Two Dudes, a pornshopgirl, and Some Really Awkward Pickup Attempts

It’s inevitable that if you’re working at a porn store, dudes are going to try and pick you up. I’m no Megan Fox by any means, but I wasn’t beaten to death with the ugly stick either, so it’s happened before. Plus, these dudes have no standards, so lucky ole’ me gets to be the object of their horny affections. On this special night, not just one, but TWO dudes stepped up to the challenge of Hitting on the Girl Who Sells You Your Porn.

Here’s the thing- I don’t mind harmless flirting. I’m the kind of gal who will smile and giggle at a tree stump if it’s got something clever to say and wiggles its eyebrows at me suggestively, and if I’ve had a couple drinks, prepare yourself, because I’m extra huggable and you’re bound to get smooched (on the cheek, you pervs.) That being said, even at the porn store, if you’re nonthreatening, clearly not looking for anything  beyond simple conversation, and appear to have bathed within the last month, I’ll play along. Hey, I’m there for 7 and a half hours and I’ve likely already read all the magazines we’ve got.

These two dudes, however, were none of those things.

The first guy walks in near the beginning of my shift. Since it’s slow, I’m reading one of those “101 Sex Tips for Couples” books we’ve got. Like I said, I get bored easily and it’s the only reading material we’ve got.  Homeslice walks in, fairly attractive, but not nearly attractive enough to back up the swagger he’s trying to pull off.  Leans on the counter, does the head-tilt, eyebrow-waggle thing, and says, “Giiiiiiirrrrl…how YOU doin’?”

Now, my dad is a HUGE “Friends” fan, so it’s all that was ever on TV in our house and I’ve probably seen every single episode. As a result, when Homeslice thought he was pulling off THIS:

"Damn girl. You so fine. I'ma tip my fedora and seduce you with my seductive seducing voice."

…all I could see was THIS:

"I WANT GIRLS ON BREAD!"

So clearly he’s already got a lot going for him. I try to hold back a snort and say, “Not much. Slow night,” and go back to my Sex Tips book. One of my regulars then comes in and asks for tokens, so I mark my page with a piece of receipt tape and go ring him up.  I come back, my makeshift bookmark is on the counter, and Joey Homeslice is thumbing through the book.

Okay, first, I don’t care WHO you are, you lose my page and I will kick you in the junk so hard it pops out your ass.  Second, um, excuse me? Did your mother teach you that it was cool to just take other people’s property without asking? Awesome. Finally, come ON, you guys…it’s a sex tips book, of COURSE he’s going to take it the wrong way:

Joey Homeslice: “Damn, girl, are these all the fine things you gonna do to me?”

PSG (Wow, you’re already assuming I’m even REMOTELY interested enough to sleep with you. You’s a bold kid, Homeslice, a bold kid.) : “No. It’s a store book. Just reading because I’m bored.”

Joey Homeslice, after tossing my book on the counter, then picks up a free catalogue we give to customers: “What’s this?”

PSG (YOU JUST LOST MY PAGE, YOU DOUCHE, I HATE YOU SO HARD): “It’s a catalogue. It’s free, you can take one if you want.”

Joey Homeslice, after flipping a page and seeing an ad for a gay-oriented toy company: “SHIT, GIRL, I AIN’T INTO THAT. You think I’m GAY? ‘COS I AIN’T GAY.”

PSG (Awesome,  you’re a homophobe too. You just keep getting increasingly more attractive…to my foot. Who would like to make an acquaintance with your ass.): “Dude. It’s just a magazine. There’s straight stuff in there too, chill.”

Homeslice: “Sorry girl, I ain’t into toys for just me. But I gotta say, I’d buy you any one of these toys up in here if you-“

PSG (Aw, HELLLLLLL NAH): “Nope. Not happening.”

And that’s where the conversation ended, because we got busy and I studiously ignored him until he slunk out.  Homies, take note: if you act a fool, pornshopgirl will shut down your swagger fosho.

So, a couple hours go by with no incidents, and I finally finished my book. (Which, by the way, was a stupid one; it was all hippie shit about ‘getting in touch with your partner’s soul and knowing each other’s inner being‘. Nothing remotely useful like a diagram of “Hit this button for maximum overdrive”. Lame.) I’m at the front counter, organizing the DVDs, when Sk8r Vamp walks in. Oh, dear god. This guy’s probably in his late 20s or early 30s, dressed like a thirteen-year-old punk- spiked hair, baggyass pants full of chains, Discman (no shit, a Discman) blaring loud enough to hurt my ears, CHECK.  He’s come into the store before and was perfectly polite, so I gave him a nod and went back to organizing. He walks around browsing for a bit, then comes up and settles near the counter.  He pulls out his headphones and starts his attempt:

Sk8r Vamp: “Have you heard of Bullet for My Valentine? That’s who I was listening to, they’re pretty good.”

