Guns and Tats

When I first started writing Tattoosday, I may have had a couple of tattoos, but I was really very naïve when it came to the subject of the craft itself.

I learned very quickly, maybe within the first week or so, that one should never refer to a tattoo machine as a "gun". An anonymous reader chastised me over that one and I still bear the emotional scars of that mistake.

Another term that is thrown around a lot is "tats". Again, I started out thinking that it was okay, and was quickly called out by a reader.

In all fairness, you hear the words "tat," "tatted up," and other variations with fairly common regularity, so it's not as taboo as calling a machine, a gun, but I made a decision early on to use the extra syllable, and always say "tattoo". It just sounds better, and since I am writing posts that I assume will live forever, I figure I better use full and proper terminology.

Next up: who are the Meaty-Beaties, and why don't I like them?