Behold.....THE OCTORILLA!

This one was fucking fun as hell to do. I will be pressuring him into turning it into a sock. If he does not, I will kill his dog. If he doesn't HAVE a dog, I will buy him a puppy.


And then kill it.

Day Of The Dead Flamingos ROCK.

This is on Vic from Sharp Tattoo (i think that's the name) in the new orleans area. This was fuckin fun as hell to do....my first lower back tattoo on a man. It isn't a tramp stamp....its a MAN STAMP.

So, I know I've Been Slacking....

But hey, sometimes we get busy, and sometimes we get lazy, and sometimes we get World of Warcraft at home....

So heres some more tattoos for you to peruse at your leisure.

I did this on a former Miss Deaf America. Flowers on a hip.


Laugh now, cry later tattoo, custom drawn.


Neo-traditional rose tattoo, custom.


Here's a monkey tattoo I did on my brother's girlfriend. It's for her son that likes to scoot around on the floor with his cars.


And I'm gunna toot my own horn here a little. This guy came in with a video of a soccer player with his name in big black roman/greek-esque lettering on his arm, i think, and he wanted his name just like that. I told him how much it was gunna be, and then said I could do it for a little bit less if I could do it in a way that he would like that would be fun for me to do as well. He agreed, and I got to do this, which I think is the best tattoo I have ever done.



All tattoos I do are custom drawn. You can contact me at Myspace, or you can call Freak Show Tattoos at (210)673-7325

Freak Show Tattoos (www.freakshowtattoos.com) is located at

310 Valley Hi Dr, Suite 203
San Antonio, Tx 78227

Been A Bit Busy....

I've been a bit busier at the shop, and havent really had time to update this, so here, have some new stuff.

Have a rampaging turtle:


A simple reaper tattoo:


A winged sword...uh...thing:


This one was fun. I did it at the 4th annual Alamo City Tattoo expo 2008, on a fellow tattoo artist (although still aprenticing) Named Cale, from Oklahoma.


This guy came in wanting tribal. All he had was $500 to work with, so I told him to let me do something a bit different that he would like. When he said yes, I busted out the sharpies, and draw this on his ribs.


This was another drawn on with sharpie.

We are SO hard on apprentices...

Sleep little Chongo, sleep.

Chihuahuas

Not my favorite dogs. But by far the favorite tattoo I've done lately.

Mom's and Tattoos

Nothing really to say today, just wanted to post some of the tattoos I got to do for other mothers.

Randy "Rambo" Grady R.I.P.

This Saturday, May 10th, during regular business hours Freakshow Tattoos will be hosting a benefit for Randy Grady, (a.k.a. Rambo).

This young man was in a skateboarding accident last week and passed a few days later. Unfortunately, the family needs assistance with expenses. Therefore, the artists at Freakshow Tattoos will donate 100% of the proceeds to the family.

Even if you don’t wish to get tattooed, all donations will be greatly appreciated.

We would like to see as many people out here at Freakshow Tattoos as we can get. The more money we can pull together, the more that we can do for the family. Help us instigate the kindness of others and come support the Grady family and the Cody kids in their hard time.






Many thanks,
Freakshow Tattoos

310 Valley Hi Drive Suite 203
San Antonio, Texas 78154
(210) 673-7325

So I Was Looking At My Traffic Stats...

and I see this:



No. Absolutely not. Printer ink is NOT tattoo ink. It probably isn't even non-toxic, turbo. See, this is the reason there is laser removal, and cover-ups, not to mention infections and other nasty things that happen to skin after putting something in the skin that definitely is NOT tattoo in. Like printer ink.

Come on people, common sense need not be a thing of the past. If you want a tattoo THAT bad, go to someone who KNOWS what they're doing, with real equipment, in a real sterile area.

Tribal Tattoos

I know what you're thinking. You want to get a "sweet tribal tatty" right? Wrong. Unless you go in and say I want a maori tattoo, or you bring in references and history and meaning about the tribe a certain design means, you are getting blackwork. Here's a quick how to guide.

Go into a tattoo shop, talk to the artists. Don't pick something off the wall, or the internet, most likely someone already has that. Ask them to draw something for you, or better yet, draw something on you. A good artist that knows about muscles and how they move in your body can generally draw you one that will fit your specific body.

