JasmineTea/Teena and I were speeding down 105, the newest addition to the
plate of spaghetti LA calls a freeway system, in flagrant disregard for posted
speed limits -- people were passing us. "Let me get this straight," I said,
"we're driving on a freeway we don't even have a *line* for on our map, following
instructions from someone we've never met, heading for a strip club we don't
know?"
"Right!" said she.
"Cool, I like this vacation."
While our primary purpose is coming to LA was to visit friends and
Disneyland (the happiest place on earth),
we were now on our way to our second goal: meeting David "Saxbeat" and Z
Bone at the second happiest place on earth,
The Bare Elegance. Helpless
without a current map, Teena read and re-read the directions Z Bone had emailed
us. We ran until we ran out of freeway and took a random left. I had just
about decided to U-turn and head the other way when we passed the Snappy
Mart, "Hum, we must be on the right track." And there was Bare, ahead on
the right.
As we entered we had to pass through a very Disneyish turnstile, perhaps
the dozenth that day. I commented to Teena (again) how disappointed I was
that we hadn't seen Pocahontas and she replied (again) that I was a pervert.
Just inside the door we ran into Saxbeat and Z Bone and all the perverts
were assembled.
We retired to a table and began to chat about matters assc. Certain of our
group's Personalities we skewered and others validated. I think you know
who you are. Cochinoman was declared
to be a real person and not a figment of David's imagination. Bare is nude
which in California means it is a juice bar. There were lots of girls about,
and almost all lookers too. This was a contrast to
Bob's Classy Lady, where Teena
and I had gone two days earlier, which had exactly four dancers two hours
before closing. The place was classy, expensively decorated in an art deco
style. It looked like the bus station on the John Larroquette Show, cleaned
up and converted into a stripclub.
Teena went to the restroom and returned to report that dancers were bitching
loudly about the cheapness of the customers that night. A familiar refrain
from her own club. I used to wonder why my ears always burned when I was
in a club. I'm afraid we weren't helping the situation, being too busy talking
to get any dances. At $20 per, with half of that going to the house, and
being done in a booth with a dutch door between the dancer and the customer,
it really didn't seem worth it. Unless you knew the dancer of course.
At midnight we cut out to head for
Sam's, Z Bone's DJ wannabe
hangout. Do they remember him there? "Z BONE'S IN THE HOUSE!" resounded over
the sound system as we entered. Yeah, they know him. Feeling bad about not
tipping at Bare, I immediately went to tip the girl on stage: Venice. Z Bone
followed me to tell her that I was a friend. She reacted to that by removing
my glasses and polishing them on the only piece of cloth she still had on.
Thanks Venice! She then turned around and smeared them up again. Thanks again
Venice!
I liked Sam's much better than Bare. It's a working man's bar in a very downtown
LA area. It is topless and so the six foot rule applies. But you get to drink
beer! For $10 you can get a table dance, on your table. And the girl keeps
the whole fee. The stage has the most elaborate set of apparatus I've seen,
its monkey bars up there. Sophia let us know that vice was in the house.
It kind of spoils the effect when you *tell* the dancers that you're vice.
After hours came around. Z Bone got on stage with Teena to demonstrate the
rings. He says that the girls have been teaching him after hours but I wonder
if he doesn't have a set in his house. The boy is GOOD! Teena did a spin,
but she's dizzy anyway, so it didn't work out so well. Teena and I had had
the life-force sucked out of us earlier by the Magic Kingdom and David was
looking 'beat too. Z Bone was disappointed that we couldn't keep on trooping,
but he's a vampire person. When's the last time you saw the sun Z?
All in all I had a truely great night/morning. Not an over-the-top drunken
party, just a really good time. Z Bone and David "Saxbeat" are gentlemen
in the best sense. And a special thanks to David for coming out of retirement
for our little assc-con. My only regret is that RJ was busy that night and
couldn't make our LA clubbing experience complete.
Marc182 (e-mail)
