Victory Rolls! Hey wait! I thought I was trying to lose those…

Manager is away today, all my content is in the hands of others for review, bills are paid….so time to goof off a bit today. First up is trying to figure out hairstyles for the photo shoot. I have a hair appointment with Ruth next week and I need to bring her some ideas on what I want her to do for me. So today I have been looking through all kinds of photos, how-to videos and the like for inspiration. What I have found to be interesting is how much of the 40’s trickled into the 50’s in terms of hairstyles. I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised. I had my 80’s hair well into the 90’s. It’s not like we hit 1990 and just said NO! to everything that came before. So….here are some of the questions I am pondering today.

Bangs – To Betty or Not to Betty

I realize that the iconic bangs for the pinup are the Betty Page U bangs. Do I really want them? Another option (which I hate) is the weird looking rolled bang. I don’t even know why I am debating this one. I would have to let my bangs grow out before I could even attempt the sausage roll on my forehead anyway. Ugh…Ok, let’s have some pictures…

Yeah, I think I may go ahead with the U bangs. Ok, fine. What’s next?

Glamour or Rockabilly?

Ok, this one is a more difficult choice. I may actually try to go for one of each since I have 2 locations, 2 outfits, that sort of thing. Why not branch out and go for both? For the Glamour part of it, I am thinking the shots with the car out in the desert. Chances are my hair is going to be blowing around anyway, so I don’t want some complicated hair do messing up my pictures. Then again, maybe the headscarf might work...SEE? I can't decide! I am thinking more Dita VonTeese/ Rita Hayworth loose curls and a hair flower. Also, I am trying to consider the timing of the shots. Chances are the car shots will be done the first part of the day. For the Boneyard, I’ll be in the swing dress which lends itself to a more rockabilly vibe anyway. Maybe that’s the one where I get the more elaborate hairstyle. I don’t know if I’m ready for victory rolls, but at least I am more open to the idea. I just think it looks like I am putting HoHos on my head.

Ok, here are more shots to consider.

 

  

Final thought…I love Bernie Dexter. Total girl crush right now. FYI she’s the model in the photo I included for my dress…and also the head scarf pictures.

Photo Update

Well I finally heard back from the Neon Museum and it sounds like we are a go for the shoot!!! YAY!!! It’s a big relief to have that confirmed because now I can work on the rest of the plans. I found a web site for classic car rentals and managed to find a red 1959 Cadillac convertible. I swear I think it’s the only 50’s Cadillac available for rent in the whole city. It was surprising to say the least. I did find a 1971 Cadillac El Dorado which I briefly considered since it was the year I was born, but it would clash with the rest of my 50’s theme. Either way, I am able to rent the car for a few hours which is nice since I don’t want to have to be responsible for it any longer than necessary.

Still on the “To Do” list from Hell is reserving the car, recon mission to the boneyard to scope out locations, recon to Red Rock Canyon to scout locations for the car, clothes, hair, makeup, blah, blah, blah…..

I will say that I ordered a dress that I’m excited about. I told myself I wouldn’t order a swing dress and then I saw this one. So much for will power…I think this is the dress for the boneyard. I’m still debating on the outfit for the car shots. More later…

Meeting Agenda

Well, it’s out there now. On Sunday morning I had to attend a 2 hour meeting at work. I use the term “meeting” loosely since generally what happens is a lecture that goes on and on forever. How awesome is it to sit in a room and be told for a couple of hours all the things you should know already and where “some of you” just aren’t cutting it? So inspiring!!

I tell myself all the time to just sit in the boat and row. This is a mindless weekend job that lets me clock in and clock out and no more. I’ve never once been late, never called in, and am focused on the financial end game. Yes, this is of course leading up to the point that I have ditched my own advice. I actually asked them if I could host our next “meeting.” I came home and typed up a sample agenda and included suggestions for team activities and everything. So much for rowing!

I don’t think I can stand to sit through one more of these. All that “leadership” and not one of them have any presentation skills. No sense of their audience at all! We have people that just started and people that have been there for almost 30 years. I was looking at everyone around me and there was a range from half asleep to “they aren’t talking about me” looks to counting tiles in the ceiling and well, you get the idea. Totally lost on the people that were literally reading documentation to us.

So like I said, it’s out there now. I turned in my suggestions. I’m really hoping that I am coming across as being helpful and not over-stepping. Then again, this job was never meant to last this long. Still, if I decide to try and come back around the holidays, it sure would be nice if I didn’t burn any bridges. I’m not going back until Saturday so it should be interesting to see if it even gets mentioned to me.

Row, row, row your boat….

Friday Night

So normally I would wait to write something up after an event, but I’m bored while waiting for a meeting, so let’s do a little warm up first shall we?

