2-8-1983

I'm 26 today. I don't feel like time is passing by this quickly but i guess it is. i used to be wicked bummed about getting older. now i don't mind it so much. more life experiences, more things to see, ect ect.

I'm going to Arizona on wednesday morning for my days off. im pretty excited to get out of the shitty cold weather, get tattooed by cory lenherr, eat some good mexican food, eat at zoe's, dad's restaurant and to spend time with zoe and the puppy.

off topic. i moved into my own apartment. so i am living by myself again, which im pretty excited about. it's nice to have my own space, as well as not having to worry about my own weird quirks annoying anyone else. it's right off of westcott street, which is only a few minutes from the shop driving. or maybe a 10 minute bike ride. so once the weather chills out im going to be riding my bike to work on a very regular basis.

the shop has kind of picked up a little bit, hopefully that trend continues. travel plans are in the future, and money is a must.

new paintings and new tattoos. i gotta upload em and quit being lazy.

finally finished.

21+ hours. i finished the inside of the arm as well but i have yet to take a picture.

it was finished in december. but ive just been lazy about posting the pictures.

a few pictures from Arizona..

Prop Plane back to Syracuse...



S.E.O.G(of course i dont have pants on)


Tower of Terror!!!!


Tattoo shop in disneyland


Eagle done at Tattoo Artistry in Tucson.

...

so lately I have been feeling very restless. i generally feel some sort of dissatisfaction, but this feeling has been growing.

maybe its the changes in my personal life. maybe its my desire to always be moving.

im not sure exactly what it is. i just know that it is growing.

i want to sell most of my things and pick up and go. sleep in my car, friends house, hotels. constantly moving. never really sleeping.

i want to do all of this, but there is still something holding me back.

fear.

fear of failing. fear of letting myself down. letting down the people i care for down.

i feel like that holds me back alot of the time from doing things i really want. it holds me back from throwing caution to the wind and saying fuck it.



never stopping. never really sleeping..never stop moving...




Travel plans to London are in the works.

Vegas is soon.


I need other places on this list.

I want out.

I want to be on the road. I want to travel and get out of this country.



I hate being stagnant for even a few days. i need to go some place new.

this is keeping me up for the last 8 hours.

So, I'm back in Syracuse. Sorta happy I'm back, sorta not happy at the same time.
here's a recap.


I got into phoenix on christmas day, i dont remember anything about teh flight from cleveland besides watching the beginning of some movie i couldnt tell you the name of, and waking up to a old episode of friends.

After landing in Phoenix i went to get my rental car.

enterprise lost my reservation.

no big deal. annoying, but no big deal. i go to budget.

i get denied a car. due to some credit check thing.

the lady is a bitch. even more annoying.

go to thrifty. same thing.. now im starting to worry.

go to alamo and luck out.

so after over 24 hours of traveling im on my way to christmas at zoe's families. the kids are awesome, her family is awesome. i get zero sleep. eat super good dinner at zoe's sister's. stuffed shells and caesar salad. go to the movies with a bunch of friends. goto sleep.


wake up at 730. take zoe to work, and drive 2+ hours to Tucson to work at Tattoo Artistry. It was great to work with Ed again, he is very much my big brother. basically from the minute we see each other the shit talking and dissing starts and doesnt stop til we part ways.

My first appt in tucson was this younger hardcore kid who got a pretty awesome tattoo. a tradition eagle holding a shield and laurel leaves. Had to draw the whole piece up on the spot which is always a challenge yet fun all the same. did a few more tattoos the first day, my brain is still so fried i could only tell you a few key points. tattooed til late and stayed with ed.

woke up on the second day in tucson, went to breakfast with ed and a few boys from the shop and vegas eric. I got french toast and some other delicious breakfast items.

Tattooed Eric that day. i did a huge dagger with roses and a banner. only got the line work and shading done, but im very happy with whats done so far.

finished some old stuff the rest of the day and did a walk in at the end of the night that ended up being something pretty cool. Got to do an eagle holding an American Flag on the back of some random dudes neck.. eagles weekend.


I ended up talking to jake for quite sometime after i packed up my stuff which was really awesome. he is a good kid and really willing to learn from anyone who has more knowledge than him.

drove back up to phx and walked in the door at around 330am.
i had to pick zoe up from being out. drama drama drama. luckily nothing having to do with her.

Sunday went by really fast. i couldnt even tell you a single event that happened that day besides shopping with zoe and going to dinner with the O'hagens at LGO.
Had the avocado pizza. so delicious.

Woke up in the morning. finished packing up spme stuff, and started our drive to anaheim, for Disneyland!
The drive went by relatively quickly and smoothly. we stayed at the Anaheim Marriot, which was walking distance to Disneyland, it was super easy, pretty cheap, and very nice. We checked in and took off for South Coast Plaza. huge mall.

We walked around for a while and i got by far the best Del Taco veggie works burrito i have ever had.

I picked up a few new shirts, even though i told myself i wasnt going to. and we headed back towards the hotel.

we ended up having dinner at PF Chang's. Which was a nice treat, considering we havn't eaten there in ages. we both got the beef with broccoli(zoe's subs with tofu), and we split these mini desserts which were tiramisu, chocolate cake, and strawberry cheesecake.

went back to the hotel and rented Roll Models, which was fucking hilarious. I'm super happy i got to see it. totally worth it.


