Helmet, Tattoos, and some cool Music

Finished up the Breast Cancer Helmet for Jeremy.  Keep an eye out for it on his blog.... http://muttincycles.blogspot.com/

Worked on the big rib panel eagle a little more over the weekend.  Got all the background shading done. Once again, the guy sat like a rock.

Tattooed Ryan today.  Ryan was a regular customer of Guillermo's.  Now that Guillermo has moved to Uruguay, I have inherited Ryan.  A couple of weeks ago, Guillermo did a MOM dagger on the side of Ryan's Neck.  Today, I did a DAD dagger on the other side.  Kinda hard to get a good pic of a fresh tattoo on the side of a neck, but he'll be back and I'll post healed pics.

Here's a couple of things that I picked up recently that are pretty cool.  The first is the new Raw Power CD.  Raw Power are one of my favorite bands.  Raw Power have been cranking out furious Italian hardcore since 1981.  In 2002, one of the founding members- Guiseppe died from a heart attack while playing soccer.  The band continued on with the only original member being Guiseppe's brother, Mauro.  They had stated that they would continue, but would not do any new recordings.  Thankfully, they changed their minds and just released 'Resuscitate'.  The new record is probably the best thing they have done since the time of 'Screams From the Gutter' and 'Wop Hour'.   For more info on this great band, you can check out their website here: http://www.rawpowerhardcore.com/

The other one, is the new OFF record.  OFF is Keith Morris' new project.  You know, Keith Morris of the Circle Jerks and Black Flag fame.  Keith went back to his roots and put out a record that sounds like it could have come out in the early 80's.  16 songs in 18 minutes.  If you're a fan of real hardcore, give it a listen.  You can stream the entire CD on line at http://digital.thinkindie.com/playlist/?ALBUM_ID=153513

In Progress Helmet and some Hard Bags

Working on a helmet for my friend Jeremy.  Jeremy does a lot of stuff to raise money for breast cancer- someone donated the helmet to him, and I'm donating the painting.  When it's done, Jeremy will have it for sale on his blog: http://muttincycles.blogspot.com/

Jeremy even built a breast cancer bike.  Here's a couple of pics of the bike:

Sorry, the pics are kinda shitty.  I took 'em at the World of Wheels show- I'm sure that Jeremy has much better pictures of the bike, but ya get what I got- deal with it.

You can also listen to Jeremy (and Pauly) on Tuesday nights from 8-10pm on Garage71.com.

Here's a couple of pics of the helmet as it is right now.  Still gotta do the cancer ribbons on the sides and some magenta striping.  I'll probably work on it when I get home tonight.

Did some simple striping on some hard bags for Jailhouse Choppers yesterday:

And, Happy Freakin' Thanksgiving.  Go eat some turkey and pass out on the couch.

Wedding Portraits and my Dumb Tattoos

Here's a shot of a tattoo I started yesterday.  This is the customers parents wedding photo.  The Photo was cropped, so I added the roses and vines around the portraits to frame it.  You can't really make up the top of someone's head, so it needed some kind of border.  The roses will be done in color.   She didn't want to sit for the coloring, and I really can't blame her- after 5 and a half hours I woulda been done too.

Also, I got tattooed again the other day, and of course it's a stupid tattoo.  Pretty much all I get any more are dumb tattoos that make me laugh.  All those stupid TV shows have lead people to believe that tattoos have to have some deep meaning- Fuck That!  The majority of my tattoos have no meaning or significance- I liked the design or the idea made me laugh.  Stop being so damn serious all the time- you'll have more fun that way.  The new one is a tattoo of a slice of house special- it was done by Guillermo.  I'm also posting pics of my slice of bacon, done by my friend Jason, and the chip on my shoulder done by Jamie.

Eagles, Toilets, and Popcorn...Oh My.

Started this eagle rib panel last night- lots of fun.  Guy sat like a rock, so I got this thing lined in just under an hour and a half.

Painted a toilet seat for a guy I know.  Actually I'm pretty sure it's for his wife- unless he has a secret alter ego that I haven't met.

The last time I bought Girl Scout cookies, I got them from a large black man that was in my tattoo chair, so I guess that it's only appropriate that I purchased some Boy Scout popcorn from a tall white guy in a leather vest, riding a Road King.  I remember when the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of America actually sold their treats themselves- now their parents do all the selling.  The popcorn is actually quite tasty- I got the Chocolate Caramel Crunch, but the Boy Scouts really need to take some packaging clues from the Girl Scouts.  I don't think the packages of Girl Scout Cookies have changed in at least 20 years- aside from the fact that they keep changing the inner trays to hold less and less cookies each year, but at least the boxes look like a box of cookies.  The first thing that popped into my head when I saw the bag of popcorn from the Boy Scouts was DOG FOOD.  Even the color choices remind me of a bag of dog food.  To prove my point, I did a little quick photoshopping....

You have the right to GET THE FUCK OUT!

