Tattoo Time?

I want to get my second tattoo at some point during the winter which means I need some help with my design. I have a vision but don't have the art capabilities to make it happen.. My vision.. A circle of spirit animals on my left arm from shoulder to just above elbow. I want it to be in the same celtic and tribal mix as my other tattoo. If you have any artistic eye and would like to help me design my new tattoo please read on and send me some drawings.. :)

Dragon on the top, clockwise of him would be a polar bear, clockwise from him a dolphin, clockwise of him an owl. In the center would be a pixie/fairy. I was thinking of having each animal in a minimalistic line art style sort of like the elements on my the other tattoo. In terms of the actual circle, it could be that the animals intertwine with each other or there could be a faint celtic knot ring like on my other tattoo. The pixie could again be intertwined with each other animal or could stand on her own or could have a faint celtic cross behind her and touching the circle. All of the animals are male except the pixie.

Email me your designs or post them as comments here..

Here are some examples of artwork I found on the web for tribal animals.

Really like these:

http://www.ideatattoo.com/media/catalog/product/cache/3/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/t/a/tattoo_professionist_animal_3.jpg

http://th04.deviantart.com/fs12/300W/i/2006/317/8/6/tribal_eagle_by_xx_trigrhappy_xx.png

http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:dU_4DOjR-gqemM:

http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:QXhkIZ0Ig2I6MM:http://i392.photobucket.com/albums/pp9/newtattoodesigns/Animals%20Tattoo%20Designs/Bear/bear.gif&t=1

http://www.tribaltattoopictures.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/tribal_dragon_tattoo.jpg

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYkg4tdhLs9XkdBeDWsjkVzvdccH4GmDiz5qnG6r87RvEO2YC2xK5vQfryMDLszvPjNz3svxgKy6o40yxczMeMGH4AWevZeJj4_gGa4rnh5ct5KqoaxA6m2hOpcPygmNgAQsWwtLs7ZQF-/s400/tribal-lion-tattoo-designs_03.jpg

Here are some others:

http://www.tattoos.org/galleries/Tribal_Tattoos/5-animals-tribal-design.jpg

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA4gMd4BHMYbX6aQ9544eXmUJsl7g1Ftq7NI27Ere0ycSg7wO6fI7ORbPrpoUx0LdIjzK0BlZaJVfwqxE8vqcp1dmsLEG0DdUVxH3VsE-3k5_N7PiIinNlzN2TI6VXLoUO_V-aOO9L_3s/s400/tribal_predator_tattoo_design_TATRPR05.jpg

http://www.towertattoo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/tribal-tattoo-2.jpg

http://images.elfwood.com/art/a/d/adelewaldrom/tribal_dragon.jpg

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ePLK5oZqMN8/STVDLqdoAMI/AAAAAAAAAEk/omYmVw7Xe-8/s400/apawae.blogspot.com.Dragon_tattoo_by_Tatsu87.jpg

http://www.cooltribaltattoo.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/blck-tribal-scorpion-tattoo.jpg

http://comps.fotosearch.com/comp/UNC/UNC275/animal-bird-tribal_~u12797048.jpg

A Series of Uppers?

What does Randal know anyway, life is *not* a series of downers, what a depressing thought... I for one can say for sure that life is a series of uppers... Lets take the last week..

Thursday, Friday and Saturday were all great days/nights, each one very different, and each one with a different beautiful lady. :D

Thursday night I went over Becca's house.. Got the tour of her house, met her mom and went to dinner at a local pizza place. I always like my pizza plain (especially when trying a new place for the first time because that's the true test of the pizza), but most people find that to be "not enough" so it was great to find out that she also likes plain pizza.. Not to say I don't like pizza with crazy toppings either but sometimes you just want cheese and sauce, maybe it's because I grew up with plain NY pizza? We also had a spinach croissant like appetizer, it was too much food, lately I've found I'm back to eating smaller portions which is a good thing.. After dinner we mostly watched Shock Treatment (god that movie is bad) and listened to lots of good music while chatting about the life the universe and everything.

