I've been making Bradotypes again. But I've been making them a new way. Last time, I created the negatives (using my secret process) then created contact prints onto photo paper in the dark room. This time, I created the negatives the same way, but scanned them instead.

Yesterday Emily and I were sitting around my parents house, when my mom got a call from some real estate investors who wanted $600,000. She didn't have the money, but her friend Adam did. An hour later Adam, the investors, my parents, Emily and I were sitting around discussing the deal. The investors wanted to buy a luxury house in Alaqua that was going up for auction. They estimated the house to be worth around $1 million. We all drove over to check out the property. The front door was locked, the back door was open, so we went in. It was ugly, but in pretty good shape. It will probably sell for more than they can afford.

Woke up at 10:20, ten minutes before the hotel breakfast ended, threw on some clothes and ran downstairs. Everyone else had already eaten, but luckily I didn't miss the omelet bar. Emily came down a while later with Rebecca, her sister who almost didn't make it because of the weather. I'm glad she made it. Spent a few hours hanging out and playing pool with Emily's cousins and uncle before the big party. The party was like a Bar Mitzvah, with Irish dancers instead of Havah Nagela. Everyone had fun. After the party, we all went back to the grandmother's house, ate, drank, played pool and played spoons.

Ate lunch at Steve's, the same place we had eaten on our first night in town. The food was bad both times. During lunch, Emily, Joey and I decided to make dinner for everyone that night. We went shopping and spent the rest of the afternoon cooking Emily and my specialty, spaghetti and meatballs. Dinner was great. We drove to the hotel in a big snowstorm, checked in and met all of Emily's sisters and cousins at the bar. Another group of people were playing country songs on the juke box and line dancing. Very entertaining.

Emily and I took the train into downtown Chicago at around 1 pm. It was an above ground, double decker train with a good view. Naturally we sat on the upper level. The city looked really beautiful as we rode into town - brick buildings, industry, and a lot of history. I hate new cities. They just don't have the same feel. I guess that's why I liked Rome so much. We took a cab from Union Station to Ann and Miguel's (Emily's aunt and uncle) hotel. From there we rented a car, picked up Ann and Miguel's friend MacArthur (I think that's his name) and drove to a park next to lake Michigan. Emily and I thought that the were just taking us to the docks, to walk in and out of stores. Instead we went on a Siberian Blizzard Death March. We walked for about 2.5 miles in snowy, windy, and freezing weather. We had dinner at a Greek restaurant called The Parthenon, after picking up Joey. The food was amazing. Better than even the Greek food we had in Greece. After dinner, Emily, Joey and I went out for coffee until 2 am.

Emily and I flew into Chicago on Sunday. We came to shoot a Lifetime Tribute Video of her grandmother and attend said grandmother's 90th birthday party. Monday we rented video lights and began shooting. She told stories for 3 hours straight. Her memory is amazing, like a camera turned on at age two and left running. She even remembers the end of WWI and running away from home to get married at age 3. We ate dinner at Giordano's, which is suppose to be the best pizza in the country. It was good, but I've had better.

Today we finished shooting the video (another 2 hours of footage) and ran errands. One of the places we went was an art supply store in downtown Downers Grove. I have a love/hate relationship with those type of stores, because I really want to be a good artist, but I'm just not. Emily's cousin Joey arrived tonight. He's great; we talked about everything from music to politics and alternative energ

We spent the weekend preparing for our big meeting with Baldwin Fairchild funeral homes. They want us to create Photo Slide-Shows for their client's memorial services. Em put together a folder with tiered sheets of paper describing our business and our service. I updated the demo DVD with the Baldwin Fairchild logo and practiced my sales pitch. The meeting is tomorrow, so hopefully it will go well.

Saturday we met Marshal and Brittany at Fuji Sushi for dinner. It was good, as usual, and I enjoyed seeing them (for the first time in a long while). Last week I rented Grand Theft Auto San Andreas (or whatever it's called). It was addictive and I spent way too much time playing it. Thankfully it was only a rental. We also rented the HBO series "Angels in America", a 6 hour program about immigrants. I fell asleep after an hour

Piggy was getting very upset about Turtle sitting on my lap this morning. She laid on the floor barking and howling for a few minutes. I got out my camera and she got even more upset.

Em and I spent most of the day scanning photos for our new ads, which are being created by Grandesign. At around 5pm we went to Home Depot and picked up some vegetable and herb plants - tomato, green pepper, broccoli, basil, sage, camomile, and some other stuff which I can't remember at the moment. We came home and planted it in a small plot in the back yard. Piggy ripped up and ate one of the broccoli plants right after we finished.

Emily, Turtle, Piggy and I spent the holidays in Dallas with Emily's dad, step mom and sisters. They are all very good cooks, so we sat around eating the entire time. Well almost the entire time. Between meals we managed to go ice skating, visit the Fossil office where Emily's sister works, check out Emily's dad's new boat and see The Aviator (which was excellent). Turtle and Piggy were annoying the crap out of us by chasing the cats around and getting into trouble.

I spent new years at Danny Berger's party and January first at De Leon Springs State park. We ate pancakes at the Sugar Mill and debated the existence of Woolly Mammoths in Florida (there weren't any, but there were giant sloths).