My weekend job puts me in contact with the public in general, but also with some pretty interesting coworkers. Most of them are ridiculously younger than me. It’s a bizarre experience. Anyway, one of my friends has reached the end of her Las Vegas experience and has decided to pack it in and move back to Indiana. Kind of a bummer since she was a good person to work with, but not a total shock given her situation. Plus, this was her first big move away from friends and family. At 24 I would have been hard pressed to make that work too. It took me at least 2 tries to get out of the Midwest. Fate is too quirky for me to risk saying that I’ll never go back, so we’ll just leave that for now…

Last weekend I took her out for drinks at where else???? The Peppermill. She loved it. Luckily she was down with the whole lounging vibe rather than clubbing. Now, with her time running out, she wants to go out again tonight. The difference this time is a bigger crowd, probably a club and something we call LBD (Little Black Dress) night. Oy. Not a lot of my favorite things here. Granted, I know I don’t have to go since I technically already had a night out with her. But, soft touch that I am, I am most likely driving tonight. So bring on the Spanx, I guess.

We have tentative plans to go to Red Rock Casino, so at least we aren’t schlepping down to the Strip. I haven’t heard from her yet today, but it wouldn’t surprise me to hear the location change a few times. Whatever. As long as there is breakfast at the end of this night I can put up with a lot.

The Think System

I have a very important project going on at work right now. So important that I can’t seem to make myself work on it. I spend so much time thinking about what I want to say and not a lot of time actually writing it down. It’s weird. I have work sessions scheduled with my subject matter experts and everything is going fine. I haven’t missed a single deadline and yet I feel like I’m not really doing anything. Does thinking about work count as work? I still enter it that way on my timesheet!!

Even as I am sitting here typing this out, part of me is thinking about PowerPoint slides and tone for the narrative that will go with them. I have another work session scheduled for next week and so far not a single word written for it. When it’s finally finished, everyone in the company is supposed to view it. And I am supposed to write up some talking points for the CEO who is supposed to make an introduction video for this training. My quest for perfection is rendering me speechless. I know I am too far in my head right now. That’s why I keep scheduling these work sessions. Deadlines are forcing me to keep actively plugging away at it.

To try and keep myself loose, I keep “walking away” from it and coming back to it several times throughout the day. In the past I have often found it useful to switch focus onto mundane things like laundry or paying bills, or whatever while noodling over some problem or another. So far no lightening bolts of inspiration. Maybe it’s time to try something else.

This ain’t no Olan Mills!!

I’m too excited about it to keep it a secret. I have decided to organize a photo shoot for my upcoming birthday. My mind is going so crazy with ideas that I can’t concentrate on work which is a very bad thing! Still, I have so much planning to do and I have to get everything going right now if I want to make my deadline. I am trying to schedule everything for the first weekend in May. I realize its Mother’s Day weekend, but hopefully that won’t interfere with my plans.

So I have started thinking about locations and I am beyond excited to say that I have set the wheels in motion to have a photo shoot at the Neon Boneyard. How completely cool is that??? I have contacted them to determine if I can get the date I want and to arrange all the particulars. Since its run by volunteers, I have to plan in advance and get permission to even get in let alone bring a photographer with me. Fingers crossed that everything is approved. And speaking of photographers…

I asked a friend of mine to take the pictures for me. I started to go down the road of looking for local photographers since there is certainly no shortage of them in this town. I contacted a few and frankly I was less than impressed with the way I was treated if they bothered to acknowledge me at all. Maybe it had something to do with how far away the date is, maybe not but they can just forget it. I decided to ask my friend David to do it. It’s a bit of a leap of faith for both of us, but even just a couple of conversations about style and tone and we are already on the same page. I feel really great about my choice.

Since I am using a friend that isn’t going to be watching the clock I feel a lot more adventurous to try different things. Case in point is that I am looking into renting a classic Cadillac convertible and have us drive off into the desert. I proposed the idea to David and he loved it. Yay!! Now I just have to start pricing that out and figuring out how far in advance I can make the reservation and if I have to get special insurance, blah, blah, big money blah…

So in case it isn’t obvious yet, I am going with an old Vegas, 50’s retro kind of vibe for the shoot. That means hair, makeup and clothes!! WooHoo!! So far I have been hitting the gym almost everyday. Amazing the things you can accomplish when you have a deadline. Come Hell or high water pictures will be taken of me regardless of the size of my waistline. Ugh. Might be time to invest in some Spanx! My hairdresser is on board and although she has also offered to do my makeup, I am pricing that out too. As for clothing, I am all over the map. I have some ideas and some items earmarked on various sites, but I really haven’t decided yet. Plus, what size do I order? No, unfortunately I have to wait on that part for now. You can count on the fact that something is going to have cherries on it!