NightMoves on ice: fractured reflections on the porn star awards weekend (pics NSFW)

"It will make your asshole feel amazing," Carmen Valentina says by way of convincing me to get a Brazilian bikini wax.

In another circumstance, I might assume she's giving me a much needed suggestion, the same way a friend might offer a mint to a person with bad breath. But, while Valentina has seen more than a few of the patrons meandering around Thee Dollhouse pantless, she has never seen me naked. This is merely the kind of conversation I tend to find myself in each October at the NightMoves Awards Show Weekend — a four day marathon of partying with dozens of porn stars at strip clubs across Tampa Bay.

What follows are my fractured memories, lessons learned, and glimpses at some of the photos I am willing to share with you, and my wife, from the infamous weekend.

* * *
Two hours before the first adult star flew into town, the owner of NightMoves Magazine, Paul Allen, went to the hospital where he remained for the entirety of the weekend passing a kidney stone.
* * *

Lesson 1: You can plan a pretty porn star picnic, but you can't control your penis.

* * *
A porn performer who we'll call Miss Colorado phoned Tracy Allen to tell her that she was waiting to be picked up at the airport. It was several hours before the starlet's plane was scheduled to arrive. Allen quickly discovered the problem: Instead of catching her connecting flight to Tampa, Miss Colorado walked to the baggage claim in Denver.
* * *
Lesson 2: Porn performers are not paid to be smart, or even sober. However, the sober and smart ones are the ones who become actual stars.
* * *

A photographer who I'll call Mack, earns a spot as my new best friend when he perpetually asks adult entertainers things like, "Can I take a picture of you giving Shawn a lap dance?"

Unfortunately, Mack's BFF status is nearly revoked when he convinces Angelina Castro that sitting on my face would make for a great photo. Considering that there is a substantial chance I will drown in Castro's 52-inch ass, I ask if I can cover my face with a scuba mask and snorkel, or at least a towel. Mack loses faith in me as a man (many guys would pay to be suffocated by Castro's ass). He thought I was an adventurous writer ready to dive into new experiences for the sake of a good story.

As a compromise, we take a series of photos with me resting on Castro's 49-inch boobs. They are not like pillows. They are like a set of memory foam mattresses.

* * *

Lelu Love is into chicken farming, which is not the name of a twisted sex act. She actually raises chickens on the new property she acquired with the money she makes off her sex site.

* * *
Lesson 3: A career in porn can be a viable route to achieving the 1950's vision of the American Dream, so long as that dream does not involve landing a job that requires an extensive background check.
* * *

The other night, Eve Banks made $400 dancing nude at Mons Venus. It was a slow night. I ask if she has a business plan for all her earnings, as I have a few projects she should invest in, like the Shakespearean play I've adapted into an x-rated screenplay. She is saving to buy a Dominos Pizza franchise. I have the genius idea of hiring strippers to deliver her pizzas. Despite my obvious brilliance, Eve fails to recruit me as her business consultant.

* * *
Lesson 4: Nude dancers are rarely accused of being financially savvy, but on the whole I would bet most dancers' bank accounts are healthier than the majority of recent college graduates. And most of them are smart enough not to take investment advice from a guy who has to save up to buy a Dominos' pizza — a single pie as opposed to an entire franchise.
* * *

A featured dancer, who shall remain nameless, would not recommend the at-home kit she recently purchased to bleach her asshole. I assumed that anal bleaching was something that should be left to the professionals. From what she tells me, it is a simple process that involves a paintbrush and a mirror. Still, what if you screw up? Could you end up with an albino asshole?

The dancer insists that the procedure is absolutely necessary. She claims her asshole is as dark as her nipples. To provide a visual aid, she pops out one of her boobs.

As strange as anal bleaching seems, I suppose it's no stranger than doctors circumcising dicks with less care than tailors put into shortening the sleeves of suit jackets. Still, this gets me wondering what body modification trends will be popular in the future.

