salami and wine

Who ate all of the dry salami at 3:48 in the morning?
Oh it was me. Stealing a bit of time from the night after driving completely wasted kids home from the roadhouse tavern. I pretend time doesn't exist at night. That's why I haven't gone to bed before three for almost 3 nights now. Hmmm. It's time to get things done that are just for Kai.

The tavern was in Elmira, a small place in the agricultural wastelands about 2 miles from the tattoo shop. I had met the bartender before, through Chris and Jessica, and went with Pete and Lucia and Jesse and Jordan and Jesse's paramour, Sarah. She is under 21, but that didn't seem to matter. The bartender was Justin, who is sober (I probably would be too, if I were a bartender), and who set up a giant water/peanutshell/ice/ bottlecap fight with the table we occupied. I was drenched, all were drenched, and then we had to get up and dance to every song. Pete and I were drinking soda water with lime, which really exagerrates how everyone rambles while drunk. I had my ass grabbed/slapped 4 seperate times, all by different guys. I got told I was hot twice, even though both qualified it with "I don't usually go for girls with short hair but......" The place has a stuffed and mounted deer head, of course, and there is a thong hanging off of the antlers. Thong the underwear. There's pool, and white homies with tribal tattooes, and a jukebox full of The Judds and the best of David Allen Coe. The floor is littered with peanut shells. In short, Mykle will love it.

Today was the one month anniversary of Mykle being gone. In about 6 days it will be our 4 year anniversary of being together. Do you subtract the months apart this and last year? So far it has been 5 months apart, roughly. I miss him every day, though life in Davis has gotten much better so I am less fixated on his memory. It is nice here, I have a group of very close friends who treat each other like family, and it's very stable and healthy and awesome. I miss Michelle though, and wish I could still see/hear her singing and talking to herself every morning as she takes epic-long showers and sprays herself with perfume that smells like melted jelly-beans.

So my big news is that I have given my first tattoo. Not on a human being, though, so don't get yourself all frisky about it. Jeff (the owner of the shop I work at) bought me and his apprentice (Brian, a nice fellow who looks very young but actually has 2 kids) some fake skin, made of rubber but said to respond pretty much like real skin. I stenciled it with my drawing of a chest peice that I call "the Moth Heart". I tattooed it and it took about an hour and a half. It was so damn exciting, I swear I was giddy afterwards. My dream is coming true here, folks!
The machine was so much easier to hold than I thought, it has a rubber grip that makes it soft and absorbs the vibration. I was able to make semi-straight lines, go over lines and spill ink all over the place. Jessica said that I am a natural!!
I am going to scan the fake skin and post it on here for all to see, that's how happy I am with it. Jess wants me to actually get that design tattooed on me (by her, of course) to commemorate the happy event, and I'm thinking it probably is a good idea. I'm not sure if I am ever going to tattoo my chest (a la Lucia), but the tattoo is designed as a chest piece, so maybe.

I'm thinking about starting another blog, to detail my trials and travails as a tattoo apprentice, since I have so much free time on my hands. Hahahaha. Please let me know what you think, oh you anonymous folk who read this (just kidding, I am pretty much sure I know all of you). Would this be interesting? Would you read it?

OK I am turning in(to a pumpkin). I am full of my midnight snack and I think the neighbor's wireless network has been pirated off of enough. Goodnight all, and I'll see you at 12:00 noon when I wake ;)