more fun things as of late
thing 1: at the suggestion of the lesbetereers, we went to portland for the fucking CORN MAIZE [sic]. it was as stupid as i expected (& we made it fun, because mocking things is awesome), but the trip was great. i had an excellent turkey burger club with "10 hour tomatoes" & yukon gold fries with harissa ketchup (omg) at violetta, but the best part of the trip was buying a shitton of strawberries at the maze. the berries were deep red, firm & crisp like an apple (sound effects included) but SUPER sweet. i'd started with just a pint, but those were gone before we'd all made it back to the car, so joe & jenna went back to pick up a half flat which we ate all weekend. joe also bought a DISTURBINGLY ENORMOUS zucchini. there are some pics from this weekend, including said zucchini, posted here.
thing 2: with the release of number seven, i threw a SAW party with sic737 in his fancy new dual-level apartment. we invited a bunch of people over & watched saw I-IV on saturday, then on sunday watched V & VI & went to see saw VII in the theatre. we interspersed the movies with amazing chris-made food, & made it a giant two-day torture porn extravaganza. i wore my baby teeth plugs the first day & triskelions the second, both of which i thought were highly appropriate. (& i worked a dread client saturday, thus making it a lucrative party, too.)
saw VII sucked. in short, they turned the last piece of a genius, tangled series of intelligent ableit gory films into a stupid horror flick where murders are committed for no reason & attention to what a human body would actually do (xref: o-kee-pah suspensions) is forgotten. the lighting wasn't even right - it was all bright & plastic instead of looking like everything could give you tetanusherpes or worse. in an effort to avoid this sort of post, i'm not going into further detail on why it was so bad, but it certainly would've been better had they gone back to saw I & given us the backstories on those characters, interweaving it as they have all the others... but whatever, I-VI are still amazing, so it was a good weekend anyhow.
thing 3: i found out i have an extra week of vacation to burn before 2011, in ADDITION to the solid week joe & i take together at the end of december each year, which i've already scheduled. so my november & december are full of three- & four-day weekends - i don't have a single 5-day work week until next year. awesome.
thing 4: i got in on a pretty rockin' slickdeal for $200 worth of sony points for signing up for a new capital one card. most people were using this to get a PS3 for $99, but i was interested in cameras. so i was approved for 10k within two minutes, researched online, then pranced down to the sony store to test drive new cameras. the last time i had a "new" camera was in 2005 when i acquired my dsc-p100 (discounting when i replaced it with the exact same model after knocking it off a table last year), & it was discontinued even then - so it's pretty exciting to see the advances of the past seven-ish years. (point-&-shoots can record movies in 3D now!#!@$ it was so much fun to play with, but has zero practical application for me.)
while DSLRs & aNEXs are tempting, i really don't need that much camera. so i decided on another cybershot, the fairly high-end dsc-hx1. it's absurdly configurable yet has a very intelligent "easy mode", & the largest optical zoom i could ask for at 20x (!). according to wiki, it came out in 2009, but i obviously don't mind being a little behind the times.
of course i'm a dealhunter, though, so instead of buying it right from sony, i found a "lightly used" bundle on ebay from a private seller - the hx1, a telephoto lens, a decent memory stick (same size i have now), & a huge case i don't want. retail new it'd be worth around $750, but the auction only hit $410 when i sniped it. so for $11 more than the price of the camera new, i got a nearly new camera, a sweet lens, & a bag to resell, PLUS i still had $200 to spend on sonystyle.com for a giant memory stick, additional battery, smaller case, whatever.
i probably shouldn't mention that i found a working coupon code on google for 15% off sonystyle, which means i stretched my free $200 out to $230 for just five minutes of searching. & i REALLY shouldn't mention that the $410 was just a part of my cut from the sales i made of a friend's jewelry collection... making the whole deal free from the start. on top of this ridiculousness, i can also resell my old p100 setup for a couple hundred. so yeah. :D
when i told rj, he said he looks forward to seeing much finer detail on joe's ass. happy birthday to me!
things 5, 6, & 7:
updated collection post! - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5488799.html:
this link is to my last collection post, from august '09. there are detailed pics of my custom jewelry box there for those who haven't managed to gaze upon its wonder & beauty see it.
regarding organization: i like to keep similar types together within each drawer, & of course each drawer is by material. my more favored plugs are generally (but not always) towards the left & top of each material section, specifically excepting the dichro drawer which is by color, & part of the stone drawer where i've grouped relic & then flashiness together. i also organize on how the drawer looks as a whole - e.g, i don't like seeing two whitish pairs next to each other in the same column. whenever i adopt a new pair into my collection, i rearrange them & the less-favored plugs in the appropriate drawer. i find that moving the pieces around sometimes helps me to notice & thus wear a pair i haven't been paying much attention to.