PSG: “Yeah, they’re alright.”

Sk8r Vamp: “You know that movie Queen of the Damned, the vampire one? I love that soundtrack. When I listen to it I get a little vampire-like, if you know what I mean. In bed.”

Oh, Christ, we’ve got ourselves a Twilight moron. Another visual comparison? Why yes, I do have one at the ready. Here’s what this overgrown punkass sees himself as:

"Gaze deep into my sparkly sixpack, for it holds the secret of life."

Aaaaaaand here’s what I saw:

"My fangs! My fangs fell out because they're made of plastic! WOE UNTO THE WORLD"

Super.  I have no words for this, so I just nod weakly and return to the movies, hoping he’ll just go away. They never go away.

Sk8r Vamp: “So, have you heard of XYZ (a bar in town)? Have  you been there?”

PSG: “Yup.”

Sk8r Vamp: “Well, I’m real close friends with the owner-” (Sure you are, slick.) “-and he gave me this super exclusive-” (Not likely.) “-once in a lifetime-” (Doubtful.) “-card, it lets me and a guest get in with no cover charge-” (There’s never a cover charge there, dumbass. Nice try.) “-just because. Once in a lifetime chance, you know. Super exclusive.”

PSG, at this point mindlessly shifting around DVD cases just to avoid a legit conversation: “Nice.”

Sk8r Vamp: “So I’m guessing you probably (makes air-quotes) “have a boyfriend”, right?”

PSG, though she has no male companion: “Yup. Sorry.”

Sk8r Vamp: “What you sounding all depressed like that for? Is he not good to you?”

PSG (It’s because I’m talking to you, moron.): “No, he’s awesome. I’m just distracted, you see, ‘cos I’m trying to get some work done, here.”

Sk8r Vamp: “Cos you know, when I see a beautiful woman…..you know?”

PSG (If you try to show me your boner I’m going to kick you in it): “Uh, sure.”

Thankfully after a few minutes of awkward silence, he announced he had some “business to take care of” and left.

I’ll be sleeping with a stake under my pillow. Also a tazer.

You Never Forget Your First…

In relationships, they say you’ll never forget your first kiss, or your first serious boyfriend/girlfriend, or your first time getting laid.

In the adult sales industry, there’s a first you’ll ALWAYS remember: the first customer who brazenly asks questions about your sexual habits.

It’s to be expected that a lot of the customers, particularly the ones who have been coming to the store twice a week for several years, would be curious about the staff.  As with all customers, 99% are normal. While Neoboss was training me, if a (sane) regular came up and started to shoot the usual shit with her, she’d introduce me, and from then on out, we’d be able to have a perfectly normal conversation whenever they came in. The sane ones are a HUGE relief during a long crazy shift; it’s nice to look up when you hear the door open and know immediately that you can chill, that there won’t be any weird shit going down. One of the regulars, The Bouncer, even is the unofficial “bodyguard” for the staff (though, thank GOD, I’ve not had to ask him and hope I never will)- if he’s in the store and a creeper is lurking around, The Bouncer, will stick around until they leave, and will even stand guard in the parking lot while we close to make sure nobody follows us home. The Bouncer, like many of my customers, is a legit nice, normal dude.

For every nice guy, though, there’s a weirdo to keep you on your toes.

I was chilling at the front desk reading a magazine when an older dude came up. By “older dude”, I mean he was probably old enough to be my grandfather. A normal-enough looking big man with glasses, he’s the kind of guy you wouldn’t be surprised to see pulling on a Santa suit at Christmas for the youngest kids in the family. He paid for his tokens, gave a nod and said “Thanks, darlin'” as he walked to the back room. Nothing strange there- while the weirdos will pry for your personal info, the sane ones realize you probably don’t feel comfortable giving out even your name to a customer. As a result, it’s not unusual to hear “Hey doll, how’ve you been?” “Excuse me, darlin’,” “Thanks, little lady,” or “Have a good one, sweetheart” several times each during my shift. Like you’ll hear a lot here, 99% of the time, it isn’t creepy in the slightest; it’s more like how they’d probably address their usual waitress at their favorite restaurant, you know? Only instead of asking for a Denny’s Lumberjack Slam, they want to know if they can rent “A Lumberjack Slams Denny”.

