Willy Goes Werewolf

The door to the club opened and in he walked, all 5’ 2” and 100 lbs of him, smiling, pleasant, and very happy to be here.

“Oh great, here comes Will.” Stacy, the main bartender for tonight was not pleased about Wills arrival.

“So what?” was my response.

“He freaks out when he drinks, you’re not here during the work week so you never see it, Jimmy the Manager is ready to throw him out for good.”

“Little Willy? How much trouble could he possibly be?” Obviously I was out of the loop on this subject. It’s not often a customer can get under the skin of Stacy. She’s a thick-skinned pro and can handle the biggest assholes with ease.

Willy looked about as non-threatening as a human adult male can look. He was very short, and very thin. Usually he’s in a good mood and easy to chat to. He even looks laid back and easy going. If you saw him you would say to yourself: “Hey, that guy is easy going.” So for him to behave in such a way as to almost get banned, in my opinion, would require a drastic change of personality.

Very few people ever get banned in this place. You pretty much have to kill, maim, rape, or steal to get permanently blacklisted. There were a handful of crazies, gangsters, and psychotic circle-jerks who have ascended to this status, but their numbers are few. I was intrigued as to what Will (or Willy as he’s called – but never to his face) had perpetrated to almost be numbered among that elite class of mega-scumbags. And I was also intrigued by the fact that he apparently is here on a regular basis in the middle of the work week raising hell. For one: he works, so he has to be up in the morning, and for two: he doesn’t seem to have a lot of money, so how – and why – is this happening?

Stacy continued to update me on the Will situation.

“He was hanging out at the club down the road. They threw him out of there as well. The owner won’t let him near the place.”

“Well, they have standards, we generally don’t. It’s **Mos fuckin’ Eisley here.”

“Well Snake, you get to baby-sit him, you’ll see.”

“I’m sure I can take him, or at least outrun him.” Getting into it with Will was a joke, but part of me seriously wanted to see what all this fuss was about. How could this chilled out, pint sized, skinny hippy be so disruptive. How could his behavior be so unmanageable, that my hardcore seasoned co-workers couldn’t handle him and wanted him gone? Well I guess I’ll find out, either way I was safe behind the bar.

The night progressed and Will seemed calm. Just another working class customer at the bar. He knew many of the regulars and they didn’t seem to shun him.

“Hey Snake!” He waved me over. “If I give you $20, would you give me a lift home tonight?”

“Sure man, you go east from here right?”

“Sure do Bro’.”

“OK no prob.” An extra twenty would help fill up my gas tank nicely.

“Thanks man, I appreciate it. Hey, wanna beer?” His offer was tempting, bartending is always more fun when you’re drinking but I had to decline. The Boss was trying to slow down the staff and their on the job drinking habits.

An hour later and Will had begun to show signs of losing control. At one point I had asked him if he was OK and he looked like he was insulted to the point of lashing out at me. I walked away thinking that maybe he just had a funny sense of humor. Now most bars would slow someone down on the drinking at this point, but this is not most bars. This is a stripclub sandwiched between an industrial wasteland and a ghetto. Since Will was on his feet and didn’t look like he was about to puke or fall over (he obviously wasn’t driving), he was permitted to continue ordering beers. The club got busy and I concentrated on serving the waitresses and forgot about Will. He was in the capable hands of Stacy who seemed to have lightened up and was actually speaking to him.

Last call was called and the place was starting to empty. I had been in the back doing a beer count and came out to assist with shutting things down. There was a loud roar, like someone being tormented to the point of mindless rage. I went to see what the fuss was about and there was Will being restrained by Big Frank, our gallant doorman. Short, skinny, pale, long-haired Will was being held safely by big, tall, black, bald headed Frank. Will thrashed, kicked out, and swung at customers who were leaving, roared and screamed. Frank had one massive arm around his chest and held him close, he seemed to be hugging him and trying to calm him down “It’s OK Will, relax man, it’s OK”, he used his free hand to wave the customers by. Frank’s strength, skill, and size are matched only by his patience. Easily one of the top Doormen I’ve worked with, he had everything under control. He wasn’t going to let Will come to any harm.