regarding restriction: i'm firm on the idea that no one needs more than 100 pairs of plugs; if i'm wearing a pair less often than three times a year, they should be sold. (the expection is for specific wear pieces - e.g. i only wear earskins swimming or to amusement parks.) though my jewelry box is basically full now, there are pairs in each material that i wouldn't much miss if i needed the space for something spectacular.
regarding categorization: sometimes i wonder where to put certain DIY plugs. the drusy i inlaid in horn are with organics (wood/horn), but the stone plugs in acrylic eyelets live in the stone drawer. stone cabs on acrylic bases are also with stone, but glass cabs on acrylic bases are in mixed-media. my dime plugs could easily go in Ti/steel (general metal), & the mirrorbacks i inlaid in acrylic eyelets could be with glass, but those are both with mixed-media too. it's one of those rare things for me for which there's apparently no hard & fast rule, & i'll surely flex on these arrangements to fit a new pair into a specific drawer.
regarding GET TO THE PICS: enough text, on with the glamour shots!
everything's 3/4" & 4ga unless noted. there are more pics & a detailed write-up at each item's "(link)".
drawer 1 - organics & titanium/steel
DF abaraka blue morpho butterfly plugs in ebony (usually kept in an airtight bag to keep the sterling silver from tarnishing), 4ga DF DIY blue morpho on black acrylic to match (link)
DF auris custom pearl morpho butterfly plugs in ebony, 4ga DF DIY pearl morpho on black acrylic to match (link, video)
DF auris idea idea idea butterfly plugs in ebony, 4ga DF horn DIY painted to match (link)
DF maelstrom studio labs ebony with purple paua shell inlays, 4ga DF abalone in horn DIY colored to match (link)
DF paul's plugs custom ebony eyelets, 4ga DF diablo ebony eyelet to match (link, link)
DF ebony stash plugs, 4ga DF ebony plug to match
DF blackheart organics custom tulipwood in ebony mayan eyelets, 4ga DF diablo ebony eyelet with DIY tulipwood inlay to match (link)
DF pink ivory plugs, 4ga SF pink ivory plug to match (link, link)
DF onetribe custom green chiapas amber plugs, 4ga DF onetribe custom green chiapas amber to match (link, link)
1/2" DF drusy DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF buffalo horn eyelets, 4ga DF drusy to match (link)
DF buffalo horn eyelets (worn with spinal captives, below)
4ga titanium fractal creations demontail captive, unanodized by me
00ga titanium fractal creations captive eyelet (link)
11/16" SF titanium jesse jarrell fractal creations triskelion eyelets, 4ga DIY triskelion in steel to match (link, link, link)
8ga titanium fractal creations spinal captives with dimpled 5/16" rubber balls, 10ga titanium fractal creations spinal captive with dimpled 1/4" rubber ball, unanodized by me, to match (link, link)
2ga titanium fractal creations interlace captives, 4ga titanium fractal creations interlace captive, unanodized by me, or 4ga SF anato steel machined eyelet, cut to 1/4" wearable length, to match (link, link)
14ga/12ga titanium goodart navel curl, "octopus" anodized (link)
14ga titanium fractal creations double eyebrow spike, unanodized by me
6ga titanium fractal creations serenity II captive, unanodized by me (link)
DF DIY bismuth plugs in resin & steel, 4ga DF DIY bismuth in resin & IS steel eyelet to match (link, link, link)
DF moodstone plugs, 4ga DF DIY moodstone plug on acrylic to match (link)
20mm SF wildcat op art eyelets, 4ga DIY op art to match (link)
DF IS steel eyelets, old style (shorter wearable area), 4ga DF IS steel eyelet to match (link)
drawer 2 - acrylics/mixed-media & silicone
5/8" SF red mirrorback plugs (DIY'd over silver mirrorbacks) DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF black acrylic eyelets, 4ga DF DIY-colored mother of pearl in horn to match (link)
5/8" SF blue mirrorback plugs DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF black acrylic eyelets, 4ga SF blue mirrorback to match (link, link, link)
21mm prizmatic red fanciful dichro cabochons DIY mounted to 20mm DF ikon plugs, 7mm red fanciful dichro cab DIY mounted to 4ga DF black acrylic to match (link)
