Divin’ on Tulsa Time: Search for a Dive-Bar Urban Legend

Gonna set my watch back to it

‘Cause you know I’ve been through it

Livin’ on Tulsa time

Don Williams

Not saying it’s late, but yesterday is clinically dead. 

Only Arnie’s remains open at this hour in downtown Tulsa. It’s a dive, the kind of Irish pub you find buried in the “free” heap in the back of the second-hand store. Life insurance policies are cancelled for any fool spending more than an hour on premises. Otherwise, it’s wonderful. I plant an elbow on the bar to claim a piece of sticky dark oak real estate and order a round of drinks for the Fellowship (bottle of Michelob Ultra for Bruno, G&T for Ichi Knuckle, bottle of water for Lancelot, draught of Guinness for Vic). For the time being, I am oblivious of my surroundings. My brain is foggy from the fading embers of yesterday and I do not happen to notice to my immediate left a young woman in pajamas and sandals. I do not notice she’d be pretty in better light. Nor do I notice her toenails are painted gold. On her left foot. The right-footed toes bare chipped nails who’ve smelled better days. She’s out of place, yet assimilated, like a captive princess: Zelda with Stockholm syndrome if Link never came to the rescue. I likewise do not notice to my immediate right one of many sooty ruffians. Maybe a chimney sweep. Perhaps he’s the Boss Level Ashtray captor of Zelda. He is more slack-jawed than an outright mouth-breather, which is unfortunate for him; mouth-breather is preferable to the ladies when given the option. Zelda had no options, not until I arrived, which is enough catalyst to anger Slack-Jaw. Not that I am aware of any of it. All of this detail comes to me by way of Bruno after I deliver the four drinks to the Hightop Table of the Fellowship. Hey man, Bruno says to me with his cheerful midwestern glee, hey, so, Vic!, do you remember how you suck at life? 

Hunh?

Don’t turnaround, bud, but you’ve got a bogey at your six who wants to rip out your spleen and put it on a corndog stick. Not sure if that’s legal, but who knows with these dust bowl county fairs, right?

Bruno is a character. He isn’t a life-sized talking bear from a children’s show, but I understand your confusion. Bruno and I met a few bars ago when he was extinguishing taco fire with gulps of Vodka/Red Bull at Mexicali. I was further upstream at the bar, drinking my hibiscus-infused mescal margarita when I heard Bruno say to a downstream audience, no!, but I once had an Iowa woman ask me to gag her with her own panties. Bruno said this. In public. Unintentionally, I knee-jerk laughed out loud, drawing the attention of Bruno. I apologized for eavesdropping before asking if he acquiesced to the demands of the Iowan. With a big handsome grin, Bruno shook his head, saying, man, I tried, like, gently stuffing her mouth, asking “are you sure you want all of it?” They were big panties, Bruno explained. They were Des Moines panties.

He is a visitor to Tulsa. All Bruno wanted for tonight was three or four quick Vodka/Red Bulls and a piano bar. Then he met a local married couple throwing back tequila shots at the bar of Mexicali. Clarification: while they were a married couple, they were not married to each other. The baseball-capped caballero was shy while the puma-eyed woman with a mullet was eyeballing handsome Bruno as if he was a Cadillac available for trade-in on the used-car lot. What you’re looking for, Sweetie, is Shady Keys, the woman told Bruno about a downtown piano bar. But that ain’t what you want, she says. Oh? What is it I want?, Bruno asked with genuine curiosity. At Towne Pub, the puma-eyed woman said, you can pay the girls behind bar $20 and they will take out their tits and flick a quarter off the bar using only a nipple. Whoa!, Bruno reacts with wide-eyed wonder. Okay, I will keep that in mind, he said. His genuine curiosity, though, did not expand beyond the piano bar. 

I, however, needed to know more…

Excuse me, I leaned forward from my barstool to inquire further. Where’s this bar? Towne Pub, Puma repeated before telling us, the men in the bar offered me cash money to do it, but I refused. Puma’s caballero boyfriend whistled and shook his head. I refused, Puma said to Bruno and me, for anything less than $100. She paused for dramatic effect before smiling. Yeah, boys!, she said, I got paid that night! I chipped some poor boy’s teeth with the quarter I flipped. Tellin’ ya, you won’t be disappointed. Go to Towne Pub! Bring your quarters!

