Growing a pair

Assuming Mark shows up on Tuesday when I'm getting Lucy finished, I think I'm finally going to ask him for real if he'll let me "work" for him. I use the term work loosely as it's more of a you answer the phone and deal with stupid people all night and you get the "family discount" on any work you want. So we'll see what happens. The worst he'll say is no and I guess that won't crush my entire universe. At least I'll have given it an honest go.

My rook seems to be doing better. I took 3 days' worth of antibiotics and gave it regular cleanings. It definitely doesn't hurt as much and I think there's only a little bit of swelling left. Piercings obviously aren't my thing. I think I'm just too damn lazy to take good care of them. The funny thing is, the two most difficult piercings to heal haven't given me any trouble. My dermal and my belly button are just peachy. So who knows? Maybe it's a sign I need more dermals ;). I've pretty much scrapped the idea of a lip piercing. If I can't make my nostril stud behave, I'm skeptical that I could make a lip stud behave. Plus, it would probably be way more trouble than it's worth to try to hide it for work. I guess if I end up working in a very liberal industry, I can get one. And if I stop being so damned lazy.

In other news, one of my friends who lives in Roanoke confirmed that Alex's is pretty much the best shop in town. So I feel more confident having Monica work on me. Her portfolio is great, but it's nice to have someone's opinion as well. Apparently another shop opened and is working up a good reputation, so I guess we'll see what that's all about. I keep telling myself I don't need to be tattooed twice at the convention. *slaps self*. Besides, the artist I wanted to do something on me never called or emailed me back, so I'm going to take it as a sign. And no one else on the list really does anything for me. I'll just take home my rockabilly skull and be a happy little girl.

Diagnosis

Well, I broke down and went to the doctor Friday night. Sure enough, it was infected. Of course, being doctors, they freaked out that my ear was going to fall off or something. They not only gave me a shot of antibiotics in the ass, but a tetnus shot. I was due for one anyway, but the implication that my jewelry was going to give me tetnus pissed me off more than a little bit. So now I'm on a 10 day course of antibiotics. The swelling is almost entirely gone, I'm pain free except for if I knock it or something, and it just generally feels better all around. And that's after essentially 5 doses of the stuff.

I also got inked yesterday and it was an amazing experience. However, I think it deserves its own entry and I have to shower and get to work. I'll give it the due time it deserves when I get home.

Sore and Cranky Mods Part Deux

I think my left rook might be infected. It's red, hot to the touch, swollen to almost twice the size of my other ear, and when I cleaned it, blood and a bit of brownish yellow gunk came off. The pain is a little better now. Obviously our expired Advil still had a little kick to it. Fortunately, there's some good stuff at the office, so I hoarded a bunch. I'm gonna take more in about an hour and I need to examine the swelling when I get the chance. I have no idea what could've caused it, but who knows? I'm debating over going to the doctor. I guess I'll see how it looks/feels this afternoon. If it's still bad, I'll suck it up and get some antibiotics.

In other news, I think I'm finally going to go over to Ink & Dagger and introduce myself. They've got a guest artist there who is offering work at a "significant" discount because he's only in town for a week or so and is apparently not well known in these parts. They do a lot of old school stuff and, I admit, I don't know much about old school tattoos. I'm slowly learning, but most (if not all) of mine are new school. Of course, if I have an infection, any kind of inking is out of the question for a while. I'd be just finishing up my antibiotics course by the time it was time to finish Lola. Euch.

Since I keep getting interrupted, I'll blog more later.