21mm prizmatic blue aquatic dichro cabochons DIY mounted to 20mm DF ikon plugs, 7mm blue aquatic dichro cab DIY mounted to 4ga DF black acrylic to match (link)
20mm DF time tunnels, 4ga DF DIY time tunnel on acrylic to match (link, link)
20mm DF elektro plugs, 4ga DF DIY elektroplug on acrylic to match (both match the barrette i made several years back.) (link)
DF atrophie acrylic & resin lish baby teeth plugs, 4ga DF black steel & resin baby tooth plug to match (link)
DF IS red rock candy plugs, 4ga SF DIY red "rock candy" in black steel to match (link, link)
DF video eye plugs, 4ga DF DIY video eye on black acrylic to match (holographic - they blink!) (link)
DF black honeycomb plugs, 4ga DF DIY honeycomb on black acrylic to match (holographic) (link)
20mm DF blue/red acid plugs, 4ga SF DIY acid plug to match (INSANELY holographic) (link, video)
20mm DF DIY mercury dime plugs, 4ga DF DIY miniature mercury dime plug on black acrylic to match (link)
20mm DF DIY red heart plugs, 4ga DF DIY red heart plug to match (link, link)
20mm DF DIY ladybug plugs, 4ga DF DIY ladybug plug to match (link)
DF mirror plugs, 4ga DF mirror plug to match (link)
DF clear superglitter plugs, 4ga DF clear superglitter to match (link)
20mm DF DIY enamel green/white faux "power plugs", 4ga DF DIY faux "power plug" to match (link)
kaos blue opal fill extracted & DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF black acrylic eyelets, 4ga DF DIY kaos blue opal fill in black acrylic to match (link)
kaos 5/16" black earskins, 0ga & 4ga kaos 1/4" black earskins to match (link)
extra 4ga & 0ga plugs:
4ga horn spirals (link)
4ga SF IS red regular dichro (old style ball flare)
4ga DF IS red regular dichro
4ga DF IS aqua regular dichro
4ga DF IS silver-blue trans dichro
4ga DF FF blue trans dichro
4ga GWS DF yellow trans dichro
4ga kaos 1/4" clear earskin
0ga SF GG black glass plug (self-shortened)
0ga SF blue glass plug (self-shortened)
0ga kaos 1/4" clear earskin
00ga DF titanium neometal prototype two-piece eyelet
click here to see the reversible plugs flipped
drawer 3 - stone
DF relic stoneworks mary ellen jasper, 4ga DF hematite DIY painted to match (link, link, link, link)
DF relic stoneworks green ocean jasper, 4ga DF green adventurine DIY painted to match (link, link, link)
DF relic/oracle dumortierite, 4ga DF denim lapis DIY painted to match (link)
20mm DF relic condor agate, 4ga DF opalite DIY painted to match (link)
DF relic stoneworks rainbow labradorite, 4ga DF labradorite to match (link, link, link)
DF relic stoneworks blue labradorite, 4ga DF oracle labradorite to match (link)
DF relic stoneworks green spectrolite, REVERSES TO purple labradorite, 4ga DF relic green spectrolite & 4ga DF relic purple labradorite to match (link, video, video)
DF relic stoneworks seraphinite, REVERSES TO straight-grain, 4ga DF DIY seraphinite cab on acrylic to match (link)
DF relic stoneworks pietersite, REVERSES TO solid flash, 4ga SF steel DIY painted to match each side (link, link)
DF middle woodland ear spools green calcite, 4ga green calcite cab set in black canadian serpentine to match (link, video)
20mm rainbow moonstone cabochons DIY mounted to 18mm DF ikon plugs, 7mm rainbow moonstone cab DIY mounted to 4ga DF black acrylic to match (link)
5/8" DF ultimate jewelz flashy sodalite DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF black acrylic eyelets, 4ga DF flashy sodalite to match (link, link)
DF red leopardskin jasper, 4ga DF glass DIY painted to match (link)
DF sodalite, 4ga DF sodalite to match (link, link)
DF metal mafia sea sediment jasper, 4ga MM sea sediment jasper to match (link)
DF wildcat picasso marble, 4ga DF plum jasper DIY painted to match (link)
5/8" DF moss agate DIY inlaid into 3/4" DF black acrylic eyelets, 4ga DF acrylic DIY painted to match (link)
DF rock crystal, 4ga DF rock crystal to match (link)
DF BMA purple/pink dyed howlite, 4ga BMA purple/pink dyed howlite to match (link)
DF white jade, 4ga DF white jade to match (link)
drawer 4 - glass
DF GG red/black power plugs, 4ga DF GWS black colorfront DIY painted to match (link, link)
DF GG red/black power plugs [2], 4ga DF black acrylic DIY painted to match (link)
DF GG bronze/ivory power plugs, 4ga DF GWS white colorfront DIY sharpied to match (link)
