"I want that on my skin."
Uh....really? You sure about that?
u/PharmSystem asked:
Tattoo artists of Reddit, what was the weirdest / most disturbing tattoo a customer wanted?
Here were some of those answers.
A Parade Of Yikes
HIV+ on the shaft of their penis, apparently they felt it would qualify as informed consent and avoid bringing it up in conversation... but alas women do not see w eyes inside their vaginas.
The Mistakes We Make When Young
I have a friend that tattooed on herself the word "spite" onto her leg when she was 14 but anytime she wears socks it looks like it says "spit".
We Love Having Names Of Serial Killers On Our Necks
Several years ago I tattooed the words "Jeffrey Dahmer" in sh*tty scratchy writing on a girls neck for her 18th birthday. She had been coming into the shop a lot with her friends as they got tattooed and talking about it. She had the letters drawn up exactly as she wanted them and everything. The answer was always the same. "No f*cking way". When she finally turned 18 she came in with a few friends and asked again. I told her politely to f*ck off with her shenanigans. A few minutes later her friend told her he could just tattoo it with the "gun" he got off eBay at home. I made the hard choice to do the tattoo to insure that it wouldn't get infected or be all scarred up if she ever decided to have it removed.
It's been circulating around the internet for several years. I still feel sh*tty about it, and hope she got it removed. http://cheezburger.com/6524093696
What Is It With People And Their Privates
Not a tattoo artist but the guy I went to for many years once told me that he had a customer come in, 20 years old and completely sober and very serious, wanting him to tattoo birds flying out of her vagina up to her lower stomach. He told her he wasn't willing to tattoo genitalia to get out of it and she said okay, I'll just take an infinity sign on the back of my neck instead. He saved her from a lot of awkward questions and a lot of regret later in life
Me Hoy Minoy
I got a tattoo of Doodlebob on my *ss.
To those unaware, Doodlebob is the character from the episode of Spongebob where Spongebob finds a pencil and draws a copy of himself.
The copy becomes alive and ends up being evil.
While I was getting it I asked the tattoo artist "so what's the dumbest tattoo you've ever given someone?"
His reply, "Honestly? Probably this one."
I've had it for a few years and have no regrets. Doodlebob will live on underneath my boxers for years to come.
Me Hoy Minoy.
Peacockoalaing
I was apprenticing with my dad at his tattoo parlour and on this particular day I had nothing to do so I was just cleaning and answering calls, a fifty-something year old man came in wearing denim shorts and thongs (sandals) with a wifebeater on and the most magnificent mullet, he asked about finishing a tattoo he had gotten in Thailand, i asked him to show me and when he did I couldn't even comprehend what was happening with it... It was a full back piece of a koala with one foot on the ground and the other on a fallen bottle of VB, holding a tattered Australian flag up in one hand and shooting an AK-47 into the distance with the Aother, the koala also had the southern cross tattood on it chest. I referred him to another artist and after they spoke he left, I haven't seen him since. All in all a very weird encounter with the most bogan Aussie you could think of.
Eyebrow Mutilation
At my shop last year we had an older lady come in and ask us to tattoo her eyebrows (not an uncommon request, even though we don't do cosmetic tattooing) but rather than regular brows she wanted them to look like greyhound dogs running off her face...she was deadly serious too...needless to say we refused 🙈
Do We Need To Highlight This
Not an artist but the guy I went to told me about someone who repeatedly came into the shop and only ever wanted sort of natural marks on his body circled. Nipples were circled, freckles were circled, moles were circled. So the guy just had loads of circles of various sizes on his body. One day he shaved off his beard, found a spot or mole on his chin and came in that day to have it circled. IIRC the artist eventually turned him away and refused to circle anymore.
Certainly Too Much Crazy
Giphy
My tattoo artist once shared this story of this girl who wanted a rose tattooed around her anus. He refused, naturally, and she whined for a bit before asking him to instead tattoo "Sweet Little Thing" across her lower back (tramp-stamp style). He again refused and kicked her out of the shop. In his words, he wasn't "going to deal with that level of crazy for that long."
This Is Real
Giphy
When I worked as a tattoo artist, a guy wanted us to tattoo his name on his infant baby, because as he put it, "she's trying to say that's not my son!" We threatened to call the Gardaà because what the actual hell! We wouldn't tattoo anyone under the age of 18, even with parental consent, and we certainly wouldn't tattoo a baby!
