Welcome to Chaos !!

Today - destination Seward. I have been there once before but not for the 4th of July. They do something called Mount Marathon in Seward on 4th of July, meaning a bunch of people run up and then down a steep mountain. This is a tradition since 1915 and it draws lots of people, spectators and the brave ones running up and down that mountain.



It was not the nicest weather today, good I brought my umbrella. I got happy again when I discovered the pie stand and even happier after my latte.
I got the rhubarb pie. It was diabetes inducing sweet.





On the way back home I stopped by the Exit glacier. That was very interesting, I found out about some hikes there that I would love to do one day.
The glacier is the large mass of snow in the middle.



I am home again and super tired, I am barely keeping my eyes open while writing this.
I hope everybody had a great 4th of July!

I saw Kate Moss on the cover of the latest BAZAAR today, of course I had to get it!!! I LOVE Kate! And there are 22 pages of Kate to drool over including the cover (and a Rimmel ad). She is bronzed and beautiful as always. I think that Kate looks Polish even though I know that she is British, maybe she has some Polish blood? I am keeping this BAZAAR, I bring all my read magazines to work otherwise for my coworkers to enjoy.
Today I am feeling kind of crappy. Not sure if I am getting sick or if I'm just overly tired. I am going to try to drag myself to work again tonight.
Tomorrow I might go to Seward to see what they have going on for the 4th of July.

I met him at Olympic Garden in Las Vegas. I worked there for a while......I never cared for it that much so after I while I just worked at Crazy Horse Too exclusively. Anyways, Olympic Garden had male strippers upstairs Wednesday - Saturday, I am not sure if they still have this going on or not. One evening I went up there with Shelley just to hang out and see the show. His name was Adrian and I thought he was the best looking guy in the club. Super hot! We started talking, the attraction was mutual and he could not believe that I was a dancer when he found out. He thought I was too innocent looking with my pale skin and long, straight brown hair. So many of the dancers in Vegas then had blonde hair extensions, huge fake boobs and a dark tan.....actually that's how it is now too. Though not all girls that dance in Vegas have big boobs and a tan, look at me.
At that time I lived in California and would travel to Vegas every so often. After a few more times of meeting Adrian we started dating.
It was fun and great in the beginning. I thought he was really good looking with his almost black hair that he would spike for work, blue eyes and a great body. He wanted me to stay with him when I came to Vegas and I did. We would get ready for work together and arrive there together. Then after work we would count our money and talk about our respective nights. It was fun.
Then one night he took me and Shelley to Utopia. It was one of the best nightclubs Vegas ever had, the best in my opinion. Forget about XS, Pure and whatever else they have now, Utopia was THE BEST. People still talk about that place. I have so many memories from there, I did my first E there and it was amazing.
Anyways, Adrian soon became jealous of my friendship with Shelley. Then there was a girl from his past that came back into the picture, she worked at Olympic Garden too and used to stare at me, she was upset I got to stay with him although she had dated him at some point and he had never asked her to stay with him. He thought she looked like Salma Hayek, I thought she looked like a curvy, almost chunky brunette with bad teeth. They started seeing each other again on and off and me and him were still seeing each other when I would come to Vegas.
Well, in the end the relationship didn't go too far, it was fun while it lasted. He was nice to look at but could be way too judgmental (I do not like that) and kind of jealous.
He spied on me a few times while I worked and would then throw it in my face though I never went upstairs to spy on him while he was dancing for women. He didn't like that I did lap dances for guys.
I think that the guys stripping upstairs at Olympic Garden were way more friendly with the women than most of us girls downstairs would be with the guys. More lovey dovey, holding hands, compliments - that kind of stuff.
The guys did $ 20 lap dances too. But their stage shows were more thought out than the girl strippers. All most of us girls do is go on stage for two songs, dance around a little, pose and twirl around the pole. The guys actually designed a whole theme for themselves, picked their music carefully and would also wear some kind of a costume to go with it too. Some of them were very good.
The women that went to see the guys strip would scream at the top of their lungs and tear at the guys. I would be horrified if guys would rip into me like that while on stage, that would never happen.
Adrian told me that the first weeks of stripping were very exciting for him. He felt great, sexually in power, women would fawn over him while giving him money, he loved it. But after some time he grew tired of it. In the end he reached a point where he couldn't stand it when women would be loud, lewd, obnoxious and crazy. And no, far from popular belief, not all male strippers are gay. That rumor must have been started by some angry, jealous "regular" guy not working as a male stripper. I knew plenty of straight guys that stripped upstairs at Olympic Garden.
Me and Adrian kept in touch as friends for a while though I have no clue to what he is doing today. I did meet up with him a few years after we had stopped dating, I lived in Vegas then. I didn't think he was that good looking anymore, he had gotten pudgy.

