Passport Pictures

This week I discovered it is much easier to get passport pictures taken than to get an actual passport.  I can now recommend Walgreens as a place to get passport pictures taken, they did a great job and made sure to do the job right.  After attending a delicious garden party, my mom, siblings, and I trekked off to get my picture taken.  I had carefully done my makeup and picked out a cute top to make sure I looked nice in my picture- I'll have this passport for ten years, after all. We got to Walgreens and a nice worker there took my picture, then disappeared to print it. My family stood around waiting for him and entertaining ourselves by looking at old DVDs, he was taking a long time.  About ten minutes later he came back and told me he would have to retake the picture.  Why?  Because the cute shirt I was wearing was so light colored it was blending into the backdrop. He showed me the picture and I had to laugh. He had tried to darken it and change the contrast so I didn't blend in so much, but the editing turned my skin orange and made me look slightly martian. Even if passport pictures are never hott, I'm pretty sure you're at least supposed to look human.  The guy told me he would go find a sweater to put on for a retake. I was okay with that, but so much for my cute outfit!  He came back and said "here, I got you some options to choose from." These options were an XL neon pink hoodie, and an XL black hoodie. They were pretty cute, but more of "cold windy day on the beach" cute, opposed to "this picture will be on a legal document until I'm 28" cute. I picked the black sweatshirt and he retook the picture. Considering how fair my skin is I'm surprised *I* didn't blend into the backdrop!
 So, one silly story later I have my passport and visa photos and I'm ready to go to the passport agency tomorrow!