Since the 70s, adult entertainers have been on the vanguard of nude fashion. They set the trends for shaved pubic hair, breast implants, and now anal bleaching. In twenty years, I wonder if we will watch old pornos and think, "I can't believe they didn't bleach their nipples. That's so 2012."

* * *

A dancer named Trina at Bare Assets can pick up a beer bottle with her fake tits. The trick is admittedly juvenile, but it also combines two elements most men love, which means her little display is more entertaining to most males than watching Criss Angel pull a rabbit out of David Blaine's ass.

* * *
Jason Lange of Honey Hole Entertainment tells me of a promo he did in which he hired a guy to walk around in a banana hammock, handing out flyers. I inquire about the process of applying for a paid position as a banana hammock-wearing flyer-jockey. Lange hires me on the spot without asking to see my credentials. His enthusiasm makes me nervous. To reassure me, Lange promises to get me drunk and drive me around in a limo full of strippers during the event. I wonder which would potentially lead to a more awkward situation: doing promo work alone in a banana hammock, or while surrounded by performers whose job it is to arouse men?
* * *

Ron Jeremy sits alone on a stool, sleeping, at Déjà Vu. He is notorious for his ability to nod off anywhere, at anytime. In the documentary about his life, Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy, there's an entire section of the film devoted to him falling asleep in strange places, including at the wheel of his car. I suppose if you have lived his life, a dark strip club may seem like home, or at least a comfortable place to nap.

* * *
A female strip club patron walks up to my cameraman and leans in for an open-mouthed kiss. She then follows him around the club saying things like, "We can leave whenever you want." We soon exit without her. The next day a guy from NightMoves tells me that after we left, that same woman sat in the corner crying.
* * *
Lesson 5: If a woman has the sex drive of a man, there's a good chance she is a man, or a hustler. At the very least she's ovulating and wants you to fill her up with babies.
* * *

Charlee Chase and Vicky Vette are topless and making out in a champagne room at Déjà Vu. I am the only one who seems to notice, though I keep averting my eyes. It's like looking at the sun. You can't stare too long without feeling like you're doing something terribly wrong.

* * *
I must consciously remind myself that just because Eve Banks casually informs me that she is not wearing underwear, and even though she keeps buying shots for the group without trying to pawn the bill off on me, she is not interested in having an elicit affair with me, nor hiring me to be her roadie for her feature dancing appearances across the country.
* * *
Lesson 6: Many dancers don't turn off their overtly flirtatious personalities when they are off the clock, and many don't bother putting their underwear back on either.
* * *

While I order a beer at the bar next to Déjà Vu, Hammerhead Harry's, a blonde named Melanie saddles up beside me. Mack and I met her earlier when she was groping another young woman at the bar in the guise of dancing.

"That guy over there wouldn't leave me alone," Melanie says, pointing across the bar. "He wouldn't stop talking about assholes."

"So what the hell are we going to talk about?"

I ask if it is her night off from dancing next door. Melanie is offended. She's not a stripper. It's her friend's night off from dancing next door — the one who just left with three dudes.

Melanie is dressed in workout attire fit for a strip-aerobics class. She informs me that she is not wearing a bra or panties. As if I doubt her sincerity, she jerks down parts of her outfit to prove it. Melanie orders us shots, which I am against taking. I assume she is just using me to buy her drinks, but then she pulls out a wad of cash from her Coach bag. When the drinks are done, she mentions that she likes women too and asks if I will buy her a shot from the shot-girl. I consent.

The shot-girl delivers the shot by straddling Melanie on a bar stool and letting her suck the test-tube shot out of the shot-girl's cleavage. The two women fall from their shared stool, flinging my full beer across the bar in the process. I wish I could say I walked away.

* * *
Lesson 7: Always be suspicious of women who party in strip clubs. Even if they aren't dayshift strippers who will expect you to pay for the bottle of champagne they order from their stripper friends, these women come with their own set of problems.
* * *
"Did you find out how much those two prostitutes at the bar were charging?" Mack asks when I return to Deja Vu from Hammerhead Harry's.

