The Itch

And no, I'm not talking about my healing tattoos. They haven't hit the itchy stage yet. My foot is healing awesome, too. Mark's gonna be so proud.

I'm itching for a few things. Namely, a full sleeve on my left arm (the arm with Lucy). My parents would absolutely wig out, so that will probably have to wait until I no longer live at home. In other words, I'll get it when I'm about 30. :P

I'm also itching for some new piercings. I'm gonna give my nostril one last try. If it screws up for a third time, then I'll accept it and move on. I still want my lip pierced and my "teardrop" dermal. Jason said he probably wouldn't be able to hide a lip piercing. I know Piercing Experience has jewelry that is flat and tan/brown. I really don't want to have to go there to buy the jewelry and then go back to get pierced by Jason or Melanie. I may need to powwow with one of them a bit more on the subject. The dermal would be hidden by my hair, so that's no biggie.

I'm also still toying with conch piercings (ear). I hear they can be finicky and you really need to have a CBR in them to get them to heal right. I wonder if that would fall under "not appropriate" at the office? I'd hate to ask because then they're onto me. If I just came in one day with it, that's another thing. Again, powwowing needs to happen.

But before all of that...bedtime.

Foot Cover Up Experience

In all the shuffle, somehow writing the experience of getting my new foot piece has gotten lost. Clearly this must be remedied.

After donuts next door I shuffled over to the shop. Mark was late, so I offered donuts to Jevin and Andrew. When Mark did arrive, he came storming in complaining about some woman in the parking lot. The mullet and aviators were what really made the visual. I wish I'd gotten a picture.

We opted for 3 roses instead of 4. Originally I'd wanted 4, but he just couldn't get them to fit in a way that would heal well. Fair enough. So we went with red, purple, and blue which are the colors of the birthstones of the women in my immediate family. So now I have a grand total of one tattoo with "meaning". Go me.

It hurt, but nothing that made me want to start crawling away. I was hanging off the edge of the massage table and Mark had my foot on his knee. He commented at one point that his leg had gone to sleep. That was met with a glare. Silly man. The worst part was right near my ankle bone. It's also where the swelling has been the worst. I started to feel a little out of it in the last 20 minutes or so. I think I've gotten to the point where I know there's only a little bit left and my body starts to let itself go a bit. The three donuts I had earlier did me right and I was fine. I may have discovered the secret to keeping one's blood sugar up during a tattoo. Donuts!

He bandaged me up and I was on my way as he had another appointment after me. As it turns out she's not from Atlanta and I was thrilled to shop at H&M over at Atlantic Station while she waited. Nice to know I helped a fellow fashionista out. :) I really like it. The color is great, I love the old school twist he put on it, and it looks much, much better than what I had. It totally accomplished the task of covering up the old piece. You can't even tell anything else was there.

It's day two of healing and other than some swelling, it seems to be doing alright. I've got some light scabbing, none of this scaly business, and it hurts to stand for prolonged periods, but other than that it seems to be doing okay. Hopefully this means I can avoid a touch up. I'm supposed to check in with Mark in about a week, so maybe I'll pick up donuts for the fam as well. Might as well combine trips, right?

Sunday Night's Alright for Fighting

Got into an argument with my dad last night over the tattoos. We spent a good 20 minutes on it. He doesn't like the whole "agree to disagree" thing, but honestly, what else can we do? Of all the reasons he gave me for not liking them, I only felt one was really valid. He even said "What if you find a guy you like and he doesn't like your tattoos?". I was like "Then he's not the guy for me". I can't believe he pulled that one out. It just seemed so ridiculous. That's something my mom would do and see it as a totally valid reason. He kept hammering on me "When is enough? When are you going to stop?" and I kept saying "I don't know". It's true. I don't. I strongly suspect it'll be much like how this whole thing got started. I woke up one morning and decided to get tattooed. I may wake up one morning and decide to quit. However, that doesn't come with a defined time frame.

As I suspected she insisted that he drive me to the convention which is why we even got into this in the first place. I think I've come up with a reasonable compromise. Once I finish my thigh piece at the convention, I won't get any more until Phoenix. I already canceled my dove on Wednesday and I'll cancel with Kurt next week in person. Then I'll only collect two in Phoenix. I've already told one guy I'm having second thoughts, which is true. I know I want the geisha from Tim and the pirate from Scott. I'll probably just tell Thad that I changed my mind. In that time, I'll be putting the extra money toward my credit card bills. That should keep him off my back, I'll still have something to look forward to, and then we'll deal with it again after Phoenix.

Collaborations

After some serious thought and talking with a few people who truly "get" my obsession, I'll be getting a collaborative tattoo from Russ and Muriel. For those who don't know, it's when two tattooists are tattooing at the same time on the same piece. They usually also share in the design process. It's a way to get a large piece done in half the time. I called today to confirm and Russ, by way of Jason (?) was all for it and said I was awesome. He was tattooing so I just let him know that I was in and would be by to meet with both of them shortly before this goes down.

When I originally asked about it, he said they got to pick the design, I'd only be on the hook for one of their hourly rates, and it would probably take 5-6 hours. Placement will most likely be the front of my right thigh. Now I think he's open to my input on what I want it to be. Crap. That means I have to think! I trust them both, so I didn't much care what they picked, as nuts as that sounds. I have so many ideas, I don't know what would look good on that large of a canvas. This is an opportunity to do something big and visually stunning. And all on display for other convention goers.