DF GG brown/turquoise power plugs, 4ga SF GG agave colorfront DIY painted to match (link)
DF GG serpentina power plugs, 4ga DF clear acrylic DIY painted to match (link, link)
DF glass distractions silver skull plugs, 4ga DF emblem glass custom fumed plug to match (link)
DF emblem glass custom lizard plugs, 4ga DF emblem custom background plug to match (link)
DF GWS jellyfish plugs, 4ga SF GG purple colorfront DIY painted as zooplankton (jellyfish food) to match (link)
DF GWS mars plugs, 4ga DF GWS custom mars plug to match (link, link, link)
DF GWS neptune plugs, 4ga DF GWS glass DIY painted to match (link, link)
DF GWS earth plugs, 4ga DF glass DIY painted to match (link)
DF GWS DIY "supernova" plugs (amber-purple colorfronts partially painted & worn backwards), 4ga DF GG clear glass DIY painted to match (link)
DF IS amber-purple jewels, 4ga DF DIY resin jewel on painted glass to match (link)
DF GWS honeycomb image plugs, 4ga DF custom honeycomb image plug to match (link, link)
DF frozenfire lattacino coils, 4ga DF FF custom lattacino coil to match (link)
DF hardass glass disappearing spirals, 4ga DF HAG custom disappearing spiral to match (link)
DF frozenfire blue glass plugs, 4ga DF GWS glass DIY painted to match (link)
DF GWS blue moon pebble plugs, 4ga DF GWS custom pebble plug to match (link, link)
DF GWS amber honeycomb texture plugs with DIY bee, 4ga DF GWS amber colorfront with DIY bee to match (link)
DF white cat's eye, 4ga SF white cat's eye to match (link, link)
drawer 5 - luciferins & dichroic glass
DF red luciferins on clear, 4ga DF red luciferin on clear to match (link, link)
DF red luciferins on white, 4ga DF red luciferin on white to match (link, link)
DF blue luciferins on cobalt, 4ga DF blue luciferin on cobalt to match (link, link)
DF green luciferins on clear, 4ga DF green luciferin on clear to match - samples (link)
18mm DF IS red spiral dichro (DIY'd over silver spirals), 4ga DF DIY red spiral dichro to match (DIY'd over IS red regular dichro) (link, link, link, link)
SF IS red crystal dichro, 4ga DF IS red crystal dichro to match (link, link)
DF IS red transparent dichro, 4ga DF IS red trans dichro to match (link, link, link)
DF IS rainbow transparent dichro jewels, 4ga DF DIY resin jewel on FF trans rainbow dichro to match (link, link, link, link, link)
DF frozenfire orange opal dichro, 4ga DF FF orange opal dichro to match (link, link)
DF frozenfire copper sparkle dichro on light cobalt, 4ga DF FF copper sparkle dichro on light cobalt to match (link)
SF IS emerald crystal dichro, 4ga DF IS emerald regular dichro to match (link)
DF GWS green/blurple honeycombs, 4ga DF IS aqua dichro DIY sharpied to match (link)
DF GWS burnt emerald dichro, 4ga DF IS silver regular dichro DIY sharpied to match (link)
DF GG blue/green/peach trichroic plugs, 4ga GG custom conical blue/green/peach trichro to match (link, link)
DF frozenfire teal transparent dichro with DIY red trans backs, 4ga DF FF teal trans dichro with DIY red trans back to match (link)
SF IS silver-blue opal dichro, 4ga DF IS silver-blue trans dichro painted white to match (link, link)
SF IS blue opal dichro, 4ga DF IS blue trans dichro painted white to match (link, link)
SF IS blue transparent dichro, 4ga DF IS blue trans dichro to match (link, link)
DF GWS rainbow dichro bubble texture plugs, 4ga DF GWS yellow regular dichro DIY sharpied to match (link, video)
DF IS blue spiral dichro, 4ga DF DIY blue spiral dichro to match (DIY'd over IS blue regular dichro) (link)
emergency plugs:
DF buffalo horn eyelets - left at work
DF black acrylic eyelets - left in my car
additional pics:
enjoy!
a comparative septum experience, with pics - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5488933.html:
since other folks have posted about their small-gauge-with-plans-to-stretch septums, i thought i might do the same. on sunday evening i added a second septum piercing in front of my existing hole.
my older septum piercing, made in early 1997, is up high & through the cartilage. i have one of those cutesy upturned noses (shut up), & if placed through the sweet spot, you'd almost be able to see the top of the ring... an aesthetic that's ugly to me. my piercer & i made the call to put it where it'd look best, pain be damned.
