Well I’ve been told that what goes on stag stays on stag, but frankly I have little time for this kind of nonsense. If you’re going to behave like an arse the place to do it is not in front of 12 of your oldest friends and on video camera. Thankfully I can report that nothing too unpleasant happened so I only have a few beans to spill . . .

As you know the weekend was split into two halves – nice and nasty – and we’re onto the nasty half. Have to say I was *SO* not looking forward to another 12 hours solid drinking, but there was nothing to be done about it, so Joe and I girded out whatsits and headed out to the merry mayhem.

Well it’s amazing how 6 pints of Grolch and 5 games of 10 pin bowling will get you back on your feet again, and so it proved to be, and the evening passed off relatively painlessly. The only bit that was weird was the Strip Club.

Strippers

I’ve never been to a strip club - I couldn’t imagine why I would want to go to some seedy dive and pay a fortune to see a bunch of unhappy women debasing themselves for cash. But stag night it was and off we went. So I go there and then the really weird thing happened. I suddenly realised I was enjoying myself. A lot. I mean what’s not to like? – perfectly pleasant venue, no entry fee, no obviously too dodgy geezers (alright some of them were a bit iffy, but there is no danger of any trouble), pub priced bar with no queue and a whole herd of really beautiful young women wearing virtually nothing wandering around. Every so often one would get on the stage and disrobe. And that’s about it.

Except of course it’s not. There is of course the concept of the private dance. This is where you approach one of these girls, ask for a dance (or she approaches you – again no hassle if you say no thanks), she leads you into the back room, relieves you of £15 and proceeds to grind her various attributes an extremely short distance from your face (remember – no touching!). Put it this way, if you’re getting on a bit remember to bring your reading glasses.

As I’d never seen all this the boys insisted I go along (number of private dances range in our party 0-6+). So that was out of the way – I’ve had the private dance and it’s over, and it was really not that bad at all. Except I suddenly found myself looking at the girls and thinking about one in particular, and before you know it I’m off again and going for the private dance – of my own free will without any coercion at all. And frankly, it was great.

OK, OK, I know this is all bad stuff, but I can’t help myself. Or rather I can’t be bothered to help myself. I know they’re not doing this for fun, but who does go to work just for fun after all? Nobody looked like they were having a bad time (though of course how can you tell) and I do feel a bit ashamed. But provided you can quiet that voice of conscience / voice of Germaine Greer / voice telling you you’re a sad old wanker, I can think of a lot worse ways to spend a couple of hours.

Having said all that I don’t think I’ll be going back – enjoying it once by surprise is one thing, enjoying it on purpose by going there seems like one step towards being a genuine stripper ogler.

And on that note I should give my congratulations to ‘Uncle’ Bob. As the oldest man in the party (49) he not only managed to keep up with the drinking, he also kicked our asses bowling (188 is a *very* respectable score btw) and was the only man to (at least voluntarily) go for the ‘2 Girl Special’. Impressive. Well expensive at any rate ;-)