Pam Biasotti Photography Blog

Archive for the ‘The personal stuff’


I am FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-Photographer Pam Biasotti San Francisco Bay Area

Published July 31st, 2008 in Photography and Me, Riley, The personal stuff, dog | 6 Comments »

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.

How Was Your Fourth of July?

Published July 5th, 2008 in The personal stuff | 1 Comment »

Low key was ours. We didn’t fight the crowds to watch fireworks. Instead since we live in one of the few cities in that Bay Area that sell “legal” fireworks we bought an atrocious amount of them and entertained the kids for about 20 minutes.

We had some friends stop by for dinner, beer, dessert and pyromania.

All photos were shot at an outrageously high ISO of 2500 at some point. Whatever. My camera CAN HANDLE IT. :)

I didn’t photograph any hot dogs, flags, watermelon eating, picnic tables, sack races, egg tossing, water gun fights, yankee doodle dandy stuff. I just photographed “Safe and Sane” pyro sticks that made lots of smoke and trash to pick up this morning.

Have a fabulous 3 day weekend…I am off tonight to meet some special people that I hope to tell you about in the future and tomorrow it’s a day of photographing dogs.

In the immortal words of Beavis…”FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!”

You really can’t see it here below, but Kyle got a bad @##$# buzz cut last week that I can save for another story because it all happened at a party and I never thought we would leave it with him “buzzed”. I saved $20 and was thrilled. I dig Dante’s new sneakers. When they don’t wear velcro on their shoes they seem so grown up.

It took miss J awhile to come forward with holding one of these. Finally she got up the courage and was sparkling like a champ.

Happy 5th of July!

Oh I forgot to add. Someone from the next street over shot this bizarre parachute firework thing (it was a flare!) that was a big red glow in the sky and it slowly started heading toward my street. It looked like it was about to land on my next door neighbor’s car but instead it settled in a tree in the front yard. The darn thing was still glowing and full of combustible crap and I ran over to make sure their house did not ignite in fire. It was that concerning. Maybe I am getting older, but it was not cool and when you live in a state known for all the fires and drought I don’t get why people do these things. Oh and thank you for all the M-80’s you shot off last night until 1 a.m. people. Thank goodness my dog Riley doesn’t mind the noise, but I can only imagine the poor creatures last night shaking to the shock of a M-80. My poor Golden Paddy used to crawl into the bathtub and shake. That is enough PSA for today. Thanks.

People that make you smile

Published July 2nd, 2008 in Friend, My Favorite Things, Riley, The personal stuff, Uncategorized, dog | 8 Comments »

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….

Teeth

Published June 7th, 2008 in The personal stuff | 9 Comments »

In the Biasotti household teeth have become an ongoing issue of importance.  One kid is losing them and looking like a vampire/jack-o-lantern and the other just got his braces.  The reality that the camera I really want and covet is wired into my oldest’s mouth right now really depresses me.  Why didn’t he get the teeth from my side of the family?  Why did he have a small cramped mouth and jacked up jaw?  Do I sound bitter?  I don’t mean to be.  We just can blame the genetics on his old man.  I am hoping my youngest takes after my side of the family as he seems to have lots of gaps and spaces between those teeth prior to losing them yet those 5 years of sucking his thumb probably caused our family orthodontist some sick thrill that he’s going to have two patients in his chair from the family.  

I like the orthodontist actually.  He’s a very nice guy that actually did quite a bit of visits and watching my older son’s mouth change before he dropped the bomb on me that I wasn’t picking up my new camera any time in the new future.  Sure there are credit cards you tell me, but what do you think I did to pay the down payment on K’s braces?  Just when I get them paid off it will be time to pay for college–watch.

Sigh….all for a good cause…

I guess you are just a dream.

 

Now D is very excited about all the new teeth he is losing.  So far he has 6 out in the last few months.  What’s funny is that the two front ones don’t have any new ones budding through yet so he continues to look like a vampire when he smiles at us.  If they aren’t in by Halloween we have a costume already waiting for him.  Hey, I have to save $$$$ now that son #1 has some “ortho bling” going on.  What color did he choose for his braces?  Oakland A’s green of course.

The one thing I don’t like about my iphone is the bad camera.  Don’t let these images influence your decision to hire me, OK?

 

 Before Braces:

 

 

 

 

And now:  That camera looks great in your mouth.

 

 

Dude, you might not have inherited my straight teeth, but you sure got my catapillar eyebrows.