So.
She emailed me. Through my boss. He had exchanged addresses with "the opiate dancer" who had so successfully manipulated him to spend a couple of grand in one night. I think he's been ineptly stalking her on email for a few days now.
If I was writing a templated note to a client, it would be this. Dripping with hooks. Cleverly worded. "look forward to having fun", "I will never forget that night when you visited".
I feel like I'm reading a direct mail campaign from the Ford Motor company. But this flyer comes dipped in emotion and sexual promise.
Tightrope moment. The line twangs under my trembling feet. I'm hanging out over the abyss. To my left, a 12,000 foot drop. As I opened the email, the pure adrenalin rush was incredible. Hit reply. "Me too" "best night of my life" "never thought I'd feel that way". Nonsense. Breathe, go to a meeting, act grown up and give people good advice. I return to the computer and delete my reply. I would be the epitome of the punter: asking her out or suggesting that she spend time with me for free. I won't do that. Not under any circumstances. I absolutely and utterly refuse to fall that way.
To the right, a rocky outcrop with a raging sea beneath. Believing that she liked me more than all the other customers who are sent a generic "nice to see you please come back soon note".
As I ponder what to do I catch my eye in the pitch black night reflection of my hotel window. The person in the gloom is looking back at me almost blankly, but if I really stare, i can see the truth in his eyes. "She's a stripper, you are money"
After 3 hot teas and a drafted presentation this morning I hit reply again, this time I have grabbed my self control by the throat. A simple one liner.
"It was really great to see you too. I hope to come and see you again soon... I had an amazing amount of fun. Keep in touch!".
I've done an insane amount of travelling since I met her. twice across the Atlantic, twice across the US, twice into Europe. I wonder whether that's why I keep dreaming of plane crashes. Or maybe there's another reason....
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Response to GraceUndressed
Last Wednesday, a dancing club in a major city. Usual score, my boss wants to go, I sort it out. Stand at the bar, reject the women whose eyes can be read more clearly than a barcode: the iris' say "you are money, give me your cash". Politely and in a nice way, reject and reject and reject, "no thank you, would you like a drink" and relax. This is so not my place. I feel uncomfortable. Buy my boss a dance, (he suffers guilt issues) encourage the girl to really wind him up. Ask her to get him going so she can make some good money. He heads downstairs. I ponder the rules of the club idly.
A short blonde Hungarian girl walks in. She is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. Genuinely. Breathtakingly beautiful. Longish hair, stripper body, eyes like evil daggers of hate. I have a quick dance with her to douse the fire. Walk off afterwards. I tell she is "very pretty" and one of the dancers mimics me under her breath. I feel a little angry that this world is so aggressive. I wander back to the bar, nice cold glass of champagne, Job done. Box ticked. End of night. But I'd not counted on my boss who returns sweaty and excited from the dance that was designed to be addictive. The opiate dance. Of course he wants more. Pour another twenty into his hand, relax, drink. I watch the hungarian girl with only passing interest. Just like leafing through a magazine. Been there. Done that. She's pretty but tried to sell me the champagne room. Badly. I can't be bothered with all that. Suddenly, he's back: Mr It's-Like-Heroin-Experience is tugging at my sleeve. He wants to go to the champagne room with his dancer. No funny business, I'm to come with him. Who do I choose? Only one choice, the pretty Hungarian with the dead eyes and the awful, slightly desparate and dismissive sales patter. The one who is way beyond my league.
Sit down at the champagne bar table. Bottle of Veuve Cliquot please. Turn on my usual erotic dancer schtick. "you would say that, I'm paying you". Remove her hands from my body, I hate the whole paid for thing. It feels so cheap. Ask a few cursory questions, engage work brain and make polite conversation. Reject her when she tries the boring stripper tricks like asking what colour my eyes are. Ask about the business model, the good days the bad days. Her goals. What makes her tick. The trip to work. Ask her what the good guys and the bad guys do. Argue that I'm a bad guy and tease her - she hides behind the dancer veil. I'm drunk and probably smell of the expensive meal we had had that evening. Speak the truth girl, I feel, please open up. Be normal. Anything. Be a person. Not a fantasy. Tell me I'm smelly. Stop trying to be a product. We could be here together for ages waiting for my boss, let's reset the situation so we are in this together. It's the only way to get through this. Trust me I've been here before.
