Have you heard of a Canon EOS Mark II 5D?
No?
Don’t feel bad. I hadn’t, either. Not until Ziva Moon at Ziva’s Inferno dropped me a note to let me know she bought one.
It’s some kind of fancy camera. Comes with an iron-clad guarantee that it’ll make Ansel Adams’ work look like the cheesy Polaroids your besotted college roommate took back in ’92 at the bubble party in Cancun.
I don’t own a fancy camera. I’m still using Adams’ old equipment. Not his good stuff. The junk he angrily threw off El Capitan at Yosemite National Park in 1952. It’s amazing what you can fix with a little chewing gum and duct tape.
I should’ve considered my equipment issues more carefully when Ziva recently invited me to participate in 30 Days of Photographs II, a sequel to the photo meme (I don’t know what meme means, either, so don’t ask me) that nearly killed both of us last year. Ziva could take award-winning photos with a broken ballpoint pen and carbon paper. But her new camera gizmo scares me.
You might remember our previous artistic excursion into the creative unknown.
Every day for 30 days, we posted carefully composed, beautifully lit photos to fit the meme’s themes. Or some kind of photo. Any photo, even if it sucked. Ziva’s were great. But at one point, I got so desperate for photos, I searched my neighbor’s trash looking for the rejects from his kid’s birthday party. You can see my photos starting here, but my “best” ones are here, here, here, here, here and here.
Trust me when I tell you that it’s really, really, really hard to post 30 half-decent photographs in a row.
That didn’t stop Ziva and me from willingly taking up the challenge again. Nor has it stopped a host of our bestus blogging buddies from joining the fray—I mean, fun—this year, including: Nicky and Mike at We Work for Cheese, Mo at MaddOg.org, Meleah at Momma Mia, Mea Culpa, John at nonamedufus, Bryan at Unfinished, Mariann at Blogged Down at the Moment, Malisa at Moonlight Hollow Pent-Up Photos, Nora at Door in Face, and LaughingMom at Where’s the Funny Here?
You can join, too.
In fact, please do.
It’ll be fun.
Oh, let’s be honest. It won’t be fun. It’ll be better than dying of boredom, and sometimes that’s the best you can hope for in life.
Please keep in mind that this isn’t a competition. There’s no winner, no prize or cash reward. No reward at all, in fact, unless you consider frustration and madness an incentive. If you do want to play, however, here are the rules, and they are inviolate:
1) The contest begins April 1st, also known as April Fools’ Day, and ends April 30th. We don’t care about whatever obligations you have on Easter or Tax Day, so stop whining and shut up. We know you’re a writer—a carefree soul who just wants to share your unique life insights with the world—but make a commitment and stick with it for once.
2) You must post a single photo—one per blogger per blog, not two or three or 10—that has something to do with the day’s theme, even if it’s a photo of a cat, and therefore worthless. If you miss a day, you can’t make it up because, to misquote the 1970s band Kansas, “You closed your eyes, only for a moment, and the moment was gone.”
3) Post your day’s photo at 6 a.m. Mountain Standard Time. If you live in another time zone, you’ll have to do the math to figure out what time that is. If you can’t do the math because you’re a writer not a mathematician, then you’re shit out of luck. I’d also suggest that throw yourself off the nearest bridge because you’re clearly a worthless sack of shit who will never make it in the real world.
4) Any photo taken since March 1st, 2012 qualifies for the non-competition. When we say any photo, we mean any photo whatsoever as long as you took the photo yourself and it fits the day’s theme in some way, even in an illogical, tenuous way that would make Charles Manson seem like Stephen Hawking. That includes nude photos, which are not only allowed, but encouraged.
5) All photos—especially the bad ones—may be accompanied by a witty, meaningful or utterly incoherent post of up to 250 words. Or no post at all, we don’t care. I have promised Ziva to obey this rule, even though I’m known in our blogging circles as “the blogger who doesn’t understand that nobody wants to read a 3,300-word post about the day he caught his high school girlfriend kissing his best friend, let alone an 970-word post explaining this 30 Days of Photographs II meme.”
