On Friday, I traveled to Oklahoma City to meet up with some friends from my college days.  One of my good fraternity buddies flew in from Portland, Oregon for a family event and thought while he was in town he would get a few people together for a night out in the O.C. (Oklahoma County), so I drove up. 

We decided to stay downtown and go out around the same places we frequented in college (as we were told the same places we went to eight years ago were still the "hot" places in town). That should have a sign right there. So, we reluctantly went -- and I couldn't believe how much things haven't changed.  Not that Oklahoma City ever led in the trend setting for nightlife, but wow, it was like I never left.  And even more astonishing, was it like that when I was there in my early twenties?

Here's how the night played out.

8:45 p.m.    Dinner at the Bricktown Brewery.  Immediate seating as it was about only 30% full.  (Perhaps it was a little late for dinner by local standards.)

9:55 p.m.    Arrived at Citywalk, a club that touts the embarrassingly bad slogan of, "Seven clubs in one ... seven times the fun".  Half of the "clubs" (or small rooms) were closed, as no one was there.  The biggest room had just one guy in his late 50s on the dance floor swaying to Tone Loc's "Wild Thing".  The smell of gas station bathroom lingered throughout.

10:15 p.m.    Arrived at Skkybar (stupidly named after Skky vodka, which was once was the club in OKC when it was Bricktown 54). I don't know how he got on this subject, but somehow the doorman began talking to us about how he wasn't bitter that people he went to school with ten years ago had gotten new trucks from "Mommy and Daddy".  Ten years ago??  Yeah, not bitter.  Trucks??

10:20 p.m.    More people than Citywalk, but not by much.  Bad dance music played from 2002.  On the plus side, a vodka tonic was only $5.

11:15 p.m.    The crowd fills in, but not the crowd I remember from college. Instead of college/greek/young- professional, think an abundance of creepy guys in tucked solid colored button-up shirts and way too many women celebrating their bachelorette parties with little penises glued to their veils.

12:05 a.m.    1999's The Launch, by DJ Jean, begins to blare and the crowd reacts as I did nine years ago when it was released.

1:20 a.m.    The lights come on.

Never again.