Saw this news story this morning.  This certainly isn't the first time that I have heard something like this before, but it pisses me off EVERY TIME.  A 13 year old boy in California was told by the school principal that he couldn't fly the American flag from the back of his bicycle while on school grounds.  WHAT THE FUCK!  Here's a clip from the news:

 

I'm gonna say it again- WHAT THE FUCK!  Has this country gone so PC-hippie-ass-liberal that we can no longer fly the American flag without someone complaining?  In the news story they stated that the reason was because of 'racial tensions'.  Racial tensions?  You're telling me that people can move here from a foreign country and complain about the fact that they don't like seeing the American flag because it offends them, and somebody will actually listen and sympathize with them?  FUCK YOU!  I wouldn't move to France and start telling people that the french flag offends me (well, I wouldn't move to France anyway).  THIS IS AMERICA.  There is NEVER a time- not a day, not an hour, not one single minute- when it is in any way wrong to fly the American flag.  I fly a flag from my front porch 365 days a year, and if someone were to ever tell me that they were offended by my flag, I would tell them to get the fuck off my property.  If they didn't leave, I would show them that I not only support the 1st amendment, I also support the 2nd amendment.  If you are living in America and you are offended by the American flag, you have the right to get the fuck out!  Go back to where ever you came here from- we don't want you here.  If you were born here and you are so fuckin'  PC that you feel that the American flag shouldn't be flown because it might offend someone that moved here, then you need to move to some country full of overly sensitive pussies.  Hell, pull a Johnny Depp and move to France.  We don't want you here either.  And, Mr. Depp moving to France until, as he said, "America is a kinder, gentler country" sure as hell is no great loss to this country.

The 3 Amigos, Stupid Tattoos & Gratuity Included.

So, I've lost my Good Clean Fun Family, and I'm really not happy about it.  To me, Good Clean Fun has always been Dave, Jamie and Guillermo.   I have been open since 1997.  Jamie worked for me from 1997 to 2008, then moved back to Syracuse.  Guillermo has been with me since 2000, and is moving back to Uruguay at the end of this month.  We all worked together for a long time- much longer than is typically common in the tattoo business.  They are my best friends and I truly do consider them 'family'.  Jamie may come back some day- he's really not happy in NY, but there are other factors involved too, so I'm really can't count on it.  I guess I'll have to hire another tattooer, but finding someone that can fill either Jamie or Guillermo's shoes is probably out of the question.  Over the years we had about a million laughs- lots of good times.  Just like family, we would occasionally disagree, but we'd get over it.  Since Guillermo is leaving and this may be the last time that we're all together at once, Jamie came down to visit for one last weekend of good times (and stupid tattoos).  If you've been in this business for a long time, you probably remember a guy by the name of Ted Nayden that drew flash for Spalding and Rogers during the 80's.  His work was horrible- poorly drawn, ugly-ass designs.  Just the kind of stupid thing we could all get to commemorate out friendship and years together.  So, we tattooed each other today.  Just to make things even more stupid, both Guillermo and I tattooed shirtless- kinda like the pics you see of old tattooers.  Added some filters to those pics to give them a vintage look.  So, here's some stupid pics of us doing each other's tattoos.

Jamie tattooing Me.  Where the hell are my pants?

Guillermo tattooing Jamie

Me tattooing Guillermo

Now, here's a picture of the stupid tattoo that all three of us got.  Each of us is missing a tooth due to some dental nightmare.  No, we're not a bunch of toothless hillbillies- Mine and Guillermo's are both a bottom molar and Jamie's is a top molar.  So just to make it even more stupid, we each got an appropriate tooth on the tattoo blacked out.  As if that wasn't stupid enough, we also added a gold tooth to each tattoo (maybe now, we'll all have to get a gold tooth).

Here's a few picture of the 3 Amigos- some taken at the shop and a couple taken outside Fogo De Chao, where we went to dinner last night.  Of course, we're acting stupid in most of them.

'Gangsta'

What is Jamie doing to Guillermo in this picture?

I love you guys and I'll miss you (yeah, I know, kinda gay).  Good Clean Fun will truly never be the same without you.  Best of luck to Guillermo with his new life in the wilds of South America.

Since that was kinda sappy, here's a bonus rant- Gratuity Included.  I hate those words.  We all went out to dinner last night at our favorite restaurant- Fogo De Chao.  It's a churrascaria- a Brazilian Barbecue, where you can overstuff yourself with lots of delicious meat (some of it wrapped in bacon).  When the bills came (we were paying separately), there was that line on the bill- Gratuity Included.  Man, I hate that!  I tip well, as do the people I know.  We work in an industry where people tip us, so we know how to tip.  I generally tip somewhere between 20 and 25 percent.  Tipping is not mandatory, it's a tip- it's meant to show your appreciation for good service, it should not be included on the bill.  I understand that there are many places that include a gratuity on bills for larger parties.  That almost makes sense to me because you will invariably end up with the one douche bag that pulls a Mr. Pink and says, "I don't tip"- cheap ass motherfucker.  But even though it was a decent size party, we were all paying separately, so in my opinion, the bills should not be treated as a party.  I don't need to be told what tip to leave- I can figure it out on my own, and there's a 99% chance that I'm gonna leave more if you don't tell me what to leave.  I wonder what would happen if they included it on the bill and you refused to pay it?  I wonder how people would react if I charged them an 18% gratuity on their tattoos?

