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Time off - HAH!
There are good things about being a one-shooter shop and there are bad
things.
The good thing is that I have at least one front page photo six days
a week - and sometimes on Sunday . The bad thing is that I HAVE to have
local front page art six days a week and sometimes on Sunday.
What that means is that even on my days off, sick days, vacation days
- whatever - there has to be local art filed for those days. My normal
days off are Sunday and Monday so I have to have work in the can for Monday
and Tuesday even though I do not actually work the days before.
Saturdays can be a zoo - Lara running around like the proverbial headless
turkey shooting up everything in site in prep for those two days off.
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A month ago I had knee surgery. And what a pain in the tookus that
has been! Two months before the surgery I was shooting feature stories
and bits and pieces of stuff trying to get enough photos to run
the 10 days I was off. Right. I had saved certain wild art pieces,
like a tour of Mitchell Caverns, for occasions such as this and/or
vacation time.
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Mitchell - This was the lead shot of a photo
package on Mitchell Caverns - a series of limestone caves with wonderful
and rare geologic formations. Quite famous among cavers. |
And speaking of vacation time, may I rant a bit here? Who can take a
vacation on the salary this small town shooter makes? I certainly can't.
Not two whole weeks of off-time I can't.
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The first three days I had help - sometimes more than I wanted
but the doc insisted I stay off my knee and insisted that someone
be there. He scared me thoroughly with threats of permanent damage
if I didn't comply so I did.
And as for going back to work. "Oh sure," he said, "You can go
back to work but you have to stay sitting down."
"Hell-O-o~~? Do you know what I do for a living? Sitting down is
not part of the job description - at least not a big part."
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Crucero cross - The grave is way out in the
desert at an abandoned rail stop. It belongs to a little girl and
has been kept up since the 1930's. The iron fence is a rather new
addition. We were never able to find any relatives of Dolores Holland.
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Coolwater plant #1 - One of the reporters was
working on a story on the power plant in Dagget that would run while
I was recuperating. This was the lead shot. The manager is conveniently
walking in front of me so that I can have a "body" in the shot. He
asked me if I just wanted to watch his tookus. Nope. |
Plus when I mention vacation I can see
the look of dismay pass over my editor's face - "Oh gawd, now what
will we do for art?" So I shoot lots of "stuff" especially on my days
off exploring the desert just in case I want to take some vacation
time so that there is local art for the front page. The good thing
about all this is that I get to run images and stories that take a
little time in the doing and since they are not particularly timely
they can run anytime. I am building up a supply of these stories -
just in case I get to go on a small vacation. |
Coolwater plant 3 - This shot was just a filler
in the power plant story- but I liked the look of all the pipes and
stuff. |
Back to the knee surgery. Afterwards I spent ten days sitting or
sleeping - absolutely bored out of my mind. I became a SciFi channel
junkie and caught up on the soaps I hadn't had time to watch. I
was attached at the knee to a cooling unit called a Polar Pack.
(Imagine a picnic cooler filled with ice and water and a pump and
hose) Anytime I needed to get up, like to go to the ladies room
or eat, I had to disconnect the hose and electrical cable and hobble
around. Inevitably, as soon as I was hooked up again I would realize
that I had forgotten something and have to disconnect again.
Some of the art and stories that I had been hoarding were hauled
out of storage. If there was any breaking news stuff - I hobbled
to the scene, shot my shots and drove back to the office so I could
sit some more. Heck, I should have just stayed at home watching
the soaps.
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Here it is a month later and things don't feel a whole lot better and
before you ask, yes, I have been a good girl and not doing anything "bad".
I am still not cleared for any hiking or walking on very uneven surfaces
and won't be for at least another month. That alone is killing my spirit.
I have taken some nice drives in the desert and did a story on the Mojave
Phone Booth gathering that didn't require me to walk from the car much.
But the weather is getting loverly warm and I am getting rather depressed
at the slow healing process and my inability to move around like I want.
"Give it time." says the doc. "Give it time', says the physical therapist.
"Yeh yeh yeh," says I.
"The reasonable
man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying
to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the
unreasonable man." -- George Bernard Shaw
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