The Guardian's Predictions for 2021

After this nightmare year, one thing is for certain: we are all desperately grabbing at hope. I know I am, which is why I was thrilled to see an article in the Guardian quoting psychics on their predictions for the future. That's exactly what I need, I thought: their clear, bright vision would re-energize me and spark hope that in 2021 life could be enjoyable once more.

For the most part, they didn't let me down. Here are some of the predictions and how they touched me.

Jayne Wallace is clairvoyant and practices aura reading, tarot and crystal healing. Her clients include Kim Kardashian West, Kylie Jenner and Kate Hudson.

(Wow. Résumés don't get more impressive than that. At least without stars of Charles in Charge.)

"Every crystal has a different voice.... The darker, deeper the colour, the stronger the voice."

In heaven right now Nina Simone is like "FUCK YEAH!!!"

"As I link in to the first quarter of 2021, the biggest question people have is health."

Which is weird, because during the Great Pandemic of 1812 everybody was fixated on tacos.

"[T]hose first months are going to be stressful in terms of mental health. Make sure you have people around you who you love."

Shit. Okay, but my family isn't going to take this well.

"March through to June is about division in health, as well as realisation – understanding and accepting why some have suffered worse."

Acceptance #1: I'm not rich or related to Trump so I'll get the vaccine after chickens colonize Mars.

"For the first four to five months [of 2021], there will be weak structure."

Huh. Yeah, I guess it could be difficult for Biden to get anything done after Trump tears all the wiring out of the White House.

Demian Allan is a teacher at the College of Psychic Studies in London, and has practised western astrology for more than 20 years.

"We are entering a period of technological revolution in 2021 that will change jobs, education and how we interact...."

I would never have guessed that, because Zoom stock is still forty-five cents a share.

"Coronavirus is not going to disappear but Mars moves out of Taurus on 4 March, easing the general health picture."

That's a bold stance. I thought some klutz might drop a bucket of the vaccine and be like, "Damn! Well, let's try again for April."

"In this country, we tend to try to engineer things back to the norm."

Because in other countries when, like, your refrigerator breaks down, you think, "Hey, instead of just repairing it, why don't we convert it into an otter sanctuary?"

Tatianna Morales has been a tarot reader and holistic healer for six years

"Card: The Ten of Wands. [This card] points to working smarter, not harder,..."

Sounds to me like the cards have seen too many T.D. Ameritrade commercials.

"Card: The Page of Swords. [This card] brings an energy of busyness, of research and strategy in 2021."

Shit. And I was just warming up to "Let Go, Let God."

"It asks that if you are inspired to take up new studies, hobbies or find new income streams, you take action."

Let me write that down. "If you want to do something, just do it." Oh, wait: it's already on my shoes.

Dale Spencer Weeks has practised as a psychic numerologist and seer for nine years....

"If 2020 has been about building a rocket ship, I liken 2021 to that ship taking off."

Interesting. But what if 2020 has been about dismantling your rockets so your enemies wouldn't release your pee tape?

"It’s going to be a huge year of change."

To all the skeptics out there, there have been a few years of absolutely no change. but they were so boring everybody forgot.

"There will also be political unrest and missiles will fly."

Shit! I had fifty bucks on missiles taking the train this year.

"[T]he vibe of 2021 is about expression and looking for freedom."

Fingers crossed that means everybody named Trump will be in jail.

"People will speak out in large groups...."

Finally! Because now every time eight of my friends get together, Paco is always, like, "Hey, guys, you know the rule!"

"[I]t is not only those with peaceful or progressive views who will seek to be heard."

That'll be a big change from 2020, when we didn't hear from any conservative gun nuts.

"February brings a seven vibration, a time when truth will be revealed. Medically, that could indicate wider availability of a vaccine."

Damn it. Okay, you win. Nobody's gonna drop a bucket of the vaccine.

"We may see revelations about the government."

I'm not so sure. Maybe Biden will also bitchslap anybody who crosses him on Twitter.

June Field was voted the world’s greatest psychic medium, beating 70,000 others in International Battle Of The Psychics

(Stop reading right now if you're a doubter asking, "Why did the other 69,999 psychics bother entering?")

"These next 12 months are a stepping stone to something better."

Honestly, I appreciate that, but things can't get worse unless masturbation makes us burst into flame.

"People are in denial about the virus and that causes friction."

This is absolutely spot on. I'll never forget my first boyfriend who was all, like, "You act like gonorrhea is a bad thing."

"Long before coronavirus arrived in the UK, I had cancelled work commitments – theatre dates and events. I felt death coming. I wanted to give the year a miss."

Well, you've got to hand it to her: she can hit it out of the park predicting past events.

"2021 will present an opportunity to reassess what’s important."

Because in 2020 we were all like, "Fuck worrying: let's dance!"

"In politics, I feel there is major change coming next year."

I agree, and I'm actually kind of worried about that. Fingers crossed Biden can keep America on track without the genius of Ivanka Trump.

"You don’t need to be a psychic to see the anger over how this has been handled."

You don't need to be a psychic to see anything you've said so far.

"Political systems will be taken down, but we will then rebuild."

Really? Everybody I've talked to has said, "There's no way we can replace Donald Trump or Boris Johnson. Let's just watch cat videos for the next twelve years."

"We will hug again next year, and we will come through this."

Love the positivity, but it's not exactly a risky prediction. Because if we don't come through this, only cockroaches and Cher will be around to call you a quack.

Read more here.

Ram Tough

We know exactly two things about oversized American trucks: they burn through enormous amounts of gasoline, and they're primarily driven by politically-conservative men who allegedly have small dicks. Or is there some other explanation for why the truck names are indistinguishable from the brand names of penis pumps? Here's a list with a sampling of each. See if you can tell them apart.

a. Grand Stallion
b. Nitro
c. Ramrod
d. Sport Trac Adrenalin
e. Red Studmaster
f. Explorer
g. Magnum
h. Gladiator
i. Ranger
j. Commando
k. Power Man 6000
l. F-250 Super Duty

Answers: b, d, f, i and l are American trucks. a, c, e, g, j and k are penis pumps. h is actually both. Here's more information for those curious about one or the other.

a. The Grand Stallion has a tapered latex sleeve and easy-to-use gliding action.

b. The Dodge Nitro is powered by a 4.0 L SOHC V6 engine rather than AA batteries.

c. The Ramrod has a battery pack conveniently attached for single-handed operation.

d. The Ford Sport Trac Adrenalin has a blown 4.6 engine making 390 pound-feet of torque. If it were a penis pump, it would be Jon Hamm.

e. The Red Studmaster has a studded adjustable cock ring, but no cup holder.

f. The Ford Explorer is available in an Eddie Bauer edition.

g. The Magnum is equipped with a new safety vacuum gauge. Don't try to imagine what could happen without it.

h. With three-foot clearance, the Jeep Gladiator could easily ride over anybody's penis. Unlike the silicone Gladiator, however, it has no internal nubs.

i. The Ford Ranger has a towing capacity of 4,200 penis pumps.

j. The Commando is penis-shaped, with a multi-speed vibrating bullet. We told our boyfriend we have no idea what that means.

k. The Power Man 6000 comes with a pleasure ring attachment. You could use it without it but, like, why?

l. The Ford F-250 Super Duty is twenty feet long. We bet its owners claim it's forty-five.

I live in a cramped New York apartment. It's so cramped that whenever I buy anything I have to toss something out, because I just can't cram in one more thing. Last month I bought a new lamp, so after careful consideration I decided a pair of pants would have to go.

I decided to sell those pants on eBay.

Now, the pants weren't in very good shape. The knees were baggy, the hems were frayed, and there was a quarter-sized hole in the seat. There was no way I'd wear them again, but with all the talk about reusing and recycling I just couldn't toss them out. I listed them with a starting bid of $1 and hoped somebody less fortunate would find them.