“Frank man, what’s up with Will?” I was concerned; I had offered to drive this nutcase home.

“This is normal, Will gets partying and loses his temper.” Frank was still holding Will, Will hadn’t heard anything we said.

“What set him off?”

“That’s just it, nothing. He just snaps.”

At this point Jimmy the Manager arrives on the scene. He’s smiling at me.

“You said you’d drive him home.” Jimmy is talking low so Will won’t hear.

“Yeah, yeah, I guess I did.” This sucked.

“Do you know where he lives?” Jimmy was still smiling. He loved this.

“No. Why?”

“Because he doesn’t know.” He nodded to Will.

“How does he not know where he lives? He lives there, he has to know.”

“Not right now. He can barely give the info when he’s sober. He doesn’t even know his own fucking name right now.” On queue Will started raging again, Frank could be heard whispering to him, trying to calm this grown man throwing a mindless temper tantrum.

“Damn Jimmy, he’s gone fuckin’ werewolf.” This really sucked. Jimmy was still grinning at me.

“Lucky you! You know he crapped in Frank’s car once. Frank drove him a few times. Crapped his pants in the car. He usually just pisses all over.” I noticed Frank had let go of Will since there were no more customers for him to try to bite or punch. I had to find out if Jimmy was being serious.

“Yo Frank,” I said “I hear Will crapped in your car.”

“Yeah. Crapped himself in his pants, but I still had to wash the seat. He pees himself usually though.” Frank had not heard Jimmy and me talking, and did not know that at some point this evening I had agreed to transport this animal.

“Well Snake?” Jimmy is looking at me, like he is waiting to see if I keep my word. Frank is watching Will who is leaning against a wall.

Will started to bellow.

“How the fuck am I going to get home?!” It seemed Will was now conscious of his plight, but had miraculously forgotten that I said I would drive him.

“Gee Will I’m not sure. Hey Frank, how is he going to get home?” I may be out of this yet. But Frank explained that he usually would drive him as he knew where Will lived, but that tonight he couldn’t as he was going the opposite direction. Jimmy was laughing.

“Fuck that. I’m not fucking driving him.” I had put my foot down. Damn all previous agreements, promises, and pacts. I don’t get paid for this. I don’t need this. “I’ll pay a cab for him out of my own money before I let him piss, puke, and crap all over my car.”

“How the fuck am I going to get home?!?!” Will was shouting his question to nobody in particular, and had still not heard us talking about him. He was leaning against the wall still, staring at the ground. Headlights appeared in the parking lot. Frank recognized the vehicle.

“Hey, it’s his friend John. John will give him a ride.” What a stroke of luck. The car stopped and a sourly looking guy came out.

“Hey Frank, hey Jimmy. Is he OK?” John looked irritated, but concerned.

“Yeah, so far, well…maybe not.”

“Fucking hell," he said "I just hope he doesn’t make too much of a mess. Let’s go Will.” John looked about as happy as a guy who was about to have to clean shit off his car seat. He had arrived on the scene just in time. Like fucking Batman or something. Saint John, showing up in the dead of night and saving the day for all of us.

** Star Wars IV – that bar where Luke met Han Solo.

Wash Your Freakin' Hands!

I came in to work on an off day to assist The Boss with some repairs. The extra cash is nice and the change in duties is even nicer. The bar seems very peaceful during the daytime. The crowd is more concerned with eating and chatting than with drunken partying and loud, bad, thumping music. The music is still on, but at a lower volume, and more of a laid back, relaxed genre.

Many regulars come out to the daytime shift. You always see the same familiar faces, in the same seats, with the same drinks. I get to know them because occasionally I’m in during the day as well, not often, just now and then. They are a friendly bunch and I find myself running a gauntlet of handshakes as I make my way to the entrance of the kitchen to find The Boss.

