The Antiprofessional: Friday in July = "Unholy Flamespitter"

Me ten minutes after starting a puzzle

And now for my next trick...I will fail at using pictures in a blog!!

I sweat. I am a sweater. I sweat during activities it’s not even appropriate to sweat during: for example, doing a puzzle. If left unchecked, this mundane, mind-soothing activity which is used as a meditation tool for most can have me sputtering out sentence fragments while drowning in a pool of my own facial secretions.

So the fact that it hit 107 degrees on Friday and I was in a full suit wasn't exactly in my "wheel house," if you could imagine.

Myself and Phil had the first on-site outing since we started our new endeavor. Our client wanted us to go to the restaurant and shoot photo and video of the kitchen, meals they prepare, the venue itself, and the belly-dancing ninjas they randomly release throughout the place to attack patrons (it’s actually pretty cool, and not nearly as violent as I make it out to be). Phil and I spoke the day prior about our plan of attack which was thus:

- Phil has a camera

- I offered to bring mine and help

- He happily accepted, more cameras are awesome

- We agree to meet at the restaurant at 7pm on Friday

Pretty cut and dry.

107 and a chance of gross...

Girls I conned into believing I was a photographer

Friday morning I woke up, dusted off my camera which I had laid out with my suit, ready to go, and made a final check. Camera's dead. Fantastic. (I know: I should have checked this sooner, THANK YOU Monday Morning coaches). I hadn't used the thing since January when I lost the battery charger for it in San Diego. Oh, I lost the charger for it. Luckily my roommate has a camera with a charger similar to mine which turns out can charge my battery. Either way, my camera is out for this particular evening. No chance I was going to go work right near queens, head back to my house all the way in Long Beach and back to Queens. Right?

....Right?

I text Phil on my way to the office to let him know we probably won't be using my camera this evening:

"Hey buddy. Suited up and ready for tonight. My camera is dead and my charger is MIA, so I'm gonna try and see if my roommate can charge it with his, after he wakes up. But just know we may not have my camera."

Text from Phil:

Ok but tonight is all about the video and photographs. The still shots are pretty critical. Better prep next time...I'll find a camera for you to use.

Suddenly, my camera wasn't feeling so "additional" anymore. In business, especially event-related ones, miscommunications and misunderstandings are inevitable. The important thing is to remember to handle them calmly. Put the gun down. Just, put it down. No one needs to get hurt. Otherwise you risk blowing out your lungs and eyeballs in a glorious screaming rampage the likes of which would make Christ’s Rapture look like a children’s magic show. Me and Phil have “rolling with the punches” down to an art form. Because, hello? Have you tried conducting business without eyeballs or lungs? Me neither. I can imagine it’s difficult.

Here's a shitty picture!

So now I have to back track to the house, where my roommate is presumably charging my camera battery (which we're not even sure will work) AFTER I put a full day in at work. Meaning from 5pm I have to do 2 hours of travelling (without traffic) in 2 hours at rush hour, with a stop to pick up my camera. In other words...

Driver's start your engines...

4:55pm: I waste no time and bolt out the office door. HEAT. The wall of hot air hits me like a starving 900-pound Silverback trying to get at my banana-dipped body. I sprint home. I have to head 30 minutes south (traffic permitting), stop at my house, pickup my camera, and sprint 1 hour 10 minutes north (traffic permitting) back to Queens to make it to the client by 7pm.

Sweat level: Minor (AC is cranked in the car)

My drawing ability.

5:30pm: I bolt through my house door like Kramer on Seinfeld, skidding on the wood floor in my dress shoes as I get to my camera on the kitchen table. The battery is laid out, fully charged, ready to go. Awesome. I see my photography guru roommate is home and ask him for any last-second pointers because, oh yeah, I have photography skills on par with my drawing ability.

5:35pm: I Starsky and Hutch my way into my car and roll out through Long Beach, which also doubles as a Stop sign infested swamp of sorrows where snails laugh at you as they screech pass with your girlfriend in their passenger seat, waving at you as you watch in wide-eyed horror. How could she? And with him? He’s not even a mammal! After my DMV-like frustration subsides, I realize there’s no fighting it, just relax and accept it.

Sweat level: Increasing to Marginal (due to frustration)

5:45pm: as I pay the $2 toll to get onto Nassau Expressway (which you can’t E-Z Pass inexplicably) here comes the rush hour!