Friday night I went over Lynz' house, on the way there I was thinking about how we had not had a true night out in a long time and how we have this great comedy club (Funnybone) close by and never go.. So, after looking up the comedian for the night we decided he was funny enough based on his online clips and went.. Being the smart people we are we knew that getting food in Man-town would be a long and drawn out process so we grabbed some wonderful sushi at the Asian Bistro by her house before going to the club. The headliner was Matt Braunger, I had never heard of him but as I said, his online clips were pretty funny. I'm glad to say he was funnier in person than he was on his clips too! The first two guys (don't remember their names) were also really funny, the MC was a guy with a mustache and he did this whole bit about how having a mustache makes him a "wild card", you never know, he's either the best cop in the world, or he's on to catch a predator. He's either a porn star or a gay porn star, you can never tell.. The second guy was also really funny, he did this whole bit about being metrosexual which was really funny, I had not heard that term really used since Queer Eye and it was cool to see it brought back.. Finally was Matt, he did a whole thing about people throwing up and it was so funny even Lynz was laughing at it. Go check out his site and his bits, I want to get his MP3 CD he was that funny. His taco bell bit and his Easter bit were also top notch.. I left the show and my stomach muscles hurt because I was laughing so hard! Funny Bones has a deal where if you buy a shirt you can get in for free on Thursday nights as long as you wear the shirt. Got a shirt, who wants to go on Thursdays? During the drive there and back we played "new" music for each other, I put new in quotes because it was not really new, just new to each other. How is it that I have dated someone for that long and they never really heard ManOwaR?

Saturday I went to the CT Ren Faire with Jessie. I was walking in and got grabbed by my friend who was in the receiving line so me and Jessie ended up standing in the receiving line with her. It was a little odd to be in the receiving line but also pretty cool too, heck it's not like we aren't dressed well enough and it's not like we don't go there enough.. This years show is an all musical cast show which was awesome, I filmed all the cast shows on my Droid so if you're interested I can show them to you but I will not post them online because you should go see it live. If you can't I will show them and I may post them on youtube after the faire closes for the year. Everytime I started to wander and look at shops I was getting waylaid by friends working different booths, not that I'm complaining because they are people I don't see often and I did eventually look at all the booths I wanted. I just felt bad because I kept getting pulled away from Jessie, mom and Joe. This years faire is also a "choose your own ending" where the faire goers vote on the ending, of course good won. I'm going to go back on Oct 23rd and hopefully I will see evil win. After the faire closed we ended up spending lots of time chatting with a friend of mine and we finally left around 7. We got invited to the after hours party but I had to catch a flight at 5am out of Boston so I needed to get a nap in at least.

One other thing I just wanted to add, Jessie and my mom each bought a dress at Aetas Designs. Great deals and great materials and workmanship. Jessie's dress was off the rack but needs some alterations, total price $65.. My mom is having a dress made from scratch and the price? $115!! For a hand made dress!? Check them out, you won't be disappointed..

---

Got up at crazy o'clock and drove to Boston. Wanted to be there for 3:30 because that's 90ish minutes before my flight. Funny thing is that the stupid airport does not actually open till 4 so I spent some time staring at empty booths. Checked in and was the first person through security. Watched a few episodes of Glee while waiting in airports and being on flights. I slept the entire first leg of the flight and most of the second and we landed in SF 40 minutes early! I'm glad we landed early because it was close timing to get into Oakland. The SF airport is actually south of SF, when I got in the car it said it was in the 80s, I drove north through SF and while doing so the temp dropped to the low 60s just to have it rise back up to the 90s by the time I got to the stadium in Oakland. I don't know if I could live in area with this kind of crazy temperature zones. I have to remember to bring a long shirt at least when I go to the Giants game on Wednesday.

