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Stitch626, how lucky for you to not be in a relationship with a fickle, small minded little man anymore. Sounds like he just released you from what could've been a long and lengthy suppression of your true self, I'm willing to bet he was vacillating and thoughtless in other areas as well. Maybe you should send him a thank you card every year on the anniversary of your independence?

Just saw this by Simon Erl: I chuckled.

I recently had a young lady make fun of the awesome eagle on my chest. She also said that people with tattoos just get them to make up for their lack of personality. I told her to get the fuck out of my apartment.

Hey there, I'm late to the party! Most slang terms and phrases irritate me. I think since I write about tattoos I might notice it more, which is a bit pap. People who say a tattoo is "sick as fuck" are my current pet peeve- if you look at any tattoo on the Tattooist Art facebook page, you will see over 100 "sick as fuck!"s. One thing which really made me laugh though- I got a little unwell last year and had to stop working for about a week. A good friend of mine who doesn't really know much about tattoos kept an eye on my site while I was away, and someone posted up a message asking where in Newcastle was great for some "ink". She told him to have a look in Newcastle Arts Centre and Amazon, and to ask a tattoo artist if they're looking for tattoo ink, having no idea the guy actually meant to say "tattoo". He was a bit pissed off and thought she was being sarcastic, but it really shows how stupid that word is for a tattoo. If it was just ink, we'd all be walking around with sharpie marks on our arms which we'd have to get re-done every day!

Derrick Snodgrass and Jason Mcaffe. Both of those dudes make great tattoos and they seem to be able to work in any style.

hahahaha i´d date her!!! i love cats,baskets,rainbows.. can someone give her my email? its [email protected]

I definitely see what you mean, like- sometimes I feel like I have to really think about this too, despite being flattered. At the minute, I don't think it would do you any harm to write for them, as long as you be a slight diva and say from the start it's all on your terms. I feel sometimes it's best to have an informal chat with the editor to try to get a feel for their attitude. If they mention anything about money or popularity, I personally pass on it, because it means they're likely to piss off a few people down the line, I've found. Judging by the issue I have, and your blog (which I really love, by the way), they could be pushing for a better direction by asking you, so if you feel positive about it I would say to go for it :)

This is the best drinking game ever! I so wish I was still a functioning alcoholic! Of course, this game could conceivably push anyone over the edge.

I have a friend who had a severe head injury that she never quite recovered from, and she feels this strongly about horses. And beer.

I kind of hope this show doesn't come to England. I'm already sick of people telling me what their tattoos mean, and the dramatic stories behind them. On the other hand, it could be fun if you play the Needles and Sins drinking game while you watch it. Have you guys seen that yet? Go to Needles and Sins Tattoo Blog and it should still be on the front page- it sounds hilarious :)

There is nothing in my career i have learned more from than GETTING tattooed. Period. Vegan chefs make shitty steaks, If you don't have tattoos you shouldn't tattoo.

Not the best photo in the world, I tried to lighten it up a bit, but here's a tattoo I noticed on a Blackheart visit recently -

Fucking great interview ! I stoped by his shop when I was in hawaii and talked to him, I really fucked up by not getting a tattoo !

I love Kevin, he's awesome!