6:00pm: Merge onto the Van Wyck. Interesting side note: Van Wyck is German for “vehicular gang rape” as traffic just forms with or without reasoning and claims many lives, furthering my hypothesis that Western Long Island highways are the Bermuda triangle of land-travel.

6:17pm: In a desperate man-move I decide to go Magellan on this bitch and make my own way, throwing caution and my GPS to the wind, and striking out on my own. Anywhere else can’t be worse than this.

6:32pm: I quickly become another “should have followed the GPS statistic.”

6:34pm: I throw curses and begin speaking in tongues as I merge onto the Long Island Expressway to try and jump onto an adjacent highway, only to realize there’s a divider you cannot cross and traffic is at a dead stop as well.

6:45pm: Rerouting…

Sweat level: Happening, but manageable (frustration and sitting too long, but AC is on)

6:55pm: Make it through Queens’ best replica of the Long Beach swamp of sorrows and proceed to stop and go for what seems like 943 blocks until I reach the restaurant.

7:10pm: Park and do a quick search for signage and curb-painting, because if I get another ticket, I am just going to snap. I even ask a local:

“Sir, do you know if it’s OK if I park here?”

“Yemen. Onlything Ugotta worryboudda breakit into yanno?” he laughed.

I move my car.

7:15pm: Find another spot. This one works. Everything else looks good, let’s rock!

Sweat level: Now we’re sweating. Movement in the heat, it’s on.

7:17pm: Call Phil. No answer.

I walk 5 blocks to the place. Knowing Phil took the subway and since this is primarily his client, I decide waiting for him is the best option. So I wait. And I sweat.

Sweat level: Heavy facial sweating and almost through the undershirt, in danger of being visible to the public eye. Apply napkins as necessary.

I seek refuge in a nearby Deli, which also doubles as a Honduran sweatshop. Their AC was actually blowing heat, if that’s possible, and their 8 year old was working the register. After realizing this is clearly a joke, I leave and decide waiting at the restaurant alone can’t be worse than slowly dying in and around various establishments in Queens.

I got inside, and I’m met with what can only be described as heaven. A blast of cool, inviting air, a completely empty, gorgeous venue, and the only people inside are three gorgeous girls who go “Hi there!!!” in their energetic, employee-mandated tone. Either way, I felt welcome.

I’m waiting for my partner, I need to speak with your manager. We’re here to shoot some footage for your Social Media Marketing campaigns.

“Great, let’s introduce you to Carlos.”

From here, I met Carlos, who introduced me to Tony, then Dino, who is partners with Tommy, but he wasn’t there that evening, and I’m sure eventually it all ties back to Kevin Bacon. We start the shoot with the kitchen which goes something like this---

Tony puts on a tophat and sprouts horns and says:

“Let us take you to the blast furnace.”

I ate one thing from this picture.

My sweat glands are on red alert. And when we get into the kitchen. It’s on. When I say it’s on, I mean full force let’s make jokes about this because I am noticeably through my shirt. My shins were sweating. I didn’t even know shins could sweat. I repeatedly told these guys they were heroes for working in the conditions and I was going to make sure OSHA knew that they should be recognized for their valor. We got some great footage of meals that they made in seconds that would take me 94 tries and $1.8 million in food store patronage to successfully create.

After I got off the kitchen water ride, I literally had to go dry off in the bathroom and put my suit jacket back on just to be presentable. Luckily none of the managers were present and I recovered quickly.

A bellydancing ninja attacks a spectator

We got back upstairs and took some shots of the outside, then BAM here come the bellydancing ninjas. Myself and Phil do our best impression of the crocodile hunter and stalk around these girls while they’re doing all sorts of exotic dance moves with everything up to and including sabers. It was pretty awesome, not going to lie. However, I was slightly disappointed that through all their fluid dance moves they never picked up the swords once to fight one another. Only slightly.

Great belly dancers - awful fencers

Me and Phil decide d to get a couple of shots of the girls after their performance for some promo material and it’s here that things got fun. On the last shot of theevening Phil suggests doing a “high angle” shot which involves him getting on a chair above the girls. I pass him my camera and “FWOOP.”

The neck strap gave out and down went the camera.

Thankfully, the camera broke the neck strap’s fall and the neck strap was fine. I just need to fix my camera.

Then I got a ticket on the way home because remember that E-Z passless $2 toll for the Nassau Expressway? Turns out you need $2 for that. And if you don’t pay that? It’s $20.

Sometimes the house has to win. I’ll get them next time. All in all the night wasn’t a total bust though, some of the pictures came out decent I did eventually go to sleep. I take my victories where I can! Love you.