Like Mariah Carey, Only.....Better?

Yesterday

People are wierd. Some people are weird and dumb. Some people are just plain dumb. Yesterday started out fine, and then shit started rolling downhill, like a snowball gathering mass.

First customer that comes in is an eighteen year old kid, wanting his first tattoo. I'm always down for that. But kids, don't start with your neck. You not only limit future employment forever, but you limit yourself other ways too. I tried to convince him that it wasn't the best idea. I say it could keep him out of a job he really wants. His answer? I have a job already. So it's okay. After about half an hour of talking to him, I say fuck it, gotta feed my kids, and do it, shaking my head internally the whole time.
So then, I walk outside to smoke a ciggarette. There's three guys out front of the restaraunt next door (Mama Lee's is THE best soul food ever. EVER.), talking about tattoos. One says that he's thinking of walking in the shop and checking us out. His friend says "No man, don't go there, I gots a friend named 'Dirty Dave' that did my tat fo ten dollas!" Dirty Dave? Ten dollars? No shit? Did it come with free AIDS and hep c as well?
Later, I'm outside again, and this 60ish woman walks up and looks in the door. "is that a LADY getting a tattoo??" she asks. Why I say yes, she says "Seems to me that she'll regret that in a year". I turn, and all the tattoos down my left arm become visible to her. "I don't regret mine" I say, and her eyes get big and she asks "Oh my, do you WORK here?" and walks off.
She comes back later with two kids, takes them to the big window, and starts lecturing them. We ALL wave from in the shop, and she gets scared and walks off.

Good times man, good times.

Kanji Tattoos, and How To Find That Phrase In Latin.

Seriously people, why get a tattoo of something in a language you don't know from a random source on the internet? I can definitly see if it's part of your heritage, has something to do with a larger tattoo (i.e. you have an oriental dragon, holding an kickass orb, a scrool with kanji on it and other badass elements), but why get something so....random? Anyways, my little rant on kanji being over, here's what the post was goingh to be about originally lol.

Tips on finding a tattoo in a different language.

1. Go to the library. Contrary to poular belief, there is plenty of sources more reliable than online translators at a library.

2. Go to a local collage, find a teacher that specializes in languages, or better yet the language you are looking for.

3. Make friends with someone from a country that speaks that language you want as their first language.

4. (one of the most unreliable ways) the internet. Try to find at LEAST three different sources that give the phrase, word, whatever it is you want in exactly the same way. You don't want a menu do you?

In the event that you find what you're looking for, make sure you get it checked out. If you DO find out someday that the beautiful kanji you have that you thought said "love" turns out to mean "lover" meaning "whore", don't come blaming me. I do not speak or write in any other language besides English, and mostly, I pretend I can't even speak that.

Gas Prices

The price of Gas versus Printer Ink


All these examples do NOT imply that gasoline is cheap; it just illustrates how outrageous some prices are....
You will be really shocked by the last one!
Compared with Gasoline......
Think a gallon of gas is expensive?



This makes one think, and also puts things in perspective.
Diet Snapple 16 oz $1.29 ... $10.32 per gallon

Lipton Ice Tea 16 oz $1.19 ..........$9.52 per gallon

Gatorade 20 oz $1.59 ..... $10.17 per gallon

Ocean Spray 16 oz $1.25 .... $10.00 per gallon

Brake Fluid 12 oz $3.15 ...... $33.60 per gallon

Vick's Nyquil 6 oz $8.35 ... $178.13 per gallon
Pepto Bismol 4 oz $3.85 .. $123.20 per gallon

Whiteout 7 oz $1.39 ....... . $25.42 per gallon

Scope 1.5 oz $0.99 .....$84.48 per gallon

And this is the REAL KICKER...
Evian water 9 oz $1.49..$21.19 per gallon! $21.19 for WATER and the buyers don't even know the source
(Evian spelled backwards is Naive.)
Ever wonder why printers are so cheap?

So they have you hooked for the ink.
Someone calculated the cost of the ink at...............(you won't believe it....but it is true........) $5,200 a gal. (five thousand two hundred dollars)
So, the next time you're at the pump,be glad your car doesn't run on water, Scope, or Whiteout, Pepto Bismol, Nyquil or God forbid, Printer Ink!

