Luck of the Shamrock

If anyone has ever been to a Dave and Buster's, Chuck E Cheese, or an arcade, you know that they are fun places. If go there with me, you can rarely pull me away from the skeeball machine where I am consistently trying to score points on those top corner pockets. Adult arcades are like playgrounds for the over 21 crowd (and it doesn't hurt that you can drink a beer while playing ping pong.) So, let me introduce you to a very interesting establishment in New Orleans called Shamrock. There's air hockey, ping pong cages, a mini bowling lane, skeeball, live music, foosball.  You name it, they probably have it. They will even give you solo cups if you want to trade in your paddles for a game of beirut.You can even have a corporate event there. Before the Shamrock moved in, this location housed the infamous Rock N Bowl in New Orleans (which has since moved across the street.) Now, before we move on to the best part, let me make something clear. This is NOT a Dave and Busters. Dave N Buster's are clean, you order your food from a waitress, there are membership cards, you can collect points, they are classy. This place is, well.....not.

After I had a healthy serving of jalepano poppers and french fries, I made my way to find my friend, Lou. Embarrassingly enough, this might be one of the first places where I have had a hard time finding the lavatory; mainly because the place is gigantic. I found it and when I found it, I was a bit confused but also, mesmerized.

You open the door and you are NOT in a bathroom. You are in the lounge area of the bathroom (you know, like they have at the mall or a nice hotel.) The walls are shamrock green and the opposing walls were mirrored. The room itself is bigger than two rooms in my house combined. There are large, black leather couches and three different large, flat screened televisions. I wish that the picture I took could do this room justice. (It was dark, really dark.)

Too dark to really capture the magnitude.

Now, I can't really imagine what happens in this lounge. It's the women's lounge, so it can't be anything too terrible. I was hoping there would be a sign on the wall that read, "no boys allowed." Imagine that you were at a corporate event and you wanted to escape. Your favorite tv show was on or you wanted to catch a sports game that none of your friends wanted to watch. You can just walk into the lounge and take a break from it all. I didn't really want to leave once I was entranced in this magical room with erin go bragh. There was a party, though, so I decided to continue. Behind the other door, there was just a bathroom. Green doors, green dispensers, regular soap.


***Post Script: As I was writing this, my boyfriend asked me what was so exciting about the Shamrock. I told him my excitement about the lounge area and his faced turned to shock and jealousy. "An entire room, there's no bathroom." I replied, "no, there was a lounge area with couches and flat screened tv before you go into the bathroom." His response, "like a whole room?" I ask, "don't they have one in the men's room?" His response, "no. just a bathroom." Well, maybe we should hang a sign in women's lounge area that reads, "no boys allowed, apparently you guys don't need to relax and gossip in the restroom."