Las Vegas - May 2008

1999 - Winston Salem

That is Nick Fletcher sitting on the top of Karl Fulbright's (now dead, he tried to miss a squirrel) Honda Civic. I don't know why we would fuck with him so much but we did. Nick and I would do anything and everything to annoy Karl in those days. I remember pulling up his parking break at seventy miles an hour on Highway 52 watching Karl freak out.

Of course this was outside of 533.

Nick lives in Hawaii now. Karl has gone missing in Winston-Salem and even has a child on the way.

Outside Seto-City Japan July 2000

This was the only day of my life where I actually felt like a minority. Not sure why we came to this progressive school in the middle of nowhere, but I felt like we we're being shown something. It was like they we're saying, "Hey, look at this excellent school, now go back and tell your friends that Japan is with it."

It was one of those schools where there are no walls. You know the type that exists outside of affluent suburbs that white formally urban-dweller parents flock to once their children have reached school age? There's some of these in and around Chapel Hill and I'm sure there's one in Ashville.

Recess was dominated by crawl fishing right behind the school.



That one kid wouldn't let go of his junk!

Back to the first part. These kids kept grabbing us and touching our hair. I remember being asked to take a knee so everyone could take a large section of my hair and stroke it up and down. They were amazed by how soft it was. Obviously these kids had never seen white people before. We were from another planet, a feeling that I've never had before or since.

Late 1960's

It seems that I have started a trend with my posts. I'm not too sure when this photo was taken since the events of my father's life have always been somewhat cryptic. Stories of this college or that tend to run together. His stay at High Point University was short. He ended up beating up a security guard to get to the girls dorm. These are the stories I hear about from my father in the 1960's. He wasn't protesting or taking drugs, he was drinking and fucking! This picture was taken when he was still playing college football, before he hurt his leg and a little bit before signing up for the marines in 68.

It's strange but the man still has the same hair line. He must of been 19 or 20 here and it's never gone futher back (in forty years) since this time. It even looks like he's gotten a little more. He was a pretty goofy looking guy, check out that well rounded nose-I've got some of that mess. Looking at pictures like these, I've always been struck by how little I look like my family. Often people have joked that my Uncle Phil was my father both from the look as well as the way we run.

1940's

This is my grandfather James Foster. He died a few months back. When I think about my impecable fashion sense, I always refer back to this image. This man is where I learned it all. I followed his every fashion move except for the ill-advised white shoe phase that no one should have found themselves in. The name of this file is "Frank Sinatra Grandfather"-how appropriate.

533 Uprisings - 1998

When I first started this little blog I thought that I'd stick with pictures that I'd taken. But I ran across this little number while looking at some pics that thought it was worth posting. It's been ten years since it all started so why not a little remembrance?

I guess I picked one of these up right as the club opened? Since I an organizer of epic proportions, I've kept most of the fliers from that era. At the time they made for great wall art but now their nice for reductive reminiscing. If you guys aren't too knowledgeable about 533, it basically picked up where Pablo's left off. Although I went to quite a few shows at Pablo's, that wasn't where I really cut my teeth on punk rock, it was here and I'm quite happy about that. I think for that whole first summer I went to every single show? It was the place to be if you were in high school and looking for some place other than the yet to be established Border's.

The actually location is now Chelsea's coffee shop on Trade Street. I have no interest in ever going in there.

2/2/08 - Boone, NC

This is Misty.

She is from King.

She likes cheese.

She doesen't like tomatoes.

She drinks cranberry flavored adult beverages.

She drives a Chevy Cobalt.

She enjoys Reba in all of her artistic pursuits.

She is a history student at UNCG.

She has an outside kitty name Chicken Nugget.

She spends a lot of money on chewing gum.

She is super unhappy about Patrick Swayzee's "health situation."

10/27/07 Lexington NC

I'm not too sure I need to explain anything here? This is a Lexington NC meal purchased at the infamous Lexington Barbeque festival, the epicenter of white trashness and arts and crafts. This tray was fine nothing spectacular, I've had better.

1/7/06 - St. Louis MO

I realized the other day that all of the pictures I've posted were taken outdoors. The reason for this is that I never have purchased a really nice digital camera. Taking pictures outdoors simply gives me better results.

This is how I usually travel, sleeping on the floor in a small apartment or house in strange parts of town. Normaly bad parts of town. Matt and Ryane are demonstrating how to do it. This particular night I slept directly to their left and a friend of mine had his head against the door. At least I was there and not in some boring hotel sleeping on a comfortable bed with tons of useless tv channels.

July 2006 - The Gorge Washington State

I've been to a few shows in my lifetime. Most have been in cramped and disgusting basements, horrible tobacco buildings, or bars way out in the middle of nowwhere. Places that people could care less if obnoxious music went on there. In the rare instances like at Tiple BBB's, the regulars actually stayed as part of the crowd. Anyway, it's nice to have a break from the usual space of smoke filled clubs. Not that Warped Tour held too many "exotic locales" for either the performer, spectator, or bus driver, but this one was amazing. Only two nights before I had joined the tour with a few friends from St. Louis. I stayed up almost allnight the first night as we drove through Northern California and into Nevada and finally Idaho. My first show was somewhere outside of Boise.

That night I took the wheel for the first time, driving almost eight hours well into the morning. When I got close to the venue, I didnt really know how to get down into the Gorge. Our instructions specifically said "not to go all the way" which would disrupt the tour buses. If you were a touring band not in one of the larger buses, then you got shit on. Instead of testing the Warped Tour people, I stayed at the top of the hill. Basically I parked in a field near the place along a dirt road. That whole next day I wondered the grounds and looked over into the Gorge. There was a constant breeze that swept throughout day, past the stage over the hill and into the parking lot.

1/1/08 - New Orleans LA

This made me giggle for hours. Enjoy.

5/18/05 - San Diego CA

At first, I wasn't going to put pictures of myself up on this freshly created blog site. It made more sense to post pictures that we're a little more universal. You know, shots of really pretty things, shots of houses, hands, and old broken chairs. In other words I wanted to do the typical photo thing. I've killed this on my second post.

What we have is a picture of myself on the streets of San Diego California on my first cross country trip. Obviously I had avoided shaving for about three weeks when this picture was taken. Facial hair's fun, so why not form it in the shape of idiocy? I think I look pretty good in the picture. When I showed my mom and my sister this one, they thought I looked exactly like my dad. At least my hair is red and his is brown. I only kept this look for San Diego and the couple days before in Las Vegas, shaving everything before getting to San Francisco.

I may bring it back next summer?

1/18/03 - Charleston S.C.

Doesn’t the world need another blog? Here’s one. I thought that since I have thousands of pictures, why not let some folks see these pictures? Not so heavy on the writing. I’ll put a little story up to go with each picture.

I had no idea what I wanted to put up as my first item. To be honest I simply needed a start to this thing so I chose a picture I took out of a Honda Accord going over the now deceased (the old one) Cooper River Bridge going into Charleston S.C. This bridge was freighting! Every time I would drive into town I would become visibly nervous when having to go over that piece of junk. It’s an ok picure, maybe too much going on? I’m not a photographer, but I take a lot of pictures.