Stephanie and I recently attended the annual Shades of Blue tattoo show in La Crosse. I should say I attended, and Stephanie participated, at least in the Vatican PX fashion show portion. No tattoos.
The tattoos come in all manner of horrible - from obese pale legs covered in a random menagerie of clip-art quality pieces, to obese pale legs covered in cliched tattoos of dream catchers, eagles and wolves. It’s like going to an art exhibit of shitty colored pencil drawings all done on terrible yellowed paper. And you could veritably smell the hepatitis in the air.
Fortunately the show does offer other attractions, including the VPX fashion show. The VPX is a small clothing store that is part of the closest thing La Crosse has to a club, The Warehouse - home to dozens of mopey 14 year old shoe-gazers. VPX is where you need to go if you have a desire to take on an edgy urban look, or perhaps some PVC for the next time you go dry-humping on the dance floor of your favorite club. More on the fashion show and Stephanie’s participation in Part 2.
Before the fashion show, however, are the belly-dancers; always entertaining to watch multiple generations of Midwestern women gyrating simultaneously. The gastric undulations and blaring eastern-Mediterranean pop music certainly sets the mood for the fashion show.
The other event that makes pushing your way around leather skinned bar floozies worthwhile is the suspension show. This year it opened with several mediocre side show acts, including hammering a nail into ones head (via nasal sinuses), walking and later jumping into broken glass and needles through cheeks and hands. The actual suspension then follows, with two people hoisted up where they swing, fight, and later give rides to the ladies.
Of course, see the gallery for all the images. Naturally there is video as well:
OOOOUCHHH! That is horrible! Looks painful.