Being A Tattoo Artist Is Tough, And Here Are 32 Times They Had To Deal With Delulu Clients

A tattoo artist friend had great stories. My favorite was the fellow who came in wanting "those two hands clapping with a necklace."

It was a rosary prayer. He wanted a rosary prayer tattoo.

Not an artist, but when I was in highschool, a kid got a 7/11 slurpie tattooed on his inner forearm. He showed it to the guy who owned the 7/11 near by, who was so impressed he gave him free slurpies for life.

edit: here ya go!
Edit 2: also i forgot to mention, it's a bad tattoo hahaha.

Guy came in and asked for a bottle of sriracha with little wings tatted on his back.

Not the artist, but I got “are you sure”d by the artist before my first tattoo.

Afterwards it was explained to me that it was because I was 25 asking for a tattoo roughly the size of the palm of my hand for my first one and he’d not done one that size on a young woman for their first before.

All went well though, which he confessed he was surprised about.

Edit for tattoo link (Circa 2013).

Obligatory "not a tattoo artist, but..."

I'm an artist someone wanted to commission to draw a tattoo for them. This was maybe 10 years ago. Dude offered me $100 to draw an obese raccoon in a diaper. I said "okay sure whatever, anything specific you'd like regarding color etc?"

He replied stating that he wanted the diaper to be "very full and leaking". Now mind you, I have drawn worse things for money. When I was a teenager and into my early 20s, these more "questionable" commissions kept a roof over my head. So I wasn't particularly shocked by the idea, what shocked me was that he wanted it tattooed. That just... seemed like the worst idea imaginable.

I ended up telling him that I wasn't comfortable drawing that and refunded the $100. He replied with a massive wall of text about how close-minded I was.

I'm sure he found someone to draw him the thing but I just couldn't do it. Not for a tattoo.

Not the artist, but was keeping a friend company. She wanted to get a wolf's pawprint on her foot. Not the top of the foot, the bottom of it. Right on the ball.

The artist and I both questioned her decision. "Are you sure? You won't be able to walk on it, and even then, the ink will probably sweat out so it won't be deep."

She was insistent, willing to pay, her choice, etc. About a week later, all that was left was the faintest outline.

My buddy almost got a tattoo with a fist coming out of the ocean holding a stack of cash with change and sharks in the water.

I wanted a tattoo on the bottom of my foot so bad. Three different tattoo artists told me no, and objectively they were right. Cuz like, that’s where it’s most likely to rub off, infection chance is much higher, it hurts like hell, etc. But I really wanted it, so I did it myself stick n’ poke. And it was the worst pain I’ve ever experienced. But five years later it’s still going strong.

Definitely the Pillsbury doughboy holding money bags, accompanied with the gentleman's street name which I can no longer remember.

Not an artist but when I was getting my first tattoo I was sitting in the waiting area and this girl probably 18-20 was with her mom and they were talking with the artist. The girl wanted some Arabic script on her arm and the artist asked them if they knew what it meant at least 2 times and they said no but insisted on getting it. She did end up getting it.

Not a tattoo artist but my cousin has a tattoo of a carrot and a tomato boxing on his calf. Apparently he was drinking at a bar and they were playing darts. Whatever the dart landed on you had to get a tattoo of that. His dart landed right smack in the middle of the carrot boxing a tomato.

A friend of mine tattooed the Janelle chick from "Sixteen and pregnant". She was mad that my tattoo cut 5 minutes into her and her boyfriends "YOLO" tattoos. When her boyfriend was done he looked in the mirror and got mad that my friend tattooed it backwards. He was reminded he was looking in a mirror.

Edit:
To be fair, I'm not sure what the boyfriends tattoo said but I believe it was on his leg.