We have some coffee, and the coffee is always fresh due to the frequent java orders. 12 noon feels early in a stripclub and everyone orders coffee, and nobody minds waiting for a fresh pot (we can brew only 1 pot at a time). After coffee it’s time to head to the Mens Washroom to repair the loose doors on the stalls. People bash these, kick these, swing on them, throw their friends and enemies into them. The Mens Washroom withstands substantial abuse on a regular basis. It is constantly being repaired. If not a broken mirror, or a hole in the wall, then it’s the doors, or maybe a clog from someone flushing something that really should have been thrown in the trash. A funny thing about this place, The Boss told me that if the wrong toilet clogs, they all clog up, and then they have to be unplugged in a certain order because they share a common pipe. He apparently figured this one out the hard way on a very busy (and messy) Friday night.

We set to work and in no time the doors are once more able to close without hindrance. The Boss notices a problem with the mirror next and we begin to fix it. At this point a customer named Phil wanders in. Phil is a very nice person, always cheerful, and he always appears happy, and shakes my hand. Phil has an interesting style. He dresses like a farmer in square patterned flannel shirts. I really can’t figure out where he buys these shirts. I’ve suspected that they may be old, purchased back when you could obtain such garments at your local mall, and that he looks after them so he may still wear them years later. Then I thought that maybe he takes drives out to some backward place where these shirts are still sold and simply buys a dozen or so to last him until the next time he’s out that way. It’s just that nobody wears those anymore; but it’s certainly a unique style.

Now Phil greets us with a “High guys!” and then relieves himself at the urinal. He then zips up and walks out – without washing his hands. I turned to The Boss and asked if he just saw what happened. The Boss stated that he failed to notice anything unusual. So I pointed out the peculiarity.
“Phil didn’t wash his hands. It’s kind of gross. I shake that guys hand all the time.”
The Boss explained that none of the customers wash their hands and that is why he tries not to shake their hands in the first place, and that he keeps a nice big bottle of Purell disinfectant gel in the back. The Boss went on saying that you can’t expect these people to wash their hands, and that these are not classy people. He told me that my expectations for the clientele that frequent this establishment are too high. I guess by using the employee washroom I never really noticed their habits.

“Man, the worse part of it is he’s eating chicken wings at the bar, with his hands.” I guess I’m a wimp when it comes to this stuff. The Boss was just shaking his head as usual, kind of having a laugh about it. “Well, even if he’d wash his hands clean, the germs would be right back on it as soon as he pushed the door open on his way out. But don’t be kicking open the door; Snake, this place gets banged up enough as it is.”

A while later I saw Phil sitting at the bar. He looked like he was getting ready to leave. He was in handshake mode. I picked up two bottles of wine so that when I walked by I would have my hands full. He would have to settle for a nod and a “how’s it going Phil, off already?” When I walk by him again I make sure I’m carrying a case of emptys to the back. Next time I passed him I was carrying some vodka coolers. “We’ll see you next time man, drive safe.” You get the picture. My hands shall remain pure!

(And you all better be happy about it because I'm the guy mixing your drinks, my paws are all over the glass, the lime wedges, the straws, and so on...)

Exaggerations and Hyper-Extensions

“He bent the guys arm back until it broke.” The voice was shocked. Damn. That shit sounds crazy.

Jimmy the Manager was sitting at the bar. He was holding court. Today he had an audience of half a dozen customers and staff members including Russ the Cook and a doorman named Frank, all listening intently as he told them the latest story of what Wayne the Crazy Doorman did to some helpless but deserving customer.

Now here’s a little about Wayne. Wayne was not just a doorman, he was a ‘Cooler’. A Cooler, in our part of the civilized world, is someone who can intimidate and mess up just about anyone. Let’s say you have a Gang trying to extort your club, you call a Cooler and he straightens them out, either by intimidation, violence, or even a negotiation of some kind (a negotiation can go like this: “Stop coming here or I’ll shoot you!” – it’s a win-win situation). Wayne was the former Enforcer of some outlaw Motorcycle Club. This meant if a big bad biker misbehaved, went against the club, or needed to be put in his place, Wayne would be the one to do it. He had to be nasty enough to scare and coerce the nastiest of thugs. Wayne was no longer in that Biker Gang, but his reputation earned him other gigs, including bodyguard work for celebs, and protecting scab workers as they crossed picket lines during rough and dangerous strikes, and occasional bouncer work at stripclubs. Wayne accomplished these jobs by being on the largish side, and having large, fast hands which would put people to sleep upon impact. He was big, but not as big as you would think when you think about a big scary biker. He was relatively clean cut, and he was old for the club game, in his 50’s at least (assuming you believe 50 to be old). He didn’t work at the club often. He just filled in occasionally. And his various viscous services were provided for reasonable prices.