And now for the list of the all-important themes for the meme (Again, I have no idea what meme means, and again, please don’t ask me. Also, don’t tell me, either. I don’t care what it means. It’s a stupid non-word, and I consider it my life’s penultimate goal to eliminate its use.):
Day 1: Silence
Day 2: Architecture
Day 3: From An Ant’s Perspective
Day 4: The experiment
Day 5: Power
Day 6: Tragedy
Day 7: Mirror
Day 8: A stranger
Day 9: Something I hate
Day 10: Waiting
Day 11: Wheels
Day 12: Fear
Day 13: Pleasure
Day 14: Forty-two
Day 15: Wood
Day 16: Ordinary matters
Day 17: Time
Day 18: Fire
Day 19: White
Day 20: Bird
Day 21: Moon
Day 22: Portrait
Day 23: Fish tales
Day 24: Crowd
Day 25: The future
Day 26: My toothbrush
Day 27: Nude
Day 28: Outlier
Day 29: Lines
Day 30: The Devil
Okay, I think that’s it. If you have any questions, please ask Ziva, because I don’t want to answer any questions. I raised four kids and work for the U.S. government, and I’m done with questions. People say there are no dumb questions, but people are wrong. There are stupid questions, lots of them. I’ve heard them all, and I’m sick and tired of dealing with the idiots who ask them.
Thank, and good luck! You’ll need it.
sweet. I’m psyched about this.
I’m not. But I’m committed. I feel like I’m going to fight terrorists in Afghanistan.
Shit, I wanted to use a photo of Poppa Sye for Day 6: Tragedy. But, um… it was taken BEFORE 03/01. And I can’t very well get a NEW photo of him. DAM RULES! Oh well, I will come up with something else.
You’re that honest? You do realize we wouldn’t have checked, right?
Yeah, I am THAT honest! I can’t cheat AT ALL. It’s like lying. And I suck at that too.
So, Meleah, tell us the worst, most embarrassing thing you ever did.
Now where did I put that black box pin hole?
Probably behind the stack of old Playboys in the basement.
You’re a grumpy old man, Michael, you know you’re loving this. I’m looking forward to beating your ass in this non-competition. In fact, I’ll even take some of the photos with only a broken ballpoint pen and carbon paper, to give you a fighting chance.
So tell me, if your life’s penultimate goal is to eliminate the use of the word meme, what’s the ultimate goal in your life?
You say grumpy old man like it’s a bad thing, young Ziva. In fact, it’s not, nor am I as grumpy as I might appear, mostly because I know that I will trump you in this non-competition of ours. And that, by the way, is the ultimate goal of my life.
P.S. — Never use the word meme around me again. *shudder*
Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme.Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme. Meme.Meme.
Meme.
I hate you, bitch.
You’re going to cut me, aren’t you?
Without a doubt.
I don’t suppose there’s still time for an apology, is there?
Good grief. What have I signed up for?
Not only do I have to do time-zone arithmetic,which is not my strong point, but I didn’t realise that I absolutely had to make every single photo…
Good job I’ve got my dubious old camera AND my dodgy phone camera, so with a bit of luck it’ll only take me a few hours…
Looking forward to the challenge, though I’m a bit afraid of the likes of you and Ziva’s prowess.
You have made a terrible mistake, Mo, no doubt prompted by the heartless needling of one Ziva Moon. But don’t be afraid of Ziva or me: You have nothing to fear but fear itself. That, and the exhaustion, frustration and degradation this non-competition evokes.
P.S. — That beer looks good. I like an amber wheat, although not usually this early in the morning.
Who are you calling heartless, Mike? I’m sure Mo doesn’t think I’m heartless. Stop bad-mouthing me to the other contestants.
Anybody who would allow, let alone encourage, another human being to participate in this descent into visual hell has got to be a little heartless. That includes me, but I’ve already admitted that I’m heartless.
This is going to be great and yet, the commitment is scaring the crap out of me.
It’s worse that adopting a cat, that’s for sure.
I wish you all the best and admire the hell out of you.
Thank you, Jayne. Likewise.
I’m so glad this isn’t a competition. Already, I can hear the thumping of chests, the cracking of knuckles and the popping of sweat. Nope. No competition here. Just a friendly little game of “I’ll show you mine if you show me your’s”. Right?