Anyway, back to the old dude, the grandpa type. Normally, once they buy their first set of tokens (we require you purchase a small amount at the front desk before you go to the back room) they’ll stick to the machine that’s in the back room if they run out. This guy, however, kept coming up to the desk instead, and kept making idle chat as I rung him up. Like I said, not creepy behavior, just a little off the norm, if a porn store can have a norm. The last one, he decided to get personal. WAY WAY WAAAAAAAYY too personal.

(Note that anything italicized and in parentheses are my own thoughts, not part of the conversation.)

Old dude: “So, how long have you been working here now?”

PSG: “Just a couple weeks.”

Old dude: “You like it here, the store? Nice place to work?”

PSG: “Yeah, not too bad. Pays the bills and all that.”

Old dude: “I like it here, it’s a good store. I like to watch the movies, you know, ‘cos of the girls.”

PSG: (Odd…most don’t talk about their preferences unless they’re asking for a specific movie or something…) “Sure….”

Old dude: “I like the ones where the girls receive oral sex.”

PSG: “….”(Oh man…old dude’s breathing heavy...)

Old dude: “So, do you like oral sex?”

PSG: “….,……..” (you are the same age as my GRANDFATHER this is WEIRD)

Old dude: (clearly not noticing my complete horror) “You know, receiving it? Oral sex?”

PSG: “……………………” (A;SLDKJFA;LDSKJF;AL OH GOD WHY)

PSG: (in a polite, offhand tone) “I’m sorry, sir, but I’m uncomfortable discussing my personal life with customers.”

Oh yeah. That happened. Grandpa Breather tried to ask about my sexual habits. And then after? TRIED TO ACT LIKE HIS QUESTION WAS AN EVERYDAY CONVERSATION TOPIC.

Old dude: (surprised tone) “Well, it’s just a fact of life, you know. Everyone has oral sex, it’s just a fact of life.”

PSG: (still polite) “I don’t discuss my personal life with customers, sorry.”

Old dude: (starts walking out the door, mildly huffy tone) “….fact of life, everyone has it.”

…

A few weeks later, we got one of our weekly DVD shipments in, and what’s one of the new releases?

“Barely Legal with Old Men”.

No joke, that shit will HAUNT you.

The Regulars

Every store has regulars. A coffee shop will get the same businessmen on their way to work in the morning who come in and immediately order “the usual”.

Being a porn shop, you can probably imagine that our regulars sway just a TAD off the norm. We’ve got two who come in on a near-daily basis that we know by name: Latin Queen, and Mumbly.

The Latin Queen is easily one of my new favorite people. He’s not a creeper in the slightest, he’s actually pretty cool. A gay Hispanic man in his late thirties, LQ hardly ever even goes in the back room anymore; 99% of the time, he comes in just to chill with all of us that work there, the porn shop crew. He’ll go out drinking with Neoboss, flirt shamelessly with the very straight Bond, and gossip like an old maid with me and T-Mama. Since I’m relatively new at the shop, he fills me in on all the dirty dealings of other regular customers (you’ll be introduced to them eventually, I promise). It’s not unusual for me to be stacking movies or some shit,  hear the door chime, and turn around to see LQ leaning on the counter saying “Hey girlfriend, what’s new?” and for us to have a good half-hour chat about nothing in particular.

Mumbly, on the other hand, is one annoying motherfucker. Like LQ, he’s gay and in his late thirties (and is one of those creepy gingers), and comes in nearly every day.  While everyone in this blog is referred to by a nickname of some sort, this isn’t one- everyone calls him Mumbly, even the other customers. Why? WE CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT THE FUCK HE’S SAYING. Seriously, he talks like he’s got his mouth full of food (or dicks, durhurhurrr. Sorry. Working at a porn store means you turn everything into a dirty joke).  He’s perfectly harmless, but like I said, irritating as fuck. He’ll stand by the counter and mumble at you in one long run-on sentence,and it’s the same shit over and over (you can tell by the tenor of his mumbles)- some 20-year-old dude he’s fucking, how he was hungry and got some McDonalds or something, and how some dude is pissed at him and Mumbly wants me to beat him up. Seriously. Every goddamn day.  And he won’t just lurk at the front counter, he’ll go chill in the cave-o-cocks and wait around, trying to start up a mumblesation with a dude to find a hookup. Somehow he magically does, and it’s usually dudes a good ten or fifteen years younger than him. Damned if any of us know how he does it. Usually we ignore him as best as we can; I usually grab an industry magazine and read and pretend to listen while occasionally throwing in a “Mhmm,” “Really?”, or “For sure.” He’ll eventually lose interest or find a piece of ass and be on his way, but some days I’m just about ready to punch him in the asshole and kick him out.