Jimmy continued his story. “He dragged the guy out for some reason. The guy was being an asshole, Wayne told him to leave, and the guy starts up with him.”
“Did Wayne bang his head off the post on the way out?” I asked.
“Of course! Wayne never misses a chance to bang heads off of the post.” This was like his patented move. Drag the customer out and ‘accidentally’ bump his head on this big post located at the door. One of the staff will wash the blood off of it immediately afterwards.
“I didn't notice him." I added, "Valerie must have served him. I was doing service bar all night.”
“He was talkin’ stupid just to the chicks,” said Jimmy, “the guy was a total prick. Rude to all the girls he talked to. He wouldn’t say that kind of stuff to a guy. At least I would hope he wouldn’t.”
I couldn’t tell you how drunk the guy was, but you’d need to be quite drunk to start a fight at this place. It’s just not something sober people ever do. It had been so busy that I had been unable to pay attention to anything other than serving hundreds of drinks to the waitresses. Apparently this guy Jimmy was going on about was a real pain in the ass.

“So Wayne throws the guy out and the guy gets in his car to drive away. Wayne reaches into the open window and grabs his arm. He holds onto it as the guy drives, and his arm stretches back and breaks! No shit!” Jimmy is loving this crowds reaction, his smiling face advertising his obvious enjoyment as he tells his tail. The visualization of the hyper-extension of the limb is graphic, and really rather horrible, leaving his listeners shocked and aghast.
“Well I ain’t worried about that shit” said the Courier Man, in for his daily beer and wings, “I never fuck around here. If I did I’d have nowhere to go.”
“Yeah that Wayne is Crazy,” added Russ the Cook in his Albanian accent “too crazy sometimes. Gonna get the club in trouble – but don’t tell Wayne I said that.”

A week later, Jimmy was telling the exact same story – sort of. He had Bald Headed Pete, Russ the Cook again, two truckers, and two guys from a warehouse nearby listening to his new legend of violence, adventure, and harsh justice.
“Yeah! No bullshit! Wayne started smashing the guy’s windows on his car. He kicked the glass in and then started breaking the indicator lights and headlights. He did the entire car. Anything glass got smashed.”
“Hey Jimmy,” I interrupted. “What did he break it all with? His feet? He kick it or something?”
“Naw, he had a cane, he smashed it with his cane. That’s how he was able to grab the guys arm and break it, he had broken the window and he just reached thru.”
“Damn that Wayne is one bad motherfucker.” Bald Headed Pete looked like he wanted to shiver. They were all awestruck by this chaotic and messy event. Jimmy was smiling.
Again Russ the Cook expressed his humble opinion “He’s too crazy – gonna give us trouble doing that shit.”

A week went by again and once more Jimmy is animatedly telling a collection of regulars the same brutal story - sort of. This time we have regulars Lucas the ex-army guy with the ponytail, Deep Fryin’ Ryan (who is the other cook), Rick and Bob from Purolator, and Phat Dave who’s a popular pot dealer, (Dave is White but thinks he’s Black – like that guy from that Trailer Park show – but in his 40s). Shocked faces surround Jimmy as he relays witnessing the ultra-violence that went down in this very parking lot.
“Wayne bends the left arm back, the one closest to him thru the window. It crunches! Broken and bent right back! The guy is screaming. Wayne reaches in and grabs the right arm, and as the guy starts to drive away he holds onto the arm, and bends it back until it also snaps! The guys got two broken fuckin’ arms!” Jimmy is like a sports commentator tonight, providing play by play details of this big fight. His crowd loves it and the exclamations come pouring in from all sides. Damn! Fuck! Motherfucker is ruthless! Yo that shit’s crazy! The usual expressions of shock and horror. Phat Dave added something about Motherfucker Trippin’ and all. Not sure what he meant since nobody technically got tripped.