I see the first and probably only flash of humanity cross her face - it says: why is he so businesslike about this, why does he reject dances, why all the while does he remind me he is only here because of the boss and his addiction to strip joints.
Some shards of her patter engage me, but are they just stripperisms: "you are cleverer than the others". "you are not like the other guys in here". I know, I know, they are stripper lines, trotted out in a bad english accent from the "Hungarian guide to emptying wallets", but the lines start to work on me a little. Never have before. I believe it just a little. That is where the danger lies. I start to try a bit harder, this girl is insanely hot. Let me be clear, she is the most pretty girl I have ever seen in my entire life. Like in magazines, TV or movies. So hot I'm amazed I didn't fall earlier. Insanely hot. It's a phrase I've never used before to describe anyone I have ever spoken to.
Do you see where this is going? It's a problem I think, but I'm on the ledge and it's a bit too deep down there, I can't see the bottom.
But I still don't see what is happening. I know that strippers do tricks, I've seen it all before. Look into my eyes. Damn, you are so funny, dry peck on the neck, stroke, blah. Done it. Been there. Feels like crap. Keep batting it off and try to make discussion, real discussion. I'm now very drunk and the second tray of fruit (with free champagne, cost only 200) has arrived. Stripper stuff.
She puts my arm round her neck. I absent mindedly start playing with her hair. Suddenly I realise and apologise. She says, don't worry it's nice and I play with her hair. I decide that I'm good at playing with hair. It's fun, and I really enjoy it. Either she is the best actress from Budapest or I've actually pressed some kind of emotional button here. Hair playing. Discussion. More hair playing. She likes it. Or acts like she likes it. We talk lots more. About dreams and ambitions. Hair playing. I stroke her face, not like you would stroke a stripper's face. Music stops. It goes blurry like Edward Munch has just painted a strip bar. We are very close.
At this point I have to stop the narrative and say: She may be acting but if she is I'm in. I'm gone. I'm sold. You know that feeling when you are about to kiss someone and it's like your bodies have collided at 1,000 miles an hour. I hope that I'm not naive. I'm probably very naive, but it felt like that. She couldn't have been acting. Could she? Was she? That's where the atomic bomb comes from. I have only ever felt like that before: kissing someone when they wanted me to. her eyes are shut. Her lips are on mine. I'm saying "I can't kiss you". She's saying breathlessly "yes you can, they can't see". Her breath is warm and smells of melon. It's nice and seems completely out of place. Is she acting? At this point I don't know. I'm in too deep. The daylight is flickering down at me from 20,000 feet. It's only now sitting in front of the cold blue glare of an LCD that I feel she might have been.. Right then, in the moment there was no doubt. She wanted me. I am feeling my voice inside repeating the classic line that is a mantra of saddos all around the world. "I've pulled a stripper". But my brain is in control. I'm saying outloud "no, it's wrong, I don't do this. I hate this shit". Pull away. Glass of champagne. Cuddle. but not a stripper cuddle where people don't touch. A proper cuddle. With a genuine feeling. That lasts for an hour, while we talk honestly together. I hope. God I don't know. Was she acting? Am I like all the other mugs? Did I just slam my rocket car of confidence into a concrete wall of control and manipulation?
Still no dances. I don't need dances, they don't turn me on. I feel like a punter. Call myself a punter and slightly annoy her. Is that the act again? I'm falling into Wonderland of truth and reality. Can't believe what has just happened. Start drinking quickly, whilst talking. Too much champagne. Not quite as good as before. The moment has gone. Is that her or me? Is she bored? We share a sandwich. More conversation, it's time to go. Suddenly find myself in the world of the customer. The guy I despise. "I'm going to Milan tomorrow", do you want to come with me? Yuck. Come on boy, this isn't your style and it's sickening.
