Which One Is It?

For a long time I've been worried about our tanning beds.  Are they worse than our competitors? Better? The same? I really didn't know, and I still don't. I hardly ever use them as I really don't have the time, or frankly, the desire. I'm here enough. I'm not coming in early, or staying late just to lie in a tanning bed. I'm just not that interested.  But one thing I always wonder about is the quality. Will people notice a difference between us, and BIG CHAIN SALON? Even though there really isn't much difference, sometimes it's in the eye of the beholder.

My question has been answered now, and with almost no effort on my part. That's my favorite way actually.

People will come in to tan, ask for a specific bed, and then go into the wrong room. It happens, and it's an easy mistake. I usually say..."Room 3", or "Room 8" just so there's no confusion, and it gets people in and out faster, but not always. I usually don't say it if it's someone that's been coming here for a long time, because why would I? I don't move the beds around, they're hardwired into their respective outlets, and they weigh upwards of half  a ton, and sometimes more, so they're all but permanent right where they are.

But when someone that's been coming here for three, or four years and says I want the "Level 5" a bed they've used on at least a dozen prior occasions by the way,  and then immediately walks into a different room and waits for the bed to start, I realized they can't tell the difference! And in this circumstance there is a difference. You'd think that would be a bad thing. But it isn't. That means that one of the big guys that blew $500,000 on eight super-duper fancy air conditioned, misting, neon lit beds wasted their money.

You're Back? Part 3

So after J.S. explosion of fury that someone would dare sully her precious little angel of a daughter, by daring to ask her to do something unsavory, despite the fact that no one asked, and don't forget she's 18, and it might sound demented to some, but the minute someone turns 18 I consider them an adult. A full blown adult on an equal - legal at least - footing with me. They can smoke, buy a house, get married, sign a contract, get prosecuted and put in big time prison, have babies, and until the late 70's even buy alcohol, which I still think they should be allowed to do, and on, and on.

Hell I had relatives that joined the military, fought in some of the most famous battles of WWII, probably killed scores of people, and were shot at 100's of times, all before they were even 17 years of age, never mind 18. Suddenly I'm supposed to approach adults of today differently than I would anyone else? Anyway she says her piece, and I do my best to look concerned, and I make promises to "get to the bottom of this" even though I couldn't possibly care less, and will forget she was even here the minute she walks out.  You know the old saying if you can fake sincerity you have it made? Pfft. They made that up for me.

I go back to work, and do whatever it is I do, and carry on like normal. I asked Girlfriend one last time what happened, she says she doesn't know what J.S. is talking about. Whatever, fine,  and everything is back to normal. Oddly after "the big scandal" one of A.R.'s former friends walks in. And since I consider "Julie" more of a friend than a customer, I relay this little tale to her. Her reply"

"A.R. (The now adult, future dancer in question) is a psychopathic liar."

Apparently their house had to be ringed with security cameras, because of A.R.s penchant for getting "sideways" with just about every human being she comes across. How bad of a person do you have to be to instill such hatred at such a young age? I mean it's not like she was a mobster or anything. But of course her mother (J.S.) thinks it's everyone else's problem. I forgot to mention that they were asked to leave the last tanning salon they were using. Oh but "it was the girls that worked there. They were nasty." Maybe. Or maybe it's because you daughter is crazy. She once flew into a drunken rage, and spit in a girls face, and punched her when she wouldn't participate in a threesome with her, and her boyfriend. That's the story anyway. The other stories I've heard are equally unbalanced, and far worse. If even half of what I heard is true... Yikes. And guess who doesn't hear about any of this? The Mom.

Keep in mind she is an attractive young girl. Thin, blonde, on the outside she's very personable, and friendly. But you do notice that thin veneer of phoniness. The over enunciated "Hi!" When she sees you. Nothing you can put your finger on, you just know she doesn't mean it.

Well a full day goes by, and I've all but forgotten all about this little, melodrama when sudden The Mom suddenly appears in the parking lot, and walks up to the door...

This CD Player Doesn't Work!

Yeah I know. One of you broke it. Some people can't even comprehend the massive technological ability required to operate a radio/CD player, and then once you walk in the door you people turn into a bunch of apes on roller-skates. All day long I hear stuff crashing, and bangin' around in those little rooms, and  nervously I go in there after you left because I'm terrified at what else you managed to break during the 10 whole minutes you were in there unsupervised.