I try to defend Melanie, but Mack is a better judge of women than me. That afternoon at the Fan Fest he recruited a woman to perform in a double blow-job scene within hours of meeting her.

* * *

The 20th annual NightMoves Awards Show kicks off with the national anthem. At the end of the song, the man next to me turns and says, "And the hookers take the field."

* * *
Lesson 8: Never wear a shirt with pearl-snap buttons around women who remove clothing for a living.
* * *
"My grandparents are in my pornos," Angelina Castro tells me. "I interview them about sex. When it comes to sex, nothing is new. They have done it all."

Instead of dildos, her grandmother used food, like cucumbers and plantains. In her large, Cuban family, sex is not a big deal.

"If I got drunk and came home, my mother would slap me," Castro says. "But I could suck twenty dicks and my mother couldn't say a thing."

* * *

Prinzzess Felicity Jade performs a different dance routine every night. One of her performances ends with guys using squirt guns loaded with oil to hit various anatomical bulls-eyes on her naked body. In another performance, she gets naked while whipping up a batch of magical muffins that violate a number of health codes. Her efforts pay off when she wins Best Feature Dancer. If she had not won, I cannot imagine what kind of stunts she would attempt to pull on stage next year. Maybe something with midgets—midgets and chainsaws.

* * *
James Bartholet accepts so many awards for all the porn parodies he's in that he runs out of acceptance speeches. His productivity is particularly impressive considering that he doesn't have sex on screen. That's like a guy being repeatedly cast in musicals despite not being able to sing or dance.
* * *

Some porn stars look like the older sibling of the person in their promo photos. Ron Jeremy uses photos from at least a decade ago, though this disparity is not all that shocking, as he is famous for being bulbous, unkempt, hairy, unwashed, and for wearing parachute pants to accommodate his mammoth dick.

A few stars like Prinzzess and Adrianna Luna are far more attractive in person—to the point where you wonder how they chose porn over fashion or fitness modeling.

Bonnie Rotten's promo photos cannot keep up with the ever-changing canvas that is her body. Her breast implants are so new they have yet to be featured on film. She has one of the sexiest bodies at the show paired with some of the strangest tattoos. A skyline of Babylon sits atop her chest. Spider webs radiate around her nipples and hang in her armpits. A bearded woman looks back at you from her shoulder. Of all her tattoos, this last one actually makes the most sense to me as it offers a commentary on porn stars: beautiful freaks who are paid to be ogled.

* * *

Women from 2001 Odyssey always perform the most dynamic pole tricks at the NightMoves Awards Show. One petite Asian woman named Gogo with "trouble" tattooed on her side, seems so comfortable flipping around on stage, you'd think she grew up with a jungle gym in her backyard that consisted of a solitary, vertical pole. Gogo has been nominated for Best Nude Dancer in Tampa Bay for most of the ten consecutive years that 2001 Odyssey has won for Best Nude Club. Yet she's never taken home the title. This brings up an interesting question. What criteria do you use to judge the quality of a nude dancer: beauty, how she looks naked, her pole tricks, or how much money she declares on her income taxes?

* * *
Lisa Ann does not so much give an acceptance speech as she threatens to use her trophy as a weapon against the creepers loitering around her table. I double-check to make sure I'm not one such creeper. You can never be too careful with porn stars. One minute you're having a casual conversation about assholes and the next you're being called a pervert.
* * *
Lesson 9: If the white guy with the gold grill can charm a porn star, so can you. All that is required is persistence and a willingness to be called a variety of insults by those who are not receptive to your advances.
* * *
My wife: "You must not have gotten any action at the party last night. You kept molesting me in your sleep. You must be getting lazy with your coverage."
* * *
Lesson 10: Your wife will forever be unimpressed by your failed attempts to pick up adult entertainers, which you pass off as self-restraint.

---

Follow Alfie on Twitter , Facebook , or at shawnalff.com