The next morning we got an early start and headed over to Disney to find that the entire western hemisphere had the same idea as zoe and I. I have never seen Disneyland so packed. to the point that we waited in line for over 45 minutes to buy tickets to get inside! None the less, Disneyland was awesome. California Adventure was so much fun. Tower Of Terror, Screamin' California,the Orange Swing ride, the cool fake tattoo shop on the board walk. throughout the whole day it seemed we got into lines at just the right time missing the insane rush. we hung out in CA adventure for a while and then made our way to Disneyland, which i totally think i should visit around every Christmas from now on. This entire month hasnt felt like Christmas, but walking through Disney 3 days after put me in such a great mood. We were able to ride Pirates of the Caribbean, and The Haunted Mansion, both of which we awesome.i had never seen the haunted mansion all decked out for the nightmare before christmas before. it was on point, from the jack-o-lanterns on spikes, to the weird little bat ornaments. it was just awesome. I ate so terribly that entire day and def paid for it later. so many churros, and candy, and coke, and blah mexican food, then what did me in was the pizza hut pizza back at the hotel room. worst idea. all in all a really great day. i convinced zoe to ride Star Tours, which she hated, and i loved.

woke up the next day and headed to Fashion Island. ate pinkberry for the first time. was very pleasantly surprised. started the drive home. long and boring as always on the way home. a total of 7 hours in the car. ugh.

got the zoe's, sat down for about 45 minutes and then drove down to Tucson for a house show on new years eve.

worst.

saw people i wish i had never seen again. although we did hang out with justin downey and rosio, which was great. zoe an i stayed at my mom's. woke up and went to breakfast with justin, rosio, and lisa. somehow we managed to talk justin and rosio into driving up to phx to hang out for the day.

we all headed to Golden Rule when we got into town and met up with John, Jsn, and Myc. tom, april, joe, michelle, dirty dan, and others came down to watch myself, myc, john, justin, and jsn, all get S.E.O.G tattoos.


we ended up doing mine, just above my left knee... terrrrrrrrible. haha.

we stayed much longer than i really waned to, but it was all worth it. sped back to zoe's stressfully packed my stuff and sped to the airport. caught my flight to newark, which i dont remember at all. newark airport is huge. has tons of food options on top of a billion areas to catch a few quick zzz's. my flight to Syracuse was on a propeller plane. this was my first exprience with one. it wasnt a bad one. but it was pretty stressful. im not a big fan of flying to begin with, the last thing i want is to see the engine on the outside, and to watch the wheels touch down when we land.


back to work. my vacation didnt seem like much of one. but they never do. im alright with that.

hello cleveland.

I opted to say fuck it to sleeping in the Cleveland airport and got a hotel room like a baller. hahaha. i figure i can shower, sleep in a bed, and actually get up in a good mood tomorrow.

The flight to cleveland was super uneasy feeling. i hate flying on small jets. you can literally feel everything. every gust of wind, every turn or move the plane makes. it makes you very aware of how not in control of the situation that you are.

I'm staying in the cleveland airport sheraden hotel. its actually pretty nice. the food is horrible.

after checking in i walked down to the main lobby and ordered myself some dinner. i got a chicken alfredo pasta dish. i figure it something kind of difficult to mess up.


it was gross. just gross. the pasta wasnt cooked and the chicken was overcooked. go figure. whateves. I plan on getting some breakfast in the am. hopefully that will be a step up.

while in my hotel room i did a small painting freehand. i didnt have any black pigment. so all the black was down with a sharpie ish marker.

oh well:





Arizona in the morning hopefully.

more adventures to come.

Lost.

So.

Im traveling to Arizona for christmas, and low and behold, my flights get delayed and now i get to spend the night in the cleveland airport till tomorrow morning when the next flight to Phoenix is available.

Ive been sittin in the syracuse airport now for the past 3 1/2 hours. people watching, people avoiding, and inter-nerding. I'm still not exactly sure when i will be taking off to actually even get to cleveland. hurry up and wait right?

I'm not too worried about it. its more the circus of the airport and how people cant grasp that the people working the ticket counters dont control anything with a plane at all taht bothers me.

I have a vending machine with coca cola ready and waiting. I'm Set.

I am, on the other hand. pretty excited to get out of Syracuse for a little while. the snow is whack. i dont mind the cold. plus it will be nice to see everyone.


this is my life currently.





so besides that ive painting more and feeling more motivated towards art in general. i will post more pictures later when im stuck in cleveland for 14 hours.

its already starting to get dark. this day is taking forever.

new tattoo.

i started and finished this piece today. super fun traditional skull with some roses.


today was good minus the big appointment i had just not showing up. ugh. biggest frustration of this industry.


im going to Arizona this week. it will be nice to get away from the cold for a little while. mexican food. girlfriend. mexican food. h2o. stoked.

Painting

I did this painting for a trade With Rachel Anne who works at Sacred Heart Tattoo in Georgia. I did it with liquid acrylic on water color paper. ive been doing alot of the flash style paintings lately.


I've been getting more and more motivated to paint a lot again. its nice to have something to fallback on while the shop is slow.

I'm starting a series of paintings of girls similar to the one i posted on here. I'm going to try to stay on the ball and get them finished in a timely fashion.


i started going to the gym again today, I'm feeling good and getting ready to be good shape again.

I'm going to be doing quite a bit of traveling over the next couple of months. unfortunately I'm not going to be tattooing on all of those trips. but on the upside it will be awesome to have some vacation time.