DolFans NYC Or The Part Of My Life That Is Falling Apart

Those who know me well know that I let the fate of a professional sports team dictate my well being, but the fact remains that when the Dolphins suck, I am fucking miserable… And they have sucked for a long time. Until last year. Last year was this miracle season where after a rough start they won 9 out of their last 10 games and ended up winning the division before getting embarrassed in the play offs. This off season I was so happy because they were even better than the year before and I couldn’t wait for the season to start.  I helped found DolFans NYC the only fan club in New York City for the Miami Dolphins.  We brought out almost 100 people for the first game at the Third & Long sports bar in Murray Hill… But then they lost. And lost again, and then lost a third time.  During their most recent loss last Sunday the man most responsible for their worst-to-first record last year was injured so badly he may never play the game of football again.  Chad Pennington is gone and so is pretty much any chance of a winning season. And such is life. The Dolphins will not win the Super Bowl again. Not only have they not won in my life time, but NO sports team I have followed EVER won a championship.  I am a Dolphins fan, a Caps fan, a Georgetown Hoyas fan, a Bullets/Wizards fan and since I went there, I am mildly a Penn State Football fan. When I was a kid, do you know what my favorite baseball team was? The New York fucking Yankees. But then my favorite player Don Mattingly retired so I gave up and started rooting for the home team, the Oriels. Guess what? The Yankees won the next fucking year and the Oriels are an embarrassment to the game.

Anyway, I don’t really care about baseball or basketball, I just want my Dolphins to win the Super Bowl once before I die. Is that too much to ask?  It probably is.  I am going to try to keep it together, while you can check out the photos from our last two Dolphins NYC meetings. I even convinced my friend Ibi to go (and I forced her to wear Aqua) to the Colts game with me, as you can see in the picture of us below.  Click here for pics from Week 2 against the Colts and click here for pics from Week 3 against the Chargers. Keep in mind that these are basically snap shots and are not up to the usual oh-so-high standards that you come to expect from Driven By Boredom Productions LLC.  Yeah, fuck you too.

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Indian Larry Block Party – 9.27.09

Indian Larry Motorcycles threw a block party down the street from my house in Williamsburg and Inked Magazine asked me to photograph the party.  While I got a few more people asking me not to take their picture than normal, most people were very friendly despite their often terrifying motorcycle riding demeanors. I have noticed in fact that generally the scarier people look the more likely they are to want their pictures taken.  That being said, I did have a few people tell me to stay away from the Hell’s Angels in attendance.  The party was a lot of fun with a grill going, bands playing and a lot of motorcycles.  I got to go inside the shop and check out a few of the Indian Larry bikes on display. They were pretty incredible.

Click here to see the photos from the Indian Larry block party.

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Trash – 9.26.09

I had been shooting photos at Exxxotica all day and I just stopped by Trash to say “hi”. When I got to Webster Hall there were several people I hadn’t seen in ages so I decided to pull out my camera and get some shots.  I didn’t shoot a whole lot, but I did manage to convince some girls to shoot some photos in the hatchback that I turned into a photo booth for Exxxotica. They are friends from Staten Island but just randomly happened to be at Trash together.  The photos kinda sucked, but they are still pretty hot.  I have more Hatchback Photo Booth shots coming up this week, but we will get to that later. In the mean time, if you click here you can see all the photos from Trash last Friday.

Ps. Just a few more posts and I will be caught up!

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EXXXotica NY 2009 – Day 2 – 9.25.09

EXXXotica day two was pretty intense for me. I was on just a few hours of sleep and I had to shoot a party for Inked Magazine around noon before I even drove my ass to New Jersey. I got there and just felt miserable until about 8PM when I was ready to leave. On my way out I convinced an unnamed Burning Angel to shoot nudes in my car. I used to drive a two door GTI before I moved to NYC, but I can’t afford it so it normally lives at my parents house. But I had it for the weekend and I had this idea to set the back up like a photo booth and shoot people. It didn’t really go over as well as I would have liked, but I did shoot a few people and those pictures will be up in a day or two. (That’s why I am keeping the Burning Angel’s identity a secret for now…)

Anyway, so by the time we finish shooting it is 845 and I am ready to leave. But when I got back 2 Live Crew was playing and I was a HUGE fan of them in like 1990. I know it is weird for a ten year old to love 2 Live Crew, but I did. After they played I tried to say my good byes. After an hour of saying bye I ran into two of the dudes from Cleric who do the music for Strip for Pain. They convinced me to stay and hang out after and we spent the remainder of the show making fun of the go-go dancers.

