’m still working on polishing things up, image selection, etc. But, check it out and give me some feed back if you have a sec.

The first art show that we hit yesterday was The Armory. It was massive. Almost too huge. I was exhausted by the time that we left. The shot above is overlooking half of one of the two piers that contained the show. Again– massive. Anyway, a few of my favorite shots from the armory include the one directly below, and the one with the hanging dollar bills.

I wasn’t really paying attention to the names of the artists for these two shots. I wasn’t even particularly fond of the pieces, but I thought that the setup of the display lent themselves to an interesting shot. Especially the one above, the way that those two gallerists happened to be standing right there conversing.

After The Armory show, we headed a bit further downtown to hit Scope. Below are some of my favorite paintings from the show.

Andy Denzler is the artist who painted the work above. The artist who did the one below is quickly becoming one of my favorite painters. Her name is Anna Borowy. I first saw some of her work a few months ago on a press release from a gallery show that she was doing in Berlin. It was very, very cool to finally see some of it in person.

And finally, I really enjoyed this piece by Victor Rodriguez called “Two Masks.” I love the concept and work. Two more shows today.

Sam B. rolls into town tomorrow. Good times will undoubtedly ensue. Incidentally, there are also grips of art shows going on this week. I will be covering nearly all of them for Curated/HS.  So, sorry if you hate visual art. Because, hey, there are going to be some photos of art shows on here for the next few days.

On an entirely different note. I just wanted to say how much I love the readers of JNB. Yeah, all 12 a of ya’ll (did I spell “ya’ll” right, Kelvis?). Even the crazy ones (you know who you are). To show a little bit of that love, I’m going to start doing some giveaways. Basically just whenever I feel like it. I might make up some fake reason or milestone to try to justify it. But in reality it is just that I’m trying to unload some (debatably) cool swag (of which I have amassed shload of in my fake-line of work)(I’ll try to cut down on the parentheticals in the rest of this post, I promise). Winning it might entail some sort of lame contest that I invent.

As a matter of fact, I have already come up with a contest, as I was typing the stuff above.  I guess that I should announce the goods up for grabs, first. The item that will first be given away via Jake’s New Blog is none other than a Flud Turntable watch. Peep the images below of the actual watch that will be given away:

from a slightly different angle–

These images are just to whet the appetites of those possible 4 of the 12 JNB  readers who might be interested. The contest won’t actually start until probably sometime next week. The awesome thing about blogging for free is that there are no rules…. ever. But here is some insider information on what the contest will entail. I recently did a video for Curated and PF Flyers in which we featured various pieces of street art around the city. The contest will be something like “who will be the first person to name 5 artists whose works appear in the vid.” So– if you are perving on that turntable watch for your aspiring rapper boyfriend/husband (because let’s be honest mostly girls read this page), or even possibly for yourself, study up on your art. At least two of the artists have been heavily featured on JNB. Spoiler alert, one of them is not Banksy.

So, yeah. There is all of that. This might get embarrassing when I actually start the contest. But until then, happy hump day.

[top img: Curated, Juxtapoz, Highsnobiety]

Like any good contributor to society, I jotted down some resolutions for the new year.  Here we are in the second week of February and I thought it might be a good time to revisit the list and do a bit of evaluation.

1. Get more rest. — This one has been patchy. But for the most part I would say that I’m doing a lot better. I have been able to cut the late nights down to once or twice per week (not counting going out on the weekends).
2. Stop eating just to break up the monotony. — I have been a lot better about this. Even though it has been a tough stretch lately, with work. I have not used buying/consuming food as an excuse to be away from my desk.
3. Stop spreading myself too thin. –I haven’t really made much progress with this.
4. Start running again.  –Finally, yes. I didn’t do the once per week for the rest of January, like I had hoped. But I did get out yesterday, then again this morning. My mileage for the year is still under 10, but hey, it’s gross out there. Check out the photo above from the weekend. There is still snow and ice everywhere.
5. Start shaving. –Shaved, then grew back the beard. I decided that this resolution is one that can wait for warmer weather.

And anxiously awaiting the return of their lovely bride from far off lands.

(slide to view)

They take a photo of themselves in a mirror, or even a small series of them. Apparently they also grow their beards back. I just want to say that I think that it’s kind of cool the way that either one eye, or the other is in focus in these shots. I guess that I also want to say that I really hope Reagan makes it home. Finally, happy Friday.