Here's a picture of the beautiful, beautiful, house special picanha at Fogo.  It's actually worth being told how much to tip.

Pink Flowers

Here's something that both irritates and amuses me.  I get a lot of dumb guys in the shop with stupid ideas about tattoos and what they're going to tell the rest of the world about the wearer.  I don't know how many times I've gotten ready to start a tattoo and had the customer look at the colors I have set out and say something like "Hey Man, what's that pink for?"  Well, the pink is for the Panther's gums.  Then I'll hear, "No Man, I can't have no pink in me, make them gums red".  Really?  You mean like the Panther has some gum disease.  Look at that, that panther should have gone to the dentist more often, his gums are bleeding.  Would someone please teach the panthers of the world to floss.  I hear the same kind of dumb shit when it comes to flowers.  "Man I like that tattoo, but ya gotta take them flowers out of it, I can't have no flowers tattooed on me".  Are you really that concerned with what people might think?  People are gonna think what they're gonna think.  I've already decided that you're a fuckin' moron, with or without a pink flower tattooed on you.  I have tattoos of flowers- they make nice tattoos.  I also have pink in many of my tattoos- it's a nice color.  In fact, one of my tattoos has a 2 inch high pink star in it.  I didn't wake up the day after getting that tattoo spooning with some dude.  If you're really that worried that someone might think you're gay, then you actually might be gay.  So, go ahead, get that pink flower tattoo, suck some guys dick, buy some cd's of show tunes and go to the gay pride parade.  Come on out of the closet.  Maybe you can even find some pink camouflage pants so your redneck buddies will still hang out with you.

Spider Skull Helmet and a Little Bitching

Finished up the Spider Skull Helmet last night.  This is another of the Daytona German Style Novelty Helmets.  Of course, it's for sale.  Gimme $150 and it could be sitting on your noggin.

Now, here's a couple of things that really bug me.  They both have to do with stupid things that stupid kids say.  Maybe I'm just getting older and doing the 'these damn kids' thing, but I don't think so.  The first is the misuse of the word 'random'.  I hear kids in my shop say things like 'Jimmy just got a tattoo of a cross- that's so random'  and 'You have a tattoo that says Good Clean Fun? That's so random'.  Listen you dopey little fuck, those are not random occurrences.  'Jimmy' came into the shop and picked out the cross he wanted and had it applied to his body.  There was nothing random about it.  He didn't spin a fuckin' wheel and have it land on 'stupid cross tattoo'.  My Good Clean Fun tattoo is not random- I own Good Clean Fun, I put thought into getting that tattoo- I didn't pick it out of a fish bowl full of tattoo ideas.

Here's the other one- MINUTE.  I've been hearing people abuse the word minute for a couple of years now.  They say things like 'I haven't seen you for a minute' when in reality its been 3 months.  I would  accept 'I haven't seen you for a while'- that makes sense.  But, minute?  It's been way more than a minute.  They also say things like 'that's a big tattoo- it musta taken a minute'.  Actually, it took about 6 and a half hours- that's 390 minutes you dopey bastard.

I know these things shouldn't bother me as much as they do, BUT THEY DO!  So stop saying minute when you're talking about a time period that's obviously longer than a minute.  And, you need to realize that very little in life is actually random.  Is your life a total fuckin' crap shoot, where you have no idea what's happening?

Fuckin' Kids.

Sand Bastard part 2, Helmet, and some Tattooing

Finished up the tins for the Sand Bastard bike yesterday.  Here's some pics.  I'll post more pictures after the parts have their final coat of clear.

Got back to work on the Spider Skull helmet last night.  I might even finish it up tonight...we'll see...

Here's a nice healed pic of Keith's chest.  I'm also posting a before picture since it's a cover up.  While he was in I got some nice pics of all the stuff I did on his arm, so I'm putting those up here too.

Sand Bastard

Working on the tins for the 'Sand Bastard' Bike.  Spent a good while today working on the gas tank and the fender.  I did the oil tank on Friday.  Still got a good amount of work to do on this.  I need to do some striping on the tank.  I will also be doing a border stripe on the tank, similar to what I have started on the fender.  The fender still needs a second color- think I'm gonna go with Crimson.  I'll post more pics as I get more done with this project.  I also hope to get some nice pics after the pieces have been cleared, and of course, of the finished bike.

Here's a tattoo that I started on Saturday.  The customer wanted 9 specific flowers, and they all had to fit under a short sleeve, so there wasn't enough room to do much with it aside from getting them all in there.