It’s funny how photography can work. Your hired as a professional photographer for your expertise, skill, equipment and a variety of other things. Some time you utilize all of those and other times you do not, it all depends on the shoot really.

We were hired a while back to do a CD for a local musician and the above photo is what I had in my head after we sat down and discussed the details. The shoot went amazing and everyone was happy.

A few days later we got together to go over the photos and in the end the client choose a photo none of us expected. Normally we take the outtakes out and just show processed final images for selection. We had accidentally left one photo of a photographer taking a photo of the client during the shoot in the pile. this of course is the one she choose.

It’s funny how photography works some times.

When I first started working with Brian I noticed the OBSCENE amount of coffee he drank, specifically Mochachinos (espresso and chocolate goodness). We made a lot of stops at coffee shops and I was not really into coffee drinks or donuts so I started to search the menu for a nice drink that I could share with Brian while he was enjoying his Mochas. His favorite place to get his drinks is Just Us Café, its fair trade and organic so it’s a great place to grab a cuppa joe. Brian suggested that as I liked tea I try some of the teas there. In no time at all I was addicted to their loose leaf green tea.

I started to hunt around and try the different teas around town and started to discover that like most things in the world every one I tried had different things about it I liked. It wasn’t long before I started to pick up on all the tea lore, steeping times, boiling temperatures and even serving sizes and traditions. I started becoming a bit of what we like to call a “tea snob” and really developing my pallet for different teas.

In November I aged another year…backwards naturally… and as a gift Brian bought me the Breville Variable Temperature Kettle! It has different settings for all the different teas. It was my first step in my now sick collection of tea paraphernalia consisting of way too many tea pots, a cupboard full of different teas and more strainers and tea balls than you could shake a stick at.

My newest and coolest piece of tea paraphernalia was a gift I got for x-mas from a dear friend. She knew how seriously I took my teas and decided she would get me a Bodum storage cup…this travel mug is nothing short of miraculous! It not only has a nice handle for ease of use but it also has its own French press so you can brew loose leaf teas in it and a mini storage compartment for hiding extra tea for later!!

I suppose by now for those of you who have not met me you have figured out I am a nut job… but at least I’m a nut job with a hobby.