The Top Ten Terrible Tattoo Territories

Three years ago, I was on a road trip with a couple of friends, and we stopped in Nashville, Tennessee for a night to check out live music, barbecue, and live music again. If you’ve ever been to the downtown area of Nashville, you understand why many in the Midwest refer to the city, affectionately, as “Nash Vegas”. The streets are brightly lit by the neon lights that are EVERYWHERE. There is music pumping out of the front door of every bar, restaurant, pool hall, or retail store on the main drag downtown. In the middle of mountains and a whole lot of nothing else, “Nash Vegas” is the perfect road trip stop for music and art lovers of all kinds.

When we pulled into downtown, we made a B-line for the crowded spots on Main Street. Our first stop was a venue called the Wild Beaver Saloon. The Wild Beaver had karaoke early in the night, a mechanical bull, and some of the biggest belt buckles I have seen outside of a WWE pay-per-view event. After a good couple of hours of beverages and making friends, the three of us wanted to walk around the rest of downtown. As we walked and talked, Sorkin-style, I heard what sounded like a bug zapper to my left. We stopped for a moment to identify the business making the noise: a late night tattoo parlor. Because we were on a road trip, and road trips lend themselves to people of all ages acting young, wild, and careless (I guess I could’ve just said ‘dumb’ right there), one of my friends excitedly blurted, “We should all get tattoos!” And for 10 seconds each of us considered the possibility of body art, and the ensuing story that we’d get to tell to our friends afterward. Fortunately, we decided against the impulse buy.

Just about every person I talk to under the age of 50, has admitted to, at the least, considering getting a tattoo. Research found that 21% of all Americans have gotten some kind of tattoo, and when you poll Americans 18–29, that number goes all the way up to 40%. I am currently in the slim majority of those without body art, but have considered getting something on multiple road trips. Most everyone I meet that does have a tattoo has a well thought out artistic expression, and when they give me the walking tour of the body ink, I’m almost always impressed with the thought they put into the exact tattoo they had permanently stenciled on the canvas, er, their skin.

However, the problem with tattoos falls not on the design itself, as those designs are often personal, cultural, contextual, and beautiful. The problem with the tattoos is the location that people have them placed on their body. Therefore, in a public service to the not-yet-tattooed, I give you the top ten terrible tattoo territories.

10. The Wrist. One of the coolest tattoos I think I have seen on someone a movie is the wrist tattoo that Brad Pitt’s character had in the movie “Ocean’s Eleven”. Combine the wrist tattoo with the fact that his character was inexplicably eating in nearly every scene, and you had a lot of screen time for the wrist tattoo. As cool as it looked, had Pitt’s character been wearing short sleeves in every scene, the tattoo would’ve looked less like a cool accesssory and more like an unfortunate birthmark.

9. The Middle Upper Back. As anyone who has a tattoo knows, one thing that can make the color and definition of the tattoo fade over time is sun exposure. If the tattoo has sunscreen over it, the sun is less likely to make the art fade. Have you ever seen someone at the beach try to apply sunscreen to their middle upper back? It’s hilarious, because it’s nearly impossible…like trying to escape from a straight jacket. If you’re going to pay for the ink, put it somewhere where you can protect it.

8. The Feet. I’ll go ahead and speak for most people not named Rex Ryan (note: Google “Rex Ryan feet” for a good laugh, but don’t do it on your work computer): Feet are gross. I don’t care if you get them tanned, pedicured, and or wrapped in the Mona Lisa. They’re still gross. Nobody wants to look at them. They are function-only. So please don’t put your body art on them and then force me to look at it. I have to stop typing this section…the thought of this is making me gag.

7. The Face. This should go higher because it’s the dumbest, but it’s also the rarest. Mike Tyson is the cautionary tale for this spot. Come to think of it, Mike Tyson is the cautionary tale for a lot of things: face tattoos, letting people punch you repeatedly in the face, being Robin Givens, etc.

6. The Stomach. Sure, the stomach tattoo worked for 2pac, but 2pac died with a 6-pack. I’m going to guess that most of us won’t be able to say the same thing about ourselves. That means that, at some point in your life, the cute butterfly you got in your 20's will eventually look like a Batman logo. Plus, do you ever want to have to use the justification, “Hey, it worked for 2pac.”

5. The Fingers. Manicured nails look good on fingers. Jewelry looks good on fingers. Not having hair on your fingers looks good on fingers. Ink on your fingers just looks like you were writing with a leaky pen. And when you meet new people, the common introduction in our culture is a handshake, so the fingers are one of the first parts of your body that new people will notice. Do you really want them to see your weirdness that early on in the interaction?

4. The Scalp. As a professional wrestling fan growing up, I often had to use the defense “It is definitely real…it’s just scripted. You can’t say falling through the Spanish announcer’s table isn’t real,” as a defense to the accusation “You know that stuff isn’t real, right?” At the moment I was making that defense, one of the stars of the WWE was Bam Bam Bigelow, a huge man known for a tattoo that covered his entire bald head. Now, you may think a tattoo is a creative way to cover the fact that you’re bald. Or maybe you just agree with me. Or maybe you left this article to go youtube Bam Bam Bigelow highlights. Let’s move on.

3. The Nether Regions. Keep in mind that tattoo parlors have the same sound as bug zappers. I’m out.

2. The Lower Middle Back. Every so often there’s a moment in life when you have to pick up something off of the ground, and as you bend over, you feel a cold sensation on your waistline, and you become paranoid that people may be able to see the top of your underpants. This scenario happens quite a bit in everyday life. Now, imagine if, instead of the top of your underpants, they see a mark that conjures up the word “tramp” in their mind. “Tramp” is only a positive image when it’s associated with a giant plate of puppy spaghetti. Avoid the stereotype.

1. The Neck. Be gainfully employed while avoiding a lifetime of scarves and turtlenecks. Find another spot for your ink.