When somebody bid a dollar, it made my day. I'd done my part for the environment, and helped some poor person on a budget. When the bidding went to $10, my heart was full. It meant somebody truly appreciated these pants, and they'd take good care of them. Plus, it paid me back a bit for the time I spent photographing them and writing up the description.

Then one morning I turned on the computer and discovered the pants were going for thirty-five dollars. This knocked me for a loop. I mean, the pants didn't cost that new, so there was no reason they should command that kind of cash after I'd worn them a few years. There were four bidders involved, so I thought maybe they got carried away by the excitement. I thought about cancelling the auction, since a mistake had obviously been made, but figured it'd be a good lesson for all concerned.

The next day, when the bidding got up to sixty dollars, I got angry. Clearly there was more to this than just a simple pair of pants. Now there were nine bidders duking it out, and twelve people added the sale to their "Watch" list. This proved to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that something unseemly was going on.

And then it hit me like a bolt of lightning that almost made my breakfast come back up. I'd heard about vending machines in Japan where they sold the panties of schoolgirls, and realized the same sort of feckless perverts were fighting over my pants as well. My stomach churned as I imagined what the winning bidder would do to them: would his tongue explore the crotch like Lawrence explored Arabia? Would he suck every ounce of my sweat from the faded fabric? Would he pore over every nook and cranny searching for wayward, discolored spots of my bodily fluids? If his magnifying glass chanced upon a a hair from the nether regions of my body, would he press it to his face in ecstacy as he performed some vile onanistic deed?

Over the next few days, though, my anger ebbed, and when the pants hit $110 I turned flattered. I mean, indigent perverts are tawdry and disgusting, but now there were clearly businesspeople involved. I pictured these men -- accountants, lawyers, stock brokers -- sitting at their computers after a long day at work, ties loosened and Brooks Brothers boxers tenting at the thought of winning my tight, tight jeans and caressing them in their manicured hands. They'd press their faces up against their computer monitors and run their eyes across the outline of my muscular legs in the fabric, faded like the shroud of Turin. Then one lucky man would win them, and get to feel the warm cotton himself, left alone to his own perverted ends. It was sick and it was depraved and, by God, I couldn't get the thought out of my head.

I was haunted. Possessed. Which inextricably leads me to an open letter I'd like to share with the buyer.

When you typed in that $140 offer, I became a walking pool of turgid testosterone, ready to pounce on anything that moved. I couldn't rest until you had my pants in your determined hands. Were you hunky and continental, like Antonio Banderas? Were you a stylish, manly gay with a dark streak, like Tom Ford? Or were you a billionaire daddy entrepreneur like Ted Turner whose wealth gave him the opportunity to play out his every demented desire? As I packed the pants into the box to ship, I pleasured myself as I pictured you.

Given the circumstances, then, I think you can see why I threw in the underwear. After I wiped myself clean with them, it occurred to me that you might appreciate something I'd worn even closer to my skin. I pictured you with my grubby shorts plastered across your face, wearing a look of pure erotic bliss, and I felt a bond of kinship between us, separated by space but joined together by kink and a tiny pair of striped bikini briefs polka-dotted with pee. And that's when I wrote that little note.

So, I'd like to offer you a profound, heartfelt apology. I had absolutely no idea they were vintage Levis worth twice what you paid for them, and that nobody but me had anything untoward in mind. Please, burn the note, and toss the underwear straight into the trash. How horrified you must have been to pull them out of the ziploc bag and hear them crackle in your hands. I didn't realize some of the bidders were women, let alone religious ones in Utah.

In closing, I'd like to make it perfectly clear that you are certainly not a disgusting little pig who should be bent over my knee and paddled until your buttcheeks are red and burning with a heady mix of pain and pleasure, and, had I known you were a pillar of the Salt Lake City community, I would never have ordered you to suck the man-juice out of my filthy ball-rag.

Please, tell the police this was all a horrible mistake and I promise I'll never eBay again.

Your Loyal ex-eBay Seller,
RomanHans

Over the last few days I've gotten literally hundreds of emails all saying the exact same thing: Roman, I just saw Harrison Ford on Access Hollywood. It was hard for me to believe, but he was getting his chest waxed. Even weirder, he said he was doing it to draw attention to world deforestation.

No, it was not a dream. World deforestation.

Roman, I've been wracking my brain for days now and hope you can help. Why is Harrison Ford getting his chest waxed like world deforestation?

Dear Readers,

I'm glad you wrote, as it seems quite obvious to me. Of course, I nearly have a degree from a major university. Harrison Ford getting his chest waxed is like world deforestation ...

10. Because like trees, grasses, mosses, and lichen, Harrison Ford's body hair converts carbon dioxide to oxygen.

9. Because after a country is deforested, it looks a lot better in an open shirt.

8. Because timber companies often clear forests just to make it easier to apply sunscreen.

7. Because chest hair is great at preventing runoff, if you know what I mean.

6. Because after they're done clearcutting, lumberjacks frequently offer to tweeze your eyebrows for free.

5. Because like trees, Harrison Ford's chest hair provides a home for thousands of species of wildlife.

4. Because when you cut trees down, they frequently scream "KELLY CLARKSON!"

3. Because when trees are allowed to grow wild across a country, it can be difficult to find its nipples.

2. Because when I think hard wood, I think Harrison Ford.

1. It's an metaphor: once its chest has been stripped bare, all the earth will have left is its pubes.

Thrilled, Chilled, and Possibly Killed

Tall men don't find a lot of amusement at amusement parks. Ridiculous admission prices, sure. Stomach-churning fast food, definitely. And whole hordes of Juicy Couture-wearing midwesterners who shove Mickey Mouse aside to stalk us, screaming "HOW TALL ARE YEW?" and "ARE YER PARENTS TALL?" But fun? Not a chance. Because when you're six foot eight, thrill rides are more of an actual fright than some casual thrill.

Now, I'm not talking about those traveling carnivals that skinny tattoed dudes set up in the parking lots of your local Pic N' Save. They'll scare anybody with a brain, and not just because you'll find thicker metal in Halle Berry's bra. No, I mean the roller coasters at major amusement parks. Space Mountain, Disneyland, Six Flags. The Matterhorn, the Cyclone, Colossus. The permanent ones. The ones where the owners can't skip town if somebody sues.

We start to worry when we hear the warnings: "Please keep your hands and arms inside the car at all times." This has always confused me. Isn't there a way of phrasing it where the two body parts don't sound completely distinct? I feel like replying, "Well, I'll keep my arms in the car, but where my hands go is anybody's guess!"

As we wait in line we replay the words over and over in our heads, slowly deciphering what they mean. They're saying that our little roller coaster car will barrel past things that are both (a) stationary and (b) cement, and they'll be within the average-sized person's reach. They're saying that an average-sized person stands a chance of death or disfigurement if they protrude too far from the car.

All the regular-sized folks, of course, couldn't care less. They laugh and joke and suck down their eight-dollar sodas, knowing that any amusement park that damages their puny little asses is just asking for a lawsuit. They'll go crazy on the ride, waving at friends on the ground, flinging their arms around so they'll fly up out of their seats, trying to snap off bits of passing stucco for souvenirs. They don't give it a second thought, and there's no real reason they should.

The tall guy, though, senses a real problem. He's gone through life protruding too far, in at least a couple different directions at once. Blithely wave your hands in the air while we're careening down that hill and you're not even going to reach my Adam's Apple. In fact, you're in serious danger of picking my nose. Once I scratched the back of my neck on a cruise ship and I knocked three folks on the Lido Deck overboard. If they're saying size could be a problem for average folks, you know it's going to be a problem for us.

