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Just a little news

Ok so a lot has been said over the past few days about the whole “mishaps” bullshit, and frankly besides expressing my disappointment with Pricked in SA, I really haven’t bothered with it all, but as it was brought to my attention that she has deemed it necessary to speak about the situation which of course was as expected completely one sided and filled with half truths. I guess I should set things straight as I see them. There are 4 sides to this story, mine, hers, her cronies, and the truth, and which ever side of the fence you sit on, you will I’m sure be voiding your gracious opinions on the subject, but giving credit where credit is due, seems like a simple thing to do, as it wasn’t, that says more about others than it does me, so with all this, I am now from my side putting an end to it. I have expressed to Chris what I feel and how I will deal with it. As for Mandy, Murray, mishap and all those people that took her side in this matter, rest assured I will not lose one ounce of...

Demanding

“Ours is an era of constant distraction, a punishing drumbeat of constant input, this cacophony that follows us into our homes, into our bed, seeps into our…into our souls, everything out there has gotten so… so amplified” Sherlock from episode 7, season 2. It rings so true for me, and the reason I bring it up or shall I say cause, is the tirade that spewed from my mouth at my phone, when after a day of work, my phone also had to insist on attention by telling me it needed charging. It’s all so damn noisy this life we lead, and it’s not that we can even choose to ignore it because it insists that you constantly listen and attend to it, take the phone for instance, ok I am my own worst enemy here, I did choose the fancy thing, and for that I am truly sorry, but do you absolutely need to know about every social media titbit, or exactly when it deems it necessary to be recharged, or when you are out of wifi range, and I know you can turn it off, that’s not the point. This constant barrag...

Anti Social Media....????

Love or hate social media, that’s completely up to you, but today and it’s early in the day so that’s not good, but here is my line in the sand. I am not going to go on about opinions and assholes again I have said it way to often, so here is my brain fart. I use social media to promote myself, and my studio, I don’t have a shop front, street studio, I have chosen another path and that is to build the kind of space I want to be in all the time, and then share that with my clients. So we work on an appointment based routine, which gives each artist time to spend with there client and design custom pieces for them. There are many pros and cons to this as you can well imagine, but the single most important thing is getting the message out there and as any small business will tell you this isn’t always easy. Client word of mouth has been our greatest allies, but social media has really catapulted this idea of mine and made it a viable venture. Every morning I get up and “check the wir...

The Wolf

This is a story about a wolf, a beautiful black and grey timber wolf, young and lithe, nothing noble, just scrapping for his meat in the pack. Having left his clan he needed to find his own place in the world, a contest with the alpha male had defeated the old male, but the sight and the look in the old man’s eyes had turned his ferocious heart and with that he left, it was time to walk the path alone. He wandered the forests, constantly wary of the encroach of man, steering clear of them, he hunted alone, times were more and more often lean, and from time to time he would drift closer to the encampments, scrounging and scavenging scraps. There were times when there were great finds, a chicken left unwatched, a pie left to cool and he would sneak in, and take off without anyone knowing better, well until dinner time of course. Then times would be really bad and he would pick through leftovers, running a lot of risk at being caught, or worse, shot. Time passed and being alone w...

A good moon rising

Thursday night at about 9pm we had just closed the shop, and I was making my way home on my Vespa. Crossing over the bridge and onto the circle on ramp to the highway I saw the moon, it was huge and hung low over the Durbanville hills, bright and gold, it felt like you could reach out and touch it. Swinging around on the on ramp Table Mountain came into view with the sun setting behind it, this huge beautiful black mountain with the most spectacular vignette from aquamarine to indigo to black, behind it as the darkness fell. I had just spent 10 solid hours tattooing and was really exhausted, but this beautiful vision could, no, would not be ignored and the message that came with it either, you really are your nickname Mr Lucky. Lucky to live in such a beautiful place, but that's just the tip of the iceberg, I have two brothers, a wonderful person with two amazing kids in my life, and my child little Laika,  but those are the obvious ones, I am lucky all the time, my shop is doing...

Depressed

I feel depressed today, infact the malaise has followed me most of the week like a turd stuck to the bottom of my shoe, no matter how hard you get rid of it, you can always smell it there. Today we bury Nelson Mandela, I don't call him Tata, or any other term of endearment, I never met him, or had selfies done with him, or even got close to him, but if you live in South Africa, you sure have felt his presence. It's sad cause I don't mourn the man, as I know that as one, he had he's shortcoming as we all do, but the passing of a way of thinking and behaving, the passing of menchkite. I feel that people can be judged by the way they treat those unable to protect themselves, and if anyone stood for those most in need, he did, but that's not why I'm depressed, I'm depressed that after such a great example, we have learnt sweet fuck all. When last did you reach out to someone or something in need, done something selfless? When last did you not put yourself, or...

IRespose

Well nothing really good comes from all the shit around you and this situation is no different. The morning of the 27th I got a call from the IStore manager, saying that he was really sorry, but they had found the issue, and it was gonna take 5 more working days to return my money. I had just got out the shower, was drying myself while taking the call, speaker phone dudes, and I just lost my mind, I am pretty sure I was close to bursting a blood vessel in my brain, bursting through my skin and like a party balloon that gets away from you my head would go flying wildly across the room, I'm grateful it didn't. Certain threats were issued, and I gave him 12 hours or I was going to the store. Yesterday after having been contacted by a young woman from the group, they had arranged and did, in all fairness drive to my home and give me my money in cash, and for my troubles a R500 gift voucher for the IStore, for those that don't know I was brought up in an Italian Catholic house...