ModBlog News of the Week – Nov 26, 2010

After being laid up in bed last week with a nasty cold, I found out today that my inbox was flooded with two weeks of stories to get through for this week’s news round up.  There’s a lot to cover this week, so let’s get right to it.

To kick things off, LA based food stylist Adam Pearson was yanked off a flight last week, the reason:  his tattoos.

LA-based food stylist Adam C Pearson was on-board a Delta flight on Saturday morning when a flight attendant asked him to step off the plane, reported the Los Angeles Times.  He was told that he had been reported for “suspicious behaviour” because of the words Atom Bomb tattooed across his fingers.

Before the plane took off, he sent a tweet: “Just pulled off delta flight, passenger said I was suspicious looking due to my tattoos @DeltaAssist not happy at all #goldmedallion fail”  After answering more questions,  the frequent Delta passenger was allowed to return to his seat.

“A public apology would be nice,” Pearson said.  ”I’m not out for blood… but why didn’t they offer to book that other person on another flight if they didn’t like my tattoos? Why was that other person more important than me?”  Pearson said he had never before been questioned about his tattoos or behaviour while flying.  ”It really just made me kind of sad that you could just point at someone and say ‘That guy is acting suspicious,’ ” he said. “It was just a bummer.”

Of course airline travel has been all over the news the past couple of weeks with the implementation of those full-body x-ray scanners.  Well, it isn’t so much the scanners that are the issue, but rather the gate rape that you get when you refuse to go through the machine.  For those of you who are travelling and don’t mind going through the scanners, Fox News has a bit of information that may be relevant.

Byrne said this means TSA workers will see any foreign objects close to the skin, including piercings, catheters, and colostomy bags.  Breast implants and prosthetic testicles will also be easily recognizable on the scanner screen.  Still not embarrassed? The X-ray technology has the ability to tell if a man is circumcised or not, although Byrne said the scanners are supposed to be designed to avoid that.

If you do end up traveling soon and you happen to be heavily modified, drop me a line if anything of interest happens, either through the scanner or the pat down.  I’m sure there are a few ModBlog readers who are interested in hearing about it.

There’s lots more to cover so keep on reading…

You may remember from a few weeks back the story of a man who got a penis tattooed on his back by his “friend” when he thought he was getting a something else.  At the time I wasn’t able to find any photos of the tattoo, but this week, I’ve managed to find something better.  An interview with both the victim and the man responsible for the tattoo.

I guess the moral of the story is, don’t let someone tattoo you right after you get into a fight with them.  Especially if they’re not an actual tattoo artist.

Another follow up story from the southern hemisphere is about the police officer who was fired for opening a beer can at a work party.  With his PA.  This one has a happy ending as it seems the officer has been allowed to return to active duty.

Andrew Lawrance was dismissed last year from his role as a sergeant at Grafton after he attached a bottle opener to his piercing to remove the top from a bottle of beer while at dinner with colleagues in Yamba in December 2008.  He told the Industrial Relations Commission he was “egged on” to perform the trick but one man took offence.  Justice Michael Walton ruled that Mr Lawrance’s dismissal was “harsh” and ordered he be allowed back into the force, albeit at the rank of senior constable.  Mr Lawrance has since had the piercing removed and had told the hearing in July that he “regretted” his behaviour.

I really hope that the removal of the piercing wasn’t a condition of his being restored to the force.

Now back is the US a professor has undergone a procedure for an art exhibit that pushes his body to a new limit.  Previously Wafaa Bilal made ModBlog news when he was tattooed with a map of Iraq on his back, with one dot in black in for every US soldier killed, and another dot in blacklight ink for every civilian killed.  This time around Mr. Bilal is having a small camera implanted into the back of his head.