Grim Reapers

So, last night I did the longest sitting on one tattoo that I have done yet. Only 8 hours, but for the kids first thattoo, he sat like a tank (though by the end he was shaking like he had parkinson's and had sat in starbucks drinking double shot espressos all day).
He came in on Friday, with a picture of some tattoo he got off the internet. The picture he brought in was awesome, but it was already on someone, and while it COIULD have been flash, it looked like it was more likely to be a custom design. I will pretty much generally refuse to tattoo something if it's already been tattooed unless it's flash, so I gave it back to him, told him I would draw him something up, and we made an appointment for the next day. Thinking I was going to do it much, much smaller, I told him to bring $450 and we'll call it a deal.
Let's just say I went a little ADD with the design, and it ended up capping his shoulder, all the way to his spine. As I had already told him $450, I said fuck it, I want to do it anyways. I work next to Lackland AFB, and a LOT of my customers are trainees that don't make jack shit. So generally I underprice my work just so I can do the tattoos that they want, and that I want them to do. Anyways, here's the tattoo.

Cross Contamination And You.

Every idiot that thinks they can buy a tattoo machine and start inking up their friends always seems to forgets one key element - the prevention of cross-contamination. This is the part that can make your "clients" really sick or even kill them, but your average scratcher usually doesn't pay any attention to it. As long as they've got a working machine, a needle and some ink, that's all they need to become the next great tattoo artist, right? It's time for a wake-up call, folks.

First of all, what is cross-contamination? The glossary describes it as "the spreading of germs, bacteria and/or disease by carrying them from an infected area to a non-infected area". To make this more simple, let's take a look inside your own home. We'll use the kitchen as an example.

I think most people realize that we can't see germs and bacteria, although we acknowledge that they can be found everywhere. Kitchens are especially prone to these tiny organisms due to the presence of foods that we prepare and eat there. Raw meats are very likely to be contaminated with bacteria such as Staph, Salmonella, and E-coli which can make you very sick if you ingest it.

If you prepare a hamburger tainted with bacteria and then go wash your hands, you have just contaminated the faucet you touched to turn the water on. So the next time you touch that faucet, even if your hands are clean, you re-contaminate your hands. Now if you go and touch someone's plate, they may touch their fully-cooked (and now safe) hamburger on that tiny area you touched and re-contaminate their meat.

If you think this is very unlikely or a little over-the-top, check this out. "The National Center for Health Statistics estimates that between 6.5 million to 33 million cases of food borne illness occur in the United States each year. Worldwide, the numbers grow to staggering proportions...As many as 9,000 people in the United States alone, die yearly."

OK, this has little to do with tattooing or body piercing, right? Wrong. The above was an example of food-borne pathogens - microorganisms that make people sick and die every year from food. The scary thing is, food-borne pathogens are nothing compared to blood-borne pathogens. This is where this article applies to you.

Blood-borne pathogens are the microorganisms that carry infection, Hepatitis, AIDS, and a host of other illnesses. This isn't a little tummy ache from Aunt Sally's bad potato salad we're talking about. These are serious diseases that can be carried in people's blood, many times without them even knowing it. When you tattoo or pierce someone, you come in contact with blood and bodily fluids. If you do not know exactly what to do to prevent those fluids from touching and contaminating any other surfaces, you are putting lives at risk every time you tattoo or pierce someone, including yourself.

When you tattoo someone, everything becomes contaminated. The ink is contaminated, the machine is contaminated, the needle is contaminated, the tube is contaminated, your gloves are contaminated and sometimes even the air around you is contaminated. Your work station is a hazard, your client is a hazard, your equipment are hazards and even that stick of deodorant you use can cross-contaminate from one client to the next. Germs, bacteria and blood-borne pathogens are everywhere. You can't see them, you can't prevent them - the only thing you can do is prevent them from becoming a threat to you and your customers. If you don't know how to do that, then you have no right putting a tattoo needle or piercing needle to anyone's skin, period.

