July 20 marked the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission when the United States first set foot on the moon.
If you know me well enough, you’d know that I’m a huge space geek. I always have been since I was about 8 or 9 years old. For all of my childhood, I was convinced that I would join the US Air Force and then become an astronaut. I even went to Space Camp. It’s true! In fact, this Sunday marks my 20th anniversary of going there! I could have told you the name of every fighter jet from a single glimpse, the names of the astronauts and what mission they were on, and every little detail about space and space history. (Please don’t ask me now, that was way too long ago! :P) So what happened? Well, when I was about 17 or 18, I came to the realization that my eye sight wasn’t good enough and the space program seemed to be on a decline with little advancement on manned missions. (And coincidentally there hasn’t been any progress with putting man into space for over 20 years now) Maybe just every kid wants to be an astronaut when they grow up.
With the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11, Buzz Aldrin released a new book called Magnificent Desolation, the words that he used to describe the moon when he set foot upon it in 1969. The Free Library of Philadelphia often has authors come to give a talk and have a book signing and wouldn’t you know that Buzz Aldrin was one of them! Buzz Aldrin was one of my idols when I was growing up because he made so many marks in history when he was a pilot and an astronaut and still continued to help with the advancement of space technology after his glory days. The talk was pretty good…and funny. I got to meet Mr. Aldrin afterward and have him sign my book. Buzz Aldrin is the second astronaut that I’ve met who has been to the moon. The first was Charlie Duke who was the tenth man to walk on the moon during the Apollo 16 mission in 1972. Anyway, it was a pretty good night for this geek girl. 
It is no doubt that I have a thing for people with cool hair. And it just so happens that one of my photos recently ran on the Tyra Banks Show! The photo is of my model Keri that has popped up on numerous occasions. Check it out in the segment below at minute 2:54 and 8:20.
On December 11, I photographed the IBF Cruiserweight Boxing Championship at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ. The fight was between Steve “USS” Cunningham and Tomasz Adamek. Steve Cunningham is from Philadelphia and you may have seen some of the photos that I had taken of him after he won the belt for the same Championship last year.
It was a night of firsts. As a photographer for Team Cunningham, I was shooting ringside (in the corner of the opponent, Adamek). I had never photographed a fight…let alone any sports for that matter. All I’ve gotta say is that the men pretty much have the sports photography covered; I was the only female photographer out of about 15 others. It was also my first time at a fight. I felt like such a guy! As the guys are flying into the ropes and there’s blood and sweat flying everywhere, I’m squealing with excitement to myself, “this is so frickin awesome!!”. Yes, I did end up with blood and sweat on my lens….and surely on myself after seeing the photos of fluids flying through the air over my head. But it was awesome and I would totally do it again.
Unfortunately, Steve Cunningham lost to Adamek, but it was a good fight. It was aired on national TV on Versus. Hopefully some of you watched! Apparently I was on there, but my face was glued to the camera the entire time so you didn’t see much of me. There’s a crappy quality YouTube video of part of the fight.
Steve is signed by Don King Productions and yes, Don King was there. I got to meet him and even shook his hand as you might have read in a previous post.
Anyway, on to the photos! I have to admit that I’m pretty pleased with what I captured and that rarely happens.
More about it soon. I’m beat and still sick.
