Last friday, by far, had to be the weirdest day of my enitre week. Not to mention we had an event to get ready for but a little emergency popped up.

As you know i currently work full time. I prefer to take my lunch late in the day. I start at 8:30am monday through friday and clock out at 5:30pm. I usually take my lunch around 2:30-3:30pm. While at work on friday, I got a call from a friend expressing her desparate need for a photographer to shoot some stock photos of one of San Diego’s premiere nightlife venues. I explained that I was at work and didn’t have my camera with me. She said that she had less than 2 hours to get high quality photos of the venue and submit them over to the public relations rep for a famous artist she may bring out. The up and down tone in her voice let me know that her time was ticking. So I told her if she was interested, that I could help but she’d have to pick me up from work, take me home to get my camera and laptop, take me downtown to shoot, send over the photos, then take me back to work – all in one hour…she agreed.

I clocked out the moment she had arrived and and we were off. First obstacle – I glanced over to her gas meter and to my suprise the needle was below E in bumper to bumper traffic on the 8 west freeway. She explained her day and how much driving she had done so we stopped and got gas. 45 minutes to go!

10 minutes later, we arrive at my house. I rushed in grabbed my camera, one lens, my usb cord, card reader, my lense cloth and laptop and we were off again. We arrive downtown and it took us about 25 minutes to find parking and walk to the venue before i actually snapped my first shot. So after one shot I have 10 minutes left before my lunch is over…Damn! then something happened.

I got into this mode where nothing mattered to me anymore as I was taking my photos – not time – not lunch – not anything. It was as if everything was tuned out and muted. The sales and marketing lady turned all the club lights and effects on for me and closed all the curtains for me. The colors were absolutely stunning. I shot on manual the entire time. I felt like a kid in a candy shop; here I was inside of a nightclub at 4:10pm taking pictures while its completely empty. I never realized how beautiful it was inside until shooting and I was amazed at how my work had turned out. It was now 4:45pm; I was 20 minutes past my lunch, 20 minutes before the pictures had to be sent over, and it was going to take at least 20 more minutes to get me back to work…I was going to get chewed out when I got back to work…Damn!

I did something I thought I’d never do out of desperation. I really needed to get back to work so i gave my SD Card, card reader, and usb cord to my friend and told her to take care of what she needs to while I go back to work. I had to trust my gut on this b/c there was a job at hand that needed to be done and plus, I enjoy helping people. I arrived back at work at 5pm one the dot only to find the entire warehouse closed down, my boss gone, and my office cpu off and all the lights off. So I called and let him know what happened. He called my cell phone back almost immediately and told me to enjoy my weekend and to be careful and don’t worry about it.

I think I’m gonna start ordering takeout for lunch….later!!!

-socal