The quest for inspiration

Inspiration for writers...well, any creative types, I would guess...comes in waves. There are times when having eight arms to write down all the good ideas coming at you wouldn't be enough. Then there are other times where it's impossible to get excited enough about any one thing to even bother jotting it down. Lately, I've been feeling kind of...flat. I usually don't worry about it because eventually, these highs and lows tend to correct themselves, usually via some internal mechanism. But sometimes, during what seems like an extended dry spell, I find myself looking for an external stimulus of some sort.

I asked a comedian friend about this and here's the advice I got...

"Tell you what you do; go to a strip club. One of the good ones..."

"Oh, I don't know, man. Strip clubs really aren't my thing..."

"Hear me out. Not a skeevy dive, a nice place."

"How do I know if it's a nice place? Is there a web site that ranks them by likelihood of contracting hepatitis?"

"A nice place is the kind that serves food."

"Food?"

"Yeah, you can get a full steak dinner with everything."

"Not on a buffet, I hope."

"No, a buffet wouldn't be good. 'Destiny, I found one of your pasties in the creamed corn again'."

"They have creamed corn on the buffet? Oog." 

"No, these places have a menu and you order a steak with lobster and even a baked potato and they cook it to order and bring it out to your table."

"Just like a regular restaurant."

"Right. Well, that plus boobs."

"So a steak dinner is your advice for getting me inspired? Why don't I just go to Outback?"

"It's not about the steak dinner. That's just your indicator that it's a nice place."

"Okay, so then what?"

"Then get yourself the best stripper. And I don't necessarily mean at this club; you might have to try other nice clubs. But you're looking for The Best One. There is always one who is prettier than all the rest of them. Not all tatted up and cracked out with a boyfriend named Diego and notices from DCF jammed between the baby seats in her '97 Dodge Neon."

"This has suddenly become a very specific description..."

"Actually, you'd be surprised how generic that description is."

"If you say so..."

"More important than how pretty The Best One is, she's classier than the rest of them. You can tell by the way she carries herself. Got more going on upstairs too. She's definitely a cut above the rest of the herd."

"Strippers gather by the herd? Huh. I would have guessed flock or litter."

"You'll know her when you see her. She's a magical creature and she shouldn't even be here. She shouldn't even exist, but she does."

"This is a stripper you're talking about and not a unicorn, right?"

"Why is this woman a stripper? Is there some deep, dark secret or is she doing it for kicks? Who knows? Who cares?"

"Wow."

"She's usually busy so you'll have to wait for her but it's worth it. Ignore the skanks, sit there and have a drink, be patient and when you get a chance, go talk to her. Offer to buy her a drink. That will usually get her to sit with you. Once you've engaged her and have her undivided atention, that's when you go to work."

"Ah, okay! You try out material on her, entertain her, get her to laugh and when she does, your confidence is boosted. Then you feel better about yourself and it allows you to go home and write! I get it now."

"What? No. That's stupid. Why would I waste time trying out material on some dumb stripper who just wants my money? No, you waste her time just long enough to where she's ready to get up and leave and then you give her just enough money to let you touch her on the butt."

"...Oh."

I probably won't go to a strip club but what I think he was saying is sometimes you have to indulge yourself. I may give that a try. Does anybody know if I'd need reservations at Outback on a Friday night?