Kinda like the shelves. You know the ones. The ones that are attached to the wall using massive three inch screws drilled directly into the steel wall stud. Yeah those. How you've managed to damage those is beyond me. Especially considering it's just a f-cking shelf. What were you doing in there between the time you got undressed, tanned, and redressed that allowed you to damage that?

It just sits there. It doesn't move. You don't have to "dodge it". It'll never run out in front of you. It's a shelf on a wall. Is this the reason so many people have "dings" on the side of their brand new car? Because some thoughtless idiot wasn't thinking? I bet you're the ones that break my shelves.

You're Back? Part 2

...Now where was I? Oh right A.R. Well a couple of weeks go by, and J.L. is just as happy as she can be. She must've been the talk of the school. I knew that because every 16 year old boy would come in here asking "Is she here?" because they knew she tanned here. Well, for a week, or two things kinda go back to normal, J.L. is happy, and the BIG EXCITING NEWS begins to sorta fade away.

Well J.S. shows up and walks up to the counter. She's been tanning here for a while, and has a daughter in high school too.

"I need to talk to you." She says.

Oh f-ck.What the Hell do you want. Just tan and get out would you? I think to myself.

"Did you know J. is dancing now?"
"Yes, why?" She's a parent so obviously she doesn't know sh-t about what her kids or their friends are doing.

"Well, I don't appreciate your girlfriend asking my daughter to work at the place with J.L.!"

"What?" What the Hell is she talking about? "I don't know what you mean"

"Your girlfriend asked my daughter if she would be interested in dancing where she works."

What she doesn't know is, that my  girlfriend's boss is a half-wit. It's his rule that anyone that owns, or works for a different business outside of "Gentleman's Club" can't mention that inside the club or to other employees. So asking her daughter to work there would most likely let the cat out of the bag, and she'd lose her job there, which we still kinda need, so that wouldn't have happened. Besides we thought it was better if our customers weren't aware of where she worked on the side. Why? Because people are weird that's why. Anyway we just thought it was better.

"Well I don't know what kind of business you're really running here, or if the other parents would be happy to know that your "pimping" out their daughters or talking them into become strippers, but I don't appreciate it!"

Of course she's almost shouting at this point.

"I still don't know what you're talking about".

And at this point I don't. Her daughter is mildly attractive, and a complete psycho bitch so I admit she'd probably make a perfect dancer, but seriously we wouldn't do that. Our business is to important to our lives to start trying to convince 18, or 19 year old customers to become strippers.

"When did you hear about J working there?" I ask her.
"Just last night when my daughter brought all of this up."

I said, "You know J has been dancing there for like three weeks now. If you just found out last night you're absolutely the last person to know. She's been telling everybody with two good ears everyday that she works there. How do you know your daughter didn't simply just go in there to apply because they're friends?"

"Because A.R. told me your girlfriend asked her to go in there!"

She's so insistent, that I start to think that maybe she's right. Maybe Girlfriend did mention something when J.L., A.R., and my girlfriend were having some sort of casual conversation in the lobby or something. But I stick to my guns because I really don't think this happened, and something seems kinda suspicious...

You're Back?

My girlfriend used to be a "dancer". The exotic kind. She was for a long time. Well as her career wound down, the place where she worked offered her a position as a manager/trainer of the new girls that were hired. To be honest I don't know  what she does exactly, but that's the gist of it. Not everyone who comes in here knows that, but some do (this'll all make sense in a minute).

The place where she works isn't really that far from the store, and it's pretty well known in the area. Even in a place as big, and heavily populated as the Greater Metropolitan Area  there aren't that many "Gentleman's Clubs" so most people have heard of all of them even if they've never actually been to them. Well one girl who'd been coming in here all through high school had her heart dead-set on being a stripper. It was her goal. Her dream. Whatever, it's her life what do I care. Anyway she was gonna start at the same club where my girlfriend works on her 18th birthday.

So, she goes through all of the preliminaries, and gets hired. She was starting that night, and comes in to tan so she'd look good. She swears me, and girlfriend to secrecy. "You can't tell anyone!" She implores. Fine. I really don't care anyway. All of my girlfriend's friends were or are dancers. It's something I've been around for a very long time so I've become completely desensitized to it. Trust me I'm not impressed that you're a stripper now.

So what's the first thing she does when she goes back to school the next day? Yes she's still in high school at this time. She tells everyone with even minimal ear function that she's "dancing now."  Again, It's her life. I don't really give a sh-t.

The problem really started when her friend A.R. decided that she'd like to give this a try...

