Thursday, August 31, 2006

SKULL


SKULL
Originally uploaded by Joe_13.
I sketched this a couple days ago. It is inspired by all the tattoo art I have been perusing lately. It is intended to be a shoulder piece, and maybe someone somewhere will want it on their body for life.
Actually my good buddy Karl has already expressed some interest in having it inked on his body, sight unseen. Who knows. he might like it.

Monday, August 28, 2006

Dead-fuckin-wood



As good as the fucking season of Deadwood has been, I do reckon that the season finale was quite the fuckin' letdown. With all the cocksuckers talking about the potential escalation of war in Deadwood, my expectations for violence were fuckin' higher than usual for this particular series' ending. I was indeed disappointed when the cocksucker Hearst left town to pursue other likely amoral ventures, leaving Swearingen and Bullock to do whatever it is that they fuckin' do when their ain't no cocksucker like Hearst to cause any fuckin' trouble.
At any fuckin' rate, I am looking forward to next season, and hopefully they'll tie up the loose fuckin' ends left by this season.

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Oprah to the rescue

My GF loves Oprah. Then again, what woman doesn't love Oprah. She's had every disadvantage one could have: poor, molested, overweight and black. She's one woman who has bitch slapped every challenge ever thrown at her.

As the richest most powerful woman in the world, one would expect her to waste her fortune on stupid things like billion dollar beach homes, private jets, and charitable donations to poor people. But Oprah has better things to blow her wad on: Like vigilante-ism.
She's offered $100,000 to anyone who gives information leading to the capture of these child predators. How awesome is that?
So far she's helped get at least 5 despicable human beings off the streets.

Monday, August 21, 2006

Weeds

We just finished watching the first season of Showtime's Weeds from Netflix.
At first, I wasn't engrossed. But by the beginning of the third episode I was addicted. Mary Louise Parker plays, Nancy, a widow who begins schlanging dope in order to feed the family. Slowly her small time operation selling schwag weed to the local stoners grows to a real business and by the final episode of the first season, she is on the verge of going big time.
Kevin Nealon of SnL pseudo-fame, steals the show as Doug, her slacker, stoner, corrupt CPA friend.
Weeds is slightly far-fetched, but pleasant, interesting and very funny. Worth 11 hours of your time. Definitely.

Friday, August 11, 2006

Meeting Jeff

I spoke to Jeff at Graven Image Tattoo in Mountain View yesterday regarding my bamboo tattoo concept. He seemed into it. What I like is the fact that his portfolio is full of very organic, colorful pieces. His specialty looks to be plant, flowers and animals and bio-mechanical designs. My concept of the flowing bamboo should be right up his alley. I've decided that instead of a true reproduction of my grandfather's painting, I could trust a skilled artist to make their interpretation of that art. As long as it maintains the spirit of my grandfather's piece.
When I presented him the art, his first comment was, "It'll have to be big."
I told him my intention to go big, either my whole back, of half my back.
We talked a bit more about the concept, the price and procedure. $50 deposit, $130 an hour. Appointments are made for sessions 4-6 weeks out.

Jeff seems to be a genuinely nice guy, looking to make good art and happy clientele. His portfolio proves he's more than competent. Possibly genius. So my enthusiasm to get this tattoo has only increased.

I'll sweat this out a bit more and let myself absorb this idea for a while before I commit. At this point I think Jeff might be the dude.

Thursday, August 10, 2006

WSOP Final Table


The final table of the Main Event of the World Series of Poker is approaching. Someone is going to win $12 MILLION for their efforts. This lucky bastard will have survived an onslaught of 8,000+ money hungry, lying, cheating degenerate gamblers to make it to this point. They'll also join the ranks of the greatest players in the world. As a matter of fact everyone who made it to the final table is officially a millionaire if they weren't one already.
My pick is for the lone poker pro left, Allen Cunningham, to win it. He's got a reputation as a gentle fellow, with ridiculous skillz to pay the billz. On the other hand it might be cool to see some schmuck with a student loan and overdue credit card bills to pay off win it.
As long as the winner doesn't FLUKE himself into the win, or bad beat his way to a championship. The winner of $12 mil. should deserve it.

Wow, $12 million. Twelve MILLION. M-I-L-L-I-O-N....
What would I do with $12 million?
First I'd have to go buy myself some new underwear.

(sigh)

Dare to dream.

Read Dr. Pauly's updates

Monday, August 07, 2006

Tattoo artist hunt

Choosing a tattoo artist has proven to be a more difficult task than I thought. Since I have the artwork already, I need someone who will be able to execute it well, able to capture the subtle differences in the values of leaves of the bamboo, and the motion of the swaying branches.
So far I've met with Martin at Lucky Stars, Kahlil at Tatto City, Doug at Staircase, Jill and Horitaka at State of Grace, Nate at True Art and Jeff at Graven.
Horiataka and Jill at State of Grace declined to do it, because it's a difficult tattoo and I think they are more interested in doing custom jobs rather than reproductions. Totally understandable.
In the future I'll definitely consider either of those two to ink one of my limbs. Something custom, something that they'd like to do... hopefully something they'd like to put in their portfolio.
So far quotes have ranged from $130 an hour to $150. The time to do my design has been estimated at 4-5 hours. So the entire thing will run $700 at the most, hopefully.
At any rate I've yet to decide on an artist. I think I'm leaning toward Kahlil or Doug. Both of them seem to handle subtle tonality changes very well. So in the coming months we'll see what happens with my decision making.