Bouncing off the walls.

The store is empty. I've been chugging energy drinks.

I have a low boredom threshold normally. Add a caffeine buzz from hell and the world goes surreal in the blink of an eye. Provided some customer doesn't provoke me to leap over the counter to savage them like a rabid raccoon, the day should pass quickly. It is amazing how compliant a customer gets when you start to foam at the mouth and chitter though.

On the subject of salivary transmitted pathogens, the sheer volume of cheap porn DVD’s is staggering. And why shouldn't it be. There are millions of hours of sex footage archived away. There are thousands of hours being shot every day. From out of this vast vault of film, the producers of adult movies for the budget conscious consumer have an all but limitless source to mine.

You see these guys, unlike the main production companies are not about making a film per se, they're all about recycling. Take a random scene, throw a phone sex commercial or two in, add in another random scene. Continue the motif until you have a DVD full. Manufacture a title out of thin air to call it. Slap a cover on it that may or may not contain footage actually found on the disc. Repeat.

In my mind's eye, I can see them throwing darts at a wall of scene numbers. Perhaps spinning a huge wheel. Perhaps releasing thousands of numbered pigeons at a time and firing automatic weapons at the fleeing flock until enough tatters settle to earth for a pressing. These folks have all the finesse of tossing kittens by the pitchfork full into a wood chipper.

And we sell these vids because people buy them. I personally look upon them with a sort of cynical disgust, movies that walk that grey, blurry edge of being an utter con. There's no way in hell we'd ever want to rent those puppies, even though there are folks who try. If you're going to rent, might as well enjoy some quality and pride in production. Besides, if you're really set on wanting to watch that particular vid, it's only a few bucks more to make it your very own. At least that way if you don't like it you can shoot it and dispose of the corpse discretely without anyone else ever knowing you watched it. The only virtue of the cheap discs is that you never know what you're going to see and you can afford to churn through them.

That being said, it is with a quiet horror that I get asked by customers if I've ever heard about a particular title, or even worse, if we have a specific title in stock and they are referring to one of these budget monstrosities.

They aren't movies! These companies pick names out of a hat. They could even use non-English porn spam email bots to craft the titles for all I know. I don't think I could even order any of them by the printed title without including a serial number along with it. If I hear anything at all about one of these masturbatory abortions, it's a lengthy tirade about how crappy, misrepresented, or low-quality the disc was. By the way, no, we will not take it back nor shall we refund your money. You chose... poorly.

I am well aware of how shiny and polished the covers are. If they weren't diabolically clever in marketing themselves, they wouldn't be on the shelves. Just never mind the oddly sanguineous ink and fine print.

This is one industry where caveat emptor should be emblazoned in huge glowing letters across the horizon. Take it from me; if something seems like a hell of deal in a store like this, it behooves you to look to why that might be.