piercing septum cartilage is no fun. we went 14ga, & it was slow & hurt more than most of my other piercings. basic healing was uneventful, no problems or scarring or anything, but it continued to sting intermittently & randomly send sharp pains through my nose for most of a year afterwards. finally it healed fully & stayed quiet. by 2001 it had self-stretched to 12ga, & i was able to encourage it to 10ga in 2009. for visible jewelry, that's large enough for my face, & goes well with my double 16ga left nostril piercings.
this community has made me really appreciate large gauge septums, & seeing as my cartilage septum would never make it, i've often debated putting a second hole in there to stretch & see what my nose does. when a tiny 12ga glass retainer came up recently on gaugetrade, & me with spare 12ga needles... i answered that door when opportunity knocked.
it sat on my desk for a month or two, & eventually the time felt right. i scrubbed down myself & my tools, & swabbed my nose. i marked a line to follow, & pierced into a receiving tube. it was all quite simple. i've pierced others' septums before, but it's quite interesting doing your own. though staying perfectly straight isn't that important in a hole that's going to be stretched, i was pleased to see i'd kept my composure & followed the markings precisely. out of curiousity, i tugged down on the needle, which gave me a vague idea of how my nose might change - & which was pretty interesting to feel, considering the cartilage septum obviously doesn't move.
of course the piercing hurt, but nothing like the cartilage did. my eyes watered, as expected, & the jewelry went in smoothly enough. (i always bring a taper in case i lose connection with the needle, but the retainer was rounded, which made it easier to insert.) it stopped hurting almost immediately, & didn't twinge at me. an hour after, i could gently press the front of my nose & feel it in there without pain, just some soreness. there was no blood. overall, MUCH less painful & simpler than the first. (even when i totally forgot about it the next morning & sleepily itched my nose by rubbing the end, it only hurt for a few minutes, heh.)
i wear a circular barbell in my older septum, & it tends to spin to the right, so i keep an o-ring on the left. i'm right-handed, so i pierced towards the left, which put both o-rings on the same side. they're just barely not touching, but i'll flip the retainer when i heal enough. my nose has no cartilage in the very front - i wager i could punch a 2ga there, if it were possible to get the tools in line - but i wanted the opportunity to stretch & potentially wear jewelry if i liked it. my placement should allow for a 4ga pincher to hang properly & not bump into the front of my nostrils, but my general goal is just a earnoseskin.
since i have a small nose & the holes are close, i'm a liiiiiittle concerned about having room to stretch to ~4ga (i don't want to go larger than that because i don't like the profile of a round nose), but i can always punch or scalpel forward if the older piercing becomes crowded - which seems unlikely considering 1/8" of cartilage is in the way of that. i might look to stretching forward using weights. oughta be interesting, anyhow.
so i have some highly edited & ridiculously close pics to share. please enjoy staring up my nose.
i'm making elvis face to bring you these shots:
hunka hunka burnin' septum
i look forward to posting equally faceless pics of the middle of my face as i stretch this lovely new hole. :D
oh hi, flashy black moonstone - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5498291.html:
please pause now & clean the area around your computer desk, so your jaw doesn't get dirty when it hits the floor.
ok, so middlewoodland made what now?
i received the following email out of nowhere:
Can you wear an 11mm thickness of plug? Its just 1-1.5mm shorter than the usual 1/2" thickness.
I am currently working on one pair of insanely SICK, fucking ridiculous blinding 100% silver flash bomb-of-all-bombs chatoyant (as chatoyant as lab) black moonstone. When this shit 'goes off' ya gotta run for cover.
Dude, I kid you not. I can't even describe the insanity. I could send pics tomorrow of the faces if you'd like but I gotta go get a welding mask to use while taking the pic.
Lunar Maximus,
Brian
i prefer shorter widths due to my vertical conch piercings (my amber are just 5/16" total width), so of course this was insanely exciting. i responded immediately & quite positively indeed.
brian noted that black moonstone is sometimes called black labradorite, & that to him it looks like "a black & white film negative of a forest". he went on to add that he's "Super Excited and could barely get to sleep last night at 2am. last time i was that jacked was with your completed calcite". i love that. :D
i was soon regaled with pics, & later told that he finished making the 3/4" pair during a full moon. :)
here are the shots brian sent of one plug finished:
& the completed, perfectly mirrored, perfectly flashy pair:
but what struck me hard about these was this first shot he sent of them NOT flashing:
the stone has such depth, like a forest floor thick with dry pine needles... similar yet in stark contrast to the wintery frozen pine needles of my seraphanite. here are more flashless shots from brian:
& brian's pics of the full, finished set. the 4ga front flare is pretty honkin' big, but i kind of like it because it's like having a small representation of the oversized flares he normally makes. it puts his mark on the set.