While everyone is blithely chattering away, then, the tall guy has gone paler than usual. He tries to maneuver toward the speakers to get further details, like there's a tornado approaching, and screams like a banshee so folks'll shut up. He realizes he's got no defense in court: with all the warnings they give, he'd be pulled apart like a crockpot chicken. "Your honor," the defense lawyer would drone, "the man was six foot EIGHT. Six foot EIGHT. Too big to fit into a FORD. Longer than a CANOE. Too tall to wear HUMAN UNDERWEAR. We were warning REGULAR-SIZED folks to be careful -- why on earth would HE get on? Surely he must have realized that getting onto this ride was like leaping headfirst into a CUISINART."

As the sweat accumulates on our foreheads, we try to imagine: how tall do amusement parks think people get?

We're painfully aware of how estimates vary. We've strolled down sidewalks where tree branches have been meticulously trimmed to a five-foot clearance. We've seen pedestrian tunnels with six foot ceilings, and we've stumbled into low-hanging power lines that wrapped around our necks like rubber chokers. Heck, I had to duck to get inside the Taj Mahal. Somebody's made an assumption here, and we suspect that in a scene involving fountains of blood and decapitation we're going to find out what.

We imagine what the world was like when this roller coaster was built. "According to our studies," the designer declares, "ninety nine percent of all people are under six foot two. I suggest, then, that we make allow at least a six foot six clearance in all the tunnels, to allow for puffy hair or Stetson hats. Sure, maybe once in a while we'll get somebody taller in the park, but that 'hands and arms' recording will definitely scare them away."

"I wonder if I'm too tall for this ride," I tell my friends as the next available car halts in front of us. "It's sounding kind of dangerous."

They laugh. "Jeez," Steve says. "For a tall guy, you're really a wimp."

And so with fingers crossed the tall person steps in, buckles himself up, and the car speeds off.

Two minutes later his train pulls into the station, just like every other. All the riders are exhilarated and exhausted and just plain out of breath ... except one. He doesn't wave to the patrons waiting to board the ride, doesn't undo his seatbelt, doesn't clamber his way awkwardly out of the car. Because he's had his head sheared clean off. He's sitting there perfectly still, but blood is shooting out of the neck and splashing all over the white vinyl seats.

The attendants look at him, all strapped in, his white knuckles still gripping the lap bar, and they share a shocked look.

"Wow," one says. "I wonder if his parents were tall."

Big Feet: Big Stuff or Big Bluff?

In the history of the universe, ever since Nothing turned into Something, since cosmic dust turned into Zara stores and salamanders evolved into aura consultants, there have been exactly four studies to determine whether Big Feet mean Big Meat.

Scientists have examined virtually everything: why the sky is blue, why birds sing, why toast always lands butter side down (Svenska Joornal der Breakfaast, 1997, pp. 162-217). So why the penis ennui? When I'm hanging around some bar, trying to choose between the reasonably-attractive tall guy and the drop-dead gorgeous short guy, the last thing on my mind is dirty bread.

Gay people blame homophobia for all kinds of stuff, but I'm thinking it's involved here as well. This is the most frequently asked question of all time, surpassing even "Who killed JFK?" and "How did that whole Trump thing start?" A million times a day somebody asks if there's a connection, and that's just the folks who catch me in clothes.

Scientists, I'm guessing, don't want to be tarred by that "gay" feather. It's okay to grow a spare ear on the back of a mouse, or genetically merge chickens with Miracle Whip so they'll start laying egg salad. But get another man excited? That's just plain weird. What are the other scientists going to think? "That Guenther, he likes the penis a little too much," they'd tell their assistants. "Now go sew these lips on that dog." And how's his wife going to feel when he comes home and recounts his day? "Honey!" he calls, setting his briefcase on the hall table, "I saw a real whopper this morning!" She might feign enthusiasm to his face, but you know she's going to tell her family he's unemployed.

Even these four studies seem a little skittish, since they all have serious flaws. The first declares there's no significant correlation between penis length and shoe size, though somehow they've avoided handling erect penises. They "gently stretch" them, like they're tight socks, and measure them that way. Because, you know, who's got the energy to get a guy hard?

I want to tell these researchers that nobody cares how stretchy penises are. I have friends who have sex with rubber plants, and friends who have sex with balloons, but I don't know anybody who wants to get screwed by taffy. Then I notice their disclaimer: they don't need to measure erections, because an earlier study showed a strong correlation between stretched length and erect length.

This sounds a little farfetched to me, so I check it out. I'll just say two things about that study: one, math is boring even with big dicks involved; and two, while the correlation between stretched and hard length was 0.793, the correlation between soft and hard length was 0.678.

Translated into English, it means guessing how much bigger a stretched penis will get is just slightly more reliable than guessing how much bigger a soft, dangly penis will get. And if that were even remotely possible, I wouldn't have cried myself to sleep three times last week.

A few months later a second group of scientists comes along, and they decide they can do better. "To hell with stretching dicks!" they proclaim. "We'll have guys measure their own!"

I'll pause here so we can all laugh at these people. Mature men with advanced degrees, wearing white coats and stethoscopes, based a study on the assumption that men wouldn't lie about their endowments. Maybe they phoned the guys and asked how long their dicks were, or maybe they shoved them into little cubicles while they waited squeamishly outside. Either way seems pretty silly to me, and I buy my cologne from Rite Aid. Doctors can remove your spleen or transplant your gallbladder or even smear a woman's pap, but getting a guy visibly excited, well . . . that's not somewhere anyone wants to go.

Anybody who's ever answered a personal ad knows how that study turned out. They didn't find any correlation between shoe size and penis length -- maybe because regardless of shoe size, everybody reported nineteen inches. Guys lie about everything, even when they know they'll get caught. "That's in dog years," they admit when you question their age. "That's on the moon," they say when you doubt their weight. As for endowment, cold weather is a popular excuse. Except I lived with one of these guys for nearly a year, and two weeks in Death Valley wouldn't have nudged him toward tiny.

Eventually a third research group steps into the breach. "That second study was nonsense," they decree, "so we're going to reenact the first." They stretch, they measure, and there's no correlation.

The veil is lifted slightly by our fourth and final group, though they're stretchers as well. "We think we found something in index fingers," they announce, "but we just didn't see enough penises." You can criticize these guys if you want -- they should get better funding, or try to sign up volunteers -- but I just want to buy them a beer and say, buddy, you and me both.

And so here I sit, a ridiculously tall man who gets asked three hundred times a day if big feet mean big meat. I don't like sharing my own personal data, at least until guys have bought me appetizers, so I've always said nobody knows. Now I can add a well-informed postscript: that nobody's done a study comparing erect penis length to shoe size, or finger length, or height. That the geniuses in our prestigious research institutes have more pressing things to do, like calculating the force required to shoot a sheep to the moon (Applied Ovine Ergonomics, Nov. 2002, pp. 523-81). That maybe it's time gay scientists stepped up to the plate.

Heck, I'll volunteer, if that'll help. Because when my time comes, I'd be pretty damned proud to have this on my tombstone:

Here lies RomanHans.

He wasn't a doctor, or a scientist, or even particularly smart.

But he sure wasn't afraid to get a guy hard.

Tall guys have to be careful who they go out with. Wander around with another tall guy and the world will cower at your feet. Hang out with an average-sized guy and you'll still get admiring glances. Venture into public with somebody short, though, and you may as well glue a "Kick me!" sign to your ass.

