Fuck You, Pay Me #19: Best of Forbes.com

This is part 19 of “Fuck You, Pay Me,” an ongoing series of posts on writing, editing, and publishing.

Off and on for a period of many years, I was a contributor to Forbes.com. Earlier this month, I decided to refocus my energies away from someone else’s website and on my newsletter, The Reverse Cowgirl. Here are some of the best things I posted on Forbes.com, from the Oscars of porn to the biggest strip club in America.

“Porn Blind”

To my right, an older man—maybe 60, or 70—is reading the evening's program with a small yellow flashlight.

To my left, a young Asian woman is studying her program as if cramming for a final.

"WE CAN'T HEAR YOU!" a man behind us screams.

On the stage, a woman whose breasts risk overflowing the neckline of her sparkling dress is at the microphone, but there is a technical difficulty, and we can't hear what she's saying.

It doesn't really matter. This is porn.

“How the Biggest Strip Club in America Grinds”

If you drive north from Miami, Florida, on Interstate 95 to Miami Gardens and make a series of turns, you'll end up at the front door of Tootsie's Cabaret, the biggest strip club in America.

On the late Friday afternoon I was there, the massive parking lot was filling up slowly. A valet directed me to the VIP parking, where I was greeted and led down a maze of hallways to an office past a stack of shelves overflowing with a rainbow of Tootsie's T-shirts to the office of Ed Anakar, the director of operations and president of RCI Management Services Inc. In other words, he works for RCI Hospitality Holdings, a publicly-traded, Houston-based corporation that until last year was known as Rick's Cabaret. Today, RCI operates over 40 establishments in the hospitality space, among them: Rick's Cabaret and Vivid Cabaret in New York City, Bombshells in Houston and Down in Texas Saloon in Austin, and Club Onyx in Charlotte and The Seville in Minneapolis. You can find RCI on the NASDAQ under RICK.

“Paul Manafort's Purported $15,000 Ostrich Jacket Is the Talk of the Trial”

Who would spend $15,000 on an ostrich jacket? If you believe Assistant U.S. Attorney Uzo Asonye, Paul Manafort would. The high-priced fashion item was cited today on the first day of the trial of the lobbyist and former President Donald Trump campaign manager. Manafort has been charged with 18 counts of bank and tax fraud. He is being tried in Alexandria, Virginia.

Asonye made the assertion in court in an effort to shed light on Manafort's income and seemingly extravagant spending habits. According to the Washington Post, “the most peculiar new detail [Asonye] offered was on Manafort's spending, explaining how the lobbyist spent so much on menswear. He had a $15,000 jacket, Asonye said, ‘made from an ostrich.’”

“Playboy Is Naked Again and It Is Awesome”

Playboy is back to peddling nudes.

Just in time for Valentine's Day, Playboy has announced its 63-year-old magazine will return to publishing naked women.

In 2015, the magazine, faced with competition from the internet where anything goes when it comes to sex, stopped running images of unclothed young ladies.

By all accounts, including my own, the results were terrible.

Now, Playboy Enterprises is back in the skin game with its March/April 2017 issue.

I took the liberty of downloading a copy. (Want one? It's $5.99.)

Here's why I like it.

“The Hardest Thing About Being a Male Porn Star”

You might think being a male porn star is easy. Have sex for a living? That's a piece of cake.

So, what can some of the biggest woodsmen in the porn business teach us about work?

As it turns out, guys who get it up for a paycheck have something to offer when it comes to career advice.

I heard from seven of Porn Valley's biggest studs via email and got the secrets to becoming a successful working stiff.

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