Those are the only regulars that we have conversations/mumblesations with on a daily basis.  There’s a few others that come in regularly:

Spoof- a fairly cool dude in his early thirties. He almost always previews porn parodies (example: Not the Cosbys, Pornstar Superheroes, Octopussy XXX 3-D), hence his name. We have legit conversations about True Blood and other shows we both love, but god help you if he somehow gets started on World of Warcraft or one of his other online games…then he’s almost as bad as Mumbly.

Boozer- Like Spoof, Boozer’s in his early thirties and almost exclusively previews. He generally comes in with a large bottle of Gatorade, but it’s more alcohol than Gatorade. He’ll have us pause his preview every fifteen minutes so he can go smoke, which gets annoying as hell, especially if he’s out smoking too long (the machine clicks once for every new preview. If we have it stopped too long, it clicks again, which fucks up our paperwork.) He gets progressively drunker as the day goes on, and he’s prone to falling asleep in a drunken stupor. For him, other drunks, and hobos, we have a legitimate stick at the front desk to poke them awake with. Haven’t had to use it yet, thankfully.

Lube Cabbie- A dude probably in his forties or fifties, perfectly pleasant, who will usually make polite conversation about the weather. He’s a cab driver, and every week, without fail, he’ll come in for the usual: a bottle of Swiss Navy silicone lube.  A whole four-ounce bottle- which would usually last somebody at LEAST two months- every week. Christ, dude, are you using it for shower gel or something?

Next time: why hitting on the chick who sells you your porn is a stupid choice!

You Must Be 18 or Older to Enter

So our store is set up pretty much like any other adult store. For those of you who are pretending you’ve never been in such a place and are asking what it looks like anyway, here’s the layout:

The store is set up into thirds. One third of the store is the movie section. These are organized into New Releases, Sale, and then categorized into either production studio or genre. We only have the cases on display; the actual movies are kept behind the desk until you purchase, rent, or preview them. The movie section, since it is most visited by males, also features male toys: the Fleshlight, jackoff sleeves, and penis pumps.  And I gotta admit, every time I go by that section, I can’t help but think of Austin Powers…”One Swedish-made penis enlarger pump.” I don’t think any of ours are Swedish though.

The next third of the store is the toy section. There’s two huge racks for magazines, a small wall for condoms and cockrings, a display for lubes and lotions, a display for miscellaneous stuff, and an incense rack. All of the walls here display different sex toys, by category: anal, dildos, vibrators, rabbits, bondage, stimulators, lingere, party gags, and clearance. Personally, I include the front desk area as part of the toy section, since it’s closest to that and has more products up there: sexual enhancement pills and creams, some candy novelties, hairdye for your downstairs (because you KNOW you want a purple pelt), and some random toys we have overstock of. Behind the front desk, we’ve got all the actual discs from the movies, batteries for testing toys before they leave the store, the DVD players and small screen for previews, and all our miscellaneous crap.

The last third isn’t actually on the main floor of the store. In professional terms, it’s called an arcade. Personally, I call it “the back room”, “the booths”, or “the cave of many cocks”.  There’s an open doorway next to the front desk leading to a dark back room- the arcade. In here, there are nine regular booths and three preview booths. In the regular booths, there are sixteen channels, each with a different movie; put tokens in and pick a channel. The preview booths work a little differently. For movies under a certain time limit, a customer can watch the whole thing for a flat rate of a few bucks. If he decides to buy it after, we knock that fee off the price of the DVD.  This is called a preview; we keep the DVD players up front and start the movie for the customer, who can then fast forward or rewind at his leisure. We have a small screen up front to make sure the movies are set up and playing properly, but there’s no sound. That can be pretty amusing. Since one of the first things a person sees when walking in is me, right next to a tv screen with frantic fucking on the screen, a lot of my conversations with first-time customers go a little like this:

“Customer: Oh god.

PSG: ….what?

Customer: Is that….is she….

PSG: (follows their line of sight to the screen) Oh yeah. Sasha Grey is definitely banging a dude who’s wearing a bear suit.”

Yeah, we’re not horribly professional here. It’s kinda hard to be when you’re talking about dicks all day. Who’s “we”, you ask? That’d be the porn store crew! There are four of us total: Neoboss, Bond, T-Mama, and me, PSG.

