I think it’s fair to say a majority of people would say that (fair or unfair) they tend to judge people’s intelligence around their occupation. Even if it’s not a conscious decision, most people pre-determine a person’s likely intelligence level based on what they do for a living. All you have to do is go to a bar in NYC for Happy Hour if you don’t believe me. When I was living in Manhattan we had a weekly Happy Hour that rotated around the city. This is a breading ground for men and women looking to meet new people… possibly that special someone… possibly that special someone for a night! More often than not the men are touting jobs much better and higher up the ladder than they actually have in reality. There can only be two reasons for that. They want to show the women their supreme intelligence and imply their robust money making power.
If you are still doubting my original thought just take the test. If you saw someone wearing a suit coming out of a building in Boston’s financial district at 6pm and you saw another person coming out of McDonald’s with their McD’s uniform on… be honest, you look at them both and automatically assume the person in the suit coming out of an office building is much smarter. I would like to challenge this thought. I would like to say that can be the correct assumption more than not, but there are plenty of instances where it is not the truth! Sometimes circumstance we are not aware of can lead to a smart person with a lesser job than we would have guessed. The flip side is also true where someone with a great job may have gotten to that position because of a family member or some other social connection that has no direct relation to their intelligence.
It was back in the year 2001 and it was my first trip to a wonderful place called Las Vegas. I went with a group of 7 other guys I was friends with at the time. We were staying at the Flamingo, which was located in the center of The Strip. I can remember the first time we rode down The Strip. The excitement was along the lines of waking up Christmas morning when you were 8 years old. I had never seen anything so wild before. I couldn’t wait to check into the hotel, throw my stuff in the room, and get outside to check everything out. We did some gambling in a few casinos. We went out to the pool to check out the scene and talent. We scouted out some food spots we wanted to hit later in the trip. Heck, I think we even walked into the Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum at The Venetian. Soon the day turned to night and The Strip exploded into sea of lights. The young ladies were out looking their very best. The skirts and dresses were shorter than K-Fed’s rap career. There were endless lines of creepy dudes making snapping noises with business cards to escort services on every corner. More over, the energy on The Strip was incredible. The mood was perfect to party and we were more than willing to join that mood. I had heard a number of stories about Vegas before being there, but hardly believed them. I heard it was a place where everyone had fun. People were friendly, looking to party and some were hoping to get rich and win their fortunes at the slots, blackjack, craps, or your table game of choice.
The guys and I had done some “pre-gaming” in the room thanks to a bottle of Captain Morgan and everyone’s favorite friend to love then hate, Jagermeister. The night started off at the Bellagio. We went to our favorite spot, Light. It is now called Bank, but it is one of the most fun bar/clubs I’ve ever been to. Light was like the Mecca of Vegas clubs for us. We had drinks and did some dancing. We talked to some groups of girls and had an all around fantastic time. After being there from 10pm-12:30am we decided to leave. I know what you are thinking… rookies. You’re 100% right, we left just when it was going to really get good. Hey, we were 22 years old and had never been to Vegas before. Anyways, we were walking up The Strip to go to another bar. As we were walking there were 2 girls I noticed across the way. They were smokin’ hot. A friend of mine needed to hit an ATM, so we needed to cross the street. I was more than willing to get a closer look at these two beauties. As we were waiting, a friend and I started chatting with the girls. They were very friendly and started to walk with our group when we started to head towards our next destination. I don’t know what I was saying, but they were loving every word out of my mouth like a fat kid loves cake. It was great. We got to the bar and I asked them where they where headed (hoping to meet up with them later on). They told me they were headed wherever I was going. Wow, this was incredible. Did I find the exact right amount of alcohol to consume to get me in the perfect zone with the ladies? I felt like Michael Jordan. Everything I threw up at the hoop was nothing but net! We went over to the bar area and this one girl with a cherry tattoo on her back left shoulder bought me a drink. Could things get better? Now they are buying me drinks. People were right about Vegas… this place rules!! We were chatting and I realized my friends were no longer in sight, but honestly I didn’t care. I was like a pitcher on the mound in the 9th inning with a no-hitter. I was straight up dealing. Everything was a strike. I couldn’t miss! I was on the kind of