I’ve been looking at the list of topics and I have decided that a simple photo of Lurch could fill about half the spots. However, you probably won’t be too crazy about the nude one of him.
I have about a jillion things to do today, but all my mind wants to do is compose photos. Thanks!
And so it begins: one contestant’s long, slow slide into madness.
I can’t wait to see this! And trust me, you don’t want me involved. On Saturday I was carrying my phone in my bag and managed to accidentally text my mother’s husband eight pictures of my cat.
I think the most interesting bit of information here is that you had a cat in your bag. I think it raises a question for all of us: Why?
Okay, I really want to do this but have a couple of questions. Do I have to take the picture on the day that it’s supposed to be posted or can I take an old picture from last year and use it? You see, I don’t bother dating my photos. My computer dates them when I upload them or whatever it is I’m doing to get them on my computer but for the life of me I don’t even know who most of the people are in the photos.
If I don’t know who the people are can I still use it? Do I need a release from them?
Why do you keep changing the picture on your blog?
Jen, it’s all in the rules, but you can use any photo going back to March 1st, 2012. That said, the question of cheating has been raised, and I’m forced to admit that we don’t have a panel of judges capable of determining whether your photo’s legit. Let your conscience be your guide.
Yeah, you can use photos of strangers, but I can’t tell you whether you need a release from them. For one thing, that seems super-personal. For another…well, there is no other. We all know you’ve been single for a while, and we understand.
I keep changing the picture because I’m easily bored. Changing the picture doesn’t help with that, but I like to pretend it does.
There are RULES?! I don’t do rules. Just for that, I’m not going to post the nude photos.
Don’t worry folks. You can still get all three of Nicky’s DVDs for $9.99 plus shipping and handling at Nicky’sGoneWild-Again.ca
Is there a trophy? I always wanted a trophy. I have plenty of room to display one now that I have a reduced collection of knick-knacks. (where did that word come from anyway?) My kids always got “participation” tropies, so I’m sure I’ve at least got that to look forward to.
We really ought to have a trophy. Something like the Stanely Cup. The problem is that there is no winner, only all the losers who choose to participate. Not this year, anyway. Maybe next year we can pick a winner and award her a huge collectible 7-Eleven Slurpee cup for her knick-knack shelf. Knick-knack being a word that comes from the old English word for a “petty trick or subterfuge,” which seems to bear no relationship to the trinkets many of us collect until you remember how much money you spent on that cheap plastic snow globe and replica of the Statue of Liberty you bought on your last visit to New York City.
The petty trick would be luring me into this “contest” which apparently doesn’t even award participation goody bags. I liken this to being on the Dating Game and not getting a consolation prize!
Now I remember where I’ve seen you before! You were contestant #3. Sorry you weren’t picked, but in the bachelor’s defense, it was little strange when he asked you if you liked dogs and you replied by barking, scratching your left leg on the floor and wagging your tail.
I think this activity might be worth giving old Seriously another go.
Liz, if this little exercise will bring you back online, then it will be worth all the pain and humiliation. Tell me you’re back…
Indeed it has. At least for April. I think I’ll go take a bunch of pictures of my house and where I walk my dogs now.
Now that’s great news!
Can I still get in? I just found out about the challenge about 5 minutes ago. All the other posts I can have up by 9am mtn time. And, yes… I can do conversions. And. I have the perfect photo. I guarantee I will make you laugh at silence.
Absolutely! Please join us, Kristen. I need a good laugh after nearly depressing myself into an early grave.
yeah… I saw that. My post is up and running. Silence. Of a unique kind
Excited to meet you 
I am just seeing this… Oh noooo! I would love to do it! Any chance I can still participate? I will post three tomorrow night if you give me the go-ahead, and then continue as the others are from there. Or is it too late?
Absolutely, Katherine! It’s never too late, please join us.
Email your email address and URL to me so that we can add your name to the list.
I will do that tonight! Yeaaaa!!!
Oh gosh! I just found this and you are three days into it. This would have been fun to try…and so, even though I’m late, and have missed moments I can never get back, I think I’ll try a few. Fun challenge!