Time to go. Mess up the costs, have to ask the girls how much they want. Pay without negotiating. She goes for more than we agreed. I'm slightly angry with her now, that was trickery. You only wanted my money. But I FELT more, more than the transaction. That's just not fair. I came here to be in control, I always have control in these places but you have got me feeling like a broken mirror, shattered and splayed across the floor.
I say, "I'll give you a tip, you were great". She says OK. Feel more angry. Quickly ask the management put 500 on my card. She says "why are you being like this". It's not good. I tell her to buy something nice. Really tell her, over and over again in a drunken annoying way. I'm angry with myself for being an idiot. She's a stripper. It's her job. Leave, with a peck on the cheek and a thank you.
And there is the bomb. It grows in the back of my mind. I need to check something. She was insanely hot. Have I mentioned that?
I need to understand this stuff. I'm a geek and I work in an industry where we analyse human behaviour in it's micro form, so I immediately start researching. Intial research: Google - how to pull a stripper. The results are ridiculous nonsense written by people who couldn't pull a plastic bag over their heads.
Next level; stripper blogs. Read them all. Mimi, Grace, the lot. Reading that shit makes me want to have a shower. It makes you realise that this is a hall of mirrors that you can't possibly understand. The only truth is that it was a lie. The only lie is that it might have been a truth. It looks like she was playing tricks. It feels like she was manipulating me. The acting was what happened. But there is a very, very, very small chance that she's not. Grace puts it best when she talks about how she reacted to a crush on a client: "By the time I'd settled the bills into my garter, my guts were back in place and everything was gone. leaving only a weird impression of the kind that, after avoiding a wreck, makes you pat yourself down for injuries anyway". Damn you Grace. Stop giving me hope.
There is a 0.1% chance that she slightly fell for me. If that 0.1% is correct, then I have to have a go. Did I tell you that she is the most insanely hot girl I have ever met? And I'm good at this stuff. I'm a sales guy. If there's a crack, I'm in. I can do it. And if the, (from my research) much more likely reality is the case, that she was just a good stripper and that I was drunk, then I would like to see her again and pay for that experience. It was incredible and I would like to know if it is repeatable. Even if I'm paying.
The reality check is clear: I wouldn't have a chance anyway - Grace again: Strippers are not at work looking for dates, and if we were, there'd be about fifty guys in line ahead of you. Enjoy the fantasy, pay me, and go home.
So true.
How's this?: Visit the club. Dress well. Carry 1000. Hope she's there. If not, leave and never return.
Follow the code: No dances, unless it's obvious that she is not as beautiful, interesting, fun as I remembered. Never ask her out or ask her to do anything outside the club. Be interested. Pay. Leave. See how things go. If it goes well, repeat. Up to a limit. Walk away. Wash hands, go and get a whiskey and relax! Never return. We all win.
And the big thing. Hope she's there, because it would be a travesty if I never saw her again. Did I tell you that she was insanely hot?
For the cost of a second hand car? I can afford it, and it will be fun.
A short blonde Hungarian girl walks in. She is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. Genuinely. Breathtakingly beautiful. Longish hair, stripper body, eyes like evil daggers of hate. I have a quick dance with her to douse the fire. Walk off afterwards. I tell she is "very pretty" and one of the dancers mimics me under her breath. I feel a little angry that this world is so aggressive. I wander back to the bar, nice cold glass of champagne, Job done. Box ticked. End of night. But I'd not counted on my boss who returns sweaty and excited from the dance that was designed to be addictive. The opiate dance. Of course he wants more. Pour another twenty into his hand, relax, drink. I watch the hungarian girl with only passing interest. Just like leafing through a magazine. Been there. Done that. She's pretty but tried to sell me the champagne room. Badly. I can't be bothered with all that. Suddenly, he's back: Mr It's-Like-Heroin-Experience is tugging at my sleeve. He wants to go to the champagne room with his dancer. No funny business, I'm to come with him. Who do I choose? Only one choice, the pretty Hungarian with the dead eyes and the awful, slightly desparate and dismissive sales patter. The one who is way beyond my league.