I'm not talking about all the problems due to the height difference. Sure, the short guy will amble along just slightly slower than a disabled dachshund, while snails and Frankenstein scamper past. Then there's the impossibility of having a conversation: his mouth is roughly ten feet from your ear, which means you'd hear more decipherable words out of a seashell. Either you pretend to understand what he's saying and just randomly nod your head, or you actually make the effort and say "What?" every time he speaks. You're going to end up a frustrated hunchback, and he'll burn out his throat yelling like Grandma. Both of you will be spitting nails, but it'll get worse when you start dating seriously and he gives you an ear trumpet for Christmas.

Now, all this is irritating -- I mean, I'd prefer a sweater -- but the real horror is how everybody else treats the two of you like a Ripley's exhibit sprung to life. The rudest folks whip out cameras to get proof to show their friends. You're not just interesting: you're one of the Seven Wonders of the World, and they'll snap away like you're the Virgin Mary made manifest over the Topeka Wal-Mart. They won't just stand across the street and worship from afar: they'll want to twist the pair of you into all sorts of insulting poses. "We wanna play up the height difference," drawls Wilbur from Bag ‘o Pretzels, Idaho, like a redneck Orson Welles. "Why doncha pretend yer stuffin' Tiny in yer big giant pocket?"

"No, no, no," his wife Durlene protests. "Have Tiny sit on Lurch's lap, like he's a ventriloquist's dummy."

I hate taking part in these scenarios, though I actually can talk without moving my lips. I leave the house feeling like an average guy, and then these folks go and spoil it. I want to run screaming for a land where people are compassionate and considerate, but somebody's got to help Tiny climb up onto a chair.

Worse than hanging out with somebody short is hanging out with someone heavy. That's a completely different phenomenon. Now the pair of you won't just look strange: you'll transform into a number. Of course, you'll be the number 10.

Oddly, this is the only time I've heard of people turning alphanumeric. If Pamela Anderson kicked a skier nobody'd see RL. If Marlon Brando screwed Wally Cox nobody'd see Qr. When a pregnant lady frisks a midget, nobody sees BY.

Nope, the number 10 is it. When two tall guys stand side-by-side, nobody says you look like 11. Hang out with a hunchback and nobody thinks you look like 12. Loiter near a snowman and nobody sees 18. But pause for a second near an overweight guy and suddenly everyone's an accountant.

More embarrassing by far, though, is hanging out with a short female, because now everyone will assume you're having sex. And now they won't just casually glance at the pair of you, or stare as you walk by. They'll chase you down the street, screaming in disbelief. They'll follow you home, pluck out their eyes, and roll them under your door to get a better look. And then the inquisition begins, always with the same idiotic question:

"Gawrsh, you're like ten dang feet tall, and she's eentsy as a mouse. How in the name of Our Good Lord Jesus do the two of you manage to have SAYYY-ex?"

Now, I get so confused by this I wonder if I'm doing something wrong. Height doesn't have anything to do with any of my bedroom activities, yet these folks give me the feeling I shouldn't let anyone under five foot eight take a ride. I mean, it's not like my partner and I aren't flexible. It's not like furniture doesn't exist. C'mon -- half the stepstools you see are like twelve inches high. They're not made for changing lightbulbs.

I thought about this long and hard, and I narrowed it down to two possibilities. One, they're concerned that while our genitals are busy, our faces are too far apart to express affection. Sure, I'm not thrilled that my mouth is closer to the Australian outback than my current companion, but as long as our middles meet I'm fine. It's like eating cookies on a roller coaster: I'm getting enough stimulation already, thanks -- let's save the Oreos until afterwards.

The other possibility is, they're worried that our genitals don't match up when we're standing. Yup, it's true: I have to bend my knees to do it doggy style, and sometimes I end up yowling like a chilly chihuahua. Apparently it's good exercise: my arms may look like sticks, but my thighs rub together when I walk.

Either way, I refuse to dignify this stupidity with an intelligent response. Usually I ignore it, but sometimes I get mad. I wonder why I have to put up with this. I wonder why these idiots think it's a question you can ask a stranger. "I do it the same way you do it," I announce. "Except I don't have any relatives in the room."

Repeat Wednesday: What A Dump

I met Trevor bar-hopping one night. He was a few years older than me -- heck, a few hundred years older -- so I tried to lose him, but he was incredibly persistent.

"Come home with me," he said.

"I couldn't," I replied.

"It's just a small penthouse. Ten thousand square feet in Chelsea, overlooking the Hudson."

"Just let me get my coat."

Almost instantly we became an item. My usual boring life vanished as I got swept up in a whirlwind of fast cars, expensive restaurants, and rubbing elbows with the rich and famous. My mom always said it was just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one, but I thought it was easier to fall for a wealthy guy. He was cultured. He was refined. He didn't wear underwear twice. How could anybody resist?

A determined, confident lawyer, Trevor leapt into commitment headfirst. Waking up the morning after our first date I found myself alone in a bedroom the size of a football field, walls of glass on three sides. "Had to go to work," a note on the Noguchi coffee table read. "Make yourself at home. See you tonight. P. S. The alarm is on so you can't leave."

Naturally, I was horribly annoyed. I felt like a goldfish in a bowl, a bird in a cage, a Fabergé egg, though I'd only pleased a couple members of the Russian royal family. But as I wandered the endless hallways dotted with tasteful Italian statues, passing room after room stuffed with armoires, wet bars, and Renoirs, I felt my anger fade. By the time I counted bathroom number eight I never wanted to see real life again.

The kitchen was vast and industrial, with more chrome than a Cadillac dealership, and the fridge was stocked like Balducci's. I smeared a truffle with caviar and headed to the rec room, where a flat-screen TV covered the one non-glass wall. I'd never let myself be "kept," I decided as I watched a King Kong-sized Julia Child chop garlic larger than my head. But I could be cute and appreciative until chickens colonized Mars.

That first date lasted eight days, with just a quick pause for breath before the second: Trevor whisked me away to his home in the Hamptons. When he hosted a pool party, though, so I could meet his friends, it spiraled straight down the toilet. There were 50 of us: Trevor, me, and 48 other folks who, one by one, either congratulated me on my "catch" or suggested innovative ways to suck the poor sap dry.

"You know what you should do," one attractive man suggested, "is have an early birthday. That way you'll get a present whether or not he lasts until the real thing."

"Make up a sick aunt in Brooklyn," a thin young guy in Speedos advised, "so you can get out occasionally and sleep with someone attractive."

"Two words," a Leona Helmsley-type whispered. "Hot chocolate. It masks the taste of everything from Rohypnol to Beano."

I figured another intergenerational couple would understand, but once December wandered out of earshot May cut to the chase: "Getting him into bed was the easy part," he disclosed. "Now you've got to get into the will."

Eventually Trevor's sister sidled over and took my arm. "I can't believe the hateful things people are saying," she said. I felt like kissing her, but then she glanced over at Trevor, who was flipping burgers in his tiny swim trunks, and guffawed. "I mean, look at him. You'll earn every penny you get!"

I broke free of her grip and stormed into the house, Trevor toddling close behind. "I'm sick of these people," I said, tears welling in my eyes. "Every one of them thinks I'm after your money. It's like I have to be a gold digger just because I wear ugly clothes, cut my own hair, and buy my cologne from Rite Aid."

That last one froze Trevor in his tracks, so I continued to the bedroom alone. I changed into street clothes, threw my stuff in my suitcase, then cleared my toiletries out of the bathroom. I stumbled outside and got in the limo, but before I could tell the driver where to go Trevor had jumped in beside me, fully clothed.

"I hoped we could ignore the differences between us," I said, "but your friends don't seem willing to try. Why are they so suspicious? Why can't they see us as a couple, as two men in love, instead of old and rich paired with young and for sale?"

"Roman," he said, taking my hand in his, "it's nothing personal. Everybody makes assumptions, rich and poor alike. It's just the way people are."

