The Pleasanton Downtown Association has its annual Dog Days of Summer parade. My chance to be amongst canines of all kinds. Getting down on the ground is the best way to capture the expressions and details. The only problem is they all came running to the camera and licked my face, my lens, my camera. I was slimed many times over. When I made it home last night Riley knew I was cheating behind his back and sniffed my clothes for a long time. Here are a few edits from the parade.
Apparently I am getting more and more of the combination together which I enjoy. We just returned from Southern California for a little downtime after the “termination” of my IT career. Sara Evans was playing at the Ventura County fair and my husband is a huge fan. Me, not so much but I admit she’s a good singer. We also stopped off in Camarillo to grab a few shots of this little miracle girl and her siblings. I hope her parents don’t mind me sharing the story with you–well actually Dad gave me permission (but I was hoping Mom would speak up.) 
I just want to say that it’s never too late to have the family you always dreamed of having. No matter how your child comes to you, the opportunity to parent a child is by far one of the most rewarding lifetime experiences. S and R tried for many years to conceive a child on their own and finally adopted their first child, a boy. M came along and guess what happened one month later? R found out she was pregnant! At the age of 40 she delivered a brother to 10 month old M.
It gets even better! We received a call a few months ago that a happy surprise was coming. R was expecting another child–a girl–at 45. Congrats to the family and to her big brothers M and M. Ha ha…sounds like a candy plug doesn’t it?
By the way, Maggie is the new family dog. Sweet addition to an already full house!
By the way, the term free refers to my employment status not to my pricing. Little joke to start off Thursday.
Ok, so it’s obviously after July 29 and I mentioned my life was changing. It changed. Hopefully you have read my about me section here–the photographer in the body of an IT geekette yada yada yada. I might have to redo this now. I am a self-employed photographer full time. That means accepting more clients that I have had to turn away and it means devoting 150% to Pam Biasotti Photography instead of the 105% I was devoting my time to!
For the first time in 22 years (uh oh now you can figure out how old I really am) I am not working for a big corporate company answering to the pointy hair bosses or evil human resource directors as to how much more productivity they can squeeze out of me while cutting expenses more and more each year. (Disclaimer: My last manager was really none of those things and I love her to death and only stayed in the corporate hell hole for as long as I did because she rocked and was the BEST example of what a manager should be) For the first time in 22 years I won’t be walking into an environment where Lumbergh is asking me to work 24/7 on an outage that is really the application side’s fault or the business side’s fault. I won’t be toting hardware from one building to the next or re-imaging a desktop. I won’t be on my hands and knees disconnecting equipment. I won’t be sneezing repeatedly at all the chemical crap in the company carpet. You get the picture. The people who were on the same contractor account as me were awesome. I will miss them all terribly but I won’t miss the days of Dilbert like absurdities that plaque every corporation.
I have done it all. From college I worked in banking as a Customer Service Manager/Ops Quality Control person with an Assistant Vice President title (which is REALLY NO BIG DEAL cause everyone is an AVP in banking), managed call center employees (ackkk fancy word for babysitter of the disgruntled), worked as a Help Desk admin (How many times are you going to forget your password? Sheesh!), Data Security analyst, Network Engineer, IT Consultant, blah blah blah
I went through the motions, did my work as well as I could, gave it my best but something died in me after my youngest came along and I just couldn’t forge ahead the way I used to. I lost my spark. So, anyway, the outsourcing company I worked for outsourced me one last time on Tuesday the 29th. It was a good ride but it’s time for a change and for Pam Biasotti Photography to be a top children’s and dog portrait photographer. I have some big plans and changes coming my way and I look foward to sharing them with my past, present and future clients. Here’s to the next 22 years of doing what I #$%()$%$#’n LOVE!!!
Speaking of love, Riley’s got some new cousins.
Ok, I lied about the bears part.
I was out of the office on location last weekend and spent a few days up in the Pacific Northwest with Erika. We had a wedding to shoot and did some dog mini sessions. Weather was sunny, warm and perfect. I was able to breathe smoke free air and escape the fiery haze that has been plaguing the Bay Area for the past several weeks. Here are a few sneak peaks.
I will be returning phone calls and emails beginning Tuesday.