And if you're a client who thinks it's cool that your friend's uncle has a set-up in his kitchen and is willing to give you a really good deal on that tattoo or piercing, you had better listen up. This is why it's more expensive to get a tattoo in a professional studio, because it costs money to properly sterilize equipment and test it for any trace of contamination. If they didn't clean anything, they wouldn't have to charge as much either. But you get what you pay for, people. Go ahead and complain about those high prices - but just remember that every time you get a "deal" on a tattoo or piercing, you're probably putting your life at risk. If you don't think your health and life are worth a few extra bucks, then you agree to accept whatever consequences you endure as a result of your stupidity.
By the way, in case you were thinking that this article was going to actually teach you how to prevent blood-borne pathogen cross-contamination, it's not. That's the job of your mentor when you get a proper appreticeship.

New Tattoos and Stinky Feetses.

I don't know what I like better. Having clients that basically just come in and say "draw me something Z" or people that come in for their first tattoos and get way more than they expected (and paid for according some a coworker, lol).

This girl came in, and after looking in all the portfolios about 4 times, looking on the internet for about 2 hours, and just generally looking around and I guess thinking about what she wanted done, she came up to me and said she wanted a violet. I asked her if she wanted realistic, cartooney, what was her flavor, and at first she said realistic. She then saw a picture on my wall that I had put on my sister-in-law of a lotus, smoke and ohm, and told me "You now what? Just draw me something halfway in between, and if I like it better, then we'll do that instead."

here it is:




Also, if you know ou are getting a tattoo near your foot, or somewhere that your tattoo artist needs your shoe off, or on your foot, wash your feet. Please. My boss has got some swampfoot stank going on. But, he also let me start a really fun tattoo on him. Can't wait to finish it.

Yes, I Know

that this is my third post today. But I just noticed the google ads on the side of my page. As this is a tattoo blog, filled with images of tattoos I did (and some I didn't do), why is google ads all about laziness? They've always been confused about what to put on my blog apparently. I've seen things about brains on the google ads, I've seen some things that are just completely off the wall...but now....is google trying to tell me something?

Tattoo Aftercare, And What Not To Do.

So you just got a tattoo. You blithely leave the shop and realize that either the artist didn't tell you what to do, didn't CLEARLY tell you what to do, or you didn't listen. So you're trying to figure out what to do. Here's what I tell my clients.

What you'll need:
Aquiphor
Dial antibacterial handsoap (unscented)
unscented, alcohol free, sensitive skin lotion. (I generally give out Eucerin, or Cereve)

Take your bandage off after 45 minutes to an hour. Take a shower (no baths), washing the rest of your body FIRST with whatever you normally use. Then, on the tattoo, use your fingers (no loofahs, washcloths, sandpaper, ect...it'll hurt like a bitch) to wash your new tattoo using a circular motion. Try to use rather warm water, the warmest you can stand, but not OHMYGODMYSKINISMELTINGOFF hot.when done, rinse, letting the water hit your skin ABOVE the tattoo, not directly on it, and then switch to cold water. Using warm water opens your pores, letting excess ink that isn't in the right layer of skin out, and then cold water closes your pores. Pat your tattoo dry with a clean towel, and then apply a very thin layer of the Aquiphor, just enough to cover the tattoo, but not stifle it. Kind of glisteny, but never shiny like you just took a vaseline bath. Use the Aquiphor for the first three days plus the day you got the tattoo, about 3-4 times a day. In other words, do it the day you get the tattoo, and then the next three days. Try to take at least a shower a day, and if you think your tattoo is dirty, it is. Wash it.
Now, three days have past, so put your aquiphor to the side, as you can use it on your next tattoo, and many others as well, and go to lotion. Try to put the lotion on 4-6 times a day, or whenever your tattoo is looking kinda dry. Your tattoo will peel, flake, it may have scabbed. Do not pick at your tattoo. Once again, do NOT pick at your tattoo. And also, here comes the worst part of ever getting a tattoo, worse than the linework, worse than the shading. It will itch. It will itch so badly that you want to rip your skin off. Do not scratch your tattoo. You could fuck it up. Once it is done peeling, generally it's done healing. If it is a particularly awesome piece, this is when you go back to your artist so they can look at it, and take healed pictures. We appreciate that.

Now, any questions? Feel free to email me. Supernummy@gmail.com
I don't care if I have never met you, even if I did not do your tattoo, I don't mind shooting you an answer to a question about your healing tattoo. But generally, it is best to ask your artist, unless you got the tattoo in a house by your uncle's best friend's wife's son's homie.

