Friday, glorious Friday

Although Friday on the chart is a smiley day, it is only because the week is over. I am not much more optimistic than I was yesterday. There are things I don't like about this, the main one is having to work with these stupid, ugly pictures. The second is, I totally hate hurting people. And third, the techniques are tricky and I remain an incompetent tattooer. I have always disliked not doing things well and have usually picked things up quickly. Not happening here.

Thank God for Matt. When I started my second tattoo it was going for 3 p.m. and I would have been there until 10 if he hadn't stepped in and cleaned me up when I wiped away half my pattern with the green soap. It was a fairly decent skull tat with flames which would allow me to work with the magnum (blending needles). The face however was complicated and that's the portion I obliterated. Basically, I ended up doing part of the outline and the flames. I'll include it here so you can see that it turned out okay (see above). Marshall was an older guy, quiet and patient.

I put a funny little spiked turtle on Ben in the morning. Benny is a regular, who turned out to be a real help to me. He could tell me when I had the needle at the right depth and pressure and speed. I am learning how to gauge my work by the sound of the machine (btw, never embarrass Lisa by calling it a gun - pros use "machines"). Tried out the rotary machine and the magnum.

I managed to stop at the Dunkin' this a.m. and got good coffee and brought donuts to school. Dropping off and picking up Lauren is getting bothersome and tonight Tristan asked me to drive him to Teen Night at the high school, so it was a long day. Tom called right at 5 o'clock so while I was waiting (thanks to Matt) for the others to finish up I caught up on his life story. Not a good week with Tara. No, I did not make it to poetry last night and didn't miss it. The library and the literary world are eons out of my sphere right now. I need this weekend to work on this blog, laundry, groceries, Eli time and reading. I have a monster stack of books I have not looked at.