Had a tougher time finding religion at The Church my second time

I returned to Houston a couple months after my first visit to The Church. I reviewed the layout and prices in detail last time (https://tuscl.net/review.php?id=362572) and those facts are unchanged.

This trip, I got there around 930p on a Thursday night, paid the $15 cover and walked through the metal detector. Things seemed a bit backward to me. First, it was a much thinner crowd of customers and dancers than on my Friday afternoon visit. Plenty of open tables and seats. Second, the crowd was less full of guys in business attire. I guess that makes some sense, but whereas I was the only guy in a T-shirt last time, this time there were tons of T-shirts and what I would describe as not only casual, but kind of scrubby clothing. Not much of a knock, just that my expectations were for everyone to be dressed upscale. Third, THE SMOKE. Holy crap. I don’t remember it being so overwhelming on the Friday afternoon, but on the Thursday night it seemed like everyone was smoking. They were all blowing their smoke at me to make my night worse. (That may have been my imagination.) My clothes reeked the next day. I had to pack them in a plastic hotel laundry bag so that TSA would let me take them on the plane. I cannot see how anyone spends an evening here and then boards a flight immediately after at the airport which is close by. If you fly after leaving here, your seat mates hate you. They do.

I headed in and found a seat at the right side bar where I’d had luck the last time. I was drinking $8 Coronas and tipping a couple bucks each time. Nothing much happened for an hour so I watched the stage show. There was a fairly lively guy a couple seats over from me. He was bantering with the bartender and a bunch of girls stopped by to say hi as he was clearly a regular. Some of the girls made eye contact with me while they were sitting with him. I wasn’t going to encroach on his action except to comment on the nfl game he and I were both sorta watching behind the bar.