Sit down at the champagne bar table. Bottle of Veuve Cliquot please. Turn on my usual erotic dancer schtick. "you would say that, I'm paying you". Remove her hands from my body, I hate the whole paid for thing. It feels so cheap. Ask a few cursory questions, engage work brain and make polite conversation. Reject her when she tries the boring stripper tricks like asking what colour my eyes are. Ask about the business model, the good days the bad days. Her goals. What makes her tick. The trip to work. Ask her what the good guys and the bad guys do. Argue that I'm a bad guy and tease her - she hides behind the dancer veil. I'm drunk and probably smell of the expensive meal we had had that evening. Speak the truth girl, I feel, please open up. Be normal. Anything. Be a person. Not a fantasy. Tell me I'm smelly. Stop trying to be a product. We could be here together for ages waiting for my boss, let's reset the situation so we are in this together. It's the only way to get through this. Trust me I've been here before.
I see the first and probably only flash of humanity cross her face - it says: why is he so businesslike about this, why does he reject dances, why all the while does he remind me he is only here because of the boss and his addiction to strip joints.
Some shards of her patter engage me, but are they just stripperisms: "you are cleverer than the others". "you are not like the other guys in here". I know, I know, they are stripper lines, trotted out in a bad english accent from the "Hungarian guide to emptying wallets", but the lines start to work on me a little. Never have before. I believe it just a little. That is where the danger lies. I start to try a bit harder, this girl is insanely hot. Let me be clear, she is the most pretty girl I have ever seen in my entire life. Like in magazines, TV or movies. So hot I'm amazed I didn't fall earlier. Insanely hot. It's a phrase I've never used before to describe anyone I have ever spoken to.
Do you see where this is going? It's a problem I think, but I'm on the ledge and it's a bit too deep down there, I can't see the bottom.
But I still don't see what is happening. I know that strippers do tricks, I've seen it all before. Look into my eyes. Damn, you are so funny, dry peck on the neck, stroke, blah. Done it. Been there. Feels like crap. Keep batting it off and try to make discussion, real discussion. I'm now very drunk and the second tray of fruit (with free champagne, cost only 200) has arrived. Stripper stuff.
She puts my arm round her neck. I absent mindedly start playing with her hair. Suddenly I realise and apologise. She says, don't worry it's nice and I play with her hair. I decide that I'm good at playing with hair. It's fun, and I really enjoy it. Either she is the best actress from Budapest or I've actually pressed some kind of emotional button here. Hair playing. Discussion. More hair playing. She likes it. Or acts like she likes it. We talk lots more. About dreams and ambitions. Hair playing. I stroke her face, not like you would stroke a stripper's face. Music stops. It goes blurry like Edward Munch has just painted a strip bar. We are very close.
At this point I have to stop the narrative and say: She may be acting but if she is I'm in. I'm gone. I'm sold. You know that feeling when you are about to kiss someone and it's like your bodies have collided at 1,000 miles an hour. I hope that I'm not naive. I'm probably very naive, but it felt like that. She couldn't have been acting. Could she? Was she? That's where the atomic bomb comes from. I have only ever felt like that before: kissing someone when they wanted me to. her eyes are shut. Her lips are on mine. I'm saying "I can't kiss you". She's saying breathlessly "yes you can, they can't see". Her breath is warm and smells of melon. It's nice and seems completely out of place. Is she acting? At this point I don't know. I'm in too deep. The daylight is flickering down at me from 20,000 feet. It's only now sitting in front of the cold blue glare of an LCD that I feel she might have been.. Right then, in the moment there was no doubt. She wanted me. I am feeling my voice inside repeating the classic line that is a mantra of saddos all around the world. "I've pulled a stripper". But my brain is in control. I'm saying outloud "no, it's wrong, I don't do this. I hate this shit". Pull away. Glass of champagne. Cuddle. but not a stripper cuddle where people don't touch. A proper cuddle. With a genuine feeling. That lasts for an hour, while we talk honestly together. I hope. God I don't know. Was she acting? Am I like all the other mugs? Did I just slam my rocket car of confidence into a concrete wall of control and manipulation?