I had to laugh when I saw the episode of Archer where he and the baby get tattoos, it was a grim reminder.
Are Dreams The Best Inspiration?
Not a tattoo artist but my artist told me about a friend of his who blacked out his nipples and a guy who had a dream in which he had lego figures as thumbs so he got them tattooed.
Poor Life Choices
Went on a date with an artist. Asked her this question. Her answer is a favorite story of mine to tell now.
"A girl came in on her 18th birthday. She was dressed super rich and talked like the most dense basic white girl you've ever seen. We asked her what she wanted done and she says, 'I want a tattoo on my butthole.'
'...what do you want there...?'
'I want words around my butthole.'
'...okay what do you want it to say?'
'I want it to say 'Dom's Butt Slut.'"
And she got a butthole tattoo that day. It wasn't done by the woman I was dating, but by someone se at that shop.
Hor
Giphy
We had a guy who came in to the shop monthly to get the word "Hor" tattooed on him. Always in different sizes and fonts/script - eventually we caved and asked what it was about (we assumed he just had a girlfriend/partner) turns out he'd misheard the name "Thor" and claimed to be a Norse Pagan. We tried to tell him about the correct spelling even showing him in books and online. He wasn't having it. A saw him a month or so ago, with "Hor" tattooed on his forehead.
Unsightly Whoops
Not an artist, but back in HS someone showed me their wrist tattoo they got at a party. The tattoo artist was tripping on acid at the time and so was the client. The guy wanted a mushroom. Instead, he got the outline of what looks like a penis. It's huge, too.
MumdaddadmuM
Not an artist and definitely not the weirdest, but I knew a girl who got the words Mum and Dad tattooed on her arm, which yknow, is relatively normal. Except she wrote it out herself, and it had no grammar or spaces so it came out as Mumdad, in big badly drawn cursive letters, along her forearm. So dumb.
Literally What
Not a tattoo artist but I know someone in my neighborhood that has his own name tattooed on his right arm. He says it for the occasions of drunkness when the police asks for his name and he can't talk.
But I think his left arm is better. It has the quote "The lion is the king of the jungle, but the wolf does not work in the circus" and next to the quote he has the face of a lion.
Do we even have a clue that they're the "one" that got away? How long until it sinks in? And how do we not know there isn't another "one" coming behind them? I have no answers. Just asking...
The Draft
Episode 1 Omg GIF by RuPaul's Drag RaceGiphy"The girl who summoned up the nerve to ask me out towards the beginning of high school. I was so humiliated by the life my family was living that I stalled until she gave up."
"Betsy, if by some stroke of dumb luck you're reading this... I'm so sorry. It was 25-27 years ago, but I still hate myself for that. You were beautiful, intelligent, a good person, and if I had anything resembling a stable, presentable home I would've said yes in a heartbeat... I had a crush on you since 7th-grade 'intro to drafting.'
I Love Her
"Weird, I was just confiding in my mom about this last night. I'm late but for catharsis's sake I'm going to post. My first girlfriend is a classic case of you don't know what you have until it's gone. She's the complete package. Beautiful, intelligent, compassionate, and so kind. We started dating when I was 17 and broke up when I was 21."
"For reference I'm 30 now. I was an idiot. I wanted to play the field. I wanted to party and hook up with college girls. It was fun at first but after a while I felt this gnawing hole in my heart. The feeling of doubt crept up slowly and still, a decade later my chest feels tight thinking about it."
"I didn't realize until my later serious relationships that getting along with your SO's family is so important. Her mom and step dad genuinely treated me like a part of their family. It's not a stretch to say I literally grew up with these people. I spent some of my most formative years with them. Birthdays, Thanksgivings, Christmases, you name it. They celebrated me and my accomplishments. They genuinely cared about me. Just amazing, salt of the earth, lovely people."
"Her birthday was in March and I sent her a text and we ended up talking for a bit. She's happily married and stable with a daughter and a second on the way. I'm genuinely so happy for her. She deserves happiness. I just wish I was a part of that. Sitting at work 10 years later I'm tearing up. I numbed myself out to it for years, it's so strange to me that I've been so stuck on her lately. Is this normal?"
