Day 46: Nashville, Tennessee

Time to cover some new ground. Somehow in my travels, I've never been to Nashville so I set out from Atlanta early this morning.

Enroute up I-75, I stop at the infamous rest area near Calhoun, Georgia and what to my amazement happens? I walk up to the urinal and am quickly joined by a very attractive man, Asian descent, who stands at the next urinal and gazes over at me. As is usual in such a situation, I get a hardon almost instantly. We smile, do the hand washing routine, go outside and agree to meet up on the upper level of this really vast rest area. It is here that I get to break in my new car (oh yeah, I bought one during this trip) and learn another advantage to those very roomy rear seats in an Infiniti.

Pleasure complete, I depart for Nashville.

What a serious disappointment. For years, Nashville had a reputation for stupendous bookstore action. Well, I'm here to put an end to that claim. What exists is hardly anything worth a special trip.

I started at the 'world's largest adult bookstore'. The billboard one sees in passing along the freeway makes that claim, but how on earth anyone could verify it is beyond me. In my limited exposure to the world of adult bookstores, I can assure you this is NOT the largest by a long shot. It might qualify for one of the 'world's largest rip-offs' but I rather doubt that will make the billboard. Otherwise known as Metro News (822 Fifth Avenue), the store is admittedly big, covering two floors and a seemingly endless selection of cellophane-wrapped porn mags and videos. Outside, the parking lot appeared to be almost full, while inside it was dead (Something I've noticed about more than one adult establishment: a parking lot full of cars, but no patrons inside! What's with that?).


The upstairs arcade was closed and apparently this wasn't just for cleaning. It was shut down until further notice, though it looked fine from the outside. Downstairs was a movie theatre which I didn't visit and another arcade which I did. You'll have to purchase $5 in tokens to enter the arcade and don't even think of approaching the arcade door without having stopped at the clerk's station to purchase your tokens. I made this mistake in order to read all the myriad notices pasted on the door and was immediately politely, yet firmly told that I couldn't venture any where near the door without spending $5.

With my $5 in tokens, I went back to the entrance to read all the notices that essentially told you your life just might come to a screeching halt if you so much as thought about sex in the arcade you had just purchased money to enter for the sole purpose of attaining sex. With this warning in mind, I decided to be very cautious and see what the locals would be doing in such a seemingly risky environment. As it turned out, they were mostly oblivious to any sense of impending doom.

I would say about 5 men were inside the arcade on a Monday between 3 and 4 pm. Most of them were standing around, looking for somebody to catch their fancy. One man was inside a booth, dropping his tokens with his door wide open. His booth did have a door -- some didn't. What I soon discovered was that out of I believe 16 booths, 3 appeared to be working. All the others were either out of order or locked up with nobody inside the booth. One booth that wouldn't work by simply dropping your token, would come to life if you beat the shit out of it -- no doubt that has been the reason most of the machines no longer work, after all that beating to get value for your money. Of course management couldn't be bothered to put up 'out of order' signs on any of the non-working booths, so any patron walking in was bound to waste some tokens in machines that ate your money but produced no video to view. After eating up my first 3 tokens in different booths, I went outside to the clerk and asked for some sort of explanation. He smiled and handed over a dollar in replacement tokens, telling me which booths worked (he was wrong).

Returning to the arcade, I stood around for a good hour and watched men come and go, each one choosing a booth with a non-working video machine, each one banging loudly to try and retrieve their lost money, and most of them meekly taking the lost money as just par for the course. One guy was really pissed, though, and I watched as he went to the clerk, demanding to know why on earth he had been forced to purchase tokens that couldn't reasonably be expected to work since the machines didn't work for the most part. When the clerk responded by getting defensive and insisting that somehow the clerk deserved to be treated with respect (all the while representing a company that was showing little respect for patrons), the unhappy cruiser lunged forward across the counter, unleashing the balance of his tokens at the clerk as they flew all over the place. I almost clapped, but decided to just be silent.

I also decided to head next door to First Amendment (428 Lafayette Street) which appeared to be much newer than Metro or at least better maintained. It was also busier at least in the retail section. The arcade area is cavernous and delightfully removed from the view of the clerks. Cameras are placed in strategic places, but it is easy to position yourself where you can't be seen. I really don't know how many booths existed, but I would guess probably 20 to 25. None appeared to have gloryholes. All had modern video machines that worked! The rooms were small to big, each with a single chair. I hung around another hour (rush hour by now) and hoped for some action. A few guys did enter the arcade area, and a couple of them were definitely cruising, but for the most part the men seemed to be aiming for a private booth and no company.

First Amendment is a decent enough bookstore and arcade and the clerk was nice if disinterested. Some cute men could be found loitering out front, but in my brief visit, the sex was just about non-existent.

Finally, I just had to stop at a new bookstore I could see from the freeway because it appeared to be housed in a church. Confessions (Davis Blvd. And Charlotte Avenue) is a recent addition to Nashville and the retail area is housed in the basement of a former church! The store has a very nice selection, but no arcade and according to the guy at the counter, no plans to install either an arcade or theatre. What a shame, because it would be a hoot playing around in this former church.


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Cruisemaster
cruisingforsex.com