After the show I went back to the hotel where everyone was staying. And I have no photos of any of this (I do have some video though) so you are just going to have to believe me when I tell you what happened. All the Strip for Pain guys were staying in a room together and they were completely fucking wasted. There was all sorts of drama going on because 2 Live Crew caught someone getting a blow job in a van, then they got caught fucking in a hotel room and people were pissed and um, let’s just move on. We went up to the room and my friend Doug is out of his mind. This guy just has a knack for getting kicked out of hotels. He started causing a ruckus and by the time he was done the room was absolutely trashed. I have most of that on video that I will get up one of these days. After completely fucking up the room this guy Timmy started yelling at Doug to sober up. He slapped the full beer out of Doug’s hand and stomped it sending an explosion of beer everywhere. Doug then defended himself knocking Timmy’s beer to the ground and stomping on it. By the time this was over I was soaking wet and we were out of beer.

There was an after party down stairs and we decided to try to go to it. The guys just tried to walk in which pissed off the security to no end. 2 Live Crew tried to pull us in but they wouldn’t let Doug in cause he was being belligerent. At some point while I was outside talking to the Cleric guys Doug tried to sneak in. I didn’t see this, but someone gave him a entry bracelet but he was so drunk he didn’t know what it was and when security realized what was happening he flung himself into some standing plants knocking them all over the ground. Nick from Cleric saw Doug crash into a pillar in the lobby so I ran inside to check on him. He was on his knees in front of the elevator.

We all got on and Doug laid on the ground dry heaving. We were trying to deal with him and we forgot to press the button for the 5th floor. On the 6th floor the door opened. It was a hotel security guard and what turned out to be the head of Human Recourses for the hotel. When she saw the scene she freaked out and told us we had to get him up immediately. Doug for whatever reason did not like this. Somewhere in the drunkenness of his mind he grabbed for her leg like an octopus and tried to pull her by the ankle into the elevator. I sprung into action and using all my strength I managed to pry him off her leg. I thought we were completely fucked but I managed to pick him up and hold him still. Everyone else kept their composure and we told her we would put him to bed. The HR woman got off on the 12th floor and we headed back down with the security guard as our escort. Nearly every floor between 12 and 5 someone got on. Every time the door would open Doug would scream, “IN OR OUT!?!” for some insane reason. I just held him tight. By the time we reached the 5th floor there were about 10 guys in the elevator and porn star Gina Lynn who was inching as far away from Doug as humanly possible. The security guard walked us to the room which was completely trashed and the only reason you couldn’t smell the beer all over the walls was because of all the pot smoke. Luckily the security guard was cool and just told us to keep Doug in the room. That was not a problem as he passed out immediately. This was probably not the best thing to happen to him because as soon as he passed out the permanent markers came out and five minutes later his ear was solid black, he had penises on his face and his shoes had been lit on fire. I actually have a picture of the results. I twittered about it!

After that fiasco I ended up going to the after party with the Burning Angel crew and I spent the next hour telling pretty much everyone about Doug’s adventure in the elevator, nearly laughing to tears every time I told it. The party was pretty surreal as it was a lot of porn stars getting drunk and dancing to a really weird NJ cover band. On one side of the room was Ron Jeremy and on the other was 2 Live Crew. It was pretty surreal. I even got to tell Jenna Haze the Doug story, which was cool because she is one of the only porn stars I knew of before I started hanging out with porn people. I really don’t watch that much porn and I have no idea who anyone is ever unless they have a bunch of tattoos or something.

I ended up getting home around 6 am and decided day three was out of the question. Besides I had to get up and watch the Dolphins lose again and have their quarterback get injured for the rest of the season. Fucking awesome.

Yeah that’s all I got for you today, click here to see all the pictures from Saturday at the EXXXtoica NY convention.

Oh, I almost forgot, the Long Island Lolita herself was there. I can now officially say I have met Amy Fisher. I think my life is complete. And by complete I of course mean, completely out of hand. Fuck. See you guys later.

