Louisiana.

Welcome to Louisiana. No joke.

From Austin we drove East on the 10, went arouuuund Houston and kept on going. Louisiana was only a few short hours east. Louisiana is absolutely gorgeous. The bayou was something new all together. A place unique as the redwoods are in California. The city of New Orleans was one of the most interesting cities I have ever visited. It is tops on my list to go back to and explore. An afternoon is not enough time. A week may be enough time to get the basics down, a month would be more like it. The unique mix of history, architecture, and mash ups of people and cultures make this city someplace to want to get to know, for better or for worse.

I really wish we could have spent more time in New Orleans. What a fascinating city. Unfortunately all we had time for was a drive through the city streets and then an afternoon and evening in the French Quarter.

The juju is strong here. Everyplace on Earth has an essence to it, and if you are tuned into it, you can feel it. New Orleans felt like no place else. If you visit the quarter, I absolutely recommend the voodoo museum. We also took a haunted history tour which was really neat too.

I walked to the shore of a swamp near Baton Rouge, and I was greeted by this lil guy. He wasn't so little either. Probably more like eight feet little.

This lil guy was more like 12 footer.

Another lil guy, sunning himself on the shore. Seriously there were freakin everywhere. Like sea gulls at the Pier.

Mississippi River view in Baton Rouge.

The old state capitol in Baton Rouge.

Sunset on the Mississippi.

What a state! Like I've already emphasized I really loved New Orleans. I really liked Louisiana. Next time we will have to spend more time in New Orleans as well as exploring the northern part of the state.

LinkedIN

I made a LinkedIn. Felt sort of awkard, but I think its going to be ok.

www.linkedin.com/pub/james-andrew-ridley/19/31b/a29

What's next? Twitter?! Oh hell no. You don't want to follow me, and I don't want you to follow me either.

Texas.

Where did I leave off last? Oh right ... cross country ... last time I got us all the way through New Mexico. Where does that leave us for this post? Oh right, TEXAS. Texas is its own country, half our trip was driving through Texas. Ok, that is a little bit of an exaggeration, but it certainly felt like that. We finished New Mexico with Roswell and drove directly East on some highway who's particular number I forget. Our first destination was the Fort Worth / Dallas area where we had some friends to stay with. We only spent an afternoon in Fort Worth, but it was definitely TEXAS. Belt buckles, steak, cowboy boots and  ... and well ... cows. We decided our sole destination within Fort Worth would be the Old Stockades. Did not disappoint. It provided for some fantastic photo opportunities and some new sites. We did not try the steak. I sort of regret that.

 

 I don't normally post pictures of my significant other in my blog, but this one came out so well. How could I not?

Those are serious cows. Totally the Triceratops of modern mammals.

 



I don't think it gets much more Texas than this shot.

After Fort Worth we were off to the Peoples Republic of Austin. I really have to take a moment to mention that this was really a miserable drive. Texans drive a lot like Californians, except their highways are only 2 lanes, and they have a tendency to drive over sized diesel trucks that are lifted as if they are mud trucks. They also like to do what I coined "The Texas Ass Ride". Not so fun at 75mph, and yes, that name was meant to be ironic.

Anyways. Austin is awesome, ok, Austin was overrated, but I still found it awesome. I don't know. I guess my expectations of Austin were just too high. I doubt its really the live music capital of the world, but it might just be the bar capital of the world. Holy crap they have a lot of bars, and each one has live music! I have a feeling we missed Austin's awesome peak by a decade or two. However. I really did dig a lot of the people that we met there. I also really loved the outdoors activities in Austin. Barton Spring is amazing. Red Bud Island along the Colorado is great. Loved swimming there hanging out with the locals. We had great food in Austin, and definitely had some good beer.

Alright, let us follow this up with some touristy pictures taken by a tourist, aka me.

In front of the Daniel Johnston mural.

This is but one of Austin's phallic signs.

Barton Springs. A must visit. Beware the lettuce.

At some show we stumbled into awkwardly on a rainy 90 degree night. No, that is not Barney.

The Texas state capitol. How did Austin get so liberal while being the Texas state capitol?! I will never know. Rick Perry must live beyond the city limits.

Anyways, that is it for tonight. I have at least two more parts to this cross country extravaganza. Is this all filler to fill in until I start shooting a brand new project here in NYC?! Kinda!!

Cross Country Part 1

I have been living in NYC now for a little over two months. We left California May 1st, and arrived in Long Island on the 15th. We found jobs, and found an apartment we could actually afford in Manhattan. Not that we are in a hip and cool part of the city, but its the same size as our old apartment in Long Beach! We sold the car, so we are stuck here.