There is so much to chew on. Where to start. I guess, time does distort perspectives in alot of cases. I used to think my pop's was heavily tattooed. I know my mom was when she was alive. She even had a monarch on her hand. Then, years later I started hanging with my pop's as an adult, and I remember, being shocked, when seeing his tattoos, that he really wasnt as blasted as I had remembered as a kid. I mean he was heavily tattooed. But by this time, I had full sleeves. It was odd to wrap my head around, the distortion of my childhood perspective. When I started getting tattooed, you were either an adventurous collector which consisted of the norm, you were a stripper, in a band, a convict, or a tattooer. The adventurous collector, didnt reveal their tattoos unless they had crossed the line and jumped head long into the freak catergory. I dont mean freak in a bad way at all. It was just how society treated them. They were people who went way out of the standard of the norm. Past the military regulation. Past the caution of their tattooers advice. Past what their family thought of them. They jumped out there, when no one else was out there...just to do it. The price they paid was being treated poorly by their peers, their families, by society in general. Not all of course. Some, and I still think this is a variable, had mental illness. Attention seekers, one shot ponies trying to make a name for themselves, being a freak. The magazines pushed this into the limelight. I saw quite a few people dive into the trend because after a couple shots of themselves in the magazines, it seemed they became addicted to the exposure. Every magazine for a stretch, you can see them having more tattoos in a short amount of time. I won't name the obvious. All you have to do, is look back in the archive of the rags. I thought I was heavily tattooed with my half sleeves and chest panel in the early nineties. I was to my biker boyfriend. Then I met a young woman in Sacramento that blew my mind. She was younger than me and had her entire body tattooed. I loved it. I had known Elizabeth Weinzirl, and a couple other heavily tattooed women. But not any around my age. I had been the freak amongst my peers, until I met this other young lady. It was inspiring to me. She was beautiful. My point being. It wasnt so common to be obviousily tattooed. The norms hid their bodysuits under their fancy suits and white ties. The little old swinger lady carefully dressed herself while in public as to not stir a commotion of interest in her until she wanted to reveal her secret. The rest of us, didnt care what anyone thought and we werent trying to be apart of a clan. Then, the mtv generation hit. Every dumb fuck from every part of the planet wanted to purchase the look of a rockstar. Neck sleeves, hand tattoos and socks. Let me tell ya, you get those boys naked and it was a huge turn off. They had run the course backward. It was a turn off to me, because of the time I came from. I was brought in through a different door, so to speak. So, in the beginning of my career, there was no, tattooers being tattooed vs. norms being tattooed. We were all in the same boat living on different islands. As society became more seasoned to the art of tattooing. I noticed high end restaurants in SF and NYC hiring tattooed beauties as servers. It had become schick. And it certainly was. Main stream had caught on, with how beautiful tattooed people can be. The only shortcircuit feeling I get from people now, is those that get tattooed to be apart of the scene. Example. Look at when the suicide girls started. It was hot!. All those lovely punkrock grrrls I had never seen naked, were displaying themselves for the world to see. Difference from then til' now. Those first bunch of grrrls were the real deal. Most all the ones that came afterward, got tattooed to be like them, or they simply got tattooed to be a suicide girl. I hope you can see the comparison Im trying to make here. Its like watching the eighties style cloths come back into fashion and the youngsters are wearing all the crap the cool people didnt wear back then. They are caught in a trend. I definitely have been caught in a few myself. Guess thats how we learn. What you see now on tv, is because its a trend. Its acceptable, so the networks seem to be marketing towards those that they think would be interested. They too, and Im thankful for this, have missed the mark. As some of you may be experiencing. Its past tense now. So, once they see that with their ratings, they will move on to something else that strikes our fancy. Im too old and fat now adays to be sold to the public. Especially on tv. The tv shows came after my prime. We didnt have internet, websites, even some of my close tattooer pals in the industry, didnt know what I could do. They didnt seem to care who was doing what unless they were in a magazine to confirm their talents. And if a bunch didnt know you, then who were you but someone slinging ink to get by. I guess another way to explore this, is if I had a kid, he/she would be in their mid twenties now. Possibly heavily tattooed or not, having been raised in a tattoo household. Being a different generation. Even my kids, if I had had them, would not know how it used to be, accept from the stories I would have told them as to how it used to be when I was a kid. Sounds like repeated history. :) Is there a moral? If you love tattoos, then wear them. Just make sure you are doing it, because you love them and not because everyone else does too. Respectfully, Mikki ps. Sorry Deb to rant on your topic. :)=

First episode and already like four arguments including a shove. I'll be watching each and every show. I'm bummed it's the same ol same ol. Lemme guess, youre getting tattooed cuz somebody died? oh what's the story behind your tattoo? Who cares?!!!!! Getting tattooed and tattooers and people in general are interesting enough. No need to fish for a story. I still think it needs to be done taxi cab confessions style. That counter lady is crazy. She mentioned she comes from the corporate world and wanted something a little less formal. The first thing she does is start micro managing and acts like a secretary in an office to people coming into the shop. Lame. The woman tattooer looks like she does good work. The whole not getting respect thing is probably bullshit. Look at women like dawn Cooke, Katie sellergren, and our very own Deb Yarian. If she feels she's not getting respect, I don't think it's because of her work must be something else. All this crap being said, I love tattooing. The good and even some of the bad. My DVR is set. Hopefully we'll get to see some real good tattoos on this show. A little less chattin and a little more tattin.

I've had an absolute rash of people lately who want nothing more than to narrate themselves with seemingly useless phrases and quotes. No flow, lousy font type and placed in awkward areas. We have one fake rapture and now the whole damn tattoo world needs to come in and get a bible verse (or 12) just in case the next one isn't a fire drill. I feel better now, thanks.

i'd hang out with him.

