Traveling stripper lifestyle

Pic: The ladies bathroom at my club of the week.

First off, I managed to get a last minute booking for the rest of this week at the same club I'm booked into for the first week of August. This is convenient because it's fairly close to next week's booking. This club is about 4000 times better than the place I just left! It is surprisingly nice inside, with proper stages and lighting, well-kept and clean public spaces, and a very spacious dressing room with lots of counters and mirrors, a refrigerator and microwave. There's even a separate smoking section so non-smokers such as myself don't have to deal with all that second-hand smoke. The club area is smoke-free. So nice!

While my traveling stripper lifestyle certainly is not boring, it is far from glamorous. No fancy hotels or awesome nightlife. It can be a gruelling schedule, so efficiency and planning are extremely important.

Distance between towns is a major consideration when booking each week on the road. Most of the clubs I work these days are in small towns and are open Monday-Saturday. As a "road girl" you work the full week, leaving only Sunday to pack up, drive to the next town and get ready for the next week.

I prefer camping over staying in hotels for a few reasons: cost-saving, living in a tent forces me to keep up at the gym because I use them for showers, I keep a better routine because the weather wakes me up before noon so I sleep right after work, and there are no bed bugs in my tent! Admittedly, I'm a bit paranoid of hotels since the bed bug incident.

Sometimes I will sleep in my minivan in a Wal-Mart parking lot. It is quite comfortable, and with the dark tinted side windows and sunshades blocking the front and rear, I have privacy while being inconspicuous in plain sight, as well as shade from the sun.

There is always wifi available somewhere so I can keep up with my internetting, locating new clubs to work, schedule planning, etc. Sometimes I find it in truckstops, laundromats, internet cafes, hotel parking lots (ha), libraries, occasionally even at the strip club!

Each week, I search the internet for campgrounds, gyms, banks, post office, health / organic food stores or cafes and wifi in the town I'm working the following week. I also research clubs and work on my route a few weeks out. Generally, you have to book work at least a month in advance so the planning process is a near-constant endeavor.

I keep everything locked in my car while camping so organization is also important. I keep my things organized each day so I don't have to waste time finding what I need for the gym or work.

My toothbrush and toothpaste live in a baggie my purse so I can brush my teeth on the go in a public bathroom or even outside using some of the bottled water I keep handy. When I first started doing this, I was a little nervous about people's reactions upon seeing me brushing my teeth where ever; however I quickly found that most people are surprisingly oblivious! If you act completely normal, most people barely notice.

My daily routine: Wake up around 10 or 11am, get to the bathroom and brush teeth, make sure I have clothes and work stuff in my work and gym bags, clean an apple, to eat as I head off to my wifi spot for the day. Internet, lunch, laundry or shopping if needed, gym, work. After work I will shower at my current gym or campground and get into my gym clothes for the next day, then bed. General work and gym/shower supplies live in those bags, so I only have to rotate clothes for the day.

I keep a bag of apples, paper towels and plastic utensils, a knife and cutting board, and protein bars in my grocery stash. I buy lunch and food for work at whatever health / grocery store I can find. I always bring healthy food to work to munch on during short breaks throughout the shift. Once weekly, I'll splurge on a nice restaurant meal or fast food to satisfy my cravings.

As you can probably see by now, it isn't difficult at all to maintain a healthy lifestyle on the road. In fact, with a bit of planning and experience, I find it easier than if I'm living in a "proper" home because I don't have time to get lazy :-)