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Strip For Pain – EXXXotica 2009 Edition

I have shot Strip For Pain a dozen or more times, and if you don’t know about it by now, just check the archives.  All that needs to be said is that it is America’s most dangerous game show, that it is hosted by Doug Sakmann and Joanna Angel and that it is sponsored by Hot Movies.

During EXXXotica they did Strip For Pain a number of times, including one of the most successful ones I have seen them do on the main stage. You can’t really tell from these pictures but this guy just got brutalized.  He had to eat some sort of peanut butter and banana and fish gut sandwich while he was being electrocuted with a dog collar.  It was pretty messed up.  He won a lap dance from a lot of Burning Angels though. Anyway, you know the deal, click to see all the pictures of the EXXXotica editons of Strip For Pain.

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EXXXotica NY 2009 – Day 1 – 9.25.09

EXXXotica NY is back and once again it is in New Jersey.  Last year it was going to be closer to NYC but the mayor of Secaucus decided that his town was to moral for a pornography convention.  Well in the mean time he has been indicted in a massive organized crime conspiracy involving bribery, Hasidic rabbis and human organ trade. Well, despite that the convention is once again in Edison, NJ at the New Jersey convention center.  It took me 90 minutes to get out of the damn Holland Tunnel and $20 in tolls. Fun times.

Friday was pretty slow as is the norm for these type of things.  That gave me a chance to get good shots of the porn stars before they were hounded with fans. Sasha Grey was the most popular star all weekend with lines running across the room, but on Friday I managed to have a 10 minute conversation with her while she waited for fans toward the end of Friday night.  I spent some time hanging out with my Burning Angel friends and talking to the people I run into at all these things. In particular I should shout out to Lexi Love, Sean Michaels, the Pop Porn guys, Revay, Roggie, and of course the whole BA crew.

Oh, I should mention that the convention was sponsored by Hot Movies.  Hot Movies is a Philly based porn on demand company who help fund my friend Doug’s Strip For Pain show, so we have to plug them. And don’t worry, the Strip for Pain shots are coming next! While you wait please, click here to see the pics from Friday at the EXXXotica NY Convention.

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Rebecca Schiffman & Teddy Blanks – 9.22.09

I am almost caught up with old stuff although I shot a ton of stuff yesterday, and today is going to be nuts as well.  I probably shot three galleries yesterday and I’ll shoot three more today.  So it may be another few days before we are fully caught up, but just know I am trying.

Last week my friend Teddy Blanks played with Rebecca Schiffman at some bar in midtown called Bar Nine. I am not sure why they play there, but it’s their second show.  I have talked about Teddy relentlessly, so all I will say is that during his set three girls started doing choreographed dances and by the end there were about 6 or 7 people doing the same dance through his entire set.  It was very weird.

Rebecca is this little adorable girl who makes some sort of singer/songwritery acoustic folk type jams.  She is pretty much nothing like Teddy musically but evidently they have a lot of friends/fans in common.  Rebecca is not just a musician but an artist and writer as well. Her website has music, links to her zine and jewelry line as well as her writing and her fine art work.  My favorite of her work is paintings she has done of photos from ebay auctions.  I am really into net based art, and I have done my fair share of ebay pranks, so that stuff is really up my alley.

Anyway, I have to go shoot photos for about 14 hours now, so just check out the pictures from Teddy & Rebecca’s show last week.

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Invite Them Up Reunion – 9.18.09

Now that my site is running reasonably smoothly again we can finally get the photos I took LAST Friday during the Eugene Mirman Comedy Festival. Yeah, we are behind, let’s get started.

Friday night’s show started with a reunion of my favorite comedy show in New York City. The show has appeared on this site before, most notably when I covered their last three shows. But when I shot their 5th year reunion was also important because it happened to be the first time I had shot nightlife photography with an on camera flash. It was sort of the starting point for me taking event work slightly seriously.

I had to see Invite Them Up get back together if only for a night. The show is hosted by Bobby Tisdale and Eugene Mirman and features a number of comics inter spliced with weird chants and bits from Bobby with Eugene taking his 10 minutes towards the end of the show. Often times there is music.

Friday Bobby was in full swing playing out his infamous mic checking bit for longer than anyone reasonably should. Bobby is not a reasonable man. Bobby lead the crowd in a number of rousing chants, although he unfortunately left out any mention of Connie Chung or Margaret Thatcher, two ladies who get a lot of play in Bobbys chanting.

