David's blog: Gay bars

Saturday, December 9th, 2006

Last night my friend Derek was in town, and we went out to eat, did some shopping and then hit the bars. I was all excited about that last bit because Thursday was when Ohio's new ban on smoking in public places was to have taken effect, so this would be the first time I could go to a gay bar in Ohio and not come home smelling all smoky. Well I was being naive and forgetting that people don't like to obey laws they deem to be senseless or intrusive, which of course I do myself when it comes, for example, to speed limits.

In the first bar we hit, the Right Corner, there was a sign on the wall left over from Wednesday night touting their big Smoke Out ending at midnight, after which, I can only assume, everyone had a big chuckle and continued to smoke because on Friday there were still ashtrays on the bar and lit cigarettes galore. I asked the bartender about that, and he said, "Oh the ban doesn't take effect until May." Right. Derek texted his bf Chip to text us back the number for reporting violations, which is 866-559-6446, but they only take messages during business hours M-F 8-5. Oh well.

A cute and friendly bartender from Stage Door
(If you see him, ask him to take off his shirt)

So we moved on to the Stage Door, where smoking was also business as usual, although they have a second bar where there wasn't any smoking going on yet, though there were ashtrays laid out. I asked the friendly bartender what that was all about, and he said, yeah, he knew about the new law, but he'd been told by his boss to set out the ashtrays. I stacked them up and set them on a chair while we were there.

David's stripper doesn't mind his butt being seen

After a couple drinks, we hopped on over to the last bar of the evening, Cell Block, where, yes, there was smoking going on, but by that time we no longer cared quite so much. We ran into a friend of mine, David, who doesn't like having his photograph taken and who gets lap dances from strippers. During all the ruckus, Derek broke a nail (omg!), then he snapped a picture of me and him, and then I snapped one of Derek kissing ass.

Update 12-11-06: I did remember to call the Ohio Department of Health to report Right Corner, Stage Door and Cell Block, each of whom will be getting warning letters. Whether that will do any good remains to be seen.

Tuesday, April 4th, 2006

Derek's 28th birthday was yesterday, and so to celebrate he went out with the SPC (a private club in existence for a while but named only last night), whose members include me, Ryan (who's been present at earlier club meetings), and Chip (the club's newest member). (Check out thingstodoindayton.blogspot.com to read about some of Chip and Derek's adventures.)

I met the group at the Stage Door, where I found them engaged in an enthralling game of video "what's different about these two pictures." That got boring soon enough, so we went to Club Masque, which on Monday nights has no cover charge, which we discovered is because no one is there on Monday nights. That was okay, though, as it allowed our drunken antics to go mostly unnoticed. As you can see, Derek is quite flexible for a 28-year-old, he sometimes launches sneak attacks on unsuspecting SPC members, and Ryan doesn't like to have his nipple exposed for viewing on the Internet.