I've never been sold one way or the other on strip clubs.

I have a friend who is moderately obsessed with them, and I've been to female clubs before. It's fine by me that they exist. I'm happy to hit one up every once in a while, and I'm fairly confident that if my boyfriend wanted to go one night, I'd be OK with that.

Visiting my friends in Atlanta over the holidays one year, my high school crush called to ask me if I'd be inclined to join him and a group of friends at a male strip club in a few hours. Still amused that my "dream guy" had turned out to be gay (and grateful for the spontaneous excursion), I was on board.

Click here to read about Loren's "unusual" experience at the male strip club ...

In my mind, a male strip club was just like a female one with, you know ... boy parts. I figured I'd throw down the overpriced entrance fee, feel a pang of complete embarrassment as I walked in the room followed by instant relief at knowing that I had Anne with me. (Anne has been my best friend since teen years and is the complete opposite of seemingly shy me.)

It started out fine, pretty much what I'd figured. The fellas picked a table up front, and we got comfy with drinks. Though a good hour probably passed before any of the strippers got any money from our group, it wasn't long before one of us got the courage to sidle up to the runway.

The Hunter Becomes the Hunted
Then, to absolutely no one's surprise, Anne grabbed a wad of cash and headed to the edge of the runway herself. It was innocent enough -- she stuck to the usual charade, shoving some ones in the boy's short-thingies.

Toward the end of the night, I noticed the same guy heading over to our table. He crouched between Anne and I and started chatting her up. Being the affable gal she is, she talked to him unawkwardly for about 15 minutes. The stripper introduced himself (with his real name) to the table but stayed focused on Anne. How I didn't see this coming I'll never know, but he eventually asked Anne out.

Boy Showgirls Can Be Divas, Too
As shocked as the rest of us were (strippers often flirt with customers for tips, but come on), Anne politely rebuffed his offer. He didn't give up. Over the course of the night he asked her out many times, sometimes leaving to do the occasional lap dance but always returning to our table.

Eventually, I was fed up and snapped at the guy, "Look, she doesn't want to go out with you!" Pissed, he basically threw a temper tantrum, left, then frequently circled back to our table to burrow holes through us with his eyes. Anne felt a little bad about turning him down, but maintained that no matter how great a guy he may be, dating a stripper just wasn't in the cards for her.

Either way, we had to laugh -- it was by far the most interesting thing to ever happen to either of us at a strip club. And beautiful as she is, I'm sure the "buddy" Anne met ranks high on her list of weird and random suitors.

Loren Lankford is an NYU grad and product of the south, raised in Athens, Ga., on cornbread and sweet tea and currently writing, drinking too much coffee, antiquing and watching Buster Keaton movies while bouncing between Atlanta and NYC.