so. i rode my bike to work yesterday b/c the weather has been really nice, but my back tire somehow went completely flat by the time i left, so i called j to pick me up. while i was waiting, i walked down to the creek and kicked around for a bit. i’m going to try to get back into the habit of taking regular snapshots of life instead of only pulling out the camera for “photography.”

i love water. if there is a creek nearby, there’s a good chance i’ll end up in it.

i’ll be making a neat little post later that should be pretty exciting. until i get that all fixed up for you, here are a few snowflakes from the last mini blizzard we had in oklahoma. the snow is always so bittersweet for me; i just adore shooting tiny ice crystals, but, as an arizona baby, i’ve never developed anything but pure content for the cold. it’s always worth it later, though, when i’m warm and toasty in my house and have lovely snowflake photos all around.

i chased the sunset on friday night about twenty minutes west of phoenix to catch a mountain sunset. i wiggled under a barbed wire fence and walked pretty far out into an open area for this one.

i went hiking in the estrella mountains on saturday and took a full 360 pano of where i was standing so you’d be able to see what i saw all around me.

i traveled back to estrella on sunday before my flight and hiked to the top of the mountain. here’s the view from where i sat for a bit. you can see on the sides how steep the climb was. i had a heck of a time getting down.

visit the postcard shop at embrea.com to pick up a set for yourself or a friend. :)

i’m awful at updating my blog, i know. i have a million things i should probably be posting, and i’ll try to get around to that later. to catch you up a little, i decided to move into the manor and rent my little house to a friend. it’s been great so far, aside from all the unpacking that is yet to be completed. i made it through the year end horse show finals, tried to remove the tip of my finger and ended up with stitches, and had an amazing birthday week with people i adore. i’m flying to phoenix on friday to shoot a concrete blonde show; i’m pretty excited about it. i’ve added a little player with a few of my favorite concrete blonde songs in case you’re not familiar with them.

for you polamour lovers, i decided to not end the project on my birthday at the one year mark. thank you for all the support during the first year, folks. i really appreciate it. i hope you’ll stick around for 2011 and watch me spend way too much money on film. hooray, priorities!

we had our first (tiny) bit of snow in oklahoma city yesterday. i had to scramble around in boxes to find all of my macro equipment, so i only managed to catch a few flakes before the sun went down. they were coming in little puffy clusters, and they weren’t sticking to the ground for more than a few minutes, but i’m hoping for more before the of winter. i hope you appreciate that i’m willing to lie on the cold, wet ground and freeze my fingers for long periods of time just so i can capture these for you. :)

sorry i’ve been so flaky. har har. ♥

i met four new friends today at mary’s swap meet! they invited me on an adventure. i accepted, of course.

gray pony said they were heading to the top of stone mountain. they tore off through the low desert, hoping to get there before nightfall.

we came up on a river, and buckskin pony walked carefully through to make sure crossing would be safe. how thoughtful!

on the other side of the river was the base to stone mountain. the ponies galloped excitedly up and over peaks.

palomino pony suddenly got a second wind and bounded up ahead of the other ponies. “wait up!” gray pony called.

whoa! that was a close call, palomino pony. whoever knew that stone mountain ended in a cliff?

black pony looked off across the canyon and wondered what new adventures awaited below…

you can buy prints from the entire polamour collection (well, almost entire; i have to add the latest ones) and a handful of prints from my standard photography collection. i’ll be adding many more as i get time, so don’t be discouraged if your favorite(s) aren’t up yet. you can let me know, too, if you’d really like for me to add a specific one right away.

i’m working on new photo pendants and a few non-photo jewelry pieces, and i promise to list those as soon as they’re ready. i’m also in the process of putting together new frames and displays for upcoming shows, and i’ll be sure to add a few of those when i can.

the fun thing about embrea is that we’ve created a point system. each point = 10¢ (ten points = $1). this way, you can earn points through contests, trades, etc, and redeem them on anything listed at embrea. here are two ways you can earn points right now:

• (10pts) post about and/or link to polamour, sunlace, or haley luna photography in your blog. i hear about so many posts through the grapevine, and this is a good way for people to let me know when they’ve mentioned my projects.

