I was up before Sam this morning, which is surprising for two reasons. 1) he usually doesn’t sleep during the day (the blockout curtains at this motel really work) and 2) it was past 9am! However, I was up before Sam. When he did wake up, we had breakfast and got ready to head out to find our destination for the day: Shaw’s Tattoo & Piercing.
Shaw’s is owned by Bob Shaw, and is actually the same caliber, if not better than the guys of Miami Ink. If you’re going to get a tattoo done, the best to get it done by is Bob. And since it comes recommended by our friend Clay, we took him at his word. Armed with the address, we headed out in search of the small tattoo studio. It wasn’t that far from our motel, or hard to find and even better was that it is only 3 or 4 blocks from our old favourite coffee shop – Dunn Bros Coffee. Shaw’s didn’t open until 12, and we were a little early so we took a detour to Dunn Bros first.
When we got inside and ordered our coffees, the guy behind the counter (the owner incidentally), recognised our accents weren’t from around here. We told him where we were from and that we came to that shop 3 and a half years ago the last time we were in Dallas – in fact we practically lived there for the free wi-fi as well as the amazing coffee. The guy remembered us. It was a little weird. Anyway we ordered our coffee and a weird shaped muffin each and then sat down to have our treats. Once we were finished, it was back to Shaw’s to get things organised.
If you weren’t aware, Sam already has 3 tattoos (one on each arm and one over his heart), and I have 1 (mine is over my heart too, same as Sam’s… literally), so we’re a little experienced at the whole tattoo thing. However. The last tattoo each of us got was 10 years ago. Still, it was fun walking back into a tattoo place and looking at the designs on the wall. No need for them today though, as Sam and I had thought long and hard, and came armed with a design already!
Josh, the guy that served us, told us that Bob wasn’t in yet – he didn’t get there until 5pm (we were already going out at 6pm so we had to make it another day to go back to get it done), but he was very helpful in getting our designs worked out. I already had mine on my computer (which stuffed up there in the tattoo parlor – very embarrassing). Josh printed it out and we worked out what should be changed or tweaked and what should remain the same. Sam was going to go with the same theme as mine, but completely different. After talking with Josh though, Sam decided to have a similar design to mine, but have the tribal ends a different design and pattern to what mine will look like.
The central portion of our tattoos? The Dallas Stars logo! The estimated cost of our tattoos will be around $600 in total, which really is a bargain compared to back home – our tatts would cost around $1000, we’re estimating. Plus, how can you not get a Dallas Stars tattoo in Dallas?? We arranged to get ours done on Friday at 3pm, but Bob called Sam later and said that he won’t be at work until 5pm and he’ll need more than 2 hours to get the work we want done, so we’re rebooked in for 5pm on Sunday night.
On our way back to the motel to do laundry, we stopped at Jack In The Box – the last fast food place we wanted to try – and got a sirloin burger each. Yum. And after Jen finished work, we all got ready to head out by 5pm to meet up with our friend, Miss Kelly. Kelly is just amazing and sweet and awesome, and also a huge Mike Modano fan, like me! Though she’s met him way more times than I have – kind of a perk of working at the Dallas Stars Stuff Store at Frisco a few years ago. As Kelly is a huge Twilight fan, and Jen’s just a sucker for spending time with us, the four of us went to Studio Movie & Grill, which is this movie theatre that’s like Gold Class at Birch Carroll & Coyle, but the chairs aren’t laz-e-boyz. We all got pizzas except for Kelly, who got cheese fries, and a drink called a “Hurricane Katrina” but I think that’s just what Kelly and Jen call them. I forget what the menu called them.
But the highlight of the food portion was when we ordered our drinks, we also got glasses of water as well, and when the waiter brought them out, Sam got his fine, and Jen got hers fine and then I don’t know what happened, but Kelly’s and mine were spilled… all over Jen’s side and my back. HOMG ICE COLD WATER! It was so embarrassing and hilarious and the poor waiter… it was his second night on the job and he was so embarrassed. Thank god it was only water though. But the hilarity ensued, when Jen and I went to the bathroom (they call them restrooms here) to use the air dryer to dry our jeans a little. Jen went first because she just had to put the side of her leg under it. Me… I had to stick my butt under the air dryer because it went all down my back and onto my chair and soaked into my jeans and underwear. OMG. Jen was just collapsing against the wall with gales of laughter and I was just laughing and choking out, “SHUT UP, IT’S NOT FUNNY!” but it totally was.
The manager gave us a complimentary appetizer, and apologised profusely to Jen and I in the hallway. We were like, “Don’t worry about it, it’s fine, it’s just water… really really cold water. It’s no problem.” Kelly said that he’d come over to “assess the damage” and talk to them and when he said that it was the waiter’s second night on the job, Kelly was like, “AWWW Don’t fire him! It was an accident!” So I hope he doesn’t lose his job over it.
Anyway thankfully everything was sorted by the time the movie started, and we all sat back to watch The Twilight Saga: New Moon. No spoilers for those who want to but haven’t seen it yet and haven’t read the books, but I will say this: It was closer to the book than I expected, and better than I was expecting as well! I didn’t mind it at all, actually. There. I said it.
After the movie though, we went back to Kelly’s to pick up Jen’s car and then we watched Glee on Jen’s tv before coming home to pass out. Tomorrow is a big day – we’re off to Fort Worth to hang out with Adam, and then having dinner with Jen’s family! FUN TIMES PEOPLE! We are in demand!