"That's where you're wrong," I said. "It's the greedy who think we're all after money. It's the conniving who suspect us of plots. It's the backstabbers who think everyone's after them. I'll go hang out with poor, stupid, lazy people if that'll stop me from being insulted."

I don't know why this made me think of McDonald's, but it did. My stomach started growling, so I told the driver to head there, and we rode in silence until the golden arches appeared. "If you set one foot in there," Trevor warned, "it's over between us."

"I know," I said, nodding gravely, "but that's how it's got to be. This is my world. Here, I know I won't be judged."

Trevor followed me inside, resigned to my decision. "At least let me pay for you," he said, "as my farewell gift." I gave him a hug, for the last time inhaling the woodsy cologne that cost more than my education. When I let go, he stepped up to a register and bravely faced the geeky clerk. "I don't want anything, but I'd like to pay for him." The clerk looked to me for my order, punched it in, and read the total aloud, his pubescent voice cracking.

Trevor and I exchanged one final glance. I'd miss him, as strong feelings intermingled with my love of his wealth. But I knew what I was doing was right. Maybe these people weren't rich or fun or creative or smart, and maybe they had to move their fingers in the air to read the menu, but they wouldn't damn someone based on appearance. We were below pride, with our farts and flab and turquoise fannypacks. This Dorothy was back in his Kansas.

As Trevor fished the bills from his wallet the clerk looked at the two of us -- him in his tailored finery, me in my humble attire. His mouth twisted into a scabby pink smile and he scratched the top off a zit. "I love it when folks buy food for the homeless!" he said.

You get busy. You know how it is. You make a snack, do the laundry, take out the trash, and suddenly the thought hits you: Wait. No. Really? I haven't had sex in eight years?

I try to come up with an actual date but can't do it. It's not like people send you Hallmark cards after you screw. You can't run to the file cabinet and sort through the greetings for written evidence: from Grandma for my birthday, from my sister for Christmas, from Keith for the spit-roasted three-way. I wrack my brain but can't come up with any holidays that usually point towards sex, like an anniversary with an old beau, or a Valentine's Day with a new one, and I can't recall boyfriends that would indicate I was screwing around at the time. Mentally I peer at my penis like a forensic examiner: while there aren't any leeches or decomposition, just judging by its overall sadness I'd say it's been seven to ten years.

Emma acts like it's a positive thing. "You've got this zen calm to you," she declares. "Like you're post-hookup. Like sexual desire is a demon and after years of fighting you've finally wrestled it to the ground."

I'm not sure this is flattery. Fun, attractive people don't wrestle horniness to the ground: they tear their clothes off and dive right in. Frequently, in fact. Six or seven times a week. Me, though -- I've apparently dealt with it for so long I've become the first person in history to permanently win. I've looked into my pants and shouted, "BEGONE, SATAN!" so many times he's packed up all of his stuff and moved to some place where sin is still a vague possibility. He's probably hitchhiking to Betty White's place as we speak.

I decide to attack the problem logically, with a three-pronged approach. I answer an ad on Craigslist, I download Growlr, and I wander around the city pretending I'm a nice person so I can meet attractive people in the flesh.

Craigslist is the first option to crash and burn. I find a personals ad from a sixty-year-old man on the Upper West Side who likes the opera, the theatre, and travel, and wants to form a connection before taking it any farther. I email him expressing similar interests and his reply shoots back. "DO YOU HAVE A DICK PIC?" he asks. And he thoughtfully includes his.

I wrestle with it for a day or two. Times have changed, I say to myself. All the kids do it these days. Then I wake up one morning with one thought in my head: sixty-year-old men should NOT have dick pics. Nobody looks at a sixty-year-old man and thinks, "I'm on the fence about doing him. I think I'll hold out until I get details on girth."

It takes me a week to dismiss Growlr. The hot dudes are all masseurs or personal trainers, which means there's a price tag attached. The regular folks confuse me. I'm expecting come-hither poses that recall Denzel Washington but instead get smiles and berets and tons of excess flesh. I just can't see them as sexual. They remind me of Rerun from "What's Happening?" While the rest of the cast is struggling with dating he's buying striped socks and asking, "Who's ready to Pop & Lock?"

I don't actually communicate with anyone on Growlr: the Shouts -- paid messages to all subscribers -- scare me off. Most include words like "420-friendly" (weed) or "PNP" (crystal meth). "Looking for PARTY FAVORS," reads one Shout. "Anybody else LIKE TO SKI?" asks another. Are these people serious? I wonder. Like cops will read these and think, "I'm stumped! Guess I'll have to look elsewhere for illegal drug use."

One man whose profile name is Happy Times gives me existential despair. "I'm bored," he says one day. "Anybody want a blowjob?" The next day it's, "I'm super bored. Who wants to get sucked?" That's followed by, "Really bored. My lips were made for oral service" and then "Just bored sick. Cum to my glory hole!" Mentally I compose a reply, but "Holy Christ, dude -- GET A FUCKIN' JOB!" probably isn't what he's looking for.

Cruising hot dudes I see in the city gets me the furthest. Stephen, a sales clerk at a local store, is getting off work and asks me if I want to go to his place for coffee. I get butterflies. Should I? Could I? He's short -- maybe 5'4" -- but he's handsome and outgoing so I agree. We're walking down 14th Street as Too Much Information pours out. He's a recovering addict who's gone to AA meetings every day for 27 years. He's currently addicted to diet soda, which explains the plastic cup he's carrying that's the size of carry-on luggage. He's 59 and claims to like age-appropriate men but his last two boyfriends were 30. Unprompted, he shows me pictures of them. When he sees my look of displeasure he offers an excuse: "I didn't want to get involved with them," he says, "but they insisted."

"Shoot," I say, slapping my forehead. "I forgot I have to be somewhere." I grab his hand and shake it to a confused look. "Nice meeting you!" I say, and I run.

Then on Sunday I go to the Folsom Street East Fair. I see a bondage demonstration, watch some Furries share a carrot, and twenty minutes later I'm with another handsome man, this one maybe 5'3", walking to another apartment for more drinks. Yaakov looked great with his shirt off, but it's back on now and with each step that memory fades. He gets a phone call and takes it. For five minutes he argues with somebody in Hebrew. It's pretty much the opposite of sexy, since it reminds me of renegotiating my lease.

We're four blocks away from his place when he tells me he's a rabbi. I feel like such an idiot; I thought it was just a bad haircut. Three blocks away he says his roommate stole his furniture so he has no place to sit down. Two blocks away he says he has no depth perception so he can't cross streets alone. "FASTER!" I implore. "LET'S WALK FASTER! I AM REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS!" One block away he tells me he was following me at the street fair. Just across the street I realize that every time he opens his mouth I get a whiff of a really bad stink.

Which leaves Yaakov stranded at a crosswalk while I head home alone. I catch a glimpse of myself in a window and I start to understand Emma's comment. I've wrestled with the demon of desire so often it's like Godzilla fighting Rob Kardashian. Still, I add a mental note to my logical approach. "FIND A TALLER MAN," it reads. Not because he'll be closer to my height, but because the short ones can't walk fast enough.

Repeat Monday: Heather Has A Mommy And A Daddy, Part Two

One night there’s a dance at Heather’s school and her parents offer to chaperone. While Heather is dancing with Danitra, she sees from the corner of her eye her mom and dad moving onto the dance floor. She watches in horror as her mom just sort of stands there swaying, her gingham granny dress limply hanging to the floor. She grimaces as her dad starts chopping at the air like Jackie Chan being attacked by locusts.

Occasionally their movements coincide with the beat. Heather runs to the bathroom crying.

“Heather, don’t feel so bad,” Danitra says. “Lots of kids have embarrassing parents.” She starts to lead Heather out of the bathroom, then stops. “Um, maybe we should stay in here a while longer. They just started doing the Twist.”