Anyway, I got to the Coliseum and found out that parking was cash only so I had to turn around and go find an ATM. Got cash and drove back, while waiting in line to pay a guy came up and handed me a free parking pass! Guess the benefit of going to the last home game of the season is everyone is looking to dump their free parking passes. The outside of the stadium is very run down and the area around the stadium looks like a demilitarized zone. I was expecting the stadium to be a dump so I was not surprised by the area. I am glad to say however that the inside of the stadium is very nice indeed. The seat I had was amazing, right behind home plate and very close to the field. The food was top notch, I'd actually put the food in the top 10 for stadium food. The upper deck had nothing but generic stadium food but the lower level had an irish pub, cheese steaks, a farmers market, etc.. The beer was vast as well, they had booths for Fat Tire, ShockTop, Pyramid, and others. The only place they had American Piss beers was at the generic stadium food booths. I had a cheese steak, fries and a fat tire. I guess it says a lot about the fans and the area that all the booths had glass walls between the customers and workers. The only bad thing about the stadium is it's a 100% non-smoking stadium which means the bathrooms become smoke houses. The first season at Citi-Field the Mets tried to make the stadium 100% non-smoking and they quickly realized that by doing so you create bathroom smoke houses so now they allow smoking on the forever ramp. The game itself was pretty lame, the Rangers crushed the A's and I lost interested in the game itself pretty quick so I wandered the stadium for a while and ended up leaving after the 6th inning.

Yesterday I had a date with a girl I met on OKCupid, we went to a brew house called Fault Line and then hung out at the hotel and hot tub. She is very cool and we are planing to go out again tonight.. :)

I sort of want to go to the Winchester Mystery House, maybe I can convince her to go there tonight. It's about 8 miles from my hotel..

A series of downers?

George Lucas has nothing on Terry Brooks when it comes to ending a book/movie on a series of downers... I just finished reading Bearers of the Black Staff which is book 1 in the Legends of Shannara series and I have to stay a bit stunned on the way it ended. In the last hour of so of the book half of the main "good guys" get killed!? I'm not saying he leaves them in cliff hangers or anything, he just outright kills them.. I'm obviously not going to say who lives or dies but holy jeez.. What a serious series of downers.. And Randal thought Empire Strikes Back ended on a series of downers, at least in that movie none of the main characters got killed...

The really shitty thing is that the next book does not come out till next year, when will I learn not to read a part of a series as soon as it comes out.. Wait, I did learn that but apparently I must have forgotten... On a side note, I still have not read the latest Wheel of Time or the third Eragon book so as I said, but..

Anyway, if you have not read the new Terry Brooks book yet don't.. I'm NOT saying don't read it ever, I'd just wait till next year and read both of them together..

----

As you may or not know Luna loves peeing on my bed, she did so the other night and I ended up trying to sleep on the normal (select comfort) bed. I was in bed for about 10 mins before I started getting real itchy so we decided to take it apart and really clean it the next day. When we did so we found mold growing, yum... Anyway, called Select Comfort and they mailed us an entire new bed, now the question is do we put it together or do we sell it? Ever since we got that bed Jessie has been unhappy with it so we are thinking of selling the *new* bed on eBay and buying something else. I am probably going to list it tonight but if anyone who is reading this is interested ($1200?) let me know and I will end the eBay auction.

This last weekend I went to Brad's house for his AnimeFest, I really think each year it becomes less of an appropriate name. The entire time I was there I don't think there was actually any Anime on, people were watching movies but not Anime.. I for one played Heroscape, which is basically a board game version of Shining Force, Castle Ravenloft which sucked and Empire Builder which is always one of my favorites. I really want to get Heroscape but I have to admit the size of the board makes storing it rather daunting, I actually got up and walked away from Castle Ravenloft it was so bad.. What can I say about Empire Builder? We realized that Empire Builder is to thank for all of our Board Game hobbies, back when I was working at Saturday Matinee my friend Joe introduced me to that game and I in turn pulled Brad and Christian away from console gaming long enough to fall in love with it.. I wonder how many other people owe their board game addiction to Empire Builder? After all these years and many, many board games later it's still one of my all-time favorites!

---

I'm about to start some crazy long time away from home, I guess I can't complain too bad because two weeks of that time is vacation but.. At least it's not as bad as it would have been, I swapped one week of travel with another instructor. Next week I'm in Santa Clara CA, I will be going to an Oakland A's game on Sunday and a San Fran Giants game on Wednesday so it will be a fun trip.. I get home Friday morning and we will probably leave for Disney World Friday night or maybe Saturday morning. I was supposed to go to Dallas as soon as I got back but that's the week I swapped out so I will be teaching in Franklin instead, then the next week I go to Mclean VA.. So I will be home one of the next five weeks... Will have to make sure the time I am home is as full as possible..