Still no dances. I don't need dances, they don't turn me on. I feel like a punter. Call myself a punter and slightly annoy her. Is that the act again? I'm falling into Wonderland of truth and reality. Can't believe what has just happened. Start drinking quickly, whilst talking. Too much champagne. Not quite as good as before. The moment has gone. Is that her or me? Is she bored? We share a sandwich. More conversation, it's time to go. Suddenly find myself in the world of the customer. The guy I despise. "I'm going to Milan tomorrow", do you want to come with me? Yuck. Come on boy, this isn't your style and it's sickening.
Time to go. Mess up the costs, have to ask the girls how much they want. Pay without negotiating. She goes for more than we agreed. I'm slightly angry with her now, that was trickery. You only wanted my money. But I FELT more, more than the transaction. That's just not fair. I came here to be in control, I always have control in these places but you have got me feeling like a broken mirror, shattered and splayed across the floor.
I say, "I'll give you a tip, you were great". She says OK. Feel more angry. Quickly ask the management put 500 on my card. She says "why are you being like this". It's not good. I tell her to buy something nice. Really tell her, over and over again in a drunken annoying way. I'm angry with myself for being an idiot. She's a stripper. It's her job. Leave, with a peck on the cheek and a thank you.
And there is the bomb. It grows in the back of my mind. I need to check something. She was insanely hot. Have I mentioned that?
I need to understand this stuff. I'm a geek and I work in an industry where we analyse human behaviour in it's micro form, so I immediately start researching. Intial research: Google - how to pull a stripper. The results are ridiculous nonsense written by people who couldn't pull a plastic bag over their heads.
Next level; stripper blogs. Read them all. Mimi, Grace, the lot. Reading that shit makes me want to have a shower. It makes you realise that this is a hall of mirrors that you can't possibly understand. The only truth is that it was a lie. The only lie is that it might have been a truth. It looks like she was playing tricks. It feels like she was manipulating me. The acting was what happened. But there is a very, very, very small chance that she's not. Grace puts it best when she talks about how she reacted to a crush on a client: "By the time I'd settled the bills into my garter, my guts were back in place and everything was gone. leaving only a weird impression of the kind that, after avoiding a wreck, makes you pat yourself down for injuries anyway". Damn you Grace. Stop giving me hope.
There is a 0.1% chance that she slightly fell for me. If that 0.1% is correct, then I have to have a go. Did I tell you that she is the most insanely hot girl I have ever met? And I'm good at this stuff. I'm a sales guy. If there's a crack, I'm in. I can do it. And if the, (from my research) much more likely reality is the case, that she was just a good stripper and that I was drunk, then I would like to see her again and pay for that experience. It was incredible and I would like to know if it is repeatable. Even if I'm paying.
The reality check is clear: I wouldn't have a chance anyway - Grace again: Strippers are not at work looking for dates, and if we were, there'd be about fifty guys in line ahead of you. Enjoy the fantasy, pay me, and go home.
So true.
How's this?: Visit the club. Dress well. Carry 1000. Hope she's there. If not, leave and never return.
Follow the code: No dances, unless it's obvious that she is not as beautiful, interesting, fun as I remembered. Never ask her out or ask her to do anything outside the club. Be interested. Pay. Leave. See how things go. If it goes well, repeat. Up to a limit. Walk away. Wash hands, go and get a whiskey and relax! Never return. We all win.
And the big thing. Hope she's there, because it would be a travesty if I never saw her again. Did I tell you that she was insanely hot?
For the cost of a second hand car? I can afford it, and it will be fun.
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