SFO Tattoo Convention Stories

ok so here goes.. i'm tired as hell, excuse the gibberish

sold copter 2 to grime. what an amazing guy. so much enthusiasm. he gave it back today so we can put an rca cord on it since he only uses that. rca rules.

my friend clay decker gave me an rca clipcord adaptor that is sick. the rca pug is CERAMIC inside so we can braze brass to it and add it to the copter 2, with bling..

sold the machine we called 'the nameless' to uptown charlie, a machine builder and collector and shop owner.

i mentioned to him i would kill for a first generation swashdrive and he said he had one almost new in the box.

without telling me, he drove home to wherever and got this thing, it's sick looking and historical too. in the box with extra clips and bushings and the directions.

he was so smitten with our newest brass tracker that he had to have it. he was mostly trying to trade me for the swashdrive, which i wanted very much.. i told him no like 300 times, and said i don't have money to buy museum pieces. he said he couldnt afford to spend any more cash so that was that. which i was relieved at because my partner had asked me not to sell it yet but to jus ttake deposit

at 630 the entire hotel lost power. some dim emergency lites but no outlets at all. this outage lasted til 8 - closing time.

at that moment me n my buddy clay decker were sitting next to his partner RICHARD STELL who was tattooing a rad looking tiger on a kid's leg. richard is a very intimidating person who was vocal about his dislike of rotaries in the past. his friends always said he was a sweetheart but i was terrified of him.

i mentioned to clay that our machines run perfect off usb and he was like yeah and then we can use one of those spelunking lights blah blah and before you know it we had rigged clipcord footswithch usb no rheostat.. i basically PUT the brass tracker in richard stells hand and said TRUST ME YOULL LOVE IT. richard shoved it right in there and took to it immediately, was hauling ass right away. his wife held the spelunking light.

all this happened as every famous motherfucker in the industry was standing around waiting for the power to come back on. it never did. many folks went home with unfinished work including DAVE HARTMAN. anyways richard sure was awful sweet to me after that. he was the only one that tattooed any more at the convention, 1 hour and 2 laptops worth of batteries later the tattoo was finished and looked awesome. richard quite liked the machine..

uptown charlie sold like 4000 dollars worth of shit right at the end an came up and offered me cash for my partner and the swashdrive for me, which i accepted.