This is what can happen with improper care of a tattoo:




Oh, and before you ask, neosporin, vaseline, triple antibiotic are your enemies when it comes to healing tattoos. Don't do it.

A Gift

I finally took the time to sit down and finish something for my husband. Between working and kids, projects I start as gifts for my husband always seem to end up on the backburner, and finally rolled up in a tube, forgotten in some dark drawer.
Yesterday was a pretty slow day, so I finally just drew something for him. Aphex Twin helped me out.

This is his drawling.

Electricity and Body Piercing....Fun Combination?

(January 2008, Pennsylvania) A 23 year old man with various body piercings decided to see what it would feel like to connect his workplace test equipment to his chest piercings. Several co-workers tried to convince him that it was a bad idea to connect himself to the electronic control tester. He ignored their pleas and proceeded to connect two alligator clips to his piercings. He hit the test button...

When the police and rescue personnel arrived, his co-workers were stiill trying to revive him with CPR and rescue breathing. They were not successful.

One Great Weekend

Generally I get to do a tattoo that I'm really into about once every two weeks. I got two this weekend. The first one was a tattoo that a good client had been thinking about getting for awhile, that seemed challenging to me, that he finally decided on. Too bad it was right before he moved, which is always a sad day for me (had two of them this week, as I work near Lackland AFB, which is where all the air force trainees are, well...trained).

His feesh..



The second one was a girl's first tattoo, and I always love tattooing birds.



I love seeing people when they see their new tattoo for the first time looking as excited and as happy as this girl did.

Don't Die!!

This has got to be the stupidest news story I've heard in a while.

Clickatron for stupidity!

Digital Tattoos?

Digital tattoo

I still havent decided wether this is awesome because I love technology, or stupid is hell because I love my way of tattoos.

Space Bunnies, Baconstaches And Karate Kids

So, before I'm a tattoo artist, I'm a mom. My son is in karate, and his oversized gi needed his name on the back. So, I go get some iron-on letters, and put them on his gi. Now, I'm supposed to be an artist. How hard is it to get irn-on letters on fabric? Apparently, it doesn't work for me. I put his name on so crooked it looks like a politician. But hey, I couldn't get my son to stop moving.


(That was a joke there, son.)

And, since this is a tattoo blog, how about another tattoo?

We have an apprentice at the shop, named Bacon. He was named by my six year old daughter when she walked up to him one day and said "You smell like bacon. Carry me Bacon!" and when he said something to her, she yelled "Talking bacon?!?!" and ran. So, I have called him Bacon ever since, and told him the other day that he was getting a bacon tattoo. He just needed to tell me where. So, he came up with this little gem.



Best tattoo I did all day.

Another fun one I started the other day was the Space Bunny. This was the girl's first tattoo, and, after my own heart, decided 'go big or go home'. Here you go.



I'm going to go back into it after it heals, smooth out the background and put some darker tones in it. I can't wait to finish it.

The Picture I Promised

I finally got my computer up and running, after a couple of down days. The last post was from my phone, which explains the horrible typos. Heh, never doing THAT again, lol. Anyways, here's the picture I promised.

Always Have Your Camera

So, I had a customer come in a couple weeks ago, he originally wanted more tribal. #ribal is the bane of my existence,.so he said "well, how about a bull? I wanted one eventually anyways." So, I draw out this bull, he says hell yeah, and i sit on his tattoo for 5 hours. I finish, and go to grab my camera from my toolbox. Didn't bring it. So he says he'll come back tomorrow, so I can get a picture. I wait all day the next day, he never showed up. For three weeks I hoped heZd come back. Finally, the day after I gave up, he walks in. Apparently, he was military, in training, and one kid decided to smoke and sell meth on base, which resulted in a lockdown. But, he came back the day he got offbase privilidges back. So I got my pictures. I'll post them later tonight or tomorrow.
Moral of the story? Keep your camera with you.

Finally have a bit of Time on my hands...

Shit's been crazy lately. The shop opened, as I stated, and we've been fucking BUSY. I love it. I get to tattoo custom artwork, no flash, I'm getting a nice little customer base, and I'm having fun. Here's some more recent stuff:





Add the fact that I got married to a wonderfully handsome, crazy and sweet guy, who takes care of my kids as if they are his own, my kids are progressing mentally faster than most kids their age, and they are body active, happy and healthy. Life is fucking nice.