brian promised procedurals this time, & deliver he did:
& procedurals of the 4ga:
here are some shots i took:
these are the backs - somehow there's also full flash there. WITCHCRAFT
of course i made you a video of them. note how wide an angle the flash is visible from - about 120 degrees on this pair! labs have a much shorter range; mine have a sweet spot of about 70 degrees max.
in-ears. as shown above, it hardly matters how they're arranged in-ear, they flash wildly from several directions as i move. they're much more active than labradorite, that's for sure.
see what i mean?
a lit in-ear set that shows the stone not flashing (these pics were hard to get, haha):
the "front flash" in-ears. i had to turn them a bit funny to get the camera to pick it up properly, but i wear them positioned vertically as shown above & they just shine all over the friggin' place.
for those wondering, i sold my DIY rainbow moonstone cabs to make space for these. :) & oh yeah, brian made this to prove he's a dork:
enjoy! i know i will. :D
ok so there's that. & if you missed the anti-subtlety above, my birthday is coming up mighty quick. send love notes & sushi posthaste & forthwith.
thing 2: with the release of number seven, i threw a SAW party with sic737 in his fancy new dual-level apartment. we invited a bunch of people over & watched saw I-IV on saturday, then on sunday watched V & VI & went to see saw VII in the theatre. we interspersed the movies with amazing chris-made food, & made it a giant two-day torture porn extravaganza. i wore my baby teeth plugs the first day & triskelions the second, both of which i thought were highly appropriate. (& i worked a dread client saturday, thus making it a lucrative party, too.)
saw VII sucked. in short, they turned the last piece of a genius, tangled series of intelligent ableit gory films into a stupid horror flick where murders are committed for no reason & attention to what a human body would actually do (xref: o-kee-pah suspensions) is forgotten. the lighting wasn't even right - it was all bright & plastic instead of looking like everything could give you tetanusherpes or worse. in an effort to avoid this sort of post, i'm not going into further detail on why it was so bad, but it certainly would've been better had they gone back to saw I & given us the backstories on those characters, interweaving it as they have all the others... but whatever, I-VI are still amazing, so it was a good weekend anyhow.
thing 3: i found out i have an extra week of vacation to burn before 2011, in ADDITION to the solid week joe & i take together at the end of december each year, which i've already scheduled. so my november & december are full of three- & four-day weekends - i don't have a single 5-day work week until next year. awesome.
thing 4: i got in on a pretty rockin' slickdeal for $200 worth of sony points for signing up for a new capital one card. most people were using this to get a PS3 for $99, but i was interested in cameras. so i was approved for 10k within two minutes, researched online, then pranced down to the sony store to test drive new cameras. the last time i had a "new" camera was in 2005 when i acquired my dsc-p100 (discounting when i replaced it with the exact same model after knocking it off a table last year), & it was discontinued even then - so it's pretty exciting to see the advances of the past seven-ish years. (point-&-shoots can record movies in 3D now!#!@$ it was so much fun to play with, but has zero practical application for me.)
while DSLRs & aNEXs are tempting, i really don't need that much camera. so i decided on another cybershot, the fairly high-end dsc-hx1. it's absurdly configurable yet has a very intelligent "easy mode", & the largest optical zoom i could ask for at 20x (!). according to wiki, it came out in 2009, but i obviously don't mind being a little behind the times.
of course i'm a dealhunter, though, so instead of buying it right from sony, i found a "lightly used" bundle on ebay from a private seller - the hx1, a telephoto lens, a decent memory stick (same size i have now), & a huge case i don't want. retail new it'd be worth around $750, but the auction only hit $410 when i sniped it. so for $11 more than the price of the camera new, i got a nearly new camera, a sweet lens, & a bag to resell, PLUS i still had $200 to spend on sonystyle.com for a giant memory stick, additional battery, smaller case, whatever.
i probably shouldn't mention that i found a working coupon code on google for 15% off sonystyle, which means i stretched my free $200 out to $230 for just five minutes of searching. & i REALLY shouldn't mention that the $410 was just a part of my cut from the sales i made of a friend's jewelry collection... making the whole deal free from the start. on top of this ridiculousness, i can also resell my old p100 setup for a couple hundred. so yeah. :D
when i told rj, he said he looks forward to seeing much finer detail on joe's ass. happy birthday to me!