Big Money.

Alright. So I talked to the people where I want to put my bar. Luckily it's a family owned building, as opposed to some faceless corporate owned place, so that definitely has it's advantages. But the site is actually much bigger than I thought. 9500 square feet to be exact.

It's not too big for what I want, the problems with a big place like that begin with the rent. The people that own the place were totally on board with my idea with putting a bar in there, which is actually a good first step. Not a lot makes me nervous, but I was very nervous when I called them because I didn't want them to think a bar was a bad idea and say no. They actually seemed excited by the idea. So hurdle one? Gone.

I admit that I fibbed just a little and told them that I wanted to put a sports bar in there, when nothing could be further from the truth. I would rather be f-cking dead than be surrounded by meat-headed sports fans 15 hours a day. And believe me the last thing this world needs is another sports bar. They'd find me hanging from an electrical cord in the back two weeks after we opened, but they'd get over that little lie.

The real issue begins with their asking price. $20 a square foot. It's really not that bad, it's just that there's a lot of square feet. So commercial rent works like this, square feet x price/12 = monthly rent. So...

9500 x $20 = 190,000 /12 = $15,833.33 a month. Every month.

It's an intimidating number. And that's just the rent. A sound system for the kind of place I want could also be very expensive. Oh sure I found one on eBay. The price? $65,000. Used. So you see why this little dream starts to look really distant. I might be able to scale this back a little, but that would defeat the vision that I have in my head. But I'll die trying to make this happen.

Here It Is...

I swiped this picture off of a celebrity blog, my second favorite actually.

Anyway when I saw the picture I knew immediately. From the outside it looks exactly how I want my place to look. I'll obviously try to make it look less like a gay bar than this one, but you get the idea.

Aside from the gay bull on the front you can imagine what it looks like inside. Kinda run down a little, the kind of place you'd go to have fun. Maybe the bartenders are hot but you can't really explain why. You know what I mean? Well there it is.

I just wish it didn't seem to get more impossible to do this every day.

$100,000!?

A customer just left here. She's tanning for her wedding in a few days. She casually mentions (she's been dying to tell me) that her parents are "spending $100,000 on my wedding." Because, "I'm the baby."

A $100,000 wedding. Even if you have the money...Why? Whatever. It's their money, and they obviously have it. I could open my bar for $100,000.

Why the sexy bride picture? Because it's my blog that's why.

Dude. You Have an AWESOME Job

A lot of the guys say that. I smile, and say "Yep!" And most of the time I do. The customers that come in here are usually really friendly, and happy, and smiley, and very, very cute.

But I can't hit on them. I wouldn't hit on them. That would be really bad for business. Some of them are also very young. Even some of the older ones, the ones in their mid to late 20's, are still mentally 17. At best.

Of the 5,000 plus people that have signed up to tan here in the past five years or so, I can count on maybe one hand the number of women that have come in here that I find attractive. Not just physically, there are a lot of physically attractive women that come in here. But I've long since passed the point where that was the most, or only important thing to me. And I wouldn't hit on them. As much as I hate this business lately, I still need it to pay my bills for a while.

Dance Monkey!

If you're gonna bring a friend in to wait while you tan, please make sure you bring something for him to do.

A book, video game, Sports Illustrated, Hustler or whatever really. By 7 or 8 o'clock I'm tired. I just want the day to end, and I don't want to entertain another person for the next 15 minutes until you're done tanning. Especially someone that's gonna ask me about sports (I can't stand televised sports).

I know that - despite what you're reading here- in general I'm an entertaining, fun guy to be around, and really I am. But by the end of the day I'm worn out from having my "game face" (hey sports!) on all day and I get worn out. And they often take up a lot of space because they're a little embarrassed to be in here, so they do that "cool guy lean" so just leave them at home, or in the car. Just leave the window cracked for them so they get some air.

Uh... Two Feet of Snow Fell Yesterday.

Remember all that snow? Remember the wind gusts of almost 70 mph? Of course you do. It was yesterday. I know you were so desperate to tan that you thought I should be here, sitting, just waiting for you to show up. All of this despite the fact that the snow was coming down two inches an hour at my house too. Some drifts were so deep, in fact, that it was past my waist.

Yeah and we had no phone, no cable, no internet, nothing.

I do appreciate the fact that you at least called to see if we were open first. It just boggles the mind that you would actually think we were open. They shut down the f-cking airport for God's sake.

God you f-cking people suck.