---

Speaking of as full as possible.. Saturday I'm going to the CT Ren Faire with Jessie, my mom and Joe.. If anyone is interested in joining us let me know... This year they are doing an all musical show..

Accident free since 1995?!

Not anymore!! I was driving home tonight from Milford and a lady ran through a stop sign and slammed into the front passenger side of my car! I saw her coming and tried to brake, but I had a choice between crossing into on coming traffic and hitting someone there or letting her hit me! I've always been one to say that accidents are avoidable, but this one was not.. I pulled over and walked back, while I was walking back she backed up from to make it look like she was well in front of the stop line. I just figured she was backing up to get out the way. I told her I would move the car and call the cops, she asked that I wait to call them.. No such luck lady, I care too much about my car to not report it. I went back into my car and traffic stopped for me to pull a u turn in the street and pull down the side street she was coming out of. While I was moving my car I called 911 and told the cops what happened and where we were.

I get out of the car and she puts me on the phone with her sister who tells me that if I don't call the cops she will come down with $4000. Umm, no thanks... Cop shows up and this lady forgets how to speak English and puts her sister on the phone who promptly tells him that it was my fault, that I was turning into the road and hit her. Unfortunately for her there were pieces of her car in the road I was driving down (rte 16) and even some pieces in the on coming traffic lane of that road. The cop looked at my car and could tell from the damage the angle of impact. He took my insurance, reg and license. The lady has (I know this will shock you) no license and no insurance! She had a little girl with her and didn't know her (the girl) birthday even though it was "her daughter".

I felt bad for her till she tried to tell the cop it was my fault! Seriously!?! I suddenly didn't feel too bad that her car was totaled and that she was facing a minimum fee of $500 and a maximum punishment of jail time. When I say her car was totaled I mean it, the entire front end was smashed in. Damage to my car you ask? If I didn't care so much about my car it might not even be worth fixing, the fog light is sorta out of whack and the bumper is cracked. Gotta love Subaru tanks!! I posted a picture of the damage to Flickr if you want to see it, actually with the new settings on this blog it's probably in the left hand column.

---

On a happier note.. FI was amazing as usual. Friday night was brutal with the bugs attacking, within the first 10-15 minutes of game I was killed, quick deathed and drained a vitality! Happy to say the rest of the weekend went MUCH better! I went on a mission Saturday night in which we had to break into a section of Aleph Complex and we did such a great job the NPCs who were in the building didn't know who had come in.. The only thing they heard was the computer announcing the microwave barrier and been dropped and then a few minutes later that it was back up. Thanks to my keen eyesight we avoided all the traps and the computer hacker who was with us did such a good job she didn't trigger any of the computer traps which would have released a horde of NPCs on us.. Go team sneaky!

a Wedding and a possible Funeral

I hate playing catch up but I apparently suck at this blogging thing lately. I would really like to get back into my daily blog mode but alas it keeps not happening.. It's not even like I don't have anything to say I just can't seem to find the time to say it. When it gets a few weeks out then it feels like I either need to write a smeggin' novel or not blog at all.

As you know (if you read the last blog) I had recently gotten my Droid X. After having it for over a month now I have to say I still love it. I do however wish the stupid 2.2 upgrade would be pushed to it already. I "check for updates" on the phone every day and still nothing.. The version of Android OS I have is buggy and it's annoying when little things hang or when you can't access all your contacts. The biggest bug I've had is the Social Networking app which does not work with any contact that is linked with a phone book contact.. This problem only happens if you try to hide anyone from the app so it's not a big deal, but still slightly annoying.

Oh, and speaking of issues with my phone... My stupid SD card died!? I lost all my pictures from the day I went to see Adams Family and the Mets game with my dad which included maybe the best picture I've had of him in a long time. I also lost all the pics and videos of my mom's "4th of july" bbq. Lesson here - copy pictures to your PC on a regular basis.

