I have a lovely tattoo and a bad taste in my mouth

[madmoisellestar]

So. That happened.

That in this case being I went to my tattoo appointment. Got the text portion of the tattoo done, did not get the image.

I think that was the best possible outcome, given the situation. The text is pretty and very much what I wanted.* I’m glad I went ahead and did that. The actual experience today was surprisingly awkward and

Comments

[whimmydiddle]

Whoa. Sorry for the ordeal.

[baobh]

Argh. That is....well, unprofessional and shitty doesn't cover it.

Randomly, I can highly recommend Charon( http://www.oddangel.com/?page_id=4 ), who, when she is not roaming the countryside in an airstream trailer with her two sphinx cats and husband, performing as a fire eater and sword swallower, tattoos in Fairfax, VA. Her schedule is a little sporadic due to the travel and such, but she tries to get back pretty regularly, and she is awesomesauce. She's done work on several of my friends, and did the runes on my back. If we hadn't moved away, we would both have gotten more work from her. (We still might; trying to con her into coming to visit Fort Collins when she's in this time zone. :) )

I'm sorry this was your first experience. They are not all like that. Just...argh! Bitch slapping is required.

[madmoisellestar]

Thank you for the recommendation - she sounds (and looks from my quick peek at the link) amazing. One of the first things I resolved yesterday was that from now on, I'm going to need a solid personal recommendation before working with someone.

I was really glad to have Tyler there - he has sat through several tattoos with friends, and was able to confirm that I was neither being a jerk in some way that merited the treatment I was getting, nor insane for thinking something was going wrong. This hasn't turned me off tattooing, just made me more cautious.

[aggiebell]

It might be worth writing a letter to the owner of the shop, unless you'd rathher just put this whole thing behind you. I'm sorry it turned out to be a bad experience.

[madmoisellestar]

I will be writing some public reviews for the internet, which I know the shop owner follows pretty carefully. Other than that, yeah, mostly just moving on.

[chickenhat]

From this point forward please remember the following:

It's YOUR body and it's YOUR tattoo.

Yes, artists should be respected, but sometimes they really need to think of you as a patron and not a client. Her inattentive behavior was uncool.

[woodspider]

for the record: like aster said, I've sat in on tattoos a few times in the past. they never went like this. it was utterly strange and uncomfortable in all the ways described.