A few weeks ago, Raleigh opened its first strip club in 17 years - a massive, 10,000-square-foot box of silicone-enhanced ribaldry that offers $5 valet parking and $7 hot dogs.
Inside, there's a glass sky box providing panoramic views of the stage. You'll find private dance areas with professional massage chairs. Male staff members wear tuxedos, and the women wear, well ... nature's blessings.
So fierce was the opposition to Capital Cabaret that several businesses along U.S. 70 - the Angus Barn among them - brought a lawsuit that wound its way clear to the N.C. Supreme Court.
After four years of fighting, with their challenge lost, many of the topless club's foes are still seething at the big white den of iniquity.
"It's like, 'Welcome to North Raleigh: Land of the Strip Joints,' " said Steve Noble, chairman of the Raleigh-based Christian group Called2Action. "You can see it from every major road. Apathy has consequences."
A lot of people, and I'm married to one of them, think it's ludicrous to use words like "upscale" and "gentleman" to describe a place where men pay to watch women undress.
A strip joint is a strip joint, they say, even if you spiff it up in a bow tie and drive it around in a limo.
But I think it's really a matter of perspective.
In 17 years, I've worked for five newspapers in three states, and those jobs have taken me inside of some of the nastiest establishments the human mind can invent.
So I can't get outraged about what goes on at Capital Cabaret - and I say this bracing for hate mail and dirty looks.
You see, when it comes to depravity, North Raleigh's new topless saloon might as well be a Denny's.
When I lived in Maryland, a local do-gooder organization held a fundraiser to build a children's playground in some nearby rural town. The event, hosted inside a local fire hall, was billed as Rooster's Night Out, and you didn't just watch the entertainment.
It was a tactile experience. Try as I might, I cannot get even the mildest account of the goings-on past my editors. This was to benefit a children's playground. Many, many people were arrested.
I have too many stories from Fayetteville, next to Fort Bragg, where strip clubs practically jump off the sidewalk and caress your car.
When I scouted Capital Cabaret, these places were more or less my only experiences with adult entertainment. I've been happily married for 10 years. When I was younger, my idea of a good time was bashing around at punk rock shows, where clothing is highly recommended.
So I was surprised after paying the $10 cover charge when the hostess asked to check my coat. I was wearing a hoodie, but she insisted on taking it and placing it on a hanger.
From there, I was struck by the quality of the furniture. It all seemed to be leather, and the televisions all appeared to have plasma screens.
I can't really describe much more, having already pushed the bounds of this family-newspaper column too far, but suffice it to say you can see pretty much the same thing in the typical issue of National Geographic.
I stayed only about 20 minutes, and I spent a lot of that time watching the N.C. State men beat Duke's hoopsters.
But after sizing up the businessman crowd, most of them wearing cell phones on their belts inside leather cases, I'll bet that a lot of them committed far greater sins in whatever corporate board rooms they came from.
Gentlemen will be gentlemen.
