I do not often to go to Akron, even though I do have family that lives near there - thankfully, it's not like they're on campus! And I have to say, I remembered Saturday night why I don't go to Akron more often: it takes forever to get there. Seriously! It's something like 45 minutes to an hour away from Cleveland, but let me tell you, it felt much longer.
But I had a big plan! Sidekick Girl had gotten hired to do a gig at Max McQ's bar, billiards, poker and apparently stand-up comedy club, and as a valiant friend, I wanted to support her. So I also dragged along another friend Kathleen, and we all sucked it up and bundled up and headed out to Akron. Max McQ's, I found out, is in a quaint area of Akron called the Valley, and I'm not going to lie - I still don't really know what that means. What does it mean? How much of a valley are we talking about here? I think it's because it's part of the larger Cuyahoga valley region, but I can't find this out for sure. Any Akron residents reading, please enlighten me. But surprisingly, Max McQ's had great martinis (and the drinks were so big, they were called maxtinis on the menu), and the comics worked hard against the poker game in one part of the room, basketball games on tv, and the lure of the pool tables next door. Rough.
So after a rousing hour or so of comedy at Max McQ's, we were still alert and looking for fun. So we did what all twenty-somethings in Akron do: we went downtown, towards the University, and hit the street of bars! We ended up at Thursday's Lounge, which had dancing. And while it took a really long time to fill up (what else was going on on a Friday night in Akron?! I kid!), the DJ had great choices and it was nice to kind of just get and shake it up while not wearing a giant winter coat.
Akron, I apologize. I assumed that with an hour's drive, there was nothing fun there! I was so wrong.
1. Yes, "the Valley" refers to the one created by the Cuyahoga. You may not have noticed -- it being dark, I presume -- that every direction you'd drive in from McQ's is uphill, except north, which is mostly downhill all the way to Cleveland (Fun Fact: from where you were to downtown Cleveland is a higher drop in elevation than Niagara Falls...except, you know, spread out over 35 miles). In fact, if you had walked out McQ's back door, wandered into the brush and tripped over a tree root, you would have fallen in the river.
Posted at 11:47PM on Jan 29th 2007 by Jeff Hentosz