Member-only story
Super Troupers—The City Without Foreplay pg99–100
Colorful companion to my memoir The Incompetent Psychic
While on break, the two silly stagehands had been rolling dice for triple shots with the bartender in the hotel’s faux stone and pewter-encrusted Olde English pub. A horrified gasp at the time interrupted their winning streak. It being far too late to make the trek around to the stage door, they grabbed their booty and took off — pounding through the casino past the baccarat tables and up the main entrance ramp to get to the showroom’s hidden fire escape short-cut.
They had a split second left to set down their drinks, dive on the handles, aim and fire up the Super Troupers* at the exact moment a beautiful woman with a bosom full of rhinestones far away on the distant stage began belting out her cheerful demand to raise the curtain.
* footnote: I never knew the brand name of those big spotlights, so I googled it. Turns out that’s what the Abba song was about. My sister who also enjoys being enlightened by useless trivia observed, “I always thought Super Trouper was a Swedish expression that didn’t translate very well.” (You’re singing the lyrics in your head now, eh? Carful it doesn’t get stuck.) — From Chapter 5
In 1979 I went from being the Tropicana Hotel’s flower girl to working for an…
