There is some violent allergen native to Cincinnati that is making me ill. It is some form of dust, mold, or plant product that irritates me more than anything ever has in my allergy-addled life. And I lived in Austin, an allergy mecca. I've had asthma, which hasn't affected me since I was 12, recur since moving here. My sinuses feel like small troughs of cement. My lungs hurt. In part, I blame the old building we're in, which the aspiring gentrifier/slumlord owner didn't sufficiently clean or refinish, leaving brick dust to sift down by the bucketfull from the charmingly unfinished walls into the cracks of the unfinshed wood floors. Fuck this, I'm moving into the most generic, airtight place we can find in Portland.

Saturday night I felt so crappy at work that I left after an hour, abandoning the promise of a pretty good night and without saying goodnight to any customers or dancers (I told management, of course). Since then the only productive thing I've done is transcribe an hour's worth of tape for a story I have a Wednesday deadline on.

Fortunately last Friday was a good, productive night for me and carried my ass through the rest of the week. I lucked out; it was a crazy, busy night, and plenty of the other girls had the kind of frustrating night where the club was packed but they couldn't sell a dance and all the guys were assholes. My night was perfect; everyone was cool, they all tipped really well, and I didn't even have to try to sell. It was lovely.

Also, the bicurious seem to have it in for me lately.

Wednesday night was very, very slow. Deadly slow. I went up around 11 p.m. with three customers at the tip rail, two of whom were a less-than-enthusiastic couple, an older man and a very attractive, very aloof, very much younger blonde. I didn't think they were interested at all as they "shared" the tip (this is when a couple tips you a dollar for both of them; not happy time for dancers). But they did request a dance later much to my shock. I was much, much more shocked when Blondie got very into the dance. Very into it. It was actually the highlight of my night--she's quite attractive, I'm not sure if she's going to get into it, I'm trying not to be awkward, then she busts out with, "I just want to bite that thang!" when I lean in. Fortunately she didn't, but I was pleasantly surprised with her response.

Then she propositioned me! A first in my career. I have never, ever been solicited by a woman. "Name your price. I'm sure [my date] will match it," she said. "Oh, I'm sure he'd do a lot of things to keep you happy," I said. Of course I didn't name a price. She could have been undercover . . .

They persisted later. Lovely people, I'm sure, but battling off a couple that's hitting on you is twice as exhausting as battling off one guy. Though I have to admit, if the deal was that I just did her, and I got a decent price, and I was 21, and a little drunk, I might have taken them up on the deal. She was definitely hot enough for me.