roll you dream of. Then the girl with the cherry asked me if I wanted to go up to her room. I thought, “you have to be kidding me?” I didn’t know what to say. My friends are never going to believe this. It felt like I was Brad Pitt going to a speed dating event with women dying for a decent man. I paused because I didn’t know what to say. I was not the “player” type so this was sort of out of my wheel house. I had to think about this for a second. The theme to Jeopardy was playing in my head for those few seconds of silence. Before I could figure out what to say she spoke again, “only $500 for 2 hours”. Suddenly I got that feeling like at the end of Fight Club when Ed Norton comes to the realization that Brad Pitt was merely a figment of his imagination and he was actually the one screwing Marla, the founder of Fight Club, and the leader behind Project Mahem. All I could hear in my head was the voice of the flight attendant on the trip out to Vegas saying, “please put your tray table and seat in the upright in the locked position… we are about to experience some major turbulence”. It was like my entire world was rocked at its foundation. I definitely gave her the deer in headlights look. I had never seen a hooker before, nevermind been propositioned by one in person. To me hookers were like Big Foot or the Lochness monster... not real, just creatures made up by people with vivid imaginations. I quickly told her no thanks and asked if she was a hooker… even though I already knew. She said, “of course cutie.” I expressed my disappointment and confirmed to her that I was not interested. She told me to hold on a second and asked me, “Do you gamble?” I said yes. She then said, “Well think of it this way… you are probably going to sit down at the black jack table with a few hundred dollars. You are probably going to lose that money and its likely going to happen in half an hour. What will you be left with then? Nothing! Or you could take that money, bring it upstairs, and I’ll show you the night of your life and give you an experience you’ll never forget… certainly better than losing in the casino for 30 minutes!” She had an excellent point. That was a well thought out argument. One might say a well crafted sales pitch. She could tell I was a smart, logical kind of person and used a persuasive argument that catered to my type of thought and reasoning. This girl was a smart cookie. I still told her that I don’t pay for sex and I’m not interested. Then instead of walking off, she actually started to negotiate. The price went from $500 to $300 and she was willing to throw in her friend. Now the offer was these two hot girls for $300 for the entire night. She knew her stuff. She knew the ABCs of sales… Always Be Closing! Naturally I told her no again and explained that just wasn’t something I’d ever be interested in. Ok, maybe I thought about it for 5 seconds, but eventually I decided that wasn’t something I would feel comfortable doing. She was smart enough to realize I wasn’t bull-shitting her and she let me go. I asked the bartender for my tab as I wanted to close it out and find my friends. As I was signing my tab, I noticed they she moved on to another guy 8 feet to me left at the bar. This guy was nothing like me. He was bigger, out of shape, not dressed well and likely in his 30s. I listened in to their conversation as I signed my tab. She took a whole different approach with him. It was amazing to listen to their conversation. She had him hooked. He was in and ready to go to her hotel room. He asked for his tab. He wanted to get out of there. It was “GO” time for him. As I was about to get up, walk away and find my friends I felt someone walk by in a hurry and brush my shoulder. This person meant business. It was a woman in her early 30s. I looked over at this guy and the hooker and I see this women standing behind him out of his sight line. She yells out, “Henry, what the heck are you doing? Who is this girl? You were supposed to meet me up in the room 45 minutes ago!!” Now if I thought I was experiencing turbulence, this guy must have had a vision of a mushroom cloud in his head. Needless to say, this was his fiancée. He was in Vegas to marry her. And yet he was 2 minutes from going up and having sex with a random hooker. What a complete and total idiot!! How ridiculous can someone be?? I have thoughts on that, but we’ll save that for another time.
So, the morale of the story is that intelligence level is not something we can just assume from someone’s appearance, occupation, age, or gender. This little hooker in Vegas not only gave me an unbelievably funny story to share with my friends, but she also showed me that you truly can’t judge a book by its cover. Now you could argue she can’t be that intelligent because a smart person would never chose to be a hooker. The truth is we don’t know her story, her situation, or how she has arrived at that point in her life. All I know is she wasn’t a stupid person. She was very clever, very well spoken, and very strategic the way she went about her “business”. And in case you were wondering my friends talked to the friend of the girl with the cherry when I was engaged in conversation with Ms. Cherry and found out they were hookers. Of course, they decided not to tell me and laugh at me from afar as the situation played itself out. Thanks guys!