things 5, 6, & 7:
updated collection post! - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5488799.html:
this link is to my last collection post, from august '09. there are detailed pics of my custom jewelry box there for those who haven't managed to gaze upon its wonder & beauty see it.
regarding organization: i like to keep similar types together within each drawer, & of course each drawer is by material. my more favored plugs are generally (but not always) towards the left & top of each material section, specifically excepting the dichro drawer which is by color, & part of the stone drawer where i've grouped relic & then flashiness together. i also organize on how the drawer looks as a whole - e.g, i don't like seeing two whitish pairs next to each other in the same column. whenever i adopt a new pair into my collection, i rearrange them & the less-favored plugs in the appropriate drawer. i find that moving the pieces around sometimes helps me to notice & thus wear a pair i haven't been paying much attention to.
regarding restriction: i'm firm on the idea that no one needs more than 100 pairs of plugs; if i'm wearing a pair less often than three times a year, they should be sold. (the expection is for specific wear pieces - e.g. i only wear earskins swimming or to amusement parks.) though my jewelry box is basically full now, there are pairs in each material that i wouldn't much miss if i needed the space for something spectacular.
regarding categorization: sometimes i wonder where to put certain DIY plugs. the drusy i inlaid in horn are with organics (wood/horn), but the stone plugs in acrylic eyelets live in the stone drawer. stone cabs on acrylic bases are also with stone, but glass cabs on acrylic bases are in mixed-media. my dime plugs could easily go in Ti/steel (general metal), & the mirrorbacks i inlaid in acrylic eyelets could be with glass, but those are both with mixed-media too. it's one of those rare things for me for which there's apparently no hard & fast rule, & i'll surely flex on these arrangements to fit a new pair into a specific drawer.
regarding GET TO THE PICS: enough text, on with the glamour shots!
everything's 3/4" & 4ga unless noted. there are more pics & a detailed write-up at each item's "(link)".
drawer 1 - organics & titanium/steel
00ga titanium fractal creations captive eyelet (link)
14ga titanium fractal creations double eyebrow spike, unanodized by me
6ga titanium fractal creations serenity II captive, unanodized by me (link)
drawer 2 - acrylics/mixed-media & silicone
4ga horn spirals (link)
4ga SF IS red regular dichro (old style ball flare)
4ga DF IS red regular dichro
4ga DF IS aqua regular dichro
4ga DF IS silver-blue trans dichro
4ga DF FF blue trans dichro
4ga GWS DF yellow trans dichro
4ga kaos 1/4" clear earskin
0ga SF GG black glass plug (self-shortened)
0ga SF blue glass plug (self-shortened)
0ga kaos 1/4" clear earskin
00ga DF titanium neometal prototype two-piece eyelet
click here to see the reversible plugs flipped
drawer 3 - stone
drawer 4 - glass
drawer 5 - luciferins & dichroic glass
emergency plugs:
additional pics:
enjoy!
a comparative septum experience, with pics - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5488933.html:
since other folks have posted about their small-gauge-with-plans-to-stretch septums, i thought i might do the same. on sunday evening i added a second septum piercing in front of my existing hole.
my older septum piercing, made in early 1997, is up high & through the cartilage. i have one of those cutesy upturned noses (shut up), & if placed through the sweet spot, you'd almost be able to see the top of the ring... an aesthetic that's ugly to me. my piercer & i made the call to put it where it'd look best, pain be damned.
piercing septum cartilage is no fun. we went 14ga, & it was slow & hurt more than most of my other piercings. basic healing was uneventful, no problems or scarring or anything, but it continued to sting intermittently & randomly send sharp pains through my nose for most of a year afterwards. finally it healed fully & stayed quiet. by 2001 it had self-stretched to 12ga, & i was able to encourage it to 10ga in 2009. for visible jewelry, that's large enough for my face, & goes well with my double 16ga left nostril piercings.
this community has made me really appreciate large gauge septums, & seeing as my cartilage septum would never make it, i've often debated putting a second hole in there to stretch & see what my nose does. when a tiny 12ga glass retainer came up recently on gaugetrade, & me with spare 12ga needles... i answered that door when opportunity knocked.
it sat on my desk for a month or two, & eventually the time felt right. i scrubbed down myself & my tools, & swabbed my nose. i marked a line to follow, & pierced into a receiving tube. it was all quite simple. i've pierced others' septums before, but it's quite interesting doing your own. though staying perfectly straight isn't that important in a hole that's going to be stretched, i was pleased to see i'd kept my composure & followed the markings precisely. out of curiousity, i tugged down on the needle, which gave me a vague idea of how my nose might change - & which was pretty interesting to feel, considering the cartilage septum obviously doesn't move.
