The Oklahoman sent Nolan Clay to write about a strip club…

3:03 PM EDT on May 27, 2014

Back in April, we gave OU student Steven Zoeller a hard time for the overly romantic and descriptive feature article he wrote about Suger's strip club on Campus Corner. It was pretty obvious he had never been to a strip club and/or seen barely concealed hindquarters before:

Tucked in the alley between Sage’s Wellness Lounge and Fuzzy’s Taco Shop is a portal to another dimension.
Beyond its threshold, framed pictures of female anatomy adorn the walls of a lounge lit dimly by colorful bulbs. A woman in lingerie has the stage, her barely-concealed hindquarters aimed squarely at the audience as she dances. Over the noise of billiard balls colliding and beer glasses clinking, the men cheer and applaud.
The bar sits across the room from the stage, managed by a small woman in her mid-50s smoking a cigarette. Most wouldn’t even expect to see this severe-looking woman working here, and she doesn’t just do that — she also owns the place.
Karen Summers is a subversion, a wrinkle in the image most people have of strip clubs. The more she and the dancers talk about the story of Suger’s, the more wrinkled that image becomes.

That still cracks me up. Not only did he call a strip club a portal to "another dimension" – apparently other dimensions have a bunch of black lights and girls asking to donate to music finds – but he also found a "severe-looking" woman. What does that even mean? Did the lady's hair mushroom up like a wall cloud or something?

On the topic of severe-looking people, OPUBCO sent company man and former hair club member Nolan Clay (that's him in the dated pic above) to creepily investigate a strip club off I-35 that may be shut down for violating city zoning laws.

Via NewsOK.com:

At Red Light Nights Gentleman’s Club in south Oklahoma City, lap dances are priced at $20 a song!
If Oklahoma City’s attorneys have their way, that and all other “adult entertainment” activities will stop at the longtime club just west of Interstate 35.
Attorneys last week asked an Oklahoma County judge to order Red Light Nights to stop operating as a strip club.
The city is complaining in a lawsuit that the club — which once was a country western bar — is operating illegally. The city is complaining the club’s location does not qualify for adult entertainment use.
The city also is complaining that the club is a public nuisance because it is within 500 feet of “an area zoned for residential use.” Directly across the street from the club are a sign shop, the sign shop owner’s house and an empty house. A block farther west — on Glenn Avenue — are four more modest houses.

Two things:

1. Yes, I added the exclamation point to the first sentence of the article. I did it to capture what I assume to be Nolan Clay's eagerness to cover and report this story. Going to a strip club on the company's dime is awesome.

2. Why did Nolan include the price of a lap dance? What relevance does that have to the story? Did he ask during the interview how much a lap dance is? If so, isn't that kind of strange and creepy?

"Next question, Destiny. How much is a lap dance? Also, do you have an ATM?"

Of course, there is a chance Nolan could have just known. Along with death and taxes, the $20 lap dance is one of life's few constants. When I turned 21 in 1999, Taco Bell bean burritos cost 59-cents, gas was around $1 a gallon, and a lap dance cost $20. Fifteen years later, Taco Bell bean burritos cost $1 and gas has risen to almost $4.00, but a lap dance still costs $20. I think it's the only service or product in Oklahoma that hasn't adjusted for inflation. Strippers need to unionize or something.

Instead of writing something obvious like the price of lap dance in the lede, Nolan should have gone with something like this:

At Red Light Nights Gentleman’s Club in south Oklahoma City, lap dances will probably get you a hand job.
If Oklahoma City’s attorneys have their way, they'll have a hand in stopping that and all other “adult entertainment” activities at the longtime club just west of Interstate 35.

Or maybe:

At Red Light Nights Gentleman’s Club in south Oklahoma City, strippers boobs roll all the way to the floor.
If Oklahoma City’s attorneys have their way, they'll roll away that and all other “adult entertainment” activities at the longtime club just west of Interstate 35.

Or this:

At Red Light Nights Gentleman’s Club in south Oklahoma City, severe looking women have barely concealed hindquarters.
If Oklahoma City’s attorneys have their way, they'll severely block that and all other “adult entertainment” activities at the longtime club just west of Interstate 35.

Anyway, I think I had something important to say about the silliness of the city singling out strip clubs over other dangerous bars and establishments around town, or possibly having Ed Shadid introduce an ordinance that only allows attractive strippers, but instead of doing that, let's watch Nolan Clay lurch around Owen Field instead. It's much more entertaining.

(P.s. - I bet Nolan can't wait for the day I do something stupid and get arrested. He'll have a field day.)