I am back in Ohio after some epic car trouble. I won't bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that seeing clouds of smoke puff out of the back of my ride outside of Little Rock was a high point of the whole adventure. Low point was shelling out $530 in Nashville and being unsure they didn't fuck something else up.

So, back in Cincinnati, and I spent today at home, in a big empty apartment, after being a guest in my sister's house for two months. It wasn't bad at all, but now I'm readjusting to lots more privacy and being able to walk around without pants again.

I will be returning to Concepts, the tiny bar in Lawrenceburg, tomorrow in an effort to recoup the car expenses. Of course I'll be driving the Wayward household's other vehicle. I have to think about what to do with mine.

Oh yeah: Hook 'em!

I'm amazed at the abuse some customers will take. I was dancing for this young Mexican* guy tonight and during the second song, sat down on his leg wrong and, I think, due to his tight jeans, um, pinched something sensitive. He yelped and I stood up, alarmed, but he asked me to keep dancing. I became much more cautious. At the end of the third song, I was facing away from him and lifting my left leg to prop my foot on the chair when he leaned forward suddenly and I clipped him in the head. "Oh, hell, are you okay?" I asked. "I'm fine, I'm fine," he said. Then asked for another dance. I guess he was really that drunk.

I also had a lot of fun dancing for one extremely gentlemanly Canadian fellow tonight. Gosh, they're even polite in strip clubs. We did some dances in VIP, where it's a little dark, and he was checking his bills to make sure they were all $20s and said, "It's a lot easier when they're different colors."

And I saw a couple of cool regulars. All in all, it helped mitigate the insanity that is a Sunday at XTC, though some guy got tossed for exposing himself (to the wrong girl, I guess) and one passed out cold on the floor. Oh, and one of the dancers told me she's read my blog and tried to pick out which dancers I referred to in some posts. I was just happy she liked it.

*There are some people in Texas who think of and use the term "Mexican" as a slur, as in "Those damn Mexicans took all the jobs. I really wanted to pick citrus this year." I am not one of them and use it as a term to refer to Mexican nationals. People of Mexican descent who are U.S. citizens I refer to as Hispanics. People from Guatemala are not Mexicans, nor are people from Nicaraugua or Honduras, all of whom I meet on a regular basis at work. I know this because my simple Spanish begins with "De donde eres?" when I'm chatting up Spanish-speaking customers.

You can't keep the strip clubs down.
From The New York Times:
The day before, Jason Mohney, owner of the Hustler and three other local strip clubs, arrived with a few dancers and bouncers and some high-powered flashlights, and found little damage to the red velvet heart-shaped couches and shiny disco balls, just a little moisture and mold on carpets - probably flooded, but perhaps from spilled beer.

"As soon as we have power, that will be the only thing that's keeping us from opening," Mr. Mohney said. "There'll be couch dances as soon as we can get open," he promised, though one of the dancers, Dawn Beasley, offered one on the spot ($30).

I’m listening to the new Dandy Warhols record; they are so totally my guilty pleasure. Mr. Wayward dislikes them so much. When I would refer to other bands, like, say, Firewater, as a “guilty pleasure,” he would say, “There should be mo such thing. If you like something, why should you feel guilty about it?” But the other day, he said, “Remember what I said about guilty pleasures? I think you should feel guilty about that.”

Thursday and Friday were pretty slow days. And I’m finding the contact level customers are expecting at the club is rapidly rising and leaving my comfort zone. It’s hard to tell a customer, “No, you can’t do that,” when he can with other dancers. I’d say there are several of us who practice defensive dancing. This is when you position yourself in such a way during the dance to minimize roaming hands. Like keeping your arms wrapped around your breasts when you lean backwards during a dance, or using your knees to keep arms at the sides of the chairs.

Not that all customers are handsy; it’s generally 50/50. Your more casual club visitor is generally happy to sit back and relax while receiving a dance. But in VIP they expect a higher contact level, for which most girls charge more. I charge more just for putting up with them back there. Unless it’s a regular who I know will behave, I can pretty much bank on having to dance very defensively back there. Hence this exchange on Friday when I approached one customer.

“Hey there. How you doing today?”
“Oh, pretty good. I was looking for Miss T today. Is she here? Or Miss S.”
Both these dancers are known as, um, high performers, and when a customer tells me he’s waiting for them, I usually leave him alone, for he is not buying what I am selling.
“No, they aren’t working today. Would you like to try a two-for-one dance?”
“Well, I was thinking about heading back to VIP. Will you go back there with me?”
“Sure. My dances back there are regular price. I only do two-for-ones out here on the floor.”
“Well, that’s kind of bullshit.”
Is it, now, Mr. I’m-looking-for-a-hands-on-experience?
“You think so? If I dance for you in VIP are you going to expect a better dance?”
“If you give me one, yeah.”
“Well, see, you expect more back there. Why shouldn’t I charge more to provide more?”
“ . . .”
“Have fun today.”

I do a couple of dances on the floor, and when next I walk by, he stops me, wanting to know why I ran off. I explained to him that I wasn’t going to provide what he was looking for and that I wasn’t interested in leading him to believe otherwise just to make $20 and piss him off. Hey, I might be a little prissy for a stripper, but I’m not going to promise what I can’t deliver.

Paragraph eight, in case you missed the Daily Show tonight, which had the lovely, hilarious video of the event itself.

I am, of course, appalled at the horrors we've seen unfold in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast over the past week. Part of me, the idealistic part that still believes we should expect a certain level of protection and assistance from our government, is upset and outraged at its seeming ineffectuality. Sadly, though, the more cynical part of me believes that, to paraphrase Joseph de Maistre, we got the government we deserve and that that's what happens when poor voters suffer from a terminal (literally, unfortunately, in this instance) case of false consciousness.

And my whole heart goes out to the gentleman I saw at work this week who had been stretched to his limit with worry over his family and his hometown. I'm not a praying person, but my thoughts have been with him.

Please feel free to buy me this when it comes out.

So my best friend’s coworker asked me to do a bachelorette party. They wanted me to basically teach a striptease class (and teach them how to twirl tassels). It was so completely and utterly different from a bachelor party in every way. For one, well, there were a lot of straight women there. The hors d’ourves included “vagina pears” (that’s a pear half with custard labia minora and a nonpareil clitoris) and figs, and penis straws for the drinks. There were daiquiris instead of kegs. And it was held in a married person’s house—usually the bachelor party is held in the single guy’s place or a hotel room.

It was a blast. I typed up a little handout full of information on where to shop for lingerie in Austin and other advice, and then demonstrated moves on the bachelorette. The tassel twirling was fun, too, but I don’t recommend it as a part of foreplay as then you have glue on your nipples.

This group couldn’t have possibly been more relaxed and fun. I can’t wait to get the photos. And potentially expand into an untapped market . . .

There are a lot of out-of-town license plates in Austin today, and I don't think it's just for the football game tonight. People displaced by Katrina are at the Burger Center and at the Convention Center. Lots of places around town are accepting donations of food, clothing, and of course, cash. We will be cleaning out my sister's garage tomorrow and taking all of the garage sale-destined items down.

Alex Chilton is still missing.

Also, any displaced dancers, go look at my links page for a guide to the Austin clubs if you need a place to work. We'll take you on and you don't have to get licensed like in Houston or arrested like in Memphis.

Last night I did a bachelorette party; I went to some clubs in Portland; I am going to a wedding tonight. I will write of these later.