Woke up and ate breakfast at the same time as my squirrel friend nibbled on food. Look how cute he/she is. Chhaya is obsessed with it.



After that I took a bath and washed my hair. When 1 45 PM came along I hopped in my 4 Runner and drove to Coffee Roasters where I met up with Lexi for a coffee. Then we went to the movies where our friend Sharon was waiting. We saw Magic Mike . If you do not know, the movie is about male strippers. I give Channing Tatum, that plays the main character an A plus. He is a good looking guy with very impressive dance moves.
I did think that the scenes in the strip club were the best and most fun to watch, obviously. The rest of the movie was ok. I dated a stripper once, a guy not a girl.....LOL. I don't have time to write about that right now, check back tomorrow for that story. It is getting late and I have to force myself to hop in the shower and shave my stubbly legs.
Not really in the mood to work but I am going to try and go in anyways.

Here are some excerpts from the articles and links about the dancers that are suing two strip clubs in Anchorage. I hope they get their money!

"Dancers received the minimum wage and tips for table dances and so-called VIP dances in a private lounge. In turn, the dancers had to pay a "house fee" of $10 an hour for each hour they worked and tip the bouncer, the DJ, the doorman, and the "House Moms and Dads" -- floor supervisors. They also were expected to sell "souvenirs" provided by charities -- Jerry's Kids was one -- and buy the souvenirs themselves if they could not sell them.
Jennifer testified that given the fees and tips required by her employer, there were days she took home next to nothing for her labors. She also explained under questioning that on one occasion her labors were painfully interrupted by post-traumatic stress disorder and a workers' compensation claim after "an individual climbed on stage and bit me.
Many people smirk at the term "sex workers," but it is important to remember these young women really are workers, and their compensation, working conditions and treatment by management has generated labor-law cases all over the United States."

http://www.adn.com/2012/01/05/2248524/dancers-wage-fight-anything-but.html#storylink=misearch

"Shanna "Brooke" Thornton, Jennifer Prater and Heather "Kelly" Kidd say the clubs also failed to pay minimum wages and forced them to pool their tips to give to other employees. They claim they're owed a total of more than $324,000 in back pay and other compensation.
While making $7.15 an hour, the state minimum wage at the time, the Crazy Horse dancers were required to pay a $10 "house fee" for every hour that they worked, the court papers say. At Fantasies, the house fee was $15 per hour. Both clubs required the dancers to tip their "house moms," or floor supervisors, along with doormen and DJs. There were also requirements to sell souvenirs or drinks to customers and "fines" if they failed, according to the court documents."

http://www.adn.com/2011/12/31/2240936/trial-to-start-over-pay-dispute.html#storylink=misearch

"After nearly six years of legal wrangling, a judge's decision could mean back wages for three strippers who said they were cheated out of money for dancing at two Anchorage clubs."

http://www.adn.com/2012/06/21/2514149/strippers-could-get-back-wages.html#storylink=misearch

"It wasn't tips from customers that was in dispute: The women claimed the clubs, the Crazy Horse Saloon and Fantasies on 5th Avenue, did not pay them for the hours they worked, charged them illegal fees and forced them to give cash they took in as tips to other employees, like DJs and "house moms".
This isn't about how much money I make in tips," Prater told the Daily News in 2006. "This is about wage and hour laws. Just because of what we do, does not mean employers don't have to follow the law."

http://www.adn.com/2012/06/20/2513413/judges-ruling-makes-strippers.html#storylink=misearch

All of that I got from Anchorage Daily News. That is concerning two clubs in Anchorage.
But there are others. Below is another VERY interesting link to License to Pimp ".

