My girlfriend bought Diablo Cody's “Candy Girl: A Year in the Life on an Unlikely Stripper” at the Minneapolis airport a few months ago and on the flight back to Seattle I read over her shoulder for a minute: a graf on the icky fetishes of some of the customers. My first thought: “So much for sex tonight.”

Finally read it myself. Zip zip. It's a fun, breezy read. Also prefigures one aspect of JUNO in this description of Sex World:

“There was a red sofa shaped like Marilyn's pucker, and a pair of chairs shaped like stiletto heels. It was all very reminiscent of the eighties trend toward 'wacky' high-concept furniture; I half-expected to see a hambuger phone.”

But it also reminded me of Jim Bouton's “Ball Four.” Both books are year-in-the-life stories regarding jobs (major league baseball player, stripper) that most of us can't get or don't want; but we relate because Bouton and Cody, in these occupations, suffer the way we suffer. I.e., the boss is an idiot.

Read here for Bouton. In Diablo's case it's more than the moustache-men and their fines over at Deja Vu; it's also the thick (in both senses) female manager at Dollhouse who leaves the following note:

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN I WANT THESE LIGHTS ON ALL THE TIME I DONT CARE HOW THEY MAKE YOU LOOK OR IF YOUR GETTING A HEADACHE IF I FIND THEM TURNED OFF YOULL RECIVE A WRITTEN WARNING AND OH YES I WILL WRITE YOU UP FOR SOME DUMD SHIT LIKE THE LIGHTS NOT BEING ON TRY ME ANY QUESTIONS

“Dumd shit.” You can't make that up.