Entertainment Committee

Quite honestly there is absolutely nothing to do in the Dayton Ohio area. Mind you it’s not a metro just an area. You can go to eat, drink, bowl, go to an arcade, go to a mall, or see a movie but that is it. There are some local sports but you can’t get in unless you inherited the tickets. I know this because Mike, the other SA on the project, and I were tasked to find a place to have team event. This would include the Deloitte personnel and the client resources. So a couple nights a week we try to check out some leads. So far however none of them have turned out very well for us. Right now as it stands our options are Bowling, Pool, Laser tag, or just catering a party somewhere.

The first place we decided to check out is called the Oregon District. We were told it was an area of town going through an Urban Revival. Thinking we may have found the place to be in town, we got directions, checked out the website, and drove Downtown to check it out. While the area is certainly going through a redevelopment it is primarily residential. Nice redeveloped buildings and a clean close to downtown neighborhood. The main attraction was a 4 block section on one street that had a few stores: antiques, music, art, and other eclectic venues. Unfortunately the definition of an antique store includes the Goodwill and the definition of restaurant includes a bar with appetizers. There are a couple nice places to dine and an Irish pub but that is it.

Next as we were so close to downtown that night we decided to check it out. They do have a nice riverfront and the local AAA baseball team may be fun to watch; but if you plan to do anything downtown, get there before 5p. They shut everything down. We saw a nice looking diner – closed. We saw a couple other restaurants – closed. Gas stations – Closed. They might as well have slid the sidewalks under the buildings at sun down and closed off the entrances to the area. The only thing open was the hospital. And that is not a place I think you want to hang out at just for fun.

So the next day we looked online and found some listing for go-karting. The partner on the project thought this was a fun idea so we decided to check it out. The only location in Dayton was 20 minutes away and we got lost on the way. Side note I need to trust my own directions, we got lost because I didn’t think the directions I had wrote made sense and second guessed them – I was right the first time we should have just followed the directions! So since we were lost we decided to get some dinner. We found a little diner just outside of Kettering called Marx and stopped in. It may not have been the best idea! The menus were photo copies and they had stop stocking a third of the items needed for half the dishes, the salad bar was very suspect, and menus – because they were laminated – were used as place mats. I had an ok grilled ham and cheese but poor Mike ordered a French toast. It was the first and only time I’ve seen French toast that was fried in oil.. Not good.

So after our fine dinner we turned around corrected our navigation mistake and continued. After another 10 minutes we came to a part of town we were not expecting to. We were after all looking for a go kart track. The area was as close to a red light district as you can get. There were no kidding a dozen adult establishments with in a 2 mile area concluding with a Hooter’s when we finally came to our next turn. At this point it was time to start looking for the address ending in 31. We located 29, 30, 32, and 33 but no 31. We did pass an unmarked garage, but that didn’t look like a go kart track. It wasn’t it was a go kart parts supplier. At the end of this nights strange adventure all we found was Fried French Toast and a go kart supplier.

Another quick note: While we can’t find anything to do there are a ton of place to buy adult beverages. We passed 6 or 7 businesses that are drive through liquor stores. Literally they were pole barns that you pulled up to a cool and ordered a 12 pack and a bottle or what ever, paid, and then drive out the back of the building! What a strange place. I though there wasn’t much to do in Des Moines! Glad I get to come home every week.