If you are still doubting my original thought just take the test. If you saw someone wearing a suit coming out of a building in Boston’s financial district at 6pm and you saw another person coming out of McDonald’s with their McD’s uniform on… be honest, you look at them both and automatically assume the person in the suit coming out of an office building is much smarter. I would like to challenge this thought. I would like to say that can be the correct assumption more than not, but there are plenty of instances where it is not the truth! Sometimes circumstance we are not aware of can lead to a smart person with a lesser job than we would have guessed. The flip side is also true where someone with a great job may have gotten to that position because of a family member or some other social connection that has no direct relation to their intelligence.
It was back in the year 2001 and it was my first trip to a wonderful place called Las Vegas. I went with a group of 7 other guys I was friends with at the time. We were staying at the Flamingo, which was located in the center of The Strip. I can remember the first time we rode down The Strip. The excitement was along the lines of waking up Christmas morning when you were 8 years old. I had never seen anything so wild before. I couldn’t wait to check into the hotel, throw my stuff in the room, and get outside to check everything out. We did some gambling in a few casinos. We went out to the pool to check out the scene and talent. We scouted out some food spots we wanted to hit later in the trip. Heck, I think we even walked into the Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum at The Venetian. Soon the day turned to night and The Strip exploded into sea of lights. The young ladies were out looking their very best. The skirts and dresses were shorter than K-Fed’s rap career. There were endless lines of creepy dudes making snapping noises with business cards to escort services on every corner. More over, the energy on The Strip was incredible. The mood was perfect to party and we were more than willing to join that mood. I had heard a number of stories about Vegas before being there, but hardly believed them. I heard it was a place where everyone had fun. People were friendly, looking to party and some were hoping to get rich and win their fortunes at the slots, blackjack, craps, or your table game of choice.
The guys and I had done some “pre-gaming” in the room thanks to a bottle of Captain Morgan and everyone’s favorite friend to love then hate, Jagermeister. The night started off at the Bellagio. We went to our favorite spot, Light. It is now called Bank, but it is one of the most fun bar/clubs I’ve ever been to. Light was like the Mecca of Vegas clubs for us. We had drinks and did some dancing. We talked to some groups of girls and had an all around fantastic time. After being there from 10pm-12:30am we decided to leave. I know what you are thinking… rookies. You’re 100% right, we left just when it was going to really get good. Hey, we were 22 years old and had never been to Vegas before. Anyways, we were walking up The Strip to go to another bar. As we were walking there were 2 girls I noticed across the way. They were smokin’ hot. A friend of mine needed to hit an ATM, so we needed to cross the street. I was more than willing to get a closer look at these two beauties. As we were waiting, a friend and I started chatting with the girls. They were very friendly and started to walk with our group when we started to head towards our next destination. I don’t know what I was saying, but they were loving every word out of my mouth like a fat kid loves cake. It was great. We got to the bar and I asked them where they where headed (hoping to meet up with them later on). They told me they were headed wherever I was going. Wow, this was incredible. Did I find the exact right amount of alcohol to consume to get me in the perfect zone with the ladies? I felt like Michael Jordan. Everything I threw up at the hoop was nothing but net! We went over to the bar area and this one girl with a cherry tattoo on her back left shoulder bought me a drink. Could things get better? Now they are buying me drinks. People were right about Vegas… this place rules!! We were chatting and I realized my friends were no longer in sight, but honestly I didn’t care. I was like a pitcher on the mound in the 9th inning with a no-hitter. I was straight up dealing. Everything was a strike. I couldn’t miss! I was on the kind of roll you dream of. Then the girl with the cherry asked me if I wanted to go up to her room. I thought, “you have to be kidding me?” I didn’t know what to say. My friends are never going to believe this. It felt like I was Brad Pitt going to a speed dating event with women dying for a decent man. I paused because I didn’t know what to say. I was not the “player” type so this was sort of out of my wheel house. I had to think about this for