• (5pts) follow sunlace via google connect. you can find it on the bottom of the right sidebar. i know most of you subscribe to the rss, but the little connect box i’ve added will give me one more place to pick from for giveaways.

i’ll keep adding new ways to earn points, and i’m always open to trade for certain polaroid cameras, instant film, old screw mount lenses, etc.

i had to skip the plaza festival this year b/c weg put me back in okc with only a short time to prepare for a booth, and i decided not to overstress myself for a change. crazy. regardless, i will be making it out there to visit with everyone, so keep an eye out for me.

for now, i leave you with my favorite cross-country eventing jump at kentucky horse park. :)

to make things more interesting, mom hired him to do a few things, including fix a leak in her flat roof. she bought a bunch of materials, and he did a little work but never came back to finish. it leaked worse than it did before on the first big rain, so she went up to find out that he hadn’t repaired the damaged area at all; he’d only painted a little tar over it. and, he took all of the materials she’d purchased.

since my post (and its great repost momentum on facebook), another lady told one of my friends (who forwarded her message to me) that he did her roof, but it didn’t pass inspection, so another company had to do it, and he’s still threatening to put a lien on her house if she doesn’t give him more money.

if you’re curious, this is what he left us with after taking over $3k:

the full story with all the details is long, so i put it under the cut if you want to read it. it was originally on facebook (proper capitalization and all!), but i had to take it down b/c it was about another member of fb. he’s even threatened to go after me for “slander”. durp.

we met with new contractors today at the manor to find out what we need to do to fix it, and it turns out that david did a bunch of illegal stuff with the plumbing. he also did such shoddy work that they’ll probably have to tear out his mess and start over. they’re getting the quotes together over the weekend, and then i’ll be filing a suit against david for what we paid him and what it’ll cost to fix the damage he’s done. stay tuned!

Jonathan and I bought a house a little over a month ago. It was a good deal on a great place, so we jumped on it. We weren’t actively looking for anything, though, so we went with an FHA loan b/c it would allow us to put less money down than with a conventional. FHA, if you don’t know, has much stricter guidelines. The house passed with only a handful of repairs required before we could close.

Mom is a flooring designer and knows a lot of people in the construction business, but we ended up in a tight spot for time b/c our lender was screwing up paperwork left and right and not returning phone calls for days at a time. Mom found a guy, David Shores, through a client recommendation. David was really friendly and eager to start the job. We worked out a deal where he would be paid $2900 out of closing. He would do the few minor repairs before closing, then redo both bathrooms in the week after.

David quickly took care of the required fixes. Some seemed half-assed, but we agreed that they only needed to get us through closing and could be revisited later. Closing was pushed back at one point, and David started to complain that he needed money. Since he was being paid out of closing entirely, I didn’t think that was at all unreasonable, so I gave him a few hundred in cash to get him by. After the weekend, he was going on about being broke again, so Mom hired him to install a gutter in her atrium, add a support column in her living room, and fix a spot on her roof that leaked. She paid him in full ($400) and purchased all the repair materials herself. He used a fraction of what she’d purchased and took the rest with him. She shrugged it off.

The one big required repair for our house was the gutters. David said he’d hired a company to handle those so he could focus on the other things. Day by day we approached closing, and the gutters still hadn’t been touched. Mom got onto David about it, and he seemed genuinely upset that the company he paid had been too busy on hail damage claims to show up. He promised that it would be fixed the day of closing, so we passed the information along to the final inspector, and he let it slide.

After we officially owned the house, David started to tear out the downstairs bathroom. He was to tear out the bathrooms to the beams, replace or repair structure as needed, update the plumbing and electric, then finish everything off so they’d be ready for paint and flooring. He’d included all faucets and tub surrounds in his bid. We gave him a key and the alarm code, and he’d be at the house when we arrived, working hard. He piled the old wood, concrete, and other scrap on one side of the house, next to the driveway. He assured us that he’d be removing it when he was done. He’d filled up one of our city trash bins with concrete scrap, which the city will not take, but he told us that he was only using it temporarily and would take the contents with the rest of the tear out.