Bilal, who is teaching three courses this semester at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, will wear the camera for one year. It is 2 inches in diameter and less than an inch thick.  The project will raise “important social, aesthetic, political, technological and artistic questions,” he said.  He declined to say when the camera was implanted or other details of the art installation, saying it “will be revealed to the public as part of the museum preview on Dec. 15″ and on a website to be launched on the same day, http://www.3rdi.me.

He said he chose to have it put in the back of the head as an allegorical statement about the things we don’t see and leave behind.  How it all fits together is still a bit of a mystery.  The camera will capture his everyday activities at one-minute intervals 24-hours a day and then be transmitted to monitors at the museum, said curators Sam Bardaouil and Till Fellrath of Art Reoriented, who commissioned Bilal on behalf of the museum.  ”He doesn’t have to alter his lifestyle or what he does. In principal, he’s moving on with his life,” Bardaouil told The Associated Press from Doha. “It will be a three-dimensional, real space-and-time experience. Once the piece is revealed, you’ll realize that the camera is only one aspect of the work and there are aspects as important that will be experienced.”

As of right now his website is displaying a countdown to when the site is launched.  Hopefully by then we’ll be able to see some photos of the implant itself.

Heading up to the Great White North, Canada popped up in the news quite a few times in the past couple of weeks.

If you watched Ellen earlier in the month you may have seen Vancouver Island native Dustin Thut on the show.

Duncan resident Dustin Thut says he woke up Thursday to calls and text messages saying he had been featured on the show Ellen.  On the program, Ellen DeGeneres called Thut’s letter to her “the most ridiculous thing I have ever, ever seen in my entire life.”    He had asked his boss Mike Morgan for a raise, but was told he’d only get one if he tattooed Morgan’s face on his rear end.  Thut visited Bully Boy Tattoos in Duncan to request what artist Jory Helms called his “most unusual portrait to date.”  ”He came in the next day, and he had this silly look on his face, and he just turned around and dropped his pants,” Morgan said.  ”I pretty much dropped my heart right there and that was that. I gave him the raise.”

That $2 raise didn’t last long, though.  ”I quickly laid him off after that,” Morgan said.

I don’t know about you, but if I had an employee do that, especially after I suggested it, I’d find a way to keep him on staff.

While we’re still on the West coast, Performance Works on Granville Island is hosting an exhibit this weekend entitled “The Tattoo Project“.

The Tattoo Project brings together the work of 12 photographers shooting 100 tattooed models. Footage of creating the exhibit will also be edited together as the final scene in an upcoming documentary that will also be called The Tattoo Project.

The show runs Friday to Sunday, with more information available at thetattooproject.ca

Over in Ontario, tattoo artist Heather Myles from InkSmith Tattoos in Guelph made the news this week with her MedicAlert tattoos.

“It was a challenge,” said Heather Myles, the Guelph tattoo artist and owner of InkSmith Tattoos who made up the stencil and did the work for Bortolon-Vettor.  Myles used to be a nurse and understands the crucial role of the MedicAlert system. The engraved tag tells paramedics that someone is allergic to penicillin or peanuts, or has diabetes or a heart condition, for example.   “I really felt I had to make the symbol unmistakable or medical staff won’t take it seriously,” Myles said. “So it’s bold, plain and nothing fancy.”

Robert Ridge, president of MedicAlert Canada, doesn’t see anything wrong with a MedicAlert tattoo when used to supplement the existing program.  “The tattoo is very much a niche response,” Ridge said. “Most people would choose the bracelet or necklace. And emergency responders have been trained to look for the bracelet, not a tattoo.”  Still, “I saw a photo of the tattoo and this one is quite clear. There’s probably no harm as a complement to our program.”  Ridge said members pay an annual fee, which keeps their medical file current. Tattoo wearers would still have to pay the fee.

While we’re talking about medicine, a doctor in Germany recently refused to perform surgery on his patient because of the patient’s tattoo.