a second. The theme to Jeopardy was playing in my head for those few seconds of silence. Before I could figure out what to say she spoke again, “only $500 for 2 hours”. Suddenly I got that feeling like at the end of Fight Club when Ed Norton comes to the realization that Brad Pitt was merely a figment of his imagination and he was actually the one screwing Marla, the founder of Fight Club, and the leader behind Project Mahem. All I could hear in my head was the voice of the flight attendant on the trip out to Vegas saying, “please put your tray table and seat in the upright in the locked position… we are about to experience some major turbulence”. It was like my entire world was rocked at its foundation. I definitely gave her the deer in headlights look. I had never seen a hooker before, nevermind been propositioned by one in person. To me hookers were like Big Foot or the Lochness monster... not real, just creatures made up by people with vivid imaginations. I quickly told her no thanks and asked if she was a hooker… even though I already knew. She said, “of course cutie.” I expressed my disappointment and confirmed to her that I was not interested. She told me to hold on a second and asked me, “Do you gamble?” I said yes. She then said, “Well think of it this way… you are probably going to sit down at the black jack table with a few hundred dollars. You are probably going to lose that money and its likely going to happen in half an hour. What will you be left with then? Nothing! Or you could take that money, bring it upstairs, and I’ll show you the night of your life and give you an experience you’ll never forget… certainly better than losing in the casino for 30 minutes!” She had an excellent point. That was a well thought out argument. One might say a well crafted sales pitch. She could tell I was a smart, logical kind of person and used a persuasive argument that catered to my type of thought and reasoning. This girl was a smart cookie. I still told her that I don’t pay for sex and I’m not interested. Then instead of walking off, she actually started to negotiate. The price went from $500 to $300 and she was willing to throw in her friend. Now the offer was these two hot girls for $300 for the entire night. She knew her stuff. She knew the ABCs of sales… Always Be Closing! Naturally I told her no again and explained that just wasn’t something I’d ever be interested in. Ok, maybe I thought about it for 5 seconds, but eventually I decided that wasn’t something I would feel comfortable doing. She was smart enough to realize I wasn’t bull-shitting her and she let me go. I asked the bartender for my tab as I wanted to close it out and find my friends. As I was signing my tab, I noticed they she moved on to another guy 8 feet to me left at the bar. This guy was nothing like me. He was bigger, out of shape, not dressed well and likely in his 30s. I listened in to their conversation as I signed my tab. She took a whole different approach with him. It was amazing to listen to their conversation. She had him hooked. He was in and ready to go to her hotel room. He asked for his tab. He wanted to get out of there. It was “GO” time for him. As I was about to get up, walk away and find my friends I felt someone walk by in a hurry and brush my shoulder. This person meant business. It was a woman in her early 30s. I looked over at this guy and the hooker and I see this women standing behind him out of his sight line. She yells out, “Henry, what the heck are you doing? Who is this girl? You were supposed to meet me up in the room 45 minutes ago!!” Now if I thought I was experiencing turbulence, this guy must have had a vision of a mushroom cloud in his head. Needless to say, this was his fiancée. He was in Vegas to marry her. And yet he was 2 minutes from going up and having sex with a random hooker. What a complete and total idiot!! How ridiculous can someone be?? I have thoughts on that, but we’ll save that for another time.
So, the morale of the story is that intelligence level is not something we can just assume from someone’s appearance, occupation, age, or gender. This little hooker in Vegas not only gave me an unbelievably funny story to share with my friends, but she also showed me that you truly can’t judge a book by its cover. Now you could argue she can’t be that intelligent because a smart person would never chose to be a hooker. The truth is we don’t know her story, her situation, or how she has arrived at that point in her life. All I know is she wasn’t a stupid person. She was very clever, very well spoken, and very strategic the way she went about her “business”. And in case you were wondering my friends talked to the friend of the girl with the cherry when I was engaged in conversation with Ms. Cherry and found out they were hookers. Of course, they decided not to tell me and laugh at me from afar as the situation played itself out. Thanks guys!
No comments:
Post a Comment