Downside is the convention is in Augusta, so I'm going to have to drive 2+ hours one way. The harder part will be explaining this to my parents. I'm less nervous about it now than I was when I made the decision, but I can't just disappear for a day or so. The good news is, if I don't feel like driving back on Saturday night, I can crash at my grandparents' house for the night. They'd probably be happy to see me. That will all be hashed out sometime this week. Daddums is the tougher critic, so I'll deal with him first. I'm half expecting him to say he'd rather do the driving to and from. I can see him at a tattoo convention now. LOL

So that's my big news and will be my final tattoo until September. Yikes! At least I'm going out with a bang before my hiatus. ;)

Tattoo Quest '09: Holy Mother

The first stop on my body mod tour was Holy Mother. It had fairly positive reviews, though not many, and I'd never heard anything negative about it. After stopping by Ink & Dagger to get pictures of Lucius, I headed over to Little 5. I was expecting to wait as it was a Friday night after work.

I walked in and it was dead. Good for me, bad for them. The shop girl (didn't catch her name) helped me immediately and was quite the character. Jett was next up in the rotation and he whipped up my design in about two minutes. I had barely finished my paperwork and he was ready for me. I did get my ID back this time, which was good.

Jett went out for a smoke while my stencil was drying. It's been so long since I've dealt with a habitual smoker, I forgot they need their fix. ;) He was still really cool though. The conversation was easy and he worked quickly. I think from start to finish, it took 25 minutes. That was probably the best part when I was used to sitting for several hours.

I had a little chat with a couple of the other guys after I was done. The vibe was good and I'd feel comfortable sending someone in there. I'm happy with my piece. Jett was happy that I picked the color I did because he had a huge bottle of it and had only ever used it for one tattoo. I love the color and I think the blue really makes it pop. Now for the list:

Friendly staff: Check
Parking/Easy to find: Parking sucks because it's Little 5, but the shop itself is easy to find.
Reasonable prices: Check
Private tattooing areas: Nope, open air

I give it a 4 out of 5.

Great Tattoo Quest '09

Some people go on quests to visit every baseball stadium or every sushi restaurant, I've decided to get tattooed at every (reputable) tattoo shop in the city. Yeah, it's nutty, but it's something that I know I'll enjoy doing. So here's the list as it stands now.

Done:
Overlord (duh)
Ink & Dagger
Only You
Black Cat
Holy Mother

In the queue:
13 Roses
Memorial 2
Sacred Heart (original location only)
All or Nothing
Psycho 2
Liberty

Some of them are harder to get walk ins with, especially All or Nothing. Plus, they're all the way in Smyrna. That will probably be one of the last I go to. I'll Yelp about it and post my experiences here. I'll judge them on the following criteria:

*Friendliness of the staff
*Private tattooing areas
*Reasonable prices
*Parking/Easy to find

Those are the basics and I may decide to add more later. There are of course the intangibles like the vibe I get from the shop, the general talent of the staff, and whatnot. The shops I listed are all fairly well known and not full of scratchers.

Let's begin!

Atlanta Convention and the Final Lineup

The picture is from last night's Yelp event. Jason (the piercer at Overlord) works for the donut guy, so we showed our donut love for the cameras. Yum! I think he did better with a goofy face than I did.

I'm now going to the convention here. I'd pretty much scrapped the idea because getting information was like pulling teeth. However, Aileen expressed an interest in going and Jason confirmed that good artists would be there. So I figured what the hell? It's a few more days to hang around "my people". I'll also be getting tattooed, but we'll get to that in a minute.

I had a super embarrassing moment today. My phone rang and it was a number I didn't recognize so I figured it was one of the tattooists calling me. I thought he said "Zack" and for about 5 minutes, I thought I was talking to a totally different person. Turns out it was Thad, who I contacted early on and then never heard from. He took it in stride, though, which made me feel a bit better. Still embarrassing, though. So I sent him a few ideas to see what he thought. No one has been giving my cupcake any love, so maybe he will.

That finalizes the line up for Hell City:
Friday first thing-Geisha bust on my left shin by Tim Beck
Saturday first thing-Lock and ribbons on my right foot or ankle by Thad Ritchey
Saturday night-Pirate pin up bust on my lower stomach by Scott Ellis
Sunday first thing-Dragon back piece by Matt "Skinny" Bagwell

I'm probably insane and the plane trip back is going to suck, but I'll have some awesome new art to show off. I'll probably load myself full of Advil and Benadryl and just sleep. The best part? In normal clothes, it'll only look like I have one new one.

As for the convention here, another guy from Ace Custom where Matt works will be coming down. His work was really solid, so I decided to see if he still had time to tattoo. He did so he's going to my magnolia blossom and peach on my right hip under and slightly behind Lola. I called a shop in Savannah, but the guy who will be coming is off today. He'll be in tomorrow, so I intend on calling him first thing about some small work I've had in mind. So it could look something like:

Friday evening-Bumblebee and ladybug on my feet by Clay McCay (in theory)
Sunday afternoon-Magnolia blossom and peach on my right hip by "Lil" Tommy McCarter

Now I just need to get a money order so I can pay for my pass to the convention. It's a bit of a pisser that they don't have an online option to order because money orders are a pain in the ass to get. Why can't I just send cash? Or better yet, drop by in person and give them the money.

Now back to Bones and relaxing. Or trying to...