This is Day 4 of Ziva's "30 Days of Photographs II" -- the story behind which can be found by clicking the link at her name. Some of you might have read that I've been doing "a little experiment" of my own since Day 1 here. What that experiment is...can be found below the list of participants and my photo below.
MikeWJ,
Nicky and Mike,
Mo,
Meleah,
John, aka nonamedufus,
Bryan, aka Unfinished Person,
Malisa,
Nora,
LaughingMom,
Tanya,
Elizabeth A.,
00dozo,
Cheryl,
Kristen,
Pam and
Katherine
The gist of my experiment is that I've been taking my Ambien and then, pretty much unbeknownst to me, I take a photo and do a little blurby write-up underneath each one. This will continue every day for the month of April. Oh, sometimes I am more coherent than other times...and sometimes I do things which I didn't know I did. Anyone who takes Ambien knows all too well about the "amnesia" which happens after the drug kicks in. I've written whole blogs under the influence of it...and many times I've been impressed by what I've written...but, when you are so incredibly detached from your own brain when you go about doing things you have no real memory of doing...it's a bit frightening. In fact, it's more than a bit. It's like I've engaged "auto-pilot" or "cruise control" and then taken a nap in the back.
But, I've decided I'm going to stick with "the experiment" here and see what my "other self" comes up with when I'm metaphorically "asleep at the wheel" -- and no, I've never driven after I've taken Ambien...and I would highly recommend that no one does, either. The pity is that I'll never know if I'm a better photographer without it...but, if all else fails -- and I fail with it -- I'll have...well, a fail-safe excuse to fall back on.
(Hopefully you can read what I've written in the photo...if you can't, this is what it says:
In the true spirit of scientific research, I offered myself up as the proverbial guinea pig to prove my theory. I not only did a double blind study...but a double brained one as well. I'm not sure which half of my brain was working when I undertook the "30 Days of Photographs II" challenge...hell, I'm not even sure one half was even engaged...but my theory is that you don't need to know what you are doing in order to complete certain tasks. I fact, some tasks are better left unremembered -- and that's where all of this starts to make sense.
I want you to take a long hard look at the object to the right. Try your best to remember it because tomorrow I won't be able to. I'll just have a vague recollection of Ambien, a camera...and stringing random words together.)