It’s all about the humor. Rule number one in the Pam Biasotti book of requirements for friendship: MUST HAVE A HUGE SENSE OF HUMOR! Last February I spent a weekend in San Diego at the Secret Photography Workshop as a staff member and met some really cool people. Ashley McNamara was one of the funniest new friends I made that weekend. We had a lot in common–she hails from the Bay Area originally and knew exactly where I was from and understood the lingo. We text messaged each other on our beloved iphones. We took pictures of others and ourselves with lots of makeup and teased hair while we experimented with off camera flash in a swanky room at the W.
I love Ashley’s photography–she has a style that’s all her own. This is a capture of her Flickr images that says it all about her. She is a genius who knows how to execute the image! She has this set on her Flickr stream that says “Failed attempt at 365″ which I wish she would just start doing again. She makes me want to do one for myself and I HATE having my photograph taken. (That’s why it’s important to have someone you trust who can do the job well. I was pleased with the outcome.)
So when I knew she was visiting from San Diego a few weeks back she did me the ultimate favor by taking some images of Riley and me for my new dog website that I am working on. I was thrilled–check these out! My portrait session by Ashley McNamara
Which image of Riley and me do you like the best? My favorite is the one blowing in Riley’s ear. Hee hee! I can’t help but wonder if I need me some botox….
Hello, I am Riley. I am a male Golden Retriever and am entering my golden years at the age of 8 and half. I have been living with Pam since the age of about 8 weeks when I was comfortable enough to wean from my mother (may she rest in peace). Pammy is my alpha–the woman treats me better than her own children. Probably because I give her unconditional love, I don’t leave my clothes all over the house and I usually stand by the door to be let outside when I have gas (unlike her own kids.)
I am going to appear on this blog from time to time, giving you a dog’s perspective on things when Pam is busy with clients. I have a simple life here. Usually I am at Pam’s feet while she works at her computer. We used to do obedience training and agility training and I think I overheard Pam mention that we might be doing the obedience thing again soon. She wants to put a CD title on me before I pass on. One of the reasons she picked me out of the litter of my three other brothers was that I was rated the smartest for obedience. I do learn quickly and love to please. My mistress’ husband–who I refuse to call my master (Pam is my master) thinks I am a knucklehead. He’s just jealous that I love Pam over him. The only time I ignore her versus him is when he has a slice of cheese or apple in his hands. Or a leash. I dig walking with him because he doesn’t make me do the obedience thing like Pam does. Pam expects me to stay at her left side, not pulling ahead or sniffing the ground. Pam will stop suddenly and then I am expected to sit when she stops. I am expected to heel again when she starts walking with her left foot. If I encounter something delightful to smell, she tells me leave it and I have to stop. When her husband walks me, I have the power to pull ahead, sniff and confuse myself with any training that Pam has done previously with me. So, yeah…I get excited when the old man takes me out for a walk.
I am somewhat a famous dog. Well, at least in my own mind. When I was a puppy, my breeder took my brothers and me to a photographer and we were photographed for some ads. You might see this popular shot on specific items that are sold in pet stores.
That was my brother and me. Don’t we look awesome? So, if you see this photo around, you can say “Hey that’s Riley!”
So what did I do today? Caught up on some much needed rest from the day before. I had a leisurely breakfast of Iam’s restricted calorie food ( I need to watch my waistline) which had a topping of Potassium Bromide on it. (Unfortunately I am an epileptic). I took a tennis ball from son #2’s possession and slobbered all over it for about 10 minutes before settling down for another nap. Yeah, my life is really boring right now. I so need to get back in the ring and prove to everyone that I am capable of becoming an AKC Companion Dog.
Okay, then. I must go for now. I look forward to joining Pam with my thoughts on this blog. She’s not terribly exciting–I feel I can bring so much more to the table with my charm and humor. Later.
I do travel for clients. Today I photographed a nice family in the Willow Glen neighborhood of San Jose. Baby M turned 8 days old and was a little doll. My usual newborn–alert. We have been having a heat wave in the Bay Area. My thermometer in the car said it was 103 degrees when I left San Jose late this afternoon. I think the heat finally got to M as she fell asleep for a bit and we were able to work with her. The best time to photograph newborns is under the age of 2 weeks. The earlier the better. I have found even less than a week old to be ideal. My motto to my newborn parents that contact me for newborn sessions is “Call me when you are crowning” so we can fit you into my schedule and I can arrange to capture the baby when it still can curl, fold and sleep. After 2 weeks newborns are sleeping less, develop baby acne and often won’t curl any longer.