A 36-year-old man needing an operation was tattooed with the image of theReichsadler, or Imperial Eagle, perched upon a swastika, daily Bild reported on Friday.  The patient’s 46-year-old doctor said he could not reconcile proceeding with the surgery with his conscience, the paper reported.  “I will not operate on your husband,” the doctor told the man’s wife. “I’m Jewish.”  The doctor then had another physician finish the procedure.

The article doesn’t go into much depth, but I suppose this could bring up a number or moral and ethical problems.  On one hand you have the Doctor who has sworn an oath to take care of his patient, yet at the same time, if something were to happen during the procedure, a case could be made against the doctor that the error occurred on purpose because of the doctor’s personal views towards the patient.  Was the doctor in the right in this situation?

In other news, a woman was arrested last week for trying to perform a type of surgery herself, when she tried to remove her boyfriend’s tattoo with a knife, without his consent.

Miner said Amerson “grabbed a knife and attempted to cut the tattoo of her name off his neck.” A cop reported that Miner had the name “Tressa” inked on the left side of his neck, and that he “observed what appeared to be two scratch marks that ran across the tattoo.”   When questioned by police, Amerson denied assaulting Miner, saying that she had “been sleeping all day.” Cops recovered a small paring knife from the living room floor, reporting that “this was believed to be the knife used.”

In an interview, Miner told TSG that he got the 2” x 2” “Tressa” tattoo in late-July and has been dating Amerson for about a year. Asked if he considered Amerson his girlfriend, Miner replied, “kinda, sorta, not really,” before adding, “she’s pretty crazy.”

I’m not going to lie to you.  I burst out laughing when I read his response to TSG.

Now while we’re on the subject of dumb ideas, and you can’t tell me that trying to cut off your boyfriend’s tattoo with a knife isn’t a dumb idea, when going out to get a tattoo it’s best not to pay with stolen merchandise.  Especially when the stolen property is an accordion.

The instrument was then recovered from Skintone tattoo shop in Pershore, where it had been left as part payment for an unfinished tattoo.  Police are now trying to trace the man who left the instrument behind under a false name.  He is described as white, aged between 25 and 35, thin, taller than 6ft and with a local accent.  His incomplete tattoo features two wolves, a larger one on the upper arm and a smaller one going down the arm to below the elbow.

Another bad idea?  Wanting to get a massive Rolling Stones logo tattooed on your horse.  Thankfully the police intervened when the court ruled that it would be considered animal cruelty.

Finally, in the history of bad ideas, this may take the cake.  Now, I realize this may very well be a hoax or a clever photoshop, which I certainly hope it is, but so far nobody has stepped up to claim responsibility.  What you see pictured below is allegedly a 13 year old son of a Russian tattoo artist, with a full sleeve.

Now before I get into celebrity round-up there is one story this week that qualifies for the round-up, but I won’t be making fun of.   A few days ago Kat Von D‘s house burnt down, and while possessions can easily be replaced, she did lose her cat in the fire.  So Kat gets a free pass this week from my usual snark.

Actually this week was pretty light in terms of celebrity news.

Model Lily Cole dyed her hair black which instantly made her “gothic” in the eyes of the press, who made sure to take note of her “brooding tattoo in Latin” on her foot.

Some website called gigwise.com has published a story rating 12 musicians based on their piercings.  From what I can tell, nipple piercings on guys are bad, single lip rings are good, but multiple lip piercings are bad.  I’m fairly certain the author of the article just picked up the stack of photos and randomly decided what was considered good and bad without actually looking at them.

Finally, Former WCW World Champion (and technically WWE Champion because the title was merged — note: sorry Jen I couldn’t resist), David Arquette was spotted partying it up in Miami.  After hitting up some gay bars, and hanging out with Wee-man, David went and got himself a new tattoo to celebrate his newfound singledom.

Which brings us to the end of this week’s news.  I hope everyone has a great weekend, and remember, if you ever stumble upon a news story that you think should be included in the ModBlog news of the week, just click here to send in the link.