8.5% ABV bottled
What Makes Sammy Strip?
I was at a networking event which is interesting because I absolutely loathe “networking” and can’t think of a typically less interesting answer in the world than that to the question: “So, what do you do for a living?’
Alas, the event had cigars, booze, splendid food, and a world-class skyscraper roof deck view to keep me sated. Alack, the event was sans women in a “old boys club” kinda way, so I had no choice but to get loaded and talk to dudes. How unseemly!
In fairness, it was a nice crew of upwardly mobile urban professionals dressed in nice clothes and living nice lives. Most all with nice wives back at their nice (and owned) homes and apartments which meant the chicanery was at a lower–more “respectable” you might say–level than I’m accustomed to.
I was quiet and behaved, unable to speak much as the majority of conversation topics dealt with things I’ve never dealt with in my life nor may ever deal with: seventy hour work weeks, nest egg creation, sweater vests, marriages, honeymoons, intended pregnancy. I just sat back sucking down a Rocky Patel Ocean Club, a Holt’s Cigar company exclusive and a mini-masterpiece of a smoke, while tippling my second career beer from Canada’s brilliant Dieu du Ciel brewery, makers of the legendary Peche Mortel. A “wee heavy” made with Quebec maple syrup, this brew has an unbelievable nose. I expected greatness. However, the taste is a little more muted. Caramel malty and complex, but not an overwhelming explosion of flavors. Nevertheless, an interesting and beautifully crafted winner.
I enjoyed my beer and smoke while enjoying the company, trying to learn a thing or two, decipher fancy business terms, acronyms, and unnecessary argot, vicariously living through these other men. “Hmmmm…could I live this man’s life?” I wondered each time a I met a new, swell gent.
I didn’t think I could, but oh how quickly the sands go through the hourglass. You never know. Then, Sammy approached me. A diminutive but jacked Indian, he was so aggressive in running up to me that I thought I was either being hit on, or that, more likely, Sammy was one of those hardcore networkers. The kind of guy with a perpetual smile painted on his face, an overly happy demeanor oozing with artifice, an abundance of faux-enthusiasm that manifested itself in a lot of head nodding, “uh huh”-ing, and question asking.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do you do? What can I do for you? Oh, how do you know him? Do you know her? Gimme a card. Shoot me an e-mail on Monday. Let’s grab coffee. Let’s get lunch. Let’s do business together. let’s facilitate a relationship. Let’s make things happen.”
But, Sammy wasn’t like that. Sammy had just entered the world of suits and ties, cubicles and offices, meetings and conference calls and coffee breaks. He found the world of business quite boring. But that was great for Sammy. Sammy liked that. For you see, Sammy’s previous job, career, occupation, vocation was a little more…interesting.
Sammy had been a male stripper.
I don’t know how the topic came up, I don’t know how we began discussing it, but as you can imagine, a besotted transgressive like me had plenty of questions to ask the man, it was almost as if I was interviewing Sammy. And lucky for us, he was quite forthcoming in the sort of blase way that shows you he is so unimpressed with himself that he is surely being 100% honest.
“It’s a standard rule amongst male strippers: no coming. For some reason, these women have no problems with rubbing a strange man up and down, fondling him, touching him, pleasuring him, but the second he ejaculates, it’s like the record scratching at a party in old TV shows. Now all of the sudden, the women are quickly sober and disgusted. Not with themselves. But with me!”
So you just have an erection for hours on end?
“No, a man has his needs. And I could only take so much. So I just decided to break the industry rules and let it fly. But never in the face. Never in the face.”
How did you get into this…field?
“I was poor. Poor as dirt. Working a shitty job at a shitty restaurant. I became friends with one of the bus boys and one day he’s kinda staring me up and down. What the fuck? ‘You have a pretty nice body, dude. Muscular.’ Is he hitting on me?! No, he’s recruiting me! Invites me to join him that night for a bachelorette party. I couldn’t believe the bank. How much cash I left with that night. I was hooked!”
How much were you making?
“This is Ontario mind you, not New York City, but I was pulling $600, $1000 even a night.”
WHAT?! Then why the fuck aren’t you still doing it?
“It was far too humiliating. Embarrassing. All these gross old ladies slobbering over me.”
You gotta be drunk, right?
“I’d drink a whole bottle of Patron before I went out there. The naked part wasn’t the worst part it was all the dancing to cheesy music. So fucking embarrassing.”
But all these women want you. Doesn’t that make you feel good about yourself?
“I tell you bro, it’s hard for me to respect women after all the shit I’ve seen. Women blowing me mere seconds after meeting me. Grandmas, mothers, wives. Fucking fiancees sucking my dick one day before their wedding. It’s disgusting. I can’t trust any women after that.”
None?
“None. I guarantee you, most all the women you meet have done the same shit before. Think of how nasty us men are. Well women are worse! They are all disgusting whores.”
Did they ever have sex with you?
“They all want to. But I never did.”
Why? Morals?
“Economics. You never have sex with a client because once you pop, then you’re done. How you gonna keep making money dancing with a deflated balloon hanging from your groin? Not to mention all the women you don’t fuck are going to be jealous of the one woman you did fuck and are going to want to spite you. So you tease all of the women, make each and every women think that she is the one you most want to fuck. You tease them, milk the money, let them milk you, but never have sex with them. Unless they are mindblowingly hot. And then, only at the last second before you leave, after you’ve maxed out your earnings.”
…
“Pretty fucked up, huh?”
Absolutely. I’m kinda disgusted with the human race myself. Did you ever feel bad the next day?
“No.”
No?
“I felt rich.”
Uh, so you want to go another bar and try to pick up some girls?
“No. I don’t have one night stands.”
B+