---

Speaking of my mom's 4th of july bbq.. Because of everyone's crazy weekend schedules my mom moved her 4th bbq to Aug 21st, that's kind of like the 4th of july right? It was fun but it was also sad that Jessie and Lenny were missing. Lenny was out in Chicago and Jessie was taking care of Hoyle who had just had hernia surgery. Did have a blast hanging out with the kids and shooting off fireworks! And as always the food was very good as was the company.. :)

The week before the bbq I was in NYC again for work. I drove down on Sunday and went to the 8pm Mets game, after the game I went back to the hotel to find out they don't have a bar right now (construction) so I went to a local bar down on the corner. They had Abita on tap and the bartender was very cool, I ended up hanging out there till they closed.. I don't really remember what I did what day anymore but I ended up hanging out with Michelle and Jim one night, we met at a vegan place and then brought food back to his apartment. We just hung out on his balcony for a lots of hours chatting, listening to music and playing with phones.

While in NYC I went to see Expendables with a bunch of guys from Laire. It was very good, lots of unnecessary action and lots of good one liners. As Schwarzenegger was walking away in a huff Bruno asks Stallone what's wrong with that guy to which he responds oh, him, he just wants to be president! The bad guy telling a female captive that he does not believe in hitting women but that guy over there (Jesse Ventura) has no problems with it! Gotta love big stars making fun of each other on film.

---

The day after my mom's bbq me and Jessie went to the beer and chili festival at Mohegan Sun. The stand out chili for me was Willi Brew Pub's chili, I had never had it because I am not one to normally get chili in a restaurant but I will make sure I get there more often. The best thing at the chili/beer fest was probably the ice cream! A company in Old Lyme called ironically enough Old Lyme Ice Cream Shoppe makes ice cream with beer, they had a few flavors to try and I was very impressed. Perhaps someone who lives or works near there should pick some up one day when they are in the area.. (hint hint)

Lush stopped making Tramp again!? When we first found Lush in Montreal I fell in love with Vagabond/Tramp, this is now the second time it's been discontinued.. Hopefully it won't be for very long this time. 

---

My dad had gotten tickets for us to sit in the Delta Club for a Mets game on the 28th. We decided to make a long day of it and got tickets to see Adams Family: The Musical on the same day.. The musical was good, the casting was great (except Pugsley), the story was all original and very well thought out and written, the dialog was classic Adams Family and they did a few awesome in-jokes throughout for the loyal Adams Family fans. The only thing that fell a bit flat was the music unfortunately. Some of the songs were very good but overall they were just eh. I think it would be more successful as a play and not as a musical. I do however recommend seeing it if you are an Adams Family fan. It is crazy expensive so maybe wait till it does a touring cast. It was very cool sitting in those seats for the Mets game, we had waiter service so you never had to leave the seat! Just wave your arm and a guy would come and take your order..

---

This last weekend was a mix of great and REAL bad! Started out great, went to Laire on Friday and was pleasantly surprised at how painless check in was this weekend. We had a bunch of pre-regs so I thought it was going to be a painful night but in the end it was not bad. Went to bed after my work assignment because my back was killing me and I was tired. Played all day / night on Saturday and lots of fun playing Daimone. I have been playing Brother Hawk more lately so it was a nice change of pace, plus Rich, Harry, Bryan and Corina all showed up so we had almost the entire Order for the first time in a very long time. Sunday I played during the morning and then left to go to Vin's wedding. Vin's wedding was very fun, I had a blast dancing (thanks Dianne for pulling me up to Come on Eileen) and catching up with Mike, Steve, Vin, Randy and Matt.

After the wedding was the problem... I went back to Laire and was not in fighting form on Sunday night, very tired from the dancing.. But, after fighting for a while I got back into form and was fine by the end of the night. Monday the town got over run, I was in good form but we were getting pressed hard! The mages got so low on power that I was told there was not enough power to give out spell defenses, I should have taken this as a sign to stop fighting so hard. But, one of the Order was down and dying and after arguing and trying to convince the other Order members to assist me in saving him I did the only thing I could do. I grabbed too little support and ran out after him. A second or two into the rescue attempt my support had fled and I was forced to run back towards the line, on the way I got hit by a dark paladin's lucky shot and fell. Was brought back to lay next to my dying brethren and was turned into a Drowned One (think zombie but more powerful). Spent the rest of the event as Daimone the Drowned One attacking the town! I have a 1 in 20 chance of coming back.. If that fails it will be a sad sad end to an epic character. At least I died trying to save my men..

---

This weekend is Future Imperfect, hopefully it will go better than Laire did last weekend.