- direct07
15 Years Later
"My very first real love. I was a teenager and I didn't really know how to be comfortable in myself or with myself. I played silly teen girl games and lost him even as a friend. Now 15 years later I still think about R from time to time. I genuinely hope he's happy in his life."
"Edit: Wow this blew up while I was sleeping. Thanks for all the sweet words and to everyone with their "one" congratulations! I suppose I hadn't looked him up on social media because I'm scared, scared he won't respond, scared he will respond, scared he'll think I'm a stalker. I'm in a happy relationship now, but what if... Etc etc etc. But I'll give it a Google."
Missed You Much
rhythm nation dance GIF by Janet JacksonGiphyA girl I dated in high school. Went on a date one time she took me out parking and I was too stupid to realize it.
"She always talked about moving away as soon as she got finished with high school. I always thought I would stay in a little town the rest of my life. Turns out I was the one who left and move to another state. Later I heard that she had told someone that I knew that she thought that we would be married at some point. Missed it by that much."
Ok... I've been a bit blind to the light. People can be cruel, but also highly creative. Why not just lead with the truth? It'll always hurt more after lies.
Chuck E.
Chuck E Cheese Wink GIFGiphy"Ah the rare AskReddit question I can answer."
"I met a wonderful woman circa 2013-2015. We worked at what I can best describe as an upscaled Chuck E Cheese. Or ghetto Six Flags. Your choice."
"We hit it off instantly, though at the time I was rather romantically inept. Eventually, she says she's leaving to join the Air Force. I tell her I'll miss her, and wished her well. The thought of asking for her number so we could stay in contact didn't even cross my mind."
"Cue the next day, I stop for lunch on my way to work, and as I'm walking to my car I hear my name being called. I turn around, and it's her, running toward me. Universe giving me a second chance, right? Wrong. My dumb butt still didn't ask for her number. She looked a little upset, and I still think about her often. Desiree, I hope you're doing well."
The Getaway...
"He was my first and last love. I was 16 and he was 18 when we met. We bounced around like idiots, on again off again, finally got together mid 20s. We both fell into bad habits - drugs and alcohol, more booze for me, more drugs for him. We had some bad things happen that were pretty detrimental to staying sober. We would split, reconcile, get sober, fall off the wagon, split, etc... repeat as necessary. We realized we were very bad for each other unless we could BOTH just get sober for ourselves, and split."
"Ten years later, I was sober for 7 years (still am, going on 18 years end of this month, actually! Woo, go me!) and he was beginning to come back, sober about a year. He contacted me, we met, talked about trying again. He said that once he had been totally clean for a year, we'd do it. That whole "Don't make any changes for a year" thing. I would visit him, tho, things were good."
"He woke up one morning feeling bad, thought he had the flu. (This was pre-now) I stayed around because he was sick, but neither of us thought he was drastically bad, just the flu, right? He got worse and worse, finally we called an ambulance because he got up from a nap and couldn't breathe. He died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. Aortic dissection."
"He got away, but someday I'll see him again. I never stopped loving him, and him me. We just weren't good for each other."
Ce la vie...
"My most serious Ex."
"Don't think I truly understood love until I met her. Loved her more than I ever thought I could love anything. It eventually ended when she told me that, through no fault of my own, she had fallen out of love with me. That was 2 years ago, still hurts to think/talk about."
"Ce la vie..."
The Avoid...
"I'm in the middle of trying to avoid that right now actually."
"It's not worth the heartache trust me. I fought to stay in a relationship for an entire year. If I would've just let her go the first time she wanted there would've been a lot less pain. We would've left on good terms. I would've lost a lot less sleep. Rip the band-aid off because once the band-aid starts peeling it's inevitable it'll fall off with time."
Kim Tate Eye Roll GIF by Emmerdale"My ex and I broke up over 3 years ago. Mutual breakup through a lack of communication on both ends I feel."
"Thought I was over that hill until this week she messaged just to say hey and ask an innocent question. We text for the best part of the day and it's brought up a lot of old feeling. Feeling pretty bitter sweet right now."
Love is a mess. Why even bother trying if you can't be true? It's not hard to just spell out the situation. And if you're the one needing to put together the words... look closer. The dialogue shouldn't be difficult.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.