of course the piercing hurt, but nothing like the cartilage did. my eyes watered, as expected, & the jewelry went in smoothly enough. (i always bring a taper in case i lose connection with the needle, but the retainer was rounded, which made it easier to insert.) it stopped hurting almost immediately, & didn't twinge at me. an hour after, i could gently press the front of my nose & feel it in there without pain, just some soreness. there was no blood. overall, MUCH less painful & simpler than the first. (even when i totally forgot about it the next morning & sleepily itched my nose by rubbing the end, it only hurt for a few minutes, heh.)
i wear a circular barbell in my older septum, & it tends to spin to the right, so i keep an o-ring on the left. i'm right-handed, so i pierced towards the left, which put both o-rings on the same side. they're just barely not touching, but i'll flip the retainer when i heal enough. my nose has no cartilage in the very front - i wager i could punch a 2ga there, if it were possible to get the tools in line - but i wanted the opportunity to stretch & potentially wear jewelry if i liked it. my placement should allow for a 4ga pincher to hang properly & not bump into the front of my nostrils, but my general goal is just a earnoseskin.
since i have a small nose & the holes are close, i'm a liiiiiittle concerned about having room to stretch to ~4ga (i don't want to go larger than that because i don't like the profile of a round nose), but i can always punch or scalpel forward if the older piercing becomes crowded - which seems unlikely considering 1/8" of cartilage is in the way of that. i might look to stretching forward using weights. oughta be interesting, anyhow.
so i have some highly edited & ridiculously close pics to share. please enjoy staring up my nose.
i'm making elvis face to bring you these shots:
hunka hunka burnin' septum
i look forward to posting equally faceless pics of the middle of my face as i stretch this lovely new hole. :D
oh hi, flashy black moonstone - http://community.livejournal.com/stretched/5498291.html:
please pause now & clean the area around your computer desk, so your jaw doesn't get dirty when it hits the floor.
ok, so middlewoodland made what now?
i received the following email out of nowhere:
Can you wear an 11mm thickness of plug? Its just 1-1.5mm shorter than the usual 1/2" thickness.
I am currently working on one pair of insanely SICK, fucking ridiculous blinding 100% silver flash bomb-of-all-bombs chatoyant (as chatoyant as lab) black moonstone. When this shit 'goes off' ya gotta run for cover.
Dude, I kid you not. I can't even describe the insanity. I could send pics tomorrow of the faces if you'd like but I gotta go get a welding mask to use while taking the pic.
Lunar Maximus,
Brian
i prefer shorter widths due to my vertical conch piercings (my amber are just 5/16" total width), so of course this was insanely exciting. i responded immediately & quite positively indeed.
brian noted that black moonstone is sometimes called black labradorite, & that to him it looks like "a black & white film negative of a forest". he went on to add that he's "Super Excited and could barely get to sleep last night at 2am. last time i was that jacked was with your completed calcite". i love that. :D
i was soon regaled with pics, & later told that he finished making the 3/4" pair during a full moon. :)
here are the shots brian sent of one plug finished:
& the completed, perfectly mirrored, perfectly flashy pair:
but what struck me hard about these was this first shot he sent of them NOT flashing:
the stone has such depth, like a forest floor thick with dry pine needles... similar yet in stark contrast to the wintery frozen pine needles of my seraphanite. here are more flashless shots from brian:
& brian's pics of the full, finished set. the 4ga front flare is pretty honkin' big, but i kind of like it because it's like having a small representation of the oversized flares he normally makes. it puts his mark on the set.
brian promised procedurals this time, & deliver he did:
& procedurals of the 4ga:
here are some shots i took:
these are the backs - somehow there's also full flash there. WITCHCRAFT
of course i made you a video of them. note how wide an angle the flash is visible from - about 120 degrees on this pair! labs have a much shorter range; mine have a sweet spot of about 70 degrees max.
Click to view
in-ears. as shown above, it hardly matters how they're arranged in-ear, they flash wildly from several directions as i move. they're much more active than labradorite, that's for sure.
see what i mean?
a lit in-ear set that shows the stone not flashing (these pics were hard to get, haha):
the "front flash" in-ears. i had to turn them a bit funny to get the camera to pick it up properly, but i wear them positioned vertically as shown above & they just shine all over the friggin' place.
for those wondering, i sold my DIY rainbow moonstone cabs to make space for these. :) & oh yeah, brian made this to prove he's a dork:
enjoy! i know i will. :D
ok so there's that. & if you missed the anti-subtlety above, my birthday is coming up mighty quick. send love notes & sushi posthaste & forthwith.