"What would you do if the strip club you worked at became a brothel?
Would you adapt to it, fight it, or quit?
License to Pimp is a feature documentary about the choices that three San Francisco strippers make as their workplaces engage in illegal labor practices. Strip clubs refuse to pay strippers even minimum wages & actually charge them for the privilege to work. I worked in half of San Francisco’s strip clubs during the 1990s and witnessed their transformation into brothels as a result of these fees. Now as a filmmaker, I uncover current working conditions & try to find out how strip clubs are able to operate outside the law."

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/himab/license-to-pimp-documentary

"Imagine you have a totally legal job as – say – a waiter/waitress or maybe a taxi driver. You’re expected to make tips and you look forward to that. You actually usually do pretty well. So one day, your boss at the restaurant or taxi company says he’s noticed you’re doing so well that you will have to pay him an amount – say $75 – out of your tips by the end of each shift. If you don’t, you’re going to get suspended or fired. That would be unfair and illegal under employment standards laws.
Yet that is exactly what happens to many strippers working legally in American strip clubs, except they aren’t even offered any sort of guaranteed minimum wage. They have to pay these “stage fees” to go to work. That’s why Hima B, herself a former stripper out of San Francisco, set out to make License to Pimp. License to Pimp will be a feature documentary about the choices that three San Francisco strippers make as their employers engage in illegal labor practices.
I stripped in San Francisco during the 1990’s and witnessed strip clubs become increasingly greedy as they took more & more of the dancers’ tips. It wasn’t enough that they never paid strippers any wages but now they required us to pay to work…I saw many strippers turn tricks to make these fees. They weren’t empowered women who wanted to be prostitutes. They had sex for tips so they could pay the strip club pimps and avoid being fired. Those who refused to have sex found it difficult to make their quotas and were eventually fired or quit.
Most women work in strip clubs because they don’t want to prostitute. It’s a sexual boundary they make and every person has a right to determine what they’re comfortable with. It’s important to have places in the sex industry where women can be sexual but don’t have to have sex. And there’s nothing morally wrong with prostituting as long as you’re a consenting adult, can work safely & without violence, and can negotiate the terms of your work.
As stripping increasingly gains acceptance within popular culture, more and more women & teenagers enter this industry and are unaware of their rights & workplace realities. This documentary reveals the impact these illegal practices have on workers."

http://www.gender-focus.com/2012/06/19/strippers-deserve-labour-rights-too/#.T-Dy76aIoI4.facebook

I admire and applaud people that stand up for their rights. You might think that strippers should not have any rights but I am very happy to see that this issue is being acknowledged and taken seriously. I have paid an enormous amount in house fees over the years, if you add it all up.
Even paid penalty fees when being sick. I've seen fees collected by the clubs for all kinds of stuff.
And I've had nights when after many hours in the club and after paying all the fees to work, walked away with no profit or very little for myself.
If you ponder that for a second, you know it's not ok.
I am not fishing for anyone's sympathy, trust me. But if everybody else in the workforce can count on labor laws and employee rights,
why shouldn't dancers?
I am tempted to file my own lawsuit. Anyone care to join me? 🙂
And yes, I am going to pledge to help Hima raise the money she needs for her project.

Got an email today from a girl that had asked me a while back how she could get hired at Heartbreakers. I think at least 40 or more girls have asked me so far. They read about Heartbreakers in the blog and then I get an email from them. I am glad to help in any way I can.

This is what she had to say. Her name is Sandi.
"Hey girl! In Williston! Got my wallet stolen yesterday but thanks to your help I already had an in and I get to work at heartbreakers tonight! Thank god! Thank you!!!!!"

My email is tatianasupernova@yahoo.com
🙂