Puma and her caballero settled their tab. As they departed, she smacked Bruno’s ass. Ask for me next time you’re in Oklahoma, Puma said to him. Yeehaw, Bruno said with faux fanfare. 

Are you not intrigued?, I asked Bruno. Who me?, he said. Not particularly my thing. It’s just a carnie trick, no?, he suggested. I admitted to him, yeah, it is all rather last century. But all the more reason to record it for posterity. Are you some kind of pervert?, Bruno asked. No, I told him, I am anthropologist. Ahh, he said, you’re a perv for science. Why don’t you just go to a topless joint? Hell, I might even tagalong. I’m Bruno, by the way, he said while holding out a cool meaty paw he released from his Vodka/Red Bull. Vic!, I said by way of introduction. A topless joint is defeating the point, I told him. I am not interested in the bare-breastedness of the situation. It’s the novelty of an urban myth. Let alone the physics of it all. This is how legends are born, right? Is Tulsa the home of the quarter-flipping voyeur? I’d like to know, I said. Man, Bruno said, I didn’t see anything about nipples & quarters at the airport welcome kiosk when I arrived. I did see a sign saying, “Welcome to Tulsa, Oklahoma: hope you weren’t expecting Omaha!”  

Bruno, I said, I think we might be onto something. This might be a story Tulsa needs to tell. We could be the chosen ones to tell it. Alright, Bruno said while swirling the ice in his cocktail glass. Fuck it. I’m in. 

The quest was born. A quest to prove whether or not there are rogue bartenders roaming the Tulsa cityscape flipping quarters with their nipples. It wasn’t as easy as showing up at Towne Pub as we couldn’t find any record of this bar. I began drawing a map on a cocktail napkin. Next to “Towne Pub”, I wrote “E.D.”, cartographer speak for “existence doubted”. Our bartender at Mexicali had never heard of Towne Pub and told us to check with Jersey Jim at the Saturn Room. We left Mexicali, Bruno with a half-filled glass of cocktail hidden within his catcher’s pit of a hand and we walked the few blocks to the tiki bar known as Saturn Room. 

Grandmothers?, I asked Bruno along the way. Yeah, man, Bruno said. There’s something about older women. They’re not driven by status. They aren’t focused on the future. It’s just right-here, right-now, let’s, y’know, get it on… AARP discounts are nothing to sneeze at either. 

We arrived at the Saturn Room. I ordered a Painkiller while Bruno downgraded from cocktails to a Michelob Ultra while he finished his smuggled Vodka/Red Bull. Jersey Jim had never heard of Towne Pub. Nor had he heard of the mythical quarter flip. But he had only been in Tulsa a few years. Where you should go is St Vitus, he said to Bruno and me. It’s a German disco-tech with an outdoor patio where conversations happen. Conversations?, we asked Jersey Jim. Yeah, he said. You’ll see. A lot of truth on that patio.

Gentlemen, may I introduce myself, said the only other patron in the Saturn Room. He was a fellow traveler wiling away his time in Tulsa by drinking at strange bars. After his introduction, Bruno asked him, you’re who?, Icky… Itchy…? The fellow traveler repeated his name, but Bruno denied him, saying, fuck that, bro, you’re Ichi Knuckles tonight. Fine, Ichi Knuckles shrugged with indifference. He wore a lavender dress shirt that had seen better hours. He was excessively groomed, ideal for the kinder climes for San Diego or Phoenix, but not for the cold desolation of the plain states. Whatever toils brought Ichi Knuckles to Tulsa left him as road-weary as the rest of us. What can we do you for, bud?, Bruno asked. Ichi Knuckles said, I couldn’t help but overhear you are looking for women who flip quarters with their nipples. Is that even a thing? Bruno responded, saying, you want to find out? We’re on a heroes’ quest. Or a fool’s errand. A wild goose chase for red herring. Ichi Knuckles smiled, asking, where do I sign up?

Thus is how the Fellowship of Gentlemen Travelers expanded. A few randos in search of glory. 