One day the class projects are due. Heather brings in the model she’s made. It’s a lump of brown Play-Doh with ketchup poured over it and dotted with marshmellows stuck on with toothpicks. She sets it on the table as her teacher comes over to look.

“Why, Heather! That’s . . . nice! Very very nice!”

“What the hell is it?” Tommy asks.

“TOMMY! Heather’s parents had me over for dinner once. This is what they call ‘chicken-fried steak.’”

Heather bursts into tears. “NO IT’S NOT! It’s a VOLCANO! That’s lava, and that’s steam coming out.”

Mrs. Weinberg-Lopez comforts Heather. Danitra enters and places her project next to Heather’s on the table.

“Why, Danitra, what’s this?”

Danitra delicately removes the sheet protecting her project.

“Versailles.”

Heather takes one look at the tiny replica of Louis XIV’s summer home, constructed by Danitra and her two dads out of two hundred cubic yards of teak plank, thirty square feet of gold leaf, sixty pounds of Italian travertine marble from the same quarry Michelangelo used, tiny topiary and functional miniature fountains, and cries even harder.

“Why did I have to have a mom and a dad?” Heather sobs. “Why can’t my family be like all the rest?”

Mrs. Weinberg-Lopez pulls Heather close. “Children,” she says,”every family is special, including those conforming to the rigid, stereotypical standard of male domination.” She starts to tell the class about her own family, including her hearing-impaired Hispanic mother, her height-challenged Israeli father, her recovering-substance-abusing brother-in-law and her Armenian sex-addict half-sister, but stops, realizing the school year is only 4,074 hours long.

“Just because Heather’s parents are heterosexual doesn’t mean they’re slow-witted philistines, though there are strong correlations you don’t need a PhD in statistics to understand. But Heather is lucky to have a sweet mom and a wonderful dad and a dog named Molly and a hamster named Samson, and they all live together in a lovely house. They’ve got interesting avocado-colored appliances, carpet as long as your hair, and furniture that‘s by-and-large wood that must have taken them hours to assemble. There’s a big plastic sofa that turns into a bed, and a La-Z-Boy -- ”

“A what?” Keanu asks.

“A La-Z-Boy,” Mrs. Weinberg-Lopez repeats. “It’s a big vinyl chair that reclines.”

“Oh, man!” exclaims Keanu, covering his face with his hands. “And I thought our Herman Miller reproductions were embarrassing!”

Mrs. Weinberg-Lopez continues. “But the important thing is, they’re a family. They’re a group united for a common purpose, where each individual is given a sense of empowerment and their shared bonds are formalized in a ritualistic manner.”

“Oh,” the students respond in unison.

Everybody hugs.

THE END

If you enjoyed this story about Heather, ask your local bookseller for these titles:

“Heather’s Mom is Narcoleptic”
“Heather’s Dad Has Epstein-Barr”
“Heather’s Sister’s Problem Still Puzzles Specialists”
and the latest,
“It’s No Picnic Being Related to Heather”

Repeat Monday: Heather Has A Mommy And A Daddy, Part One

I don't believe this. Apparently it's so fashionable to be gay, there are support books for children who have heterosexual parents.

Heather Has a Mommy and a Daddy

Deep in the heart of Dullsville, at the end of a cul-de-sac, behind a lawn of scratchy brown grass dotted with giant plastic butterflies, three flaking cement deer, and a philodendron the size of Bob Hoskins though with fewer decorative parts, lives Heather Thompson.

Heather has a mommy and a daddy. Heather’s daddy is an accountant. Her mommy is a homemaker. Before Heather was born they met, fell in love, and got married.

“I love you very much and I’m having your child,” Heather’s mom said.

Danitra is Heather’s best friend. One of Danitra’s dads is an empowerment facilitator. The other is an aura consultant. Danitra doesn’t know what they do at work, except they don’t need briefcases. Before Danitra was born her daddies met and fell in love, and after seventeen years spent discussing caring and support, handling acceptance, and negotiating intimacy, they had a commitment ceremony.

“I love you very much and I’m designing the rings,” Danitra’s Daddy Mike said.

One day in school Heather’s teacher, Mrs. Weinberg-Lopez, tells the class to draw pictures of their families.

Danitra draws two men, Julio draws two women, and Heather draws a man and a woman.

Keanu points at the woman Heather drew, with squiggly yellow hair, a crude red dress and simple brown shoes. “This dad here’s got some ugly drag going on,” he says.

At lunchtime Danitra sits on the bench next to Heather and pulls a sandwich out of a brown paper bag.

“Want to trade?” Danitra asks. “I’ve got grilled eggplant and goat cheese on marjoram foccacia.”

“Um, I didn’t bring lunch,” Heather stammers, kicking her brown paper bag out of sight. “I’m . . . uh . . . on a diet.”

“Diet?” Danitra asks. “Haven’t your dads told you not to buy into that patriarchal looks-based chauvinism? And anyway, what’s this then?” she asks, holding up the bag with “HAVE A SUPER DAY!” written in sparkle marker on it.

Julio, who was listening nearby, runs up and grabs Heather’s lunch. “Yeah, what’s this? It’s somebody’s lunch!”

Heather jumps at the bag but Julio holds it out of reach. “You give that back!” Heather yells.

“Try and make me!” Julio chides. He pulls Heather’s sandwich apart and drops it like it was electrified. He wobbles away, holding his stomach.

“Oh my God!” he cries. “There’s like dead stuff in there!”

Danitra looks at the sandwich lying on the cement. “Is that MEAT? Is that like SPAM?”

Claudia, sitting quietly at the other end of the bench, bursts into tears. “Heather’s eating BAMBI!”

“It’s friggin’ Wonder Bread!” Julio scoffs.

Keanu walks toward the bread and peers at it. “And it’s got LUBE all over it!”

“You idiot, that’s MAYONNAISE.”

“What’s mayonnaise?”

“It’s like goat cheese for heterosexuals.”

“Heterosexuals?” Keanu asks. “Heather’s mommy and daddy are heterosexuals?”

Heather starts to yell. “No! I don’t have a mommy and a daddy. I’ve got two daddies!”

“Hell-OOOO!” Danitra says, drawing the word out to twelve syllables. “We can see your clothes!”

“Um . . . “ Heather stalls, “then I’ve got two mommies.”

“And we’ve seen you play baseball,” Julio answers.

Heather, unable to think of a response, sits on the bench and starts to cry. Danitra pulls a robin’s egg blue bandana from her pocket and dabs at Heather’s face.

“Maybe your mom’s not really a woman,” Danitra offers.

“Well,” Heather says, sniffing, “she cleans the house, and cooks, and does the laundry.”

Danitra fumes. “We’re trying to establish that she’s female, not that she’s an idiot.”

“Maybe your dad’s not really a man,” Julio suggests.

“Well,” Heather answers, wiping her nose. “He’s big and strong and he’s got a moustache.”

Several of the children wonder what this proves but nobody says anything.

“So let’s say you’ve got a mom and a dad,” Keanu says. “Then where did you come from?”

Heather thinks for a minute. “They went to bed together, and then I was born.” Some of her friends express further interest, but Heather doesn’t have a brochure. “Daddy put his thing in mommy -- “

“Oh, man,” Keanu interjects. “Is that legal?”

“HelLLLLO!” sings Danitra, who gets the word up to eighteen syllables this time. “We’re in CaliFORnia!”

“And nine months later I came out of my mommy’s tummy,” Heather adds.

Several of the children wonder why they didn’t hire a surrogate with a vagina but nobody says anything.

Thanks for the great list of recommended songs, Spotify! They really fit well in my new playlist. The Andrews Sisters were all about fucking.