Driving cross country was an amazing experience. It is something that I feel everyone should do at some point in their lives. It is part of growing up in the United States. It is a must do.

We drove through the southern part of the states, and we visted a lot of cities and towns along the way. Tuscon, Tombstone, Las Cruces, Roswell, Fort Worth, Austin, New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Memphis, and Nashville were all major stops for us. I took well over two thousand photos, and so did she. We have had a lot to go through!

I am getting a little angsty, so I am going to skip the writing and go straight to some photos. Actually, I think I am just hungry. Pizza time. Brb. Alright, three pieces later, I am a happier camper. I think its time to post some pics and go wander around town.

Leaving California we had to make a stopover at Slab City and Salvation Mountain. The rumors are true, Lenard Knight is now in a home. There is a co-op of people from Slab City that are maintaining his mountain. I wish Lenard the best, he is a truly special man with a lot of love in his heart.

Sunset in Arizona just outside of Tuscon.

A cemetery outside of Tuscon.

Tombstone Arizona. Tombstone was pretty awesome. I am big on cheesy road side attractions. I can't get enough of em.

Roswell New Mexico. Odd little town. I highly recommend eating at the Cowboy Cafe, and partaking in every single cheesy alien thing you can find. When else in your life will you do that again? Never. Unless you go back to Roswell ...

updated website

I updated my website this afternoon: http://www.jamesandrewphotography.com/ . I simply added the "Fashionable Portraits" portfolio onto it. Really, most of these photos have been on my site in some form or another. They occupy an awkward middle ground. All of these shots were created for the purpose of being something or another, whether that something or another was for use in a models portfolio as head shots, or the hair stylist portfolio for their use or maybe just a school project. Often times they were created simply for my portfolio for an opportunity to play with light and a new model. I don't feel comfortable calling them fashion photography or portrait work. They are not quite personal work, nor are they strictly commercial work. The middle ground that they occupy is both less than more than their sums. Awkward.

Anyways. I have been going through the thousand or so photos I took while traveling cross country. Wow. It was a really amazing trip. Hopefully soon I will have the time to really look at them. Right now I am incredibly busy finding an apartment as well as a new job. Jobs are important, so are homes. I would like both please.

Alright, thanks Blogger for changing your menus. It only took me a few minutes to fumble through and re-discover how to post a blog.

Enough of that eh? Ok, I just got to New York! Tomorrow will be my first time in the city. For now I am staying in a suburb on Long Island. I am hoping to have an apartment by the 1st of June. Until then, I am posting everything from my really slow and under powered lap top. Editing truly is a task on this thing. We will see what I can make happen.

Drove cross country, took the scenic route for as much of it as I could afford. My route was San Diego to Tuscon, to Alamogorod NM, to Roswell NM, to Fort Worth TX to Austin TX to Lafyette LA to New Orleans LA to Baton Rouge LA to Memphis TN to Nashville TN and then it was a pretty crooked shot to NYC. I tried to avoid the interstates as much as possible except at the end when time finally really mattered. I will post more on this later.

A bit of minor news. I am moving to NYC in a month and a half! OK, I won't actually be there until mid May, but I am leaving California on May 1st. Exciting stuff. I am going to be driving cross country, through the southern states and then up the East Coast. Expect a lot of photos from that! In the mean time, I am incredibly busy with getting stuff in order.

In other minor news. I finished putting Santa Ana into a portfolio. http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/3057018 You can purchase a copy for yourself through Blurb. A little pricey, but it looks pretty awesome. I will potentially update it at some point with an essay of some kind, but for now its mostly photos with a tiny bit of writing. It looks pretty amazing in person.

These are a few shots from the Hickey Underworld. A small part but extremely important part of my project "Unknown". The Hickey was a punk house in Long Beach. It was off Magnolia and Anaheim, and once a month they would host a mixture of local and touring bands. Some of the shows got pretty ridiculous. These four shots came from the show where Andrew Jackson Jihad headlined. The place had to have a couple hundred kids there. The police broke the show up at 10, but a lucky few dozen got ushered into the house. After the police left, Andrew Jackson played and it was ridiculous. These shots were before all that, during the opening acts.

The house itself was an unassuming home. On a regular night you would have no idea what kinda shit was going down. On party nights, there would be kids spilling out of the house all over the patio. Bicycles chained to the fences. 40ozs on the lawn.

After a few shows they started charging a few bucks at the door. All of the money went to the touring bands, and to fix the occasional broken window.

I believe this band was Merry Christmas. Local band, and all of their friends knew the words.

The Hickey Underworld attracted one of the best crowds of any show that I have been to. Nearly everyone was there to have fun. I don't remember anyone starting fights. I only remember everyone having way too much fun.

Thanks for reading!