We got down to the beams, and he added some new ones in places where there’d been rot from a very old leak in the wall (we wanted the bathrooms tackled in entirety first for reasons like this). He fixed some older pipes and began to hang drywall. When he was about halfway down from the ceiling, he tore out the floor to the joists, and we could see that they definitely needed to be replaced, which was what we were all expecting. That’s when the trouble really started.

Mom picked up two really cute vanities with sinks for him to install, and we chatted with him about other projects that we wanted to do (using him) in the future. We met up with him at Lowe’s to pick out the faucets and tub surrounds, and he pointed a few out, then told us to let him know later what we wanted. We were confused b/c we were under the impression that we were meeting with him to actually get the materials. Mom talked to him about it, and they decided that she was going to go with him to pick everything out for us when he was ready.

At some point we noticed that a week had gone by with no David. When one of us would text, he’d reply that he was on another job or wrapped up in family issues and would be there the next morning. We were a tiny bit frustrated b/c he’d originally said that the bathrooms would only take a few days each at most, and we were waiting for the downstairs bathroom to be complete before we put in the new flooring in the adjoining bedroom, which a friend was planning to move in to.

Mom and I both tried contacting David numerous times. He’d never answer when I called and rarely responded to my texts. Mom needed him to finish what he’d started at her house, and we were still waiting on him to start on the floor at ours. When she’d text him, he’d tell her that he’d be there at x time. She’d show up and wait, sometimes taking time off from work, to meet him at either house, but he never came. When she’d ask him, he’d text that he was busy, had a family emergency, etc, and would give her a new time. This happened over and over.

We decided that maybe he had already spent all of the money he was paid and just didn’t have the resources to finish. We talked about working out more work with him so we could front him what he needed for materials, but we never got to discuss it with him b/c he just kept ignoring our calls, texts, and emails. Mom finally sent some “I mean business” messages after days with no response, and he replied that his daughter came first. She told him that she understood that, but he had to let us know if something came up instead of just blowing off appointments and ignoring calls.

After more promises of dates and times with no David, Mom apologized and told me that we’d probably have to file charges b/c he clearly had no intention of finishing either of our houses. We tried to give him one last chance and called, sent texts, and emailed, but neither of us heard nothing in return. I finally told him that she was planning to file, and he responded that he would meet up with us on Wednesday (today). I asked him to set the time, and he said 5pm. He also made a comment that we were all communicating poorly about the job. Whatever. At least we were getting somewhere.

I emailed and texted him today to make sure that 5pm was still good, then Mom, J, and I all left our jobs early (to accommodate his chosen time) and met at our house. David texted me to say that he was in Edmond traffic in the rain but was hurrying. I replied that J and I were running a little bit late, so it was ok. At the house, time kept passing with no David. Mom was looking at me like, “he’s not coming.” I asked how long, and he replied that the rain was bad and it would be about half an hour. Roughly two and a half hours after our meeting time, I texted a few times with no reply. We joked that if he did reply, he’d just tell us he got into a wreck or something. He eventually did text me back, after I sent a message about it not taking that long to get from Edmond to OKC, and said that he had to pull his truck out of a ditch b/c of the rain. Mom said, “pix or it didn’t happen,” and left to go let her dog out. I told him she was talking about filing charges, and he said “call who you must.” That’s the last I’ve heard from him. It’s now after 10pm.

Fun fact: Mom called me after she reached her house to tell me that there was a huge roof leak in the area David “fixed”, so she went to look at it, and she’s pretty hot right now.

