Tattoo lovers differ in just about every way possible. Some love realism, some are here for silly colors and cartoons. To some people every bit of ink has to have a meaning, and for others "because I felt like it" is totally fine by them. One thing most of us have in common is seeing at least one piece of art that made us wonder "who thought that was a good idea?"
Imagine how much worse that must be for the people in charge of creating those "masterpieces." Well, you kind of don't have to anymore.
Reddit user Oreoboii69 asked:
Tattoo artists of Reddit, what request made you go "I don't think that's a very good idea"
At first it was just the artists who chimed in, but it didn't take long for more people to speak up with their stories, and pretty soon the whole thing was a magical dumpster fire of bad ideas, misspellings, and at least one totally wrong name. Brace. It's about to get awful.
Teenage Boyfriends
I asked this to my buddy's tattoo guy and he told me this:
Two young girls come in with their mom, 16 and 14. They want to get their boyfriends' names tattooed on their back, like tramp stamp area. Big letters. Said each one would be $3-400. Mom approves.
He's tattooing the first girl, 16. Decides he will try to strike a conversation. "So, how long have you been dating your boyfriend?" ... 2 months.
Okay.. finishes first girl, next girl up. Thinks to himself.. should not ask, but gotta know... "So, how long have you been dating your boyfriend?" ... 5 weeks!
He asked the mom if she was sure prior and her words were, "They got good grades and this is what they wanted."
He also mentioned that if he wasn't so in the need of the cash he would have declined, but had bills to pay.
Buttception
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I remember this one pretty clearly because the guy was such an idiot. Guy had an overly big head and was wearing some sort of generic band t-shirt. He kept ogling the sexy tat samples and giggling - like the Betty Page stuff that nobody really gets. He had a friend with him that was obviously a moron too; friend had this horrible under-bite and blonde Elvis hair. He wanted a tattoo of a butt with a tattoo of a butt on it.. and he wanted it right on his butt.
I didn't want to have to handle the fool's unwashed butt, so I gave him a quote for like double the normal price - but he paid it anyway.
Always "Remeber"Â
Was dating a girl, and her friend brought home a do it yourself tattoo kit. Yeah. Immediately everyone starts saying what they want tattooed on them while I'm backing up into the corner like some kind of scene from a horror movie. Thus ensued two hours of painfully hilarious, sh!tty tattooing. All kinds of random lines. A bad drawn rectangle. But the one that takes the cake, this guy got "Always Remember" tattooed on his bicep. Except, the amateur artist missed an "M", so instead his tattoo read "Always Remeber"
Three people looked at it and said yeah it looks great, it's awesome.
The instant I looked at it, I died. I laughed, So. F*cking. Hard. I couldn't take it. Assh*le move on my part, but what do you expect when you get a tattoo from a bunch of amateurs?!
Practice
I used to work with a bloke who liked to practice tattooing himself. It started with the lower legs and after about a month of owning his own tattoo gear, his legs ere covered in shitty line drawings of diamonds, dollar signs, card suits, bank notes, etc.
But then the big day came where he showed up sporting a phrase something like:
"If you had the World in your hands, would you hold onto it, or just let it slip away"
(sort of like the Eminem lyric but not quite the same)
That wouldn't have been so bad - if he hadn't done it on his f*cking neck, using the mirror and filled it with almost as many spelling mistakes as there were words.
Columbine
We had a crazy client come in one time asking for the portraits of Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the kids responsible for the Columbine massacre, on her calves.
We refused, but later she came back in with a boyfriend she had for less than a month and he got a "Property of _______" tattoo right above his junk.
"Fail Music Speaks"
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My very good friend, just after school, joined a mildly successful band. While pretty oiled up from a gig and 3 days of non stop drinking and drugs meets an old friend who expresses his admiration of the impressively quality koi sleeve my friend had done and said that he is about to become a tattoo artist himself and if my friend would ever like to, he could be his first customer, for free of course.
So, band friend decides to get his calve tattoo'd just before a major music festival, he decides that "When words fail, music speaks" was the quote around an old school microphone.
The session starts off rocky and just gets worse, this guy has never tattoo'd a human before and here is doing a piece bigger than my whole hand spanned out.
Halfway through my friends says thanks, but they must stop now this is going badly, he is bleeding, the lines aren't straight and the guy is clearly out of his depth.
What did the tattoo look like for the festival and about 10 months after until he got cash together to fix it?
It was an outline of a microphone that looked just a child had drawn a penis while having never seen a penis before with the lovely quote of:
"fail music speaks"
Almost 10 years later we still manage to fit that quote into just about every group conversation we have.
That's Not My Name
I know a guy who was desperately trying to impress a woman and get her to date him. I was there when he turned up and showed her his very first tattoo. Of her name...
Which she laughed at hysterically before she told him that it wasn't her name, it was a nickname because her actual name was unusual and people always got it wrong.
So he's walking around with a random name on him and she's even less likely to ever date an idiot like him.
The Nether-SwastikaÂ
When someone talks about bad tattoos I always remember what happened to my mom, who works at a hospital. Once, they had to operate on a girl who was about 18 years old. Basically they do these surgeries on veins and arteries. Usually they use catheters inserted into the groin so obviously they see the patients private parts.
Well the girl had a tattoo down there and - I sh*t you not - she had a damn swastika tattooed on her crotch. The doctors were speechless. The girl claimed that she "doesn't know what it means."
I have so many question.
- aaakyn
At Least We Know It Was A Wanted Pic
Her boyfriend's d*ck pic. I hope they're doing ok...
Pot Of Gold
Went to get a burrito and the 19 yo dude had a f*cking rainbow coming out of one ear and it ended at the pot of gold next to his mouth. Guess who's making burritos forever?
"I've Not Actually Seen It"Â
I did see a dude getting a huge thigh piece of Mad Max Fury Road the week the film came out. It was like an old school movie poster with the characters faces around a car, and looked sick.
Mentioned to the guy that he must really love the film. His response: "I've not actually seen it yet."
The artist looked up, mid ink, horrified when he heard that.
- SGDave
Satan v. Jesus
Not me, but I have a friend who was a longtime owner of a tattoo parlor. I was asking him this very question. He said he once declined a guy who wanted to get a tattoo of Satan bashing in Jesus's skull with a crucifix.
Dot
My uncle's buddy wanted the "worlds smallest tattoo" to be in the Guinness book of world records. The tattoo artist (also a friend of my uncles) was hesitant and thought it was a joke and an insult, so he took the tattoo gun and gave him a "dot" on his back and told him to get out.
"Got Boost?"Â
My girlfriend's little brother has the worst tattoo. He is 15 and went to Serbia with his friend to visit their family. He writes home to his mother asking if he could get a tattoo. Mom says no.
He then comes back with a large tattoo of an engine part with the text "got boost?"
He's pretty happy about it and I don't think he is going to regret it any time soon, but I did have a pretty hard time not laughing at it. He's 15, he doesn't even drive, and I'm pretty sure that's not the correct engine part.
She Objects!
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A guy came in with his girlfriend, wanting a tattoo of her name. Over her objections.
Stank
I was sitting in the room with my friend when a guy walked into the shop and asked to get "my rap name tattooed on my neck." It was his first tattoo and he got a little bit frustrated when the artist refused.
His rap name was Stank.
- apl_soz
Truth Or Dare
A drunk lady asked me to tattoo a penis on her head while her boyfriend kept saying "It's truth or dare bro do it." I requested sobering up first. She said she would kill herself if she didn't get a big black c*ck on her head.
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.
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