I Was A Teenage Carnival Barker II: Mexican Strip Club Patron Wrangler
"Great minds think alike. So do drunken carnies with corn dog sticks and the chance to shank you." - Frankerson Peterson
+ + +
It truly amazes me the bizarre circles life moves in. Well, it is not really a circle, despite what the first season of 'True Detective' keeps telling me. Its more of a realistic orbital pathway, elliptical. You move away from things in a sort of arc, for better or worse, and then just as you realize life is changing you find yourself on the other side of whatever you are orbiting and heading round the long way again. So more of an eccentric orbit.
[[Ah, home sweet home. Here there is only one way to do things, Carlito's Way.]]
Hey, fuck you, I'm sick and even at my best I'm not Sir Isaac Newton. Orbital/gravitational mechanics were never my strong suit, I have always been much, much better at getting into the pants of girls who are excellent at orbital mechanics. There is nothing better in this world than a sexy girl with a big brain. Two things all of my exes thus far have in common, they are all, or were at the time, gorgeous, and they all have superior IQ's. I used to joke that I had an IQ cut-off of 130, minimum, turns out that isn't really a joke.
Yeah, this cold medicine is kicking my ass. The tequila I've been chasing it with wasn't recommended by the doctor, but what the fuck does he know with his fancy degree, and his fancy office with furniture, or his white coat and his "Yes, goddammit, I'm a real doctor, stop asking me 'how much junk I'll prescribe for your close personal friend Abraham Lincoln ($5 USD)'. I even told him about Abe's awful headache, and how he clearly needed "Enough morphine that Keith Richards from The Rolling Stones might come wafting along its scent like a hobo catching a whiff of hot food in an old cartoon.", but he was less than sympathetic. Asshole.
Turns out that some things are always true, it takes more than $5 USD to bribe a doctor. No matter where you are in the world. Anyways, back to the subject at hand.
[[My personal physician for the duration of my convalescence.]]
After my brief tenure as a DJ at the club, my 'Americaness' at first an asset, then a liability due to my inability to spin "Reggetron" or whatever the fuck its called. A genre I in no way advertised a familiarity or fondness for. I must confess that the two days I was spinning there I genuinely enjoyed it. It had been a long time since I worked as a proper DJ, and while I never intended to make a career of it, it has always been enjoyable.
Music is one of the loves of my life, and sharing it with others in such a way has always been very appealing. One of the reasons I love hosting parties despite my basically anti-social nature is I love facilitating other people having fun. Music is an excellent way to do that. Though it seems that despite the house's desire to have someone spin more American style music, their desire for more of the same was stronger. I also suspect it had something to do with not wanting to have two DJ's on staff to pay.
Regardless of the reasons they invited me to stay on doing "promotions", which instead of implementing various ideas ideas I had to upgrade the sound system, club in general, and social media presence all on the cheap what they had in mind was more... traditional. Traditional in the 'Carnival Barker' sense of the term.
Standing on a street corner, with a single lamented flyer for the club, trying to convince American tourists in town for cheap diabetes medication and dental work that what they really needed on a freezing afternoon was a cold beer at an off-main-street strip club. So there I am, with four other guys working for the same club, all trying to hustle the same people to go to the same club.
At first I wondered why they were so competitive with me, but figured it out fast... you get paid per head you wrangle in, so all of them are in constant competition for customers for the club. Except one guy, who seems to make most of his money selling cocaine while hes supposed to be drumming up business for the club. I guess thats one way to avoid the hustle. He isn't selling for the club, or even to the Americanos they are trying to lure in, this seems to be a side business for him unrelated to the strip club. A 'Side Hustle' as the hep cats might say.
Do hep cats say 'Side Hustle' anymore? I'm not as cool as I used to be. Fuck, I was never as cool as I thought I was.
Its not that I feel I'm too good for the job, in desperate times one does what one must to survive. Survival trumps nearly all other concerns for me in most circumstances. The problem is the money is shit, its not what we discussed at all, its murder on my far-to-fucked-for-my-own good spine, and the biggest concern of course is the clubs owners own the building Tessa and I are rent-to-squatting in. Good old Carlito's Cafe, or what remains of it.
I dislike someone, even nice people like the folks who own Vampiz, having this much power over my life. Over my basic survival. I realize others deciding your fate is something you can't avoid in life most of the time, but that doesn't make it any more palatable for me.
+ + +
This post and its original content copyright James Radcliff, and has been brought to you by Mexico, tequila, and generally poor decision making. If you would like to donate to support this bizarre little travelogue, feel free to do so via Patreon or PayPal. As always, this strange and debaucherous adventure has been brought to your screen by viewers like you. Thank you.
https://www.patreon.com/jamesradcliff
paypal.me/jamesradcliff
https://www.instagram.com/dispatches_from_the_field/
Comments
Post a Comment