Repeat Sunday: My German Boyfriend Comforts Me After A Bad Haircut

Whenever you tell someone exactly what's going to happen, the world conspires to prove you wrong. In this case, it starts with a haircut appointment at a stylish Tribeca salon. "In America you can get a good haircut for free?" my German boyfriend asks.

"Here's a New York secret," I say. "You find a salon where trainees do free haircuts. Ask for the names of all the trainees, and don't get your hair cut unless there's a Japanese woman there. Japanese women are so afraid of doing something wrong that for an hour or two they'll barely touch your hair. They will slowly, cautiously snip away at it until the instructor walks over and says, 'You're doing a very good job,' but because he has cocaine and a boyfriend at home he will finish the cut in three minutes flat. That way you get an professional haircut for just a five-dollar tip."

He shoots me a look that says he's impressed, and it flashes through my brain when the Japanese trainee is hacking away at my hair. She clearly has no idea what she's doing and has absolutely no reluctance to impose it on every side of my head. She makes Norman Bates look both talented and sedate; if she glued the scissors to her Doc Martens and tap-danced on my head it would leave a better result. The instructor comes over and scolds her in Japanese, and she is immediately contrite. He shows her how to hold the scissors and how to hold her hands. She watches carefully, but when he leaves she proves powerless to reproduce his motions so she returns to the random hacks. Five minutes later he returns and the scene repeats.

They say the earth is 98% water. I leave the salon with bald scalp making up the same percentage of my head. My German boyfriend rings me on FaceTime before I get to the subway. "Wow," he says. "It is short. It is really, really short."

Me, I'm fine with denial. "It's good. It's not too short. It looks really good."

"It is short. It is very short. I do not expect it will be that short."

"Fine," I snap. "It's a little short. Maybe it's a little short."

He notices my irritation. "I usually will not comment on how short it is, but I do not expect it. You tell me Japanese women are afraid to cut hair."

"I found one who isn't," I snap. "She wasn't afraid at all. She had a style in mind that she thought was right for me and she went for it. I think it looks really good."

"It is short," he repeats.

"It's a little short but not too short. I'll look great in three weeks when I come see you in Berlin."

He shakes his head. "I wish so," he says. "But human hair does not grow so fast."

I think about throwing my iPhone but remember that even giving it a sharp nudge means a two-hundred dollar repair bill. In Europe everybody knows how to spot an Ugly American: they're overweight, they wear multicolored coats, and every sentence that comes out of their mouths compares their new surroundings unfavorably to that Utopian homeland. "In America there's an elevator in every hotel!" "In America restaurants have catsup for your french fries!" "In America Mr. Whiskas poos wherever he wants!"

Reluctance to embody a tired cliché briefly appears in my brain but I swat it away and stomp on it. "In America when somebody gets their hair cut you tell them how nice it looks. You don't say, 'It's short! It's really short! HOLY GOD, IT'S SO GODDAMN FUCKING SHORT!' No, you say, 'Wow, that looks good! You are so handsome!' and that's the end of that."

My German Boyfriend is shocked. We've only dated for a couple of months so I'm still on my best behavior, and this is my first outburst. "Okay," he says, visibly recoiling. "It is not too short. It is a very good length."

"Thanks," I say as my anger recedes. He tried, and though the awkwardness persists I think we dodged a bullet. I realized we would have culture and language problems but hoped that with patience and heart-to-heart talks we'd get through them and our relationship would continue to grow. "I'll shampoo it tomorrow and fluff it up and it'll look really great."

He inspects it again, then says, "I think you will not need shampoo."

Repeat Monday: Gay Math

I flunked math in high school, and I blame word problems. “If one train heads east at thirty miles an hour, and another heads west at twenty miles an hour, when will they meet?” All I can think of is, why didn’t these people fly? I mean, twenty miles an hour? Ice cream trucks move faster. And the horrible food, the crowds, the screaming kids. My head starts to spin so fast bystanders ask me for rides.

Now if they’d asked questions I could relate to, I’d be Stephen J. Hawking today. I came up with some examples: see if you’re better at solving these than the junk they gave you in school.

1. Carl’s nipples are two feet from his penis, and twenty-four inches apart. A leather loop passes through the rings in each piercing. What’s the minimum length of this loop?

(a) seventy-two inches
(b) Sir Isaac Newton
(c) Is Carl spherical or what?

2. Twelve men are in a bar. Three are wearing shoes, five are wearing socks, and two are wearing both. How many men are in bare feet?

(a) God, and I thought “Pajama Night” was annoying.
(b) six
(c) This is why they don’t sell alcohol in Utah.

3. Al likes two hours of foreplay. Ted likes intercourse for forty-five minutes. If they have sex together how long will it last?

(a) The important thing here is that Al and Ted seek some form of counseling.
(b) two hours forty-five minutes
(c) Are you sure these guys aren’t lesbians?

4. If Sam has four inches soft and twelve inches hard, what percentage does he grow?

(a) Spain
(b) 300%
(c) If that’s the Sam I used to date, he thought watermelons were eight feet across.

5. Pat and Chris leave the Manhole at 2:15 a.m. Ignoring lights, they cross Melrose, then Vermont, then Hyperion. What will the policeman give them?

(a) If the Manhole is a straight bar, a friendly wave.
(b) If it’s a lesbian bar, a stern warning and a long, google-eyed look at their breasts.
(c) If it’s a gay bar and this is the LAPD, twelve jaywalking tickets and six shots of mace.

6. Arnie says “All three of us are bottoms.” Wayne says, “You’re the only bottom.” Fred says, “Wayne and I are both bottoms.” If each of them always lies or always tells the truth, how many are lying?

(a) two
(b) the Japanese art of paper-folding
(c) Sigh. They’re all bottoms, aren’t they?

7. There are thirty guys in line at the Pit at 1:30. Eight are more attractive than Wayne. The doorman lets one guy enter every three minutes. Every five minutes four more guys arrive, and two are more attractive than Wayne. When will Wayne get inside?

(a) Ugly dudes ought to stay home. That’s why God invented TV.
(b) 12:15
(c) When Pat Boone stars in “Naked Boys Singing!”

8. At 8:04 on Christmas morning Pete unwraps a G. I. Joe. If it takes ten minutes to take his helmet off, eight minutes to take his shirt off, six minutes to take his boots off, and seven minutes to take his pants off, when will Joe be naked?

(a) 8:41
(b) Christmas is a time for joy and happiness. Pete should just yank Joe’s pants down right away.
(c) Don’t remind me. That was the day I discovered disappointment.

9. A troll spends three-fifths of his money on a stud. He spends half of what’s left on another stud. In all he spends eight dollars. How much money did he start with?

(a) I know why the studs keep leaving.
(b) ten dollars
(c) I wouldn’t wave at an ugly guy for less than twenty.

10. Brad is a 10, and usually sleeps with other 10’s. After every beer, though, he’ll settle for one number lower. If he gets to the bar at seven and has one drink each half-hour, when will he approach Ernest Borgnine?

(a) Ernest Borgnine? What, is Jim Varney dead?
(b) midnight
(c) When his liver swells up like a loofah.

11. Al has two cats. He moves in with Ted, who has eight cats. If each cat eats a can of Sheba every day, how many cans will feed all the cats for a week?

(a) I could never buy cat food with a tiara on it.
(b) 70
(c) If these are the same guys with the two-hour foreplay, they are positively definitely lesbians.

12. If a man and a half have sex with a man and a half in a day and a half, how many men will have sex in six days?

(a) twelve
(b) Just out of curiosity, are we talking top half or bottom half?
(c) Jeez, and I thought my boyfriend was a whore.

13. A man’s penis is twice as long as his big toe, and half as long as his feet. If the three measurements total forty-two inches long, how long is his big toe?