Neoboss is the manager. She’s in her mid-thirties and chill as all get-out. She works the morning shift Monday through Friday, and she’ll usually call in at least once during our shift to just chat and see how things are going. She’s amazingly organized and determined to run a successful shop, which we are- she brought the store up some 15 percent in sales last year. There’s no “if you have time to lean,  you’ve got time to clean!” nonsense here. She gets that you can only wipe a counter so many times before you start rubbing the varnish off, so as soon as our basic cleaning chores are done for the day, we’re done. We can read during our shifts, but only if they’re store magazines, so either the skin mags like Hustler and Penthouse, or the industry mags, like Adult Video News or one of the toy catalogs behind the desk.  She doesn’t yell at us for swearing or talking back at rude customers…mostly because she does it more than any of us. She’ll be the first to chase down an asshole for flipping the bird as he walks out, just so she can give him what-for as he drives away.

Bond, the assistant manager, is the lone male of the store. No, he’s not called Bond for some pervy reason, you dicks, it’s because he’s your average late-twenties dude who loves James Bond movies. He’s the first one to snap up the Bond parodies when we get them in the store (employees get free rentals). My first shift, one of our regular customers, Spoof, came in and asked him how the Octopussy 3-D parody was; they had a good ten-minute discussion about it. Bond is the store’s movie guru; if a customer wants a recommendation or asks how this or that movie was, we call Bond over.  Whenever we do shift change, there’s usually a dance party involved, or excited discussions over this week’s “How I Met Your Mother” episode.

T-Mama and I are on the low rung of the ladder, the clerks. T-Mama’s in her late twenties with three kids, and she also cracks me up. Bond, T-Mama, and I make up and evening and weekend shifts. Most of my and T-Mama’s shifts overlap for shift change, so we see each other all the time. She’s also quick to call out customers on their rudeness, and she’ll forewarn me of any creepers in the back room to prepare me for their antics.  Out of all of us, she’s the one who most often takes advantage of the employee 40% discount- girl buys stuff pretty much every other shift.

So, that’s our happy little family in our twisted little home.  Tune in a couple hours from now for more on the Regulars and some creepy dudes!

Hi, I sell buttplugs for a living!

Yeah, thought that’d get your attention.

Anyway, WHAT UP. I’m pornshopgirl, or PSG. I’m a twentysomething sex-positive (look it up) female, and I work at a shop in a town on the globe. That shop sells porn and sex toys.

Naturally, I get some pretty strange characters walking in to make some preeettyyyy interesting purchases. Here’s where you get to read about them. GET EXCITED, YA’LL.

Before we get to the good shit, let’s set some ground rules, yeah?

1. Put the haterade back in the fridge, yo. That means play nice in the comments- be civil to fellow commenters; be civil to me; I’ll be civil to all you pervs. Don’t be a dickbag, and we won’t have any problems. Any comments of such a nature will be deleted immediately.

2. Though I’m an atheist, I’m pulling out the Bible for this one (that’s right, heathens can do it too!): Judge not lest ye be judged. This goes for both family and friends that I invite to read this, along with whoever else shows up. Before you go on a tirade about me working in a sick place or that I support people who diddle kids or that all my customers should be locked up, think about this: you all got here because two people somewhere did the nasty. Danced the horizontal tango. Made the beast with two backs. Simply put, somebody fucked someone else and you happened. It’s natural, and as long as everything is safe, sane, and consensual, it’s normal. That’s what being sex-positive means: I firmly believe that sex, as long as it is safe, sane, and consensual, should not be taboo, that it should be an open topic, and that all abstinence-only education should be replaced with safer sex education. This means before you all make a comment, think for a second. Think about those fuzzy handcuffs in your nightstand, that dildo the size of your forearm under the bed, the gallon-size bucket of warming lube (oh yeah. they sell them in GALLON BUCKETS. I shit you not.) in the closet–don’t you even lie, you know those are all there. Each and every one of you. That’s all I ask- think before you comment. I might swear more than a fucking sailor. I’ll bag up your vibrating cockring with a smile and ask if you’ll be needing any batteries today. I’ll candidly talk about sex and buttholes and every inappropriate thing you can imagine like it’s part  of an average conversation: “I had a grilled cheese for lunch. And I sold a fat trucker a stripper pole and a Fleshlight, he was cool.” And you know what? It’s all my choice, so if you’ve got an issue, get to steppin’, because I don’t want to hear your whining.

Cool? Cool.

Start watching this page for everything you’ve all been waiting for, the good dirty stuff that follows the “Ya want fries wit dat?” equivalent for adult stores…

Would you like lube with that?