Tattooed Zoë

This is Jacqui Moore, who according to the tabloid newspapers, got this body suit to spite her now divorced husband.  (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2019320/Jacqui-Moore-celebrates-divorce-asking-new-partner-tattoo-ENTIRE-body.html?ito=feeds-newsxml)  It took her eight years and all the tattoo work is thanks to her new partner, who is a tattooist. I am struggling not to feel envious for her transformation is truly shocking and exciting. 
There remains her right leg and face fully to cover.  Everything else is remarkably complete, except I notice there's her head as well.  I wonder if she will eventually go the whole way.  Jacqui is now 41, so was only 33 when she started, and is the mother of two children.  I do not believe that throughout the eight years of pain and resolve she was constantly saying to herself "that will show him" but rather once free from her marriage that she may have felt free to do something that she had for some time wanted to do, yet fel…

I was a little incredulous at Ben Boston's comment that there could be as many as 1,000 tattoo "scratchers" or amateur tattooists in Bristol but was chatting to another and in this case very young tattooist who until recently was working at Birmingham Ink (http://www.birminghamonk.com/).  He said Ben was right and the craze is getting out of control.

In the States a campaign group has been created called "Destroy Your Local Scratcher". http://destroyyourlocalscratcher.weebly.com/

It highlights the "Tattoo School" programme aired on the TLC channel last week in America.  In our risk averse society it's surprising the health authorities don't seem to care about the absence of hygiene practices with amateur tattooists and the non-use of Autoclaves which costs thousands of pounds to buy.  It seems the scratchers can easily buy the actual tattoo machines off eBay for very low prices.  It's a funny old world.

Suddenly it can be seen what the three sirens on the left side of my body are all about.  This angle of photo makes me look so very covered, while in reality there is still my stomach and some of my right side to be completed on my torso.  So I'm still quite a few months away from completing that stage.

Ben was back onto his regular topic of amateur scratchers.  He argues that actually tattooing rather than being tattooed is now all the rage.  He thinks there may be as many as 1,000 of these people in Bristol.  I've no idea how he arrived at this number but he says he is receiving a stream of enquiries to his website on the subject.

This seems to cross check with what's happening in the USA.  The Needles and Sins site features a campaign against a new reality TV show over there called "Tattoo School".  This has enraged the American tattoo community.  Here are some details of the programme.

On Thursday, July 14 at 9pm, TLC will air "Tattoo School". Award-…