Bon Yoyage, Junior or How I found myself in a strip club Saturday night

A long, long time ago when I was getting ready to leave for my tour of duty in the Army, all I wanted to do was go over to Chicago for a couple of days and see a ballgame or two. However, at the last minute my best friend at the time pussed out (sorry, but that's really the only way to describe how that went down) and I didn't get a wild, blowout weekend.
The son of a friend of mine (we'll call him Junior) has enlisted in the Navy and leaves for basic training this week. He wanted to spend one more night on the town so a bunch of his friends got together Saturday night. Wanting to wish him a fond farewell as well as being sympathetic to Junior's wish, I offered my services as a designated driver.

The evening started with a little get-together of family and friends before turning into a pub crawl that included a visit to the lounge at the Hyatt, site of the annual Fetishcon. We went there not to gawk at the revelers but rather to enjoy the ambiance of the establishment's...okay, we went to gawk. We're repressed Americans. It's what we do.

While we were there, one of Junior's buddies (we'll call him Greg) pulled me aside and said, "you know, Peter (the other buddy) has never been to a strip club before, and we were wondering...". After a brief negotiation of terms, all of which had to do with things that could result in Junior's mom getting mad at me, I agreed to accompany them to a strip club.

Now, I am not a fan of these places. I know they're kind of in vogue right now as some sort of anti-politically correct, backlash statement but I just don't like them. To me, they just seem like very lonely, desperate and sad places, not to mention terribly expensive. Here's how I would describe a visit to a typical strip club to someone who's never been: Imagine going to a theme park where it costs $15 to get in, which isn't bad, but every ride inside costs from $20 to $60 each to get on. And then, you're not doing anything but sitting in the car for a few minutes. To actually ride, the price starts at $200 and goes up. Imagine going to Disney World where a ride on Space Mountain costs between $200 to $500 and could give you chlamydia, while at the same time Donald Duck is walking around squawking at you to purchase at least one drink or he'll throw your ass out. Another way strip clubs are like theme parks is that they'll sell you a tee shirt which you'll probably only want to wear while you're right there.

So we went to the 2001 Odyssey Lounge, Tampa's second most famous but "BEST ALL AROUND" (if the club's marquee is to be believed) strip club. I told the boys we would be there for exactly one hour. We got there at 2:10AM and they could have all the fun they could handle between then and 3:10AM. They explored while I anchored a spot along the wall near the DJ booth. Several dancers approached me, offering to provide various services but I explained that I was not there to "party". There was a little bit of back-and-forth, but I enjoy bantering with pretty, scantily clad (if at all) girls:

"I'm sorry, you're a lovely woman and I'm sure you're quite skilled at what you do, but I'm just here to monitor the health and safety of these three young men."
"Oh, are you a doctor?"
"...sure."

Overall, they understood my role and function and left me alone. They're professionals and so am I. No sense in wasting each others time.

While I can't divulge specific activities out of respect for individual privacy, I can say we left exactly when we said we would, without anyone getting into any kind of trouble or completely draining their bank account, which qualifies this as the most successful visit to one of these places I've ever had.