The gravity of the situation is far more messed up than it sounds (I’m trying to refrain from the colorful language I’d like to be using right now). I still don’t have new gutters, so water is draining straight into the basement. The downstairs bathroom floor is gone. Like, you can step through the joists onto the dirt gone. There’s already mold in the basement from the water draining into it, hence the gutter requirement from FHA. So now we have an open floor to a moldy basement, which has also morphed into stargate for fiddlebacks (brown recluse spiders), and it’s storming right now. We can’t close the door, and did I mention that there was cat (I really hope it was a cat) shit in the bedroom the other day? Gee, I wonder how it got in.

Our friend obviously can’t move in, and Jonathan doesn’t want to stay at the house b/c who knows what is going to crawl out of the floor next. It’s not very convenient for me to be there b/c I’m on crutches and have to go upstairs to use the other bathroom, and we’d already moved our office over there b/c we’d been assured that everything would be done within days.

David also, shockingly, never removed the tear out from the side of the house, so the City left me a lovely citation to clean it up. I have no way to haul it, nowhere to take it, and I’m not even physically able if I did have the first two covered. Oh, and it’s not my damn job. So, I’ll be getting a fine for that in a few days. Yay.

I just keep thinking about how he stood in the bathroom one day, bitching about what trash his sister is b/c of the state her house is in. Really? I have a f*cking HOLE in my house.

The worst part of this mess is that his work was actually good when he chose to do it. I was content with him as my handyman and not only intended to use him for dozens of other projects, but gave his name to damn near everyone b/c I wanted to get him more work. We are SICK over this, and I thought it would make more sense to write it all out so I don’t have to keep telling bits and pieces to everyone.

David’s facebook is here, and his email is sooners1227@yahoo.com. You know, in case you’d like to share your thoughts on the stellar guy he is.

Oh, hey, I’ll just throw a rug over it.

Feel more than free to pass this link around. Actually, that would be just swell.

**update**
Mom said to clarify that he never finished anything at her house; he only hung three pieces of gutter and patched the roof, then took all of her supplies and materials.

**update**
David sent me an email:

“please be advised that the link below that you created along with the comments have been reported as abusive and as slander to Facebook
the remaining work at [address omitted] will need to be completed by a different individual than me
i am in contact with an attorney for legal assistance to get this matter resolve as quickly as possible
i am sure you and/or you mom are doing the same
the information you posted about your moms roof is incorrect – as of 9-3-10 the roof was not leaking – as of yesterday it must have sprung another leak – and if you had all the information concerning your moms house, you might be thinking differently about what you post”
DAVID SHORES 609-9032

i wasn’t exactly stranded. i have a lot of friends in the area, and i could carpool or borrow a car if i really needed one. jblood and i carpooled to work most days b/c his rodeo had a brake problem, and he’d just been letting it sit until he someday needed to get it fixed. we both preferred to ride bikes when possible, and the loss of my saturn led to daily bike commutes to work and anywhere else we wanted to go. i figured that this was a great opportunity to be on my bike more often — i’d been slacking off over the past few months b/c it was just easier to drive — and i decided to put off car shopping until the weather turned against me near the end of the year. j fixed his rodeo in the meantime, just to be safe.

not long after this all started, chevy asked me to participate in a promotion where i’d drive a new malibu for a month and blog about it on their site. i almost always politely decline in these situations, but my friends pushed me a bit, and i decided to do it. what could it hurt?

during the first conference call, i asked a lot of questions. they told me to drive the car like i would normally and make it a part of my life. but, they also told me that it would be sold as new once returned and any damage would be my responsibility. i asked if that meant i was to drive it carefully and not put my dog or bike in it, and they danced around it, saying, “use your own judgment.” they wouldn’t flat out tell me, “no, you can’t do x,” but it was very apparent that it was to be driven carefully in town and kept clean. at this point i really started to wonder why i’d agreed to this whole thing, but, at the very worst, it was a chance to test drive a car i wouldn’t have originally been interested in.

