ozuma kaname.

had some work done today, three hour session on my back courtesy of mr.ben jones, or, 'the world's most handsome man' as we call him, great afternoon, loads of tea, kit-kat's and inappropriate comment's, this is a shop card that i really like from my collection, seem's to sum up tattoo's for me.......

old school tattoo parlour, literally, someone's backroom, no autoclave, shared needles, [or washed with 'fairy liquid' if you were lucky, no surgical gloves, the 'artist' probably smoking while he's tattooing, add that and a load of dodgy geezer's watching you, [especially acker bilk, bloke with trilby and well dodgy 'ripper' beard, far right, [in the photo, not his political leaning] and you have the ultimate tattoo experience, bring back the old day's, skin infections, bad tattoo's, hepatitis, wavy lines and bruising, proper..........

double-hard bastard.

respect due, we are not worthy, pain.......

 had some work done, japanese fighting cock's, [ok, let's get all the jokes out of the way, finished?, feel better now?], 'toriwase' is a japanese word that is used as a springtime word in 'haiku' or japanese poetry, i love spring, it's my favourite time of year and i wanted a tattoo to celebrate it, ben drew it up and lined them out, lot of work still to do but he's nailed it......

kaname ozuma.

scarred for life.

ozuma kaname.

had a great afternoon today, in work early-doors and out of there for 1400 hrs, grab an egg-mayo sandwich and in to 'secondskin' for a session with ben, watched the brazil-portugal match while waiting and my mate stevie 'mucka' marsh turns up on his dyna, clean as a pin and twice as shiny, mucka had been into work to see me this morning and somehow the conversation had turned to birthdays, [it's mine on tuesday, 51, my race number!], steve chucked a hd t-shirt at me, 'happy birthday milky', [don't ask], chuffed with that, cheers mate, the next three hours go in a flash, piss-taking, tea-drinking and baiting the traffic wardens and shouting at the punters sneaking into the local knocking shop across the road, oh yeah, i also ended up with the outline for my next piece down my ribs.

my last two days holiday entitlement for last year, if i don't take them before may 1st i lose them so i book thursday and friday off, thursday is a lovely day, i'm working in the garden with my son jack and the dogs, as fast as i plant my bulbs the little fuckers are digging them up again, phone rings, 'ey up bastard, some wankers cancelled for my first slot friday morning, do you want an hour session?, 'yeah ben, i'll be there at 9.30, make sure the kettle's on', smart, get an hour on my on-going work, 10.30, phone rings, 'sorry mate can't make it today....', 'might as well carry on then mate...'

.....the phone rings and it's ben's 12 'o clock appointment, 'sorry mate, can't make it today..', 'might as well bash on and get a bit of tattooing done then', says ben, out with the sharpie and he's free-handing for twenty minutes before rubbing it out and starting again, 'let's drop two flowers in there and add to the wind bars.......'

......so, we just get plugging away, when you do a long session you just chill, it just sort of flows, your body just gets used to the abuse that you are inflicting on it and the endorphins kick in, it's simillar to when i used to fight, you didn't feel anything until you stopped.

detail of the hoo-bird, [japanese phoenix], we decided not to add the red to it and leave it as a simple black and grey piece.

stu, dangerous and me went to stafford to the classic bike show yesterday, really good day, some lovely bikes there, prices ranged from reasonable to truly ridiculous, lot's of foreigner's spending money, i got 30 back issues of classic racer off pigfarmer for a quid a piece and bought some aluminium round stock for a couple of quid, today, i got some more work done on the hoo bird down my left-hand side, couple of more three hour sittings should see it done, then start on filling in around it.