Baby M’s mom was quick to advise me she delivered and we managed to capture some interesting images throughout their beautiful home. No need for studio lights today–all natural light. My hat goes off to Baxter, their lovely Dalmatian. He was a gem with the baby and as you know dogs are my thing. Give me your dog–I want to capture it too!!
I promised a few sneak peaks
Dad’s smile was making me laugh. He wouldn’t stop beaming at his beautiful girl.
Baxter was a champ! He’s been under the weather but put up with the humans’ desire for the perfect shot
This is Tanner and Cookie. They are siblings. From what I understand they are mischievous little jackals who get into all sorts of situations. They are Border Collies and if you don’t know anything about Border Collies, they are in the herding group which means they are incredibly smart, wicked, high energy and SNEAKY. At least these boys are.
I heard that the latest thing they like to do is get into the garbage and eat it.
I am meeting their master Russ for lunch today. I have known Russ for over 10 years now–he’s one of my favorite friends on the planet. I would say when he became parents to these boys we really had some awesome dog talks and I hopefully gave him some good advice that he could pretend to use. He probably humored me to shut me up.
Russ played an integral part in my life when I decided it was time to leave a management position and do some hanging out at the company’s Help Desk. I wanted to get into Information Technology and Russ was managing the Help Desk at the time. There were only 5 admins I think, we were a smaller company then and I remember our interview. It was very laid back.
Russ: So, um…yeah. (No, he wasn’t a Bill Lumburgh). Why do you want to leave a management position to work at a Help Desk?
Pam: So, um…yeah. I want to get into the IT world. I love computers–love troubleshooting–I really think I need a change. (Still too confused to even think about photography full time)
Russ: Okeeeeee. When can you start.
Well, it was something along that nature. Heck, it was 1997 and some significant changes were also happening in my life. After 6 years of commuting from a bedroom community way out in the San Joaquin Valley called Tracy we were tired. While driving with our 2 year old son on 580 (that’s freeway talk) my husband was rear ended while moving, not once, but twice! And the drivers that rear ended him just kept going! So we decided it was time to bite the bullet and move back to the Bay Area where you get less of a house but location location location.
So Russ hired me. I was his model employee. I demonstrated how professional and kick @#$#$ I could be as a Help Desk Admin. He was the most amazing manager. He never talked to me. He was too busy putting out fires and getting stuck on outage calls. We had lots and lots of outages back then. I just reset passwords for the same morons day after day that couldn’t remember what their passwords were. (I am one of those morons today). After about 4 or 5 months something horrible happened. Russ moved on to another position. And then another.
I became mortified by the Help Desk after about 7 months and moved along into other IT positions until 1999 when I became a network engineer. You know my story about that in the about me thread.
I knew Russ much better after he was no longer my serious manager. I found out that he matched me in sense of humor and sarcastic wit. When we talk I laugh like there is no tomorrow because he is so funny. Over the years I can call him, vent, make horrific jokes and he is there on the other end laughing his #$$%$% off. (or at least he’s pretending to make me feel like I am funny).
So, yeah. My journey to where I am today is due to Russ. Part of it. Not all of it. I wouldn’t dare humor him to think he’s the sole reason. He just got me started down the path that led me to where I am today. I like to talk about people that helped me reach my journey of where am I today. I think I will pay for his lunch.
Today’s session was in Moraga and we had some fun. A sneak peak of P and B and their doggy Ginger. All three were most expressive. It doesn’t get much better than this when the family dog gets in on the session. I have to add that these boys’ mom was a darling lady. She walked Ginger quite a bit while I was working with the boys and just let us do our own thing. Her polite, well mannered boys are a reflection of her warmth and kindness.
I made a trip out to San Rafael to photograph baby L and his parents. L was yet another baby who doesn’t like to miss a beat when I am there photographing him. Sure enough as I was leaving he was ready for his slumber. I also met his big brother Zeus, who you can tell was the baby of the house before baby L came along.
