NERD TATTOOS… UR DOIN IT WRONG
D’oh! According to JLP on Associated Content, I made just about every rookie mistake in the book with my new tattoo:
It’s no secret that nerds love dinosaurs. While body art of a living dinosaur is likely to look cartoonish, fossils have a certain scientific air to them. A fossil tattoo should have a subtle, classy color scheme. Fossil designs are ideal for those who want to avoid a garish, multi-colored tattoo.
Hint: Think beyond Triceratops. Consider a tattoo featuring more obscure prehistoric creatures, such as trilobites or ammonites.
Oh, why didn’t I consult the experts before I branded myself for life as a total amateur?!
But is my tattoo a fanciful picture of a fossil with floral decorations, or a scene set in the Cretaceous of a (relatively) freshly decomposed triceratops in a field of flowers? What do you think?
Ink Nerd meets Red Rocket
Ok, finally, here are the “in progress” shots of the now-two-week-old triceratops skull tattoo; lots more after the jump…
Mike Bellamy of Red Rocket Tattoo giving me the business (photo by Amy).
Ain’t nothin’ like the real thing, baby…
While in Philadelphia, I stopped by the Academy of Natural Sciences, to check out their Hall of Dinosaurs, and I lucked out!
Not only did they have this excellent triceratops skull (it’s as big as me!), but in the fossil prep lab off to the side of the Hall, museum staff were working on cleaning and assembling triceratops fossils!
More photos (click to enlarge):
I spoke with the nice paleontologist lady in the fossil lab for a while (you can see her arms working on a cast of a big fossil in the first thumbnail photo, above), and she encouraged me to volunteer to help out with the fossil prep. When I told her I lived in a different city, she said some of their volunteers only come in once a month… don’t tempt me!
I wonder if the Museum of Natural History has a similar gig…
Not for the faint of heart.
Greetings from beautiful Philadelphia, PA! My wife is here on business, and I am her escort for the weekend. I wish I felt better… Yesterday, in my head-cold-induced stupor, I accidentally deleted the draft of my long and extremely interesting story about the process of getting this tattoo.
I’m working on the rewrite, but in the meantime, you’ll have to be content with these gruesome photos of peeling tattooed flesh, taken yesterday (day 5?) soon after I woke up (more after the break):
Fearless fossil hunters
After sitting next to me at work for 3+ years, I’m surprised that Sasha didn’t know I was into fossils. This trilobite is my prized possession, fossil-wise, paired with a really nice tattoo I found in modify_evolution’s flickr photostream (gotta keep it on-theme, right?):
I found it in an abandoned quarry in the bluffs in Alton, Illinois, just a few miles outside of my hometown of St. Louis (and across the Mississippi) when I was about 9 years old. My friend Ezra had just found an excellent trilobite fossil near there the weekend before, and I begged my dad to take me (and Ezra) to the same spot to look for more. I didn’t have much hope that I’d find one as nice as Ezra’s, but sure enough, I picked this one out of the gravel. I’m sure my dad was relieved that I found something; he had been ready to go home for quite a while..
The photos after the jump will give you a better indication of scale…
Looks like we made it…
Ink Nerd enters the blogosphere. Thanks for the link, Will… No such thing as bad press, right?
Tricera-tattoo Status: besides being totally awesome, it’s still swollen, sore, and a little red around the edges, but I haven’t started scabbing, peeling, oozing, or any of that stuff. It feels a lot like a bad sunburn, including the hot-to-the-touch thing. I’m keeping it moist with Aquaphor, per doctor’s orders. Also starting to get a little stubble where the manscaping was done..
Next: The making of Herbie the Love Ornithischian
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