"i love you, dad"

"I love you, dad" has to be my favorite quote from Old School. Only a guy like Will Ferrell could make that sentence hilarious. Plus, I think it's hilarious in general to tell people you love and/or miss them. In college I was the president of a film club (there were 3 members, including me, and we didn't want/allow anyone else to join), and we always used to tell each other "I miss you" because we thought it was funny.

...I guess you had to be there.

Anyway, my dad is pretty legit. In his youth he moved to Hawaii and drove a pedicab for a living. He and his brothers started a "fire dance" tradition in my family that has been carried on at all big events, the men wear hand-made (usually poorly hand-made) masks, no shirts, and dance around with large planks of wood that are on fire at both ends. Don't worry, there's always a hose nearby. He dressed up like a woman one April Fool's Day (it was part of a bigger prank he was playing on his employees) and picked me up from school when I was in 7th grade. Actually, that was the first time I ever told my father "I hate you", but looking back on it makes me laugh. When he turned 50 he shaved his head and got his ear pierced to be funny. He showed up at his 40 year high school reunion in an A&W bear costume with two Elvis impersonators as sidekicks. This year he decided to get his first tattoo ever in Cabo San Lucas, a heart with my mom's name.

Okay, that last one he didn't mean to be funny, but it was definitely surprising. When he showed it to me before I left for China I thought I was going to vomit, which I realize is a strange reaction, but my dad? With a tattoo? What kind of alternate world was I living in that that could even be a possible reality? Mostly I was worried that he didn't like it, because he kept saying how he wished it was bigger.

Well, yesterday he decided to make it bigger by adding to the heart and putting the names of me and my sisters on it. Initially he wanted some lame barbed wire thing (a little too Pam Anderson for my liking), but after a few drawings by his tattoo artist and some coaxing from my anchor-loving twin, he decided to go for a whole nautical theme. I think it's suiting, considering he got the first one done right by the beach. Plus, it's very sailor of him, which I find amusing.

It's pretty damn awesome to have my name tattooed on someone's body. I worked some of my non-existent photoshop skills to blur my name out since I have a blogosphere identity to uphold, duh. I went ahead and blurred Twin's name out too, since it's practically the same as mine. Not that my identity is really even a secret, but my whole Strawberry alter-ego thing is one of the few consistent pleasures I have in my life, so I'm willing to spend 45 seconds to edit my name out of a picture in order to keep the whole thing going.