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« Friday Cephalopod: Somehow, he just looks pissed off | Main | Everyone must dance »
Category: Cephalopods
Posted on: March 28, 2008 7:00 AM, by PZ Myers
Last weekend, I met a young woman who asked me to sign a picture of a friend's tattoo (not the real tattoo, unfortunately!), and it's so pretty I said I'd have to include it on the Friday Cephalopod. Here it is:
(Eat your heart out, Carl!)
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Comments
That is certainly an attractive tattoo! The octopus looks quite content but then it does have a nice location.
Posted by: Fred | March 28, 2008 7:14 AM
Hmm. You forgot to include your signature in the picture. Or, uh, is that NSFW?
Posted by: Genuinely Doug | March 28, 2008 7:31 AM
You're being asked to sign tattoos, now? How rock-and-roll is that?
Posted by: Moggie | March 28, 2008 7:43 AM
At least with that location the octopus won't be migrating south as the years go by.
Posted by: Zeno | March 28, 2008 8:26 AM
Always good to see more people with octopus tattoos. My brother, another friend and I all have (non-matching) octopus tattoos we got around the same time.
Posted by: Tony | March 28, 2008 8:55 AM
Eh.
I still say:
Tattoos are for people who want to be noticed -- but without going to the trouble of actually becoming interesting.
Posted by: Hank Fox | March 28, 2008 9:08 AM
Eh.
I still say:
Generalizations are for people who want to sound knowledgeable -- but without going to the trouble of actually learning anything.
Posted by: dimestore | March 28, 2008 9:22 AM
This is not an octopus
Posted by: Gurgel | March 28, 2008 10:00 AM
A TW and now nakkid groupies. And you never had to learn to play the guitar.
It's no wonder you got thrown out from where righteous Christians were gathered for their 60 minutes of hate.
Posted by: tsig | March 28, 2008 10:02 AM
#8
Thanks for the clarification, Magritte ;-)
Posted by: Mike P | March 28, 2008 10:06 AM
That's nekkid!
The classic line (from Roy Blount, Jr., IIRC) about the difference between naked and nekkid:
"Naked means you ain't got no clothes on; nekkid means you ain't got no clothes on and you're up to somethin'!"
Posted by: Bill Dauphin | March 28, 2008 10:21 AM
#10
Just pointing out what a frustrating experience it must have been for PZ. He didn't get to fondle a real octopus. Not even a pretty girl with an octopus tatoo ... just a picture of a pretty girl with an octopus tatoo. Well, a picture of part of one. And it's too cropped to tell if she's pretty.
Posted by: Gurgel | March 28, 2008 10:42 AM
I am neither interesting nor pretty. No real loss for PZ.
Posted by: claire meanie | March 28, 2008 10:50 AM
As the friend who asked him to sign the picture I can tell you that the tattoo bearer is both interesting and cute, despite what she says.
Posted by: tlb | March 28, 2008 10:56 AM
Eh.
I still say:
Overreactions to jokes are for people who like to be noticed -- but without going to the trouble of obtaining a sense of humour.
Posted by: DrFrank | March 28, 2008 11:03 AM
Dammit, spent too long composing that and the effect was spoiled.
Posted by: DrFrank | March 28, 2008 11:05 AM
As another friend of the tattoo owner, I will just send out an fyi to the haterz out there: she *will* cut you. That being said, she is indeed interesting and pretty and awesome. It's rare that I get to see the whole tattoo. I usually only get a peek at a tentacle or two.
Posted by: JJ | March 28, 2008 11:05 AM
I didn't mean it like that, Claire. Your tattoo is gorgeous. As for "interesting", that's a dubious thing to be, anyway. Hell, Ken Ham is "interesting".
Posted by: Gurgel | March 28, 2008 11:06 AM
If that's claire meanie in the picture, she's lying: how could healthy, young and female (and illustrated!) not be interesting?
(except possibly to gay males and hetero females, but those are both incomprehensible to the rest of us...)
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler | March 28, 2008 11:07 AM
I'm with you on this one, Hank.
Remember those little transfers you could get years ago? Like model kit decals. You'd soak 'em in water for a bit, press them against your skin, gently peel of the backing and presto! you are now marked. For some damn reason they always looked better on the backing than on my arm. All I could think of was how silly I would look with a cartoon permanently displayed on my body. Couldn't shake the notion that I'd stop liking it pretty soon.
One thing puzzles me about tattoos. Is there no white ink? You know, for people with dark skin. If visibility is the object, how come Dennis Rodman's tats don't stand out? The entire notion of body art goes right over my head. I always considered the body to be art enough. Well, there's no accounting for taste.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | March 28, 2008 11:08 AM
Hmmm. Maybe I'd better re-think that Star Catcher tattoo I was planning on...
Posted by: Kseniya | March 28, 2008 11:19 AM
#11 Bill
You seem to be implying that PZ was up to something. You should give up these low blows and character assassinations.
(notice I never had to admit I was wrong)lol
Posted by: tsig | March 28, 2008 11:34 AM
Someday, someone is going to find a cephalopod with a PZ Myers tattoo, and then things are really going to get weird.
Posted by: Dan | March 28, 2008 11:44 AM
Can't help with the tattoo, but I'd post you one of these come May, if you'd like.
http://www.squishable.com/pc/squish_octopus_15/Big_Animals/Big+Squishable+Octopus
Hmmm - I don't actually need your address come to think of it. I could just send it to the dept.
