This evening while I was sitting in one of the oversized very used chairs at Barnes & Noble, I was browsing through a design magazine. This particular design magazine I feel is usually rather good, and helpful, (even this issue was helpful). However I am a photographer, and granted, I can hardly call myself a professional, I tend to think like one. I have an eye for really crappy work, and when I see a really, and I mean REALLY crappy photograph on the cover of a reputable design magazine, it almost makes me not want to read it. (Buuuuuut I did anyway. Well, the articles that pertained to me).

The magazine cover was a photo of a couple in their design studio...maybe? it was sort of hard to tell. Anyway, the photo was so out of focus it was ridiculous. Not only was it out of focus, but it looked like it had been Photoshopped to look out of focus to cover up a crappy image. This makes me mad on many different levels, but to name a few it makes me mad because I could have done a better job, and I haven't done anything yet. It also makes me mad because you'd think, if you're running a magazine you would have better taste, and a much better eye than to put something so horribly out of focus on you're cover. You can get an idea of what the cover looks like by going here: http://www.howdesign.com/currentissue/ But you won't actually see what I am talking about unless you take a trip to your local bookstore or magazine stand. Now, the photographer who did this cover seems to do wonderful editorial work. You can view his work here: jonathanchapman.com and see for yourself that the work is great. Not entirely sure what happened between that work on his website, and the image on the cover of HOW magazine.

Perhaps it wasn't the photographer at all who made a crappy image, but the 'tard who did the post production work in PS that made it a mess. I guess we'll never know.

Today as I was cashiering a Russian woman probably in her late 50's came into my line. As normal, I greeted her with a friendly smile and a "how are you today." She may have said hello, but what followed was not friendly. When I finished ringing her up, I asked if she wanted one bag or two. She gave me a filthy look and said, "two". I grabbed the largest size bag we had and started to open it. Out of nowhere the lady I was helping loudly snarled at me and said, "I want bag with handles!" "Sorry" I replied, "we don't have any with handles, just the paper." "why not?!" She snapped back (At this point I was pretty annoyed) "we just don't" I said, "If you like, we have reusable bags that have handles for sale." She had no reply for me. The end of that transaction I handed her the receipt and she quickly snatched it out of my hand. I walked away.
A few minutes later I looked outside, and saw the same woman loading her groceries into her car. However, instead of just picking up the bags and setting them into her trunk, she was taking every single item out of the paper bags and putting them into reusable Trader Joe's bags. Upon seeing this I lost it. As I watched her I said to a fellow employee, "Hey Richard, see that woman out there? She is taking all of her groceries out of her paper bags and putting them into reusables. How much you want to bet that she will leave the paper bags in the cart, and leave the car in the parking lot?" Of course I didn't get much of a response from Rich because he was with a customer himself. But sure enough, just as I had called it the woman left the paper bags in the cart, and pushed the cart to the side. I immediately went outside to retrieve the cart, and as I grabbed the cart I raised my hand in a wave and said, "HAVE A GREAT DAY!" Granted she looked a bit confused because she probably knew that she was being an incredibly intense hag.
What I just don't understand is why in God's name did she have such a damn fit because I didn't even have any bags with handles, when she could have just declined the bags all together and simply have said, "No worries, I have bags in the car" She would have done the same amount of work, and she wouldn't have wasted any bags to begin with. If anyone out there understands this method, please enlighten me.