one of the annoying things was how they assumed i had dreams of being a full time blogger or something. there was a lot of “your blog will get so much more traffic” and “lots of people will see you.” the thing is, i like to write about things that are going on in my life when i have time. i have no interest in quit my job to be a full time blogger, and i’m not trying to promote this site on a large scale. if you know me and want to read it, cool. if you don’t know me and want to read it, nifty. plus, i already agreed to do the promotion, so stop trying to tell me about how awesome it will be for me b/c i’m not stupid; getting people with a lot of local readers/followers to promote a product for a month in exchange for gift cards is good, inexpensive marketing.

they let me pick the color, but it was between mocha and white. i went with the former. i asked if they had any obnoxious colors, and the dealer said, “chevy doesn’t make ugly cars.” ok.

chevy sent me (and two other bloggers) on missions every week. they were boring housewife-themed missions like “go grocery shopping” and “get a manicure,” but i’m not sure what else i was expecting. surely “go hiking, then throw your muddy bike in the back of the car,”  “tow a horse trailer,” or “drive up a mountain” weren’t in their best interest.

let’s just skip ahead to the pros and cons of this car. on the plus side, it drives smoothly and accelerates quickly. it has a high safety rating and does feel really safe, even on the highway. i came to love the xm radio and ipod controls. i’m torn on the bluetooth. it was pretty neat for the first day or so, but the novelty wore off once i had people in the car and it started automatically answering all my calls. as someone who’s on the phone often, i can see the need for being able to talk without using the phone itself, but the actual implementation could be a lot better. the trunk had a lot of space. this is apparently one of the huge marketing points for the malibu. so, yeah, it does. it won’t fit my bike, though.

on the not-so-plus side, the onstar never worked for me in the city (i could call it, but they couldn’t get turn by turn), and i now have no intention of ever having that feature installed on purpose. google maps on my iphone saved me when onstar had no idea where it was telling me to go. the headrests bend your neck at an uncomfortable angle, and i can’t imagine getting rear ended and not walking away with major neck injuries b/c of this. no matter how hard we tried, we couldn’t get two large coffees (which aren’t huge) in the cup holders at the same time. the middle holders are too close to each other, so you can only have one drink there at a time. there are holders in each door, but they won’t accommodate tall drinks.

at the end of the day, it’s a $30k car that gets ok gas mileage. everyone who rode in it thought it was a nice car, and it is a nice car, but it’s not for me. i don’t know if the name, which i hate, influenced my subconscious (think malibu barbie), but that’s pretty much exactly how it felt to me: a boring car for a content housewife to drive when she takes her polite kids to soccer practice or when she wants to meet her boring friends at a quiet bar where they drink cosmos and flirt awkwardly with the bartender.

whatever, that’s how my brain works.

i honestly don’t hate the malibu. i just wasn’t excited about it at all. from what i understand (from people at work who watch tv), they’re trying to market to women in their 20s-30s. i just think they’re targeting the wrong demographic. don’t get me wrong; it’ll be a great car — it may just be the perfect car — for many of you. it just didn’t suit me at all, and i constantly felt like i had to be overly careful with it.

if that doesn’t make chevy hate me enough, i managed to end up with a knee injury that eventually landed me on crutches a week before i had to take the malibu back. realizing the need for a car in the event that an injury might keep me off my bike, i left the dr. and went straight to the hyundai dealership and bought a 2010 accent. it’s adorable, gets good mileage, and there’s a 0% interest for 60 months promotion going on (to move out the 2010s). they sent a tow truck after my poor dead saturn, for which i’d just received a violation from the city (having a nonworking car parked on my property) and had ten days to remove. my dealer drove to lawton and brought me back a green one that evening b/c i hounded him until he found one. it has all the features i liked in the malibu and enough room for many drinks. in fact, jblood liked my accent so much that he went and bought the exact same one (in dark gray) the following monday.

so cute.

i have to thank chevy for helping me decide what features i’d like in my new car and for making me realize that i could, in fact, live with an automatic transmission. as it turns out, clutchless is the way to go when you have a knee injury. to be honest, i’d have slightly preferred a manual in the accent, but they only offer it in a stripped down version (no auto doors or locks, etc). i still love it, though, so i’ll live.

i hate that i’m admitting this, but i really want to put daisy rims on it.