“If you have an apple, and I have an apple, and we exchange the apples, then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea, and I have an idea, and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”

- George Bernard Shaw

I recently attended the Association of Professional Piercers’ annual convention in Las Vegas and, while I was initially quite apprehensive, the experience ended up being an overwhelmingly positive one. Foolishly, I was given artistic license as far as how I chose to document the event, and thus, below you can see my coverage of the week in painful, narcissistic detail.

	PROLOGUE/SUNDAY My first day in the so-called city of sin. Conversely, the tales of Vegas itself are as old as time: The sleaze, the crime, the lust and depravity — being known as the kind of place where even society’s most morally-fibrous invariably find themselves knee-deep in debt and elbow-deep in a call-girl. If I had small-town sensibilities, they’d have been offended just thinking about the possibilities of moral corruption this week had to offer.
	MONDAY Official coverage begins. First day of classes, a buffet, and Norwegians! Whether it was due to the locale being an APP convention or if this was actually truer across the industry as a whole than I’d imagined, I had to wonder: Is the piercing community more conservative than I thought?
	TUESDAY The APP was taking chances this year, and that included hosting seminars by Allen Falkner and Shannon Larratt. With the possibility for controversy higher than ever, people seemed more appreciative and open-minded than anyone could have hoped for. You know the feeling of camaraderie that develops between people who may not know or like each other when they’re together while something horrible happens, like a car wreck or a Vin Diesel film? That’s what this was like; the subject matter was intentionally grisly, but the worse it got (note: getting an awed hush out of an audience of 250 people can be achieved simply by showing a slide of a man’s ass being pierced by a kitchen knife), people began to understand — themselves, each other, and BME — a little bit better.
	WEDNESDAY Tuxedo rentals, a near-donnybrook with a dart dolt, and the potential for some emu-induced intimacy. This was my first exposure to the early-afternoon sun in Las Vegas, and it was just a killer. I’m fairly certain the temperature was topping out at roughly 130 degrees, but as they say, at least it was a dry heat — which seems kind of like the meteorological equivalent of saying that a homely girl has a good personality.
	THURSDAY/FRIDAY More realizations about the APP, a running diary of the Prom Night banquet, and the painful morning after. Tam Sherman takes the stage, and the award show begins! According to the program, some awards on the docket include “The ‘Fastest’ Piercer”, “The Most Neo-Tribal Piercer”, and “The Unsung Hero”. Maybe it’s just the alcohol poisoning, but I think I have a pretty good shot at taking home “The APP Attendee Most Likely To Resemble David Crosby by 9:30” or “Best Robert Downey Jr. Impression”.

    - Jordan Ginsberg  (iam:snackninja)

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A recent acquisition from the illustrious, high-profile world of low-budget sporting-goods photography, Jordan Ginsberg is a Toronto native. Born affiliated to the Levi tribe, Jordan renounced his religion shortly before his Bar Mitzvah but still believes he is entitled to a role in the liberal Jew-run media and sees BME as an ideal stepping stone. Votes left, throws right.

Article copyright © 2005 BMEZINE.COM. First published May 17th, 2005 in La Paz, BCS, Mexico. Requests to reprint must be confirmed in writing.