the stripper story.

well.

it all began on a fateful (or divinely ordained, depending on your theology) Thursday afternoon. it was the day of Linell's acceptance into the nursing program, making it a very momentous square on the calendar indeed. something had to be done to mark the occasion! it was a celebratory emergency!!!!!!!

so Linell and Katelyn swiftly planned an evening at Steamer's, the jazz club in Fullerton that everybody and their mom seems to like. they both invited me to go along, and i rearranged my schedule to comply. i'd never been to Steamer's, and neither had Linell. Katelyn the veteran assured us that good times would be had by all. but it turned out that she accidentally lied...

*cue twilight zone theme/swirly flashback visual effects*

we met up a little after 9:30. Linell and i parked in the back and tried not to get mugged and/or cat-called, while Katelyn parked about a mile away, apparently so that she could walk down a busy street in a skirt and heels at night. so far, so good.

when we finally walked into Steamer's, we were unceremoniously seated at a table about a third of the way back from the stage. onstage was a guy who appeared to be about thirty-four (judging from his hairline) singing really bad emo acoustic songs with ironic and "humorous" (i.e. lame... sauce) lyrics. (one song was about asking some girl to be his "first wife," discussing the details of future alimony and who gets to keep the kids.) the screen behind him said that "intermission" would be over in two minutes, whatever that meant. so we were glad when he was finally done ten minutes later...

we were busy ordering stuff from the really sketchy broke-down menus, including a three-dollar diet coke that turned out to be a soda can and a cup with ice in it, so we didn't pay much attention as the "real" talent got on stage. it was this girl dressed like a 1940s cabaret singer - a red dress, satin gloves, and this outrageous wig of shiny red curls. at least, we thought it was a wig. we weren't actually sure at the time.

but in retrospect it probably was, on account of what went down.

after about five minutes of the music playing, we noticed that this singer girl... wasn't, like, singing. all she was doing was sort of swaying and moving her arms seductively to the cheesy horn-and-drum music, and kind of winking and leering at the audience like a bad Vegas lounge singer. okay, weird. we made fun of her and discussed her hair/wig, never suspecting what would follow.

DUN DUN DUNNNNN...

actually, what immediately followed was that she in fact peeled her long gloves off and sort of tossed them away with reckless abandon, if you know what i mean.

you would think we might have had a clue by this point, but no... no, no, NO, because Biola girls, and BASE girls in particular, and LovingRoom girls especially, are not the stripper sort of people. at least not in public. but this was a different sort of loving-room...

*cue twilight zone theme again*

we finally SORT OF got a clue when ms. cabaret took off her top, exposing a more revealing top underneath. mostly this just made us confused. after this point you don't really need a lot of graphic detail (this isn't some dirty romance novel) but basically she proceeded to take off her other clothes, leaving her in only some extremely non-Biola-contract-approved undies.

at which time we all got pretty uncomfortable... we also noticed that everybody in the place had stopped talking and were kind of waiting with bated breath - some uncomfortably and some probably hopefully - like, "is she really gonna do it?!" prettttttty disgusting.

i think it was at this point that we finally thought maybe, just maybe, we should get out of there. i leaned over to katelyn and said "if she takes anything else off, i'm leaving."

but i'm pretty sure that none of us REALLY thought that she was going to actually, you know. do the deed, so to speak. i mean this is STEAMER'S. in FULLERTON. there were BIOLA STUDENTS at the table next to us, for crying out loud. come on. no way.

YES WAY! YES WAY!

basically, as soon as the Red Harlot undid her bra, the three of us each uttered some version of "aw HELLS no" (maybe not in so many words) and stood up to leave. hopefully, in our noisy departure we broke some of the magical spell of silence/demonic oppression (who knows?) as we walked out. IT WAS HORRIBLE! HORRIBLE!

and that's the stripper story.


EPILOGUE:

some waitresses who were standing outside informed us (as the terribly aromatic smoke of their cigs wafted through the cold night air) that "it wasn't usually like that," and they didn't know she was going to do that, and they had walked out too, etc. i felt kind of bad for them... not as bad as i felt for us, but still. it would be helpful for SOMEONE to know next time the Stripping Bandit comes to town, you know?

and the three of us remained in shock for the rest of the night. Denny's helped. but our rehabilitation remains incomplete. i for one may never recover. at least we got a good story out of it.

poor Stripping Bandit. i wish she had had more self-worth. and more... clothes.

so needless to say, we're going to Steamer's again next Thursday. anyone in?

just kidding, we're not going back there anymore. no wonder Biola students stay in their rooms watching Disney movies all weekend. beware the seduction of smoke-filled rooms (well, it would have been if it weren't illegal in the state of California), cheap diet coke and bad wigs.

it's a dangerous world, girls. a dangerous world.