This got me wondering if all the other nasty stuff I’ve heard Wayne do is all exaggerated to an extreme. His business depends on people being scared of him so it would benefit him financially. If you are trying to intimidate people who are already terrified then it goes to say that most of your work is already done. I did not witness the fight in the parking lot, but I know that the events become more and more extreme the more often the story is told. Maybe Wayne gave ‘The Guy’ a bitch-slap and told him to fuck off. Nobody but Jimmy ever tells the story. I think he was the only witness.

I was thinking that maybe there was some way I could get this exaggeration phenomenon to work for me. Maybe I could get a story circulating about the size of my penis. This could be quite amusing. Thru the inevitable process of exaggeration that exists at this club, I thought about how people eventually would talk about it. I could try to get this nice rumor started at a conservative 7 inches and then see where it goes.
“10 inches!” they would say “No bullshit! And I hear it’s thick too!”
“Yeah and I hear he can go an hour without – you know – finishing.”
“All the dancers just hang out with him now!”
“He’s too big – gonna give us trouble doing that shit.”
“Motherfucker is trippin’!” (whatever that means).
Could you imagine the possibilities? Then I thought of the girls here and I realized that I did not need or want any extra attention from them. Life was complicated enough and at least I had my health.

Some time later The Boss was counting up some money in his closet-sized office, the same room that contained the hot water heater. He was preparing this weeks pay for his staff. The Boss doesn’t exaggerate too much. The Boss never looks for an audience. The Boss speaks only when necessary. The Boss speaks truth.
“Wayne was in the Vietnam war.” He was now folding the envelopes so the cash would stay inside.
“How, he’s Canadian, why would he be in ‘Nam.” I hadn’t heard this one.
“They took in people from other places, not sure how it worked but if you really wanted to go you could enlist.”
“But why go?”
“He said it was a great way to kill people legally.”

Damn! That shit IS crazy!

Chris Gets Some Coffee

Chris looked happy today. The DJ had obviously put some effort into his appearance before he had set off to work. His unusually cheerful and optimistic demeanor was so strong as to be instantly noticeable.

Chris was Caribbean decent but would stress that he was Canadian. He was a guy that seemed to be always desperate for just a little luck. Like all he needed was for life to just to give him a break, just once. Chris the Crackhead he was called, but he liked Carlsberg Beer and an occasional joint, not crack. He was disliked by his co-workers, even scoffed at by other DJs. Yet I always liked the guy, The Boss liked him too. I guess that’s all you really need in your corner where you work is The Boss.

There would be times when I’d be behind the bar and the DJ that was spinning that night would make a comment like: “So I hear you’re working tomorrow night – with Chris!”
Too which I would reply “Sure why not. Chris is OK.” But I’d wonder why he had so much negative voltage directed at him. As far as I was concerned, and I’ve worked with him for a long time, he had more negativity hurled at his head than he deserved.

Chris is a starving artist. His art is DJing. He must DJ as he is incapable of doing anything else. His preferred music is old school funk from the 1980’s. People put him down for his taste, but again the Boss (and myself) found it refreshingly different than the usual rap, R & B, or rock that the other DJs normally would play. Chris never has money. And he never seems to be able to get many work hours in a week. He begs for more shifts but sometimes the shifts just aren’t available to give. Occasionally he would find a gig at another bar for a night or two a week and he would talk about it and how it may lead to some decent income, only to learn that nobody in their right mind would work for said club. He would tell the stories of the insanity he witnessed and abuse he took at these places and how it drove him to ultimately quit. And again he would be back, asking The Boss for more shifts.

His lack of money had landed him well in the pocket of The Boss – who would constantly give him cash advances. Chris lived on cash advances. He was constantly hungry and would try to supplement his lack of meals with what he could hustle from the cooks in the kitchen. When The Boss wasn’t around, Chris would play a long break song, and then run off to visit the kitchen for any scraps left to be scavenged. These bits of food could be from the cooks cooking too many fries for an order, or maybe a left over chicken wing that never made it into the last order. And if he was really lucky, they would occasionally hook him up with a sandwich.

