What better way to relax after 24 hours of travel than another trip? So on my return from Singapore I went to visit Washington (only about 2.5 hours away). We visited the most excellent Air and Space Museum then had a drive around the sights.

The biggest surprises from the visit:-

– the Whitehouse is tiny. Really much smaller than you’d think. It made me think of that Monty Python scene where they are all saying “Camelot”, “Camelot” with voices full of awe and wonder, then one voice pipes up and says “it’s only a model….”

– people went to the moon in shoeboxes using technology that I would hesitate to use  to take me to the shops and back. Wow

–  Orville and Wilbur Wright ran a bicycle business before turning their hands to planes. Their mother gave them their interest in engineering.

– You can make beer with kelp. Really. I found this out here.

The Whitehouse. Actual size.

I’m feeling geriatric. Not just because everyone in my trapeze classes is younger, bendier, fitter and just plain old better than me (although that doesn’t help) but because I just had a flu jab. I thought I might as well as they were on offer but I’ve always seen them as something for the old and infirm. I’m trying to convince myself it was Ok as a)I might not have the same resistance to the germs they have over here and b) as the jobs are covered under insurance here  there isn’t an actual outlay.

That rationalisation got me thinking about healthcare here. I now have a theory that the US style of privatised heathcare positively encourages  hypochondria. In the UK when you shuffle off to the local quack and say that you have a headache and are feeling a bit miserable – he’ll send you home with suggestions to take an aspirin and have a bit of a word with yourself. Over here they have to check _everything_ so you don’t sue their arses for missing something, however unlikely. So you present with a headache, and before you know it you’ve had MRIs and CAT scans and investigations from all the shiny machines that go ping*. From your point of view, once you’ve paid what is effectively your insurance excess then you might as well have all they can offer you. That just doesn’t seem quite right.

*Of course I haven’t actually gone to a quack here except to get a signature that says I’m fit to drive (total joke because I reckon the recently deceased could pass their test in Pennsylvania). That said I did just get an injection which I’m not entirely sure I need. Is that how it starts?

I’ve had a tattoo for over 18 years now – a fact which makes me feel positively ancient. In all that time I have never once regretted having it. Until this week.

Before I had it done I had only seen the fuzzy, badly drawn, sailor style tats. Then I saw the beautiful tattoos a friend of mine had covering both arms. I was fascinated by the  intricate and brightly covered carp swimming around John-boy’s forearms. It was actual art. On his body. I had to have one.

Once the decision was made, it took me ages to choose the right place to get mine done – I researched not only the cleanliness of various tattoo parlours but also the artistic style of the artists. I bottled out several times before I finally did it.

I was thrilled by the art but I also liked the people’s reactions to the large dragon on my shoulder – there was still a shock factor. When I spent the following summer in Italy I recall being asked many times if I’d been to prison (the answer eventually became “yes – for assault and battery on an Italian chap who wouldn’t take no for an answer….”).

Since then tattoos have become so much more mainstream – you  can get them done everywhere. Even Selfridges offers them now (although it eacapes me why you’d have one done there – I mean it isn’t very rock and roll getting tattooed in Selfridges). As a result of the increased demand (and I think the lack of limits on who can set themselves up as a tattoist, the quality of artwork is going downhill. There are some amazing artists out there whose medium is tattoo ink but the vast majority can barely manage colour by numbers. I’ve seen some shocking examples.

The part that has bothered me this week is that it feels like EVERYONE has them. I was at a class in town (OK so it was a trapeze class so possibly not an accurate cross section of the population) and every single girl had one. Some were the tramp stamp sort, some just some words on the inside of the forearm but it feels like everyone other than trainee nuns has some sort of drawing on their skin.

I blame Victoria Beckham.  She’s done for tattoos what chavs did for Burberry. No longer exclusive but common. Urgh.