The walk downtown was half a mile. The cold night pushed our pace. My fellow travelers suggested hiring a car, but I insisted on walking. The only way to know a place is on foot. I have never been to Tulsa before and may never return. Which is why we must learn tonight! whether the myth of the quarter flipping is real or imagined. Bruno fought through shivers to say, I am beginning to think sexy puma lady was pulling our leg. Ichi Knuckles raised a trimmed eyebrow, saying, sexy?, how sexy? Bruno responded, have you ever seen a mongoose shred through a cobra? Like that, but fucking. Ichi Knuckles asked, why didn’t you pay her $100 to save yourself the trip? Because!, I yelled at him. That’s like a self-fulfilling prophecy, isn’t it? You don’t give the doomsayer the doomsday weapon, do you? Besides, where’s your sense of adventure? 

Jersey Jim could not be more correct: St Vitus is a euro-trash dance club with medieval hysteria vibes. As we waited for service at the bar, I explained to the Fellowship, “St Vitus’s Dance” was a dark age dancing mania where peasants literally footloosed themselves to death. Long considered a demonic infestation, we now believe their brains were poisoned by a mold in their bread. A man near-bar from us turned to ask, that shit true? Yeah, I said, what the hell are you drinking? Hpnotiq & Sprite, said Lancelot. Does it taste blue?, Bruno asked Lancelot. Nah, it tastes like I am going to have a migraine by morning, he replied. Hehehehe, oh man, Ichi Knuckles giggled. 

Opal is the woman behind bar. Ja!, she responded to our questions with her peculiar smile. Ja!, I have heard of this quarter-flipping. Really?, the four of us gasped. This was our first real lead. But Towne Pub has been closed for a while. You must try the Dirty Nickel, Opal told us. 

Would you like to join us, Lancelot?, Bruno asked the Hpnotiq drinker. Would you like to be a member of the Fellow Travelers of Gentleness as we chase this sacred unicorn? Nah, I’m good, fam, Lancelot shook his head. Not sure that’s anything I really want to see. Don’t worry, Bruno said, I still think it’s a joke. I looked up “quarter flipping nipples” on Yelp!, Bruno said, and I didn’t find shit. Though, I guess I could expand my radius.

Bet!, Lancelot said, nodding, convincing himself. I mean, what the hell?, he said. Let’s get after it. 

Jersey Jim had also been right about the patio. Heat lamps warmed the open-air salon of marijuana smoking philosophers. Conversations were had. Nope, said one skunky wrangler in a cowboy hat, but I have heard of a homeless fella who will pickup loose change with his balls. Bruno turned towards me with a hopeful expression, saying, Vic?, is that hero quest worthy?  

Nope. And so the Travelers of Strange Fellowship meandered onward. 

We left St Vitus for another dive, the Rabbit Hole, where we listened to live music and drank draft beers. The Fellowship did not last long here. A soft-spoken logger in faded flannel was asking Lancelot where he was from while suggesting he wouldn’t mind it if someone bought him a beer. The logger’s lumberjack friends loomed just off-stage, lurking in the dark long hallway towards the bathrooms, their eyes watching us like raccoons. Two possibilities, Bruno told Lancelot and me: either the lone logger is an instigator looking to provoke us into a fight or those lumberjacks are looking for free beer & dicks to gobble. Fifty/fifty: you guys want to flip that coin and see if it lands on getting head?, Bruno asked. 

Nope. And so the Fellows of Gentlemen Strangers meandered onward. 

To appease Bruno’s lust for dueling pianos, we visited Shady Keys. Unfortunately, for him, it was karaoke night and the crowd was desperately thin (figuratively speaking only). We loitered in the parking lot long enough for Ichi Knuckles to take a shit inside the dueling piano bar. As we waited, a Lincoln Town Car pulled-up, picked-up two scantily clad harlots, drove around the block for two minutes before dropping off the two women who staggered out. It’s not polite to stare, Vic, Bruno told me. Are you some kind of pervert? No, I said, but I study commodities exchange. Ahh, he said, you’re a perv for economics.

Meandering onward, backward, sideways through the Blue Dome District of Downtown Tulsa, we found most establishments at this hour were closed. Then we spotted Arnie’s. 

And here we are. 