But today Chris looked sharp. He was cheerful (which was strange – stripclub DJs are never cheerful), and he looked like he was coming somewhere good, or going somewhere better. Since his shift ended at 2AM and he was just arriving (the time being 7PM), I figured maybe he had a date, or an interview, or a life, or some luck for a change. He walked by with his shoulders a little straighter, and at a quicker pace, and he said hello. I looked to Jess, the other bartender, and we both shrugged.

Ten minutes later Chris came walking by my part of the bar. His nice, button up shirt, while still wrinkle free, was splattered completely with some kind of dark liquid.
“Yo Chris! What the hell happened to you?”
“Fucking Gina threw her coffee at me!” He seemed beyond angry.
“Why?” I asked – although I knew the answer would not make sense.
“I asked her to get ready to go on stage next – which is part of my job you know – to tell the girls when they’re on stage – and she didn’t like that – she threw her fucking coffee at me for me doing my job!” He stormed off, probably to find Jimmy the Manager.

A few minutes later I saw him walking by the bar again. Still wearing his nice shirt horribly stained by a direct hit of what must have been a completely full mug of coffee, probably with a bit of cream because none of dancers drink black coffee. He wasn’t smiling now. He looked like he had been given a sharp wake up call. He looked like any optimism he had arrived with today had been ripped out of him, and that once again, he was acutely aware that his life sucked, and that his overall situation was unlikely to improve anytime soon. His shoulders were back in the standard-for-Chris slouched position. Nice shirts just aren’t enough to keep the relentless stupidity of a low end peeler bar at bay. Chris learned that you can try to pass yourself off as a winner, but winners ultimately do not inhabit this place. His face showed this final understanding.

This got me thinking. The bar physically shields me from what occurs on the floor. I can listen and witness and watch the blatant and obscene foolishness, and as long as I don’t screw up someone’s drink or their change, I am free from the problems that seem to plague both my fellow employees (and customers). I’m still a tourist in this place. Despite working here all these years I’m pretty much the only employee that doesn’t need this job. If I lost this gig my day job would easily carry me. But what if a place like this was my main source of income? What if I was dependant on a career like this? How would I feel if I walked into the office of my day job tomorrow and someone threw a cup of coffee at me, and I had to sit at my desk the whole day in a ruined shirt, knowing the perpetrator would ultimately be unpunished? And that somehow, in this world, it was commonplace to mistreat your fellow employees by lobbing coffee at them. What if you were so low down that those things most people take for granted, like dignity and respect, were simply non-existent and beyond your expectations?

Jimmy the Manager came out of his office and sat at the bar. He started doing nothing. He was just sitting there looking at the wall, or one of the lights or something.
“See what Gina did to Chris?” I asked. I was putting away some clean glasses. It was early and still slow.
“Yeah.” He was shaking his head, similar to how The Boss shakes his head.
“Are you going to tell her off for that?” I inquired.
“Yeah I am, but not now.” He was still doing nothing. Just sitting there.
“You should dude, Chris doesn’t deserve that shit. Nobody here does.”
“I will, but not yet.” He was still doing nothing. Like he was waiting. But then he noticed me looking at him and said:
“She has a fresh cup of coffee again. I’m going to wait until she’s drank it.”

Wow. Smart. No wonder he’s management.

Dancer Reality - and Change Your Underwear!

“Man, you must LOVE working here! All these hot chicks everywhere. How did you land this gig? This gotta be the best job!”

Not really, but you can certainly see a thing or two, and you can learn a lot.

People put a lot of effort into coming to this club. They often travel thru heavy highway traffic. They park in a parking lot that is frequently visited by thieves, vandals, and drunk drivers, potentially exposing their vehicle and property to theft and/or damage. The club often has minimal security, we do not search for weapons, and it is conveniently located close to one of the more rougher areas in town. Yet men of a wide age range, from nineteen to over sixty come to this place. Why do they come? They come because of the strippers – no pun intended.

