This Sort of Thing Never Happens on Miami Bink...

Nothing beats mixing college students, bodily desecration, and lawsuits to make the transition back to civilian life from one's honeymoon that much smoother. Deadspin alerts us to the reaction of the aforementioned admixture thusly:

[Jason] Harris, a 20-year-old college student who had never previously gotten a tattoo, headed for The House of Ink in St. Louis, where he wanted the words "St. Louis Cardinals, World Series Champions, 2006" inked on his back. However, according to a negligence lawsuit Harris just filed, the resulting fist-sized tattoo was marred by errors for which he now wants in excess of $25,000 in damages....In an interview, Harris told [The Smoking Gun] that instead of "2006," the year 2000 was inked between his shoulder blades (the New York Yankees won the World Series that year). And the word "World" was misspelled as "Worlb."

Well, it's comforting to see J. Danforth Quayle's landed on his feet, at any rate. On a more sober note, the unfolding of this Lifetime-movie-worthy tragedy is steadily ensuring that no one involved will come out looking at all good. From the official complaint document (Page 2, TSG):

...Defendants' agent and servant [that'd be Rocco, the tattooist, we presume] due to negligence and carelessness incorrectly spelled words and put the wrong year on Plaintiff's person causing severe damage to plaintiff's body....

The wrong year would be 2000. Instead of 2006, i.e. last year, specifically October, when the Cardinals -- the baseball team based in St. Louis, mind you, the very same metropolis in which the tattoo parlor is located; I mean, this isn't some back-alley ink joint in Jakarta we're talking about -- won the World Series. The run-up to which presumably had signs all over the freakin' place, with the "D" prominent. And a parade to cap it off, we're presuming.

Now, in the defendant's, erm, defense, one could easily understand the inkologist's confusion. We watched that World Series, and we too have severe cognitive trouble processing how exactly in the Wide Wide Worlb of Sports the Cardinals came out victorious. Nonetheless, they did, and for that fact alone it would seem that Messr. Harris has Sully's House o' Needles over the proverbial barrel. Until, of course, one delves further into the basis for the complaint:

...Plaintiff had a right to rely on Defendant's, and Defendant's agents and servants...representations of superior knowledge, education, skill and learning ordinarily used by those individuals in their profession.

I'm hardly a lawyer, but the "right to rely" on the "superior knowledge, education, skill and learning" displayed by the average product of the Missouri public school system that finds gainful employment at a tattoo parlor might not be as solidly grounded in case law as our plaintiff thinks. Particularly not if the complaint document filed contains multiple misplaced apostrophes, an unclear capitalization issue, a missing serial comma, and a tautology in the space of 2 paragraphs. Apparently, Plaintiff and Defendant share the same legal firm:

There's the wrong way to do things, and then there's the Sebben & Sebben wrong way.