With the exception of a website called Cats That Look Like Hitler and a scene involving Scatman Crothers in the otherwise dreadful Clint Eastwood film Bronco Billy, the funniest thing I've ever clapped eyes on is a picture of a tattoo, freshly inked on a young man's right shoulder, which reads: "Roses are red/My name's Dave/This poem makes no sense/Microwave".
I know I shouldn't laugh but it's hard not to. And the more you try to fathom what was going through Dave's head when he asked for the tattoo and what was going through the tattooist's head when he executed it, the funnier the whole thing gets.
With more and more people being inked these days, it stands to reason more and more people are wandering around with tattoos like that, indelible messages or images that they wish they'd never commissioned.
The statistics back it up. An American survey in 2012 found that 14% had what's known as "tattoo regret" and a survey last year found that one in six inked Brits hate their tattoos so much they want them surgically removed. Among those who wished they'd never seen the business end of a tattooist's needle is fashion designer Nicole Richie, who has had a large cross removed from her back and revealed this month that the design on her neck - a red ribbon with her surname on it - could be the next to go. "I was a 19-year-old idiot when I got this tattoo," she said in an interview.
Never slow to spot an idea for a cheap TV series mocking people like Microwave Dave, Channel 4 has made Tattoo Fixers, a reality show filmed in a "pop-up parlour" - ie a hastily-converted TV production office - whose tattoo artists specialise in covering up misjudged inkings. It starts a nine episode run on Monday.
Based on the opener, men are by far the worst culprits, mostly because aged 19 they go on holiday with other men, drink to excess and wake up with tattoos on their bottoms.
That's exactly what happened to Adam, one of the first "customers" through the door. In fact he was so drunk, he can't remember getting the tattoo at all. Bless him, when he woke up with a burning sensation on his left buttock he assumed he'd been stung by a wasp. If only. What he'd actually been stung by was a tattoo the size of a fist which read: "On holiday with the lads, Kavos 2012". That wasn't the worst of it, though. Alongside the words was a life-size image of erect male genitalia. You can watch in wonder as he gets this turned into a rose.
In fact tattoos of male genitalia are something of a theme in the first episode as skateboarder Dave also has one he'd like removed. His is rather less artful than Adam's: you'll have seen similar things sketched on the walls of public toilets, or possibly on show in one of our trendier art galleries as an example of naive folk art. Dave's is on his leg, though.
So think before you drink before you ink. It's a dubious kind of fame that a terrible tattoo will bring you.
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