These ladies who provide the entertainment are our customers fantasy come to life. Well some of them. Often guys will spend money on these girls just to have them sit and chat. Most go for the private dances, which to me as a straight male makes more sense. Many men arrive flowers for the girls, they buy them drinks, they buy them gifts, sometimes expensive gifts, they even put themselves at the service of these girls. Behind the bar I hear it all. Things like “hey if you ever need a drive” or “you’re moving? I’ll help you move, I’ve got a truck!” even “hey if you want I’ll kick that guys ass”, and on occasion “hell I’ll shoot the bastard for you if you want! I mean it, I’m fuckin’ hardcore!”

To say some of these girls have these guys eating out of the palms of their hand is an understatement. What is really miserable is that some of these guys are married. Some are married and successful and can afford gambling hard earned cash to potentially score with a dancer. Some losers are married and poor! They sacrifice what little cash they have on buying these girls their drinks, gifts, whatever they request. I really can’t decide who disgusts me more, the dancers who exploit these morons, or the morons themselves.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of customers who are wise to all this. They come to have a beer, watch the show, and then they leave it at that. Younger guys generally can’t afford to splurge on dancers, and the older streetwise biker or gangster types seem to be immune to this stupidity as well. It’s the ‘nice guys’ that get caught up in this. And we all know being a ‘nice guy’ really means you’re a Pushover.

Many of these ladies get serious relationship offerings from these ‘pushovers’. It’s pitiful. Countless times there have (and will be) successful, good looking pushover-dudes coming to the club day after day trying to woo some dancer, only to be endlessly lead on or refused. Yet these same girls will go home to some drug abusing boyfriend who beats them, or at least makes their lives somewhat of a living hell. You would think you would need to ‘have it all’ to get with these girls, but you really don’t. In fact it helps if you're a loser and a dope-fiend, because having lots of drugs is a sure way to obtain some stripper action. (***Important Disclaimer: not all dancers are like this - just some of the ones at the bar that I work with - some of them are normal girls - but who wants to read about the normal people?***)

So you see, it’s different when you work for a stripclub and you're behind the bar. You see how some of these girls behave, you see how they treat people like suckers. When you’re behind the scenes and know what goes on, the novelty wears off fast. Ever hear of a fast food place staffed with burger-flippers, who for some reason refuse to eat there? It’s a lot like that.

It's difficult to believe that people still fall for this, but this stuff happens constantly.

And a perfect example presents himself...

The customer was a younger dude. He didn’t seem to have logged much time in stripclubs before and the dancer Chloe was milking him. He was in love! He had already taken two cash advances from the bar to buy drinks for; and table dances from Chloe.
He was talking to me now. “Hey man, this place rocks, Chloe is so fuckin’ hot man!”
“Yes she certainly is.” I said.
“She took my phone number, she said she’d call me. She says she’s stripping just to pay her way thru school, she’s taking Interior Design.” He was so proud of himself. I had already heard it all because he had also told the other bartender working with me the same thing.
“Good for you! Go for it dude, she rocks!” This was what I do. I continue to feed the flames; “I’m surprised she took your number my man, these girls NEVER do that, but then I hear she is single.” I'm just shoveling it at him. I’ve turned evil because of this place, and I doubt I’ll change. This guy is acting like it’s the greatest night of his life.

However what he doesn’t know is that Chloe has a boyfriend. Some bad-ass, dope-using, loser of a guy, whom she supports. She had a kid but the grand parents raise it, or The Children’s Aid took it or something - the point is she's a bad mom and it's gone. She’s not in school because she’s too lazy, stupid, fucked-up; you name it – to finish anything that would require even the tiniest amounts of concentration or discipline. And by the way buddy, I’ve worked three days in a row this week, and that is the same damn thong she’s been wearing each day. Yep, no hygiene needed here. She wears the same fucking underwear all week. And this bitch is your fantasy? Your dream girl? Could your standards get any lower? I will never stop someone from blowing off their own foot. It’s my entertainment. Watching these fools chase poisoned shadows gives me my laughs.