At the Hightop Table of the Fellowship, most of us are attempting to temper severe alcohol buzzes. De-accelerate. Lancelot said it best, yo, my check engine light is on. I need to switch to water, fam. Ichi Knuckles refuses to relent, inviting more gin into his bloodstream. He asks us, hey gents, when you flick-someone off, y’know, give them the bird, do you fly the thumb? Or no thumb? I tell Ichi I think it is a generational thing. The middle finger always flew solo until some Gen X asshole invented the thumb outrigger. Thank the millennials for casting the unnecessary thumb aside. It’s more efficient to leave the thumb at home. Gotcha, Ichi Knuckles says with a nod, so I am showing my age when I include a thumb? Dude, Bruno tells Ichi Knuckles, just go with with feels natural. Don’t overthink it. If you want to tell someone to fuck themselves, it has to come from the heart.   

Zelda, the captive princess in pajamas, descends upon our table. She plops down her can of BudLite. Her brown eyes stare somewhere between my left eye and my right nostril as she asks, where the fuck you doing here? Having a wee pint, lass, I say. You’re not around here, she says, voice slurring. Lancelot and Ichi Knuckles smile as they watch this exchange; Bruno, our big protector, turns his head to spy on Slack-Jaw, the chimney sweep ruffian burning coals at the bar. Zelda asks if I want to buy her a drink. 

…sure. What the hell? I go to the bar and order a non-alcoholic beer. They do not have any. Naturally. I order soda water on ice. I return to find Zelda on my stool. You’re not cold?, I ask Zelda, referencing her bare feet in soccer sandals. With a smile, Zelda tells me she lives upstairs. And then she closes her eyes. I believe it was intended as a wink, but her eyelids were too heavy for the quick maneuvering. She grasps the tabletop as if requiring leverage to open her eyes. She elaborates, telling us she came downstairs to the bar to check her mail. Bruno leans forward with interest, is Arnie a mailman? No, but!, Zelda says with sudden alertness, my dad knows to send my mail here. 

Where does your mom send mail?, Bruno asks with a smile. What about your grandmother? Are they pretty? Oh, yes, Zelda says. They are gorgeous!, she says. Really?, asks Bruno, interested in Zelda’s ancestry. He asks, between your mom and grandmother, which of these gorgeous ladies do you take after?

Zelda thinks about it. 

My pa.

Ha!, I snort a laugh. The snort has jump-started me out of my fearless dreamy state, but I’ve still no idea Slack-Jaw is about to fling a pint glass at my head. Fortunately, Bruno has his eyes trained on the local ruffian. 

Do you want to make a bet?, Zelda asks us. A bet?, on what, Ichi Knuckles asks her. Dunno, Zelda says with a head shake. Any bet. I love to gamble. Bruno says, well that would explain why you’re hitting on Vic. He’s a fucking shark, Bruno tells her, be careful. Zelda smiles at me and gives another long blink that nearly turns into a nap against my shoulder. 

Actually, Ichi Knuckles says to Zelda, Vic just proposed a bet. He is betting $20 you can’t flip a quarter with your nipples. Zelda’s sleepy eyes widen with startle. What fuck did just say? Oh no no no!, Bruno the protector is trying to calm the situation, saying, it was a bad joke, forget Ichi mentioned it. Zelda turns her angry eyes from Bruno to me. Make it $25. 

Vic?, Bruno asks me with raised brows. Is this organic enough of an experience to qualify for your doctorate thesis? Or is it not kosher? Yeah – no, I say, without having to mull it over. I’d rather observe this phenomena in the wild. 

Slack-Jaw arrives. For the first time tonight, I notice him from the breath on the back of my neck. Hey!, he hollers from his mouth gap. He doesn’t elaborate before Ichi Knuckles begins giggling nervously. I think our Uber is ready, gents!, Bruno says and grabs Slack-Jaw’s fist to shake it, saying, it’s been a pleasure, as always. Slack-Jaw is quizzical, but undermined. He shakes Bruno’s hand, saying, yeah, uhh, likewise. Lancelot alone remains seated, looking around, asking, who ordered an Uber? Zelda stands with the rest of us, asking with concern, wait, what?, where are we going? Hey sweetheart, Bruno says to Zelda, you should go upstairs and take an Advil, okie-dokie? 

Thus concludes the very first meeting of the Tulsa Chapter of the League of Extraordinary Traveling Fellows of a Gentlemanly Strangeness. Y’know Vic, I think we all learned something here tonight, Bruno says as we split-up, walking opposite paths down empty streets. Yeah?, I ask, and what’s that? 

I learned, Bruno says, faith in a common purpose can really bring men together to accomplish a bunch of jack shit. So long, Vic. 

So long, Bruno.