Man, everybody already used my smart-ass answers but the Greg Irons quip was funnier than I could have come up with. But back to the original question. This is one of the newer approaches to tattooing that makes me slightly uncomfortable to be honest. Myself and a few tattooers I know and work with have noticed the trend of customers finding a sense of pride in how long they had to wait for their tattoo. As if that makes the tattoo more worthwhile. With some of the currently living/working tattooers mentioned in this thread, I personally know people (not even on the internet) that have tattoos from all of them. Filip, Horiyoshi III, Shige and Mike Rubendall. Yeah, they had to wait a little while for some of them but not as long as you'd think for others. Mike Roper is a different situation because he makes it deliberately difficult to get in touch with him, which answers the question posed above. But that wasn't really the question that was asked and it's rarely the question that gets asked. The question, or at least the implication, is "who has the longest waiting list' or "who has appointments booked furthest into the future". If I were to be snarky "who gives me the most bragging rights". For me the hardest people to get a tattoo from are the tattooers who are located furthest away from me. The ones where I have to get off my ass and do something about it. Time is easier to overcome than distance although patience is a different matter. It astonishes me that people call our shop from the outskirts of the city expecting us to change the way we work because they are catching a train to get here. On the other hand, we are humbled and honoured by the people who cross seas and continents to get tattooed regularly with us. But that's aside from the issue. Why is it a trend that makes me uncomfortable? Because I've heard people brag about how long they had to wait for 'x' artist and wear that information like a badge of honour. It feels almost as distasteful as bragging about who charges the most. Yeah, tattoos are for tough guys and tough buys like to brag and maybe that seems harmless, but it makes me uncomfortable and I have trouble clearly explaining why. Maybe it's because it's a phenomenon spurred on by the internet and the gossipy world of hearsay. Nobody calls and checks with the artists or shops they want to get tattooed at. Nobody travels down to the shop to ask the question. They just ask random strangers on the internet who have a lot of time on their hands and like to talk about something they know nothing about. Then the reality gets lost or twisted and in the end the real information is lost. I see this a lot with regards to the shop I work at. Forums are (or certainly used to be) bursting with 'facts' about how much we charge, how long we take, how far 'x' and 'y' are booked or how long their waiting lists are. Nobody calls the shop to ask and nobody suggests that the person calls to ask. I know that happens with a lot of things but it seems like this is starting to have a real-world effect, however small. People who wanted tattoos that we would love to do heard that we wouldn't tattoo them at our shop because we were so cool and busy and booked up for decades and rolling around in money 'n' bitches or something. We've heard of this a few times and it seems to be happening more. Yeah, we're busy, you may have to wait a little, maybe not. If someone has contact information, especially a phone number on their website it means that they want you to call. I'm not really going to touch on the tone of the "are they a fad or are they really worth it?" comment, except to say that if you have to ask, the answer is "no". Sorry to jump on this fun thread with a rant. I look forward to more witty quips.

My most recent tattoo is a lion head door knocker, by Dustin Golden

Funny side story. I was working at Gill's underground shop in Daytona---- he went out and the the police raided the shop while he was gone--- we all got arrested , our equipment confiscated etc etc etc but the press he got in all the magazines!!! --- I do believe he called---he and Mr Tramp were of the PTBarnum school of thought "even bad publicity is good publicity"! ---- Also, the same shop I was manning the shop alone when Roy Boy and his lady friend came looking for Gil. While there, a group of 1%s from Pa came in----- so what did Roy Boy do? Left me alone there with the group. Someone took one of my machines. A fight went on in town afterward, over my machine. Someone got very hurt. The following year after having tattooed for 4-5 bike weeks in a row-- I cocktail waitressed instead ---in a bar that featured David Allen Coe along with go go dancers Those were dark days. And now roy boy is gone and crazy ace too

1) tiny lettering upside down on the wrist 2) paragraphs of tiny lettering on the ribs and inner bicep 3) even smaller tiny lettering behind the ear.

My future wife only has 2 tattoos both of which I did on her, a set of black flag bars and a tiny simple heart and dagger. I hate tattooing her.

I also weighed in on the thread MsRad's referring to, with this-I now have a phobia of too much pink skin on men. I've just kind of gotten so accustomed to being around more heavily tattooed folk, if I see a dude walking down the street with his shirt off and he's all pink, kinda creeps me out. Or maybe it's just that dudes who insist on walking down the street shirtless creep me out? But the ones with no tattoos look like they're in some kind of lady suit, like the one the guy in Silence of the Lambs was making. I do believe that we love who we love, and if it's really love, externals don't matter. What's most important to me is that someone is comfortable in their own skin, being true to themselves, and fully living the life they're meant to live. That being said, I'm really glad my husband hasn't held back regarding tattooing or anything else. I was in a relationship with someone who wasn't tattooed, and he was a somewhat restrained individual. It was when I once picked him and his boss up at the airport in shorts, and he was freaked out because his boss, who already knew I was tattooed, could my tattoos on my calves. When he was sheepish and weird, and his boss was actually happier to see me then he was, I kinda knew it wasn't going to last. Not because I embarrassed him, but because I saw him for what he was, a coward. Of course there are always exceptions, but most heavily tattooed people aren't overly concerned with what mainstream society thinks of them, and they generally aren't cowards.