The night ended. The love-struck customer departed with a huge smile, knowing with certainty that this stripper babe was going to call him. The club was emptying. It was quiet and peaceful. The lights were all on. Chloe was walking by so I waved her over to the bar. You could see the acne rash on her face now that we had the main house lights up.
“Hey Chloe, I got a question. Why do you wear the same fucking thong all week?”
“You think I give a shit about this place, I don’t give damn, it’s just stupid customers so what the fuck do I care.” She repeated the answer again, then once again. Then she called a cab.

Now that’s what I call a catch!

The Collective Logic of One Normal Human Being

Traffic was good today so I had arrived to work early.

I had attempted to enter the club through the back door where the kitchen is but the cook had decided not to answer the doorbell we have back there – or he was drinking at the bar. Either way I still prefer to park in the back. My car is safer parked out of sight, where drunks won’t kick it or crash their own cars into it. These auto-related nuisances can seriously eat into a nights earnings.

It was still fairly bright out and the usual bunch of smokers were gathered at the front entrance, puffing away and muttering to each other. One of the dancers had braved the cold and stood wearing just a short coat and a bikini. Free advertising for the club I thought since the front door was in clear view of the highway. A dancer would always have company while she smoked outside. A perfect chance for a customer to talk privately with the lady – conversation is always easier without loud music. You could ask questions quietly. There was always a feeling that there was more of a chance to hear the answer you want to hear. A customer can whisper a proposition – instead of screaming it into her ear. It just seemed more proper.

The mullet haired DJ was playing the same overplayed songs he always plays. A dancer who was really too old to be in this business anymore prowled the stage. The funny thing was most of the girls in this area of the city who worked as strippers were too old – so the fact that she was older ultimately, in this case, made no difference. The stripclub scene was a reason in itself for her, and dancers like her, to still be there. These ladies looked great in the 1980’s and early 90’s. Their customers loved them then. Now much later the same sort of customer – now much older – pursued and spent money on the same dancers – now much older. Like an ongoing soap opera that never ends and refuses to refresh it's characters; steadfast in a silent decision to neither move on or evolve.

The Boss was sitting at the bar. And the cook was at the bar – drinking - as I had suspected. I guess there were no orders at this point in the day. The Boss had opened this club immediately after graduating university. He had been young for a stripclub owner when he started. His easy going and humble nature won everyone’s respect so his youth was never a hindrance. Now years later he was still there, still in business. Clubs galore had opened and closed around him but his was still running. No small feat these days. He looked extra tired and more miserable than usual.

“What’s up Boss?” I asked.
“Had to fire Colleen.” He said. Colleen was a dancer. She had excessive stretch marks on her stomach. That didn’t matter though – what mattered was the fact that she was crazy, possibly on many kinds of illegal drugs, and entirely unreliable. I always wondered about Colleen. She seemed to always have this desperate smile when she performed. Sort of like saying “Please spend money on me – I fucking need it!” People that worked at the club and some regulars would comment on her stretchy stomach. Supposedly you could grab a mitt full of the skin and pull it out a foot like baking dough or something. It was sad, I had always figured it was probably motherhood to begin with that had driven her to stripping (since she was unqualified to do anything else and desperate for cash), and yet it was motherhood that subtracted the necessary ‘perfection’ needed to make good bucks dancing “clean” for customers. The less perfection, means the less money – or you get a little 'dirty'.

“Too bad”. I said. “I wonder how she supports her kid. She must collect welfare on the side or something”.
“They all do,” says The Boss, “these one’s are too stupid to work a real job, and too stupid to make the most out of this stuff. They can make a few hundred in one day and they’ll still be flat broke. Colleen doesn’t live with her kid. Her ex has it, or the Children’s Aid or whatever. Long gone. It’s not even her problem anymore – and she still can’t get her shit together.” He had a way of shaking his head side to side as he talked, like he never got used to this, like after all these years it still disgusted him or surprised him and he still found it difficult to believe. “You know," he continued, "if you took everyone’s brain in this place – you’d have the collective intelligence of one single, logical human being.”
“Yeah, that would be about the extent of it. I’ll be behind the bar”. And I started my shift.