<:ponder>
Posted by: Sili | March 28, 2008 11:47 AM
A tattoo of an octopus? That is mad-craziness! *Everyone* knows that tattoos can only be of one of the following:
1) any/all members of KISS
2) half-naked, Boris-Vallejo-inspired Valkyries
3) mothers, and exhortations to love same
4) instructions not to resuscitate the bearer
Posted by: casaubon | March 28, 2008 11:56 AM
The placement isn't right. That tat should have been down on her belly, so that the hectocotylus could have been drawn going down to...
;-)
Posted by: Russell | March 28, 2008 11:58 AM
Oh, man. I wish I could sign a picture of that!
Posted by: M. Robert Bond | March 28, 2008 12:30 PM
@#11
The first place I heard that line was on a Lewis Grizzard stand-up album back in the '80s. It's easy to see how he could be mixed up with Blount, though.
Posted by: Ranson | March 28, 2008 12:38 PM
Very pretty, and it looks like an octopus to me - just because you can't see all eight legs doesn't mean the represented organism lacks them.
And yes, there is white tattoo ink.
Posted by: Monado, FCD | March 28, 2008 12:55 PM
Nice tattoo, Claire!
Dan wrote: "Someday, someone is going to find a cephalopod with a PZ Myers tattoo, and then things are really going to get weird."
Dan, with that joke, you win the internet. :D
Posted by: MH | March 28, 2008 12:56 PM
Sad. Ooohing and aaahing over a tightly cropped photo of an octopus on a woman's shoulder?
That fact that any of you has ever kissed a girl should be plenty evidence of God!
Posted by: anonymous | March 28, 2008 12:58 PM
Better than ooohing and aaahing over lies in a book made up by control freeks. At least the girl and tat exist in real life and no ome is deciding how to live their life by them.
Posted by: Dahan | March 28, 2008 1:07 PM
no one..
Posted by: Dahan | March 28, 2008 1:09 PM
Dahan,
Have you kissed a girl?
Posted by: anonymous | March 28, 2008 1:11 PM
White ink does not work well on very dark skin. However, it can be used to make "stealth" tattoos on light-skinned people.
From special tattoo inks:
Posted by: Monado, FCD | March 28, 2008 1:15 PM
You must be in 4th grade, anonymous. I think that's the last time I heard that question asked. That explains why you still believe in god.
Yes, I've been married for 12 years and my wife let me kiss her on our wedding night...
Criminy your an idiot.
Posted by: Dahan | March 28, 2008 1:18 PM
That's IDiot to you ;)
Posted by: anonymous | March 28, 2008 1:21 PM
Does anyone else out there remember the movie "Irezumi"?
Just asking. Never mind.
Posted by: MikeM | March 28, 2008 1:32 PM
I haven't. My daughter was born by parthenogenesis.
(You're not fooling anyone, Mr. Jealous...)
Posted by: Azkyroth | March 28, 2008 1:32 PM
It's a good thing that you provided those links, Kseniya, otherwise I might have been confused.
Posted by: Brownian, OM | March 28, 2008 1:45 PM
Heh, You know I had to check, I thought it was this chick's tattoo but it isn't. You may want to scan her photos for the tattoo though it looks very nice among other things :)
Posted by: Chris | March 28, 2008 1:53 PM
Mark Morford of the San Francisco Chronicle provides a link to an extremely disturbing photo of GW posing with a badly burned soldier. It's not for the faint of heart, but I think this picture is worth a thousand words.
Posted by: MikeM | March 28, 2008 1:57 PM
Kseniya: Before clicking on your links, I thought you were referring to a star-gazer, which struck me as a bit odd for a tatoo . . . but perhaps not inappropriate for this forum . . .
Posted by: Physicalist | March 28, 2008 2:50 PM
My girlfriend got a tatoo of a chambered nautilius shell on her inner thigh.
The thing is if you put your ear up to it you can smell the ocean.
Posted by: dNorrisM | March 28, 2008 3:15 PM
LOL!
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | March 28, 2008 3:33 PM
@#42. It's the guy on the right who's disturbing, of course; the guy on the left is just unlucky.
Posted by: Dave | March 28, 2008 4:00 PM
Now that you mention it, I think you're right. I've been familiar with that line for a long time, but I believe the most recent time I actually heard someone say it, it was Blount... quoting Grizzard.
To be fair, I did qualify my attribution with an IIRC. ;^)
Posted by: Bill Dauphin | March 28, 2008 5:31 PM
Dan:
You realize, don't you, that Pharyngulites all over the world are now trying to figure out how to get the tattoo gun to work inside their aquaria. On your head be it!
Posted by: Bill Dauphin | March 28, 2008 5:36 PM
Very nice. By the way, I've moved all the science tattoos over here. Plenty of cephalopods to be viewed. Along with circuits, nitrogen cycles, solar systems, and every other geek expression you can imagine.
Posted by: Carl Zimmer | March 28, 2008 11:28 PM
Looking at these I'm almost getting the feeling I'm missing out.
Posted by: Azkyroth | March 29, 2008 1:10 AM
Addendum: ...by "these" I mean the science tattoos.
Posted by: Azkyroth | March 29, 2008 1:12 AM
Dan:
Someday, someone is going to find a cephalopod with a PZ Myers tattoo, and then things are really going to get weird.
You realize, don't you, that Pharyngulites all over the world are now trying to figure out how to get the tattoo gun to work inside their aquaria. On your head be it!
Actually, there is no need to tattoo an octopus--all a Pharyngulite has to do is line the aquarium with photos of PZ, and when the octopus camouflages to match the environment....
Posted by: Chris Booth | March 30, 2008 8:52 AM
Very nice -- but I've been waiting for PZ to comment on the
lovely squid tattoo on the arm of the winner of Project Runway. Maybe I missed it...
Posted by: Sonja | March 30, 2008 6:41 PM