Bobby brought on SNL writer John Mulaney to open the show. John sat next to me on the plane to South by Southwest this year and we had a very awkward conversation where I accidentally talked shit about several projects he worked on. I don’t mean to not like SNL I just think most of the cast is annoying, and yeah I like Dimitri Martin live more than I like his show, but John is a funny fucking guy and had me laughing his whole set.

Next up was Morgan Murphy who I saw opening for Patton Oswalt and Eugene nearly for years ago. When I moved up to NYC she was opening for Neil Hamburger at Piano’s and tried to sneak me in to the sold out show. I have sort of have had a crush on her since then from a far, but now she lives in NYC so now I am probably going to run into her on the street and not make eye contact. I have seen her a few times and she was hilarious as always. She also did a bit of prop comedy with some Jewish New Year 5770 shades which were pretty epic. She told me she had been wearing them all day.

After Morgan was John Hodgman who I have never actually seen do stand up, but I am a big fan of. Considering half his bit was about how everyone recognizes him from his TV commercial you probably know him as the PC guy from the Mac Vs PC commercials. I ran into the Mac (Justin Long) at McDonald’s the other day, so now I have my bases covered. I personally am a fan of John from his work on This American Life and Boing Boing, two of the more nerdy things I have been obsessed with in my life. His roast of Obama was also pretty outstanding. It was good to get to see him do stand up.

Next was an Invite Them Up staple called 30 seconds of stand up where a comic does EXACTY 30 seconds of generally improvised stand up. The very funny Joe Mande stepped up and did his 30 seconds on Friday. He was then followed by Eugene who brought up Larry Murphy to help him do a bit involving Daniel Day-Lewis trying to figure out how to use a Blue Ray DVD player while staying in his There Will Be Blood character. This was all followed by John Westley Harding doing a few songs for a short musical break to the comedy.

Speaking of music, up next was Reggie Watts who makes the most insane music you have ever heard using only his voice and a Line 6. He was brilliant as always, but there is nothing really to say about it. You just need to see him for your self. Your mind will be blown. Even watching him on tape does not do him justice.

The headliner of the show was former Daily Show correspondent and American hating Red Coat John Oliver. I have seen him do stand up a half dozen times and while I am always near tears in laughter, I always leave with just a little more hatred towards the British. His humor is so elitist that he has figured a perfect way to make hipsters laugh by attacking Americans as a whole which hipsters feel a sense of superiority over. So when he makes fun of American’s for being ignorant gluttons the audience some how feels he isn’t actually making fun of them. I think it is brilliant and completely hilarious and had a real sense of pride when I explained that only Americans would create a hot dog eating contest, then get beaten in it and make it a statement of national honor to win it back. And as I hope you know by now, I am a HUGE Joey Chestnut fan. USA! USA!

It was a great show and I was glad to see Invite Them Up back if even only for a night. The room was too dark though and so the photos aren’t great.  They aren’t even as good as the pictures from the day before. That being said, stand up comedy photos aren’t exactly riveting, but I hope you guys check out all of these comedians and if you get another chance to see Invite Them Up you should get on that.

I also wanted to mention that there were four people in the show named John.  I had this idea for a long time to collect autographs of famous people named John as an art project.  I think once I moved to NYC and started being around celebrities a lot more the idea of asking anyone for an autograph seems super awkward even if it’s mostly for an art project. Still, when I saw John Hodgman and John Oliver talking outside, I probably should have added them to the collection/project. There is a pretty good explanation of the John autograph idea here if you want to know what the hell I am talking about.

Anyway, let’s move on.  I need to get some sleep. I have to cover an adult convention in NJ tomorrow which I am sure will be super weird.  I have this idea of turning my car into a photo booth and trying to convince porn stars to pose in it. Not sure if that will actually happen, but it sounds really funny to me right now.  So, please click here to see all the photos from the Invite Them Up reunion and I will talk to you guys when I get back.

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Trash – 9.18.09

I took these so damn long ago I am not even going to talk about the night.  I never remember anything more than two days after it happens. That’s why I take photos and blog about everything.  It’s a product of a decade of insomnia. It was Jessie Lee’s birthday and Alex Malfunction renewed his very recent wedding vows in between burlesque numbers. Speaking of burlesque, this gallery is slightly NSFW because of that.  You might just have to deal with it.

Click here to see the photos from Trash.

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