(a) Ohmigosh, I’m shaking like Katherine Hepburn in a massage chair.
(b) six inches
(c) This guy’s going to cause fistfights at “Barefoot Night.”

14. Black paint is $50, used toilets are $10, and a crummy sound system is $100. How much will it cost Luigi to convert his garage into a gay bar?

(a) You forgot to include how much three bad techno CDs cost.
(b) $160
(d) Garages are dark, cramped and disgusting. He’ll make a fortune.

15. Two gay people are sitting in the park. The little one is the big one’s son, but the big one isn’t the little one’s father. Explain.

(a) Didn’t I hear about this on “Dateline”?
(b) I don’t think these guys are really related at all.
(c) Everything’s so crazy these days, I wouldn’t be surprised if the big one had a uterus.




HOW TO SCORE:
Dress nicely. Avoid open-toed shoes. Thank anyone who says you've got a hot ass, but run when they pull out thermometers.

Repeat Friday: Two Mistakes

Every time Richard opens his mouth he makes two mistakes. "I absolutely love Picasso's works from his purple period," he declares at the art museum, staring in admiration at a tiny, colorful work.

These pronouncements always stop me in my tracks, because I never know which mistake to address first. In this case I say, "Actually, Picasso never had a purple period. And that painting in particular is a Mondrian."

"Oh," he says. He nods his head like he's suddenly semi-educated, when in reality he's just moving on to his next mistakes. He doesn't seem to realize how hard it is to talk to him. When somebody makes one mistake, the human brain can easily decipher it. One mistake is glaringly obvious: Ellen Degeneres is married to Portia de Rossi, not Tia Carrera. Narcissus aren't orange, they're white. One can't actually dodge taxes by diverting some of their income to a 10K. The brain decides whether or not the err is worth correcting, and that's the extent of that.

When someone makes two mistakes, though, additional parts of the brain are required, because the conversation receptor is thrown into overload. A dialog starts ping-ponging inside the head. It's like the NYPD caught a naked man holding up a liquor store and then couldn't decide whether the case should go to Violent Crimes or Vice. "Have you heard that great new song?" Richard asks, and then he laughs. "'It's Christina, asshole.'"

I have to mentally list all the possible permutations and then rank them by the likeliest. Does he mean Christina Aguilera? Probably not. Nobody's meant Christina Aguilera in quite a long time. No, odds are it's Britney Spears. But she never called anybody an asshole, right?

Meanwhile, Richard is standing there blissfully, not a thought in his head.

Now, I kind of like Richard. He's attractive and fun and professional, three qualities I've rarely found before, let alone in the same man. But I can't help but wonder. Making one mistake at a time marks you as an ordinary, fallible human. What does two at a time say?

Still, he's my man for most of December. I bite my lip when he tells me he has a crush on David Beckham, the rugby player who's married to Scary Spice. I sigh sadly when he announces that Oreo cookies are made by leprechauns. I watch in silence as he pours champagne into a martini glass that has colored salt around the rim.

And still, somehow, we make it into bed. The usual way, pretty much: we go out to dinner, drink a bottle of wine, go back to his place and start making out. "I bet you've got a big dick and you know how to use it," he whispers into my ear.

I say, "Oh, just shut up and lie down."

Repeat Monday: Stripping Grammar Naked

Once in a while, somebody will ask me where I learned to write. Sometimes I tell them about the year I spent under John Rechy at Princeton. Sometimes I tell them about the freeform prose classes I took with Edmund White, or the sabbatical at that writer's colony off the woodsy coast of Nantucket.

And sometimes I tell them the truth: that I learned everything I know from sitting naked in front of my computer and reading lots and lots of godawful porn.

Experts know the best way to learn what's good is to study what's bad. For instance, I learned how not to cook Mexican food from Taco Bell, what not to wear from Wal-Mart, and how not to have sex with ex-husbands 1, 2 and 4. Desperate to find the very worst in writing, I cruised the sleaziest internet porn sites, searched Google for every four-letter word, and scrutinized every fan-fiction site where Spock and Sulu ever touched.

To save you time, though, and from discovering your belongings heaped on the doorstep by an intolerant boyfriend who knows about Internet Explorer's "History" file, I've compiled the most miserable writing I've found in many hard years of study. If we take a moment to examine these examples and see what mistakes were made, we can use that knowledge to write up some rules that we can use to improve our own work.

(1) He had nice thick chest hair that covered his entire body.

The first thing we learn is, never eat breakfast while surfing porn sites. Because while chest hair can be reasonably fetching on, say, a chest, when it creeps over to the forehead or the elbows it can make Dan Savage spew up his Sugar Pops. It doesn't take an expert to realize chest hair is best confined to the upper torso, in much the same manner that toenails should remain in the vicinity of the feet.

(2) Jim grabbed his ass through his tight shorts and said, "I want you bad."

From this awkward construction we learn that if there are two or more males in your story, avoid using the word "his." Your dramatic scene will turn farcical if the reader thinks your hero is grabbing his own body parts and expressing his feelings of desire. Similar examples include the following:

-- The stranger wrapped his hungry mouth around his mushroom head.

-- Standing at the side of the bed, Gustavo grabbed his ankles and lifted them high into the air.

-- Slowly Maury worked his lips down to his stomach.

(3) All night long Carl slept, sprawled naked across the bed, and Max approached with anticipation.

What we learn here is, modifiers in the first half of your sentence also apply to the second. We’ve got a scene that’s probably eight hours long, which means Max moves about as slowly as gay rights.

(4) Brad's endowment was throbbing so hard Joshua thought it'd explode.

The problem here is painfully obvious: Don't frighten your reader with images from Japanese horror movies. You've spent hours conjuring up the perfect picture, then you go and spoil the mood:

-- Chuck's erection grew so hard it could have knocked over Hitler.

-- I'd never seen an ass pounded so relentlessly, and I watch Tucker Carlson.

-- His equipment, trapped in those thin white shorts, looked like my grandma in her bra.

(5) Max took out Walter's penis and played with it.

Watch out for the words “took out.” While you may assume it’s equivalent to “bared" or "uncovered,” the reader may opt for another meaning, like “to remove from a box.”

(6) I really wanted to have sex with him. After I finished my french toast, I slid over next to him and brought it up.

Here we've got a confusing pronoun -- in this case, the word "it." The writer is hoping he can refer all the way back to his previous sentence, but instead the reader stops at the closest noun, which just happens to be "french toast."

Other regrettable examples are:

-- My wife and I made love on the deck of our pristine white yacht, then I tied her to the pier and went home.

-- Cooper and I took the dog for a walk. I couldn't resist the way his ass swayed back and forth, so I dragged him behind a bush and took him from behind.

(7) He grabbed hold of his meat and pulled out a condom.

This sentence shows that sometimes there's a weird synergy between different parts of your sentence. Either half of this line is fine by itself, but put the two together and it sounds like a magic trick.

Similar missteps include:

-- I squeezed the bartender's nipple and he refilled my empty glass.

-- Wayne rubbed Raoul's butt until Barbara Eden appeared.

(8) On my knees, Stephen grabbed my head and guided it toward his groin.

This is what's called a "dangling modifier," because the writer has misplaced a clause. Rather than being turned on, the reader pictures a Cirque du Soleil-style attraction. Re-read your articles searching for sentences like:

-- Covered with mayonnaise, Roger took a bite of his sandwich.

-- Engrossed in the newspaper, his penis lay there quietly.

-- Nearly at orgasm, Puddles the dog trotted in.

Well, we've just barely scratched the surface, but today's lesson has to come to an end. Remember, there are serious side effects to reading too much porn. You start to feel inadequate by constantly comparing yourself to these perfect, unreal images, and your self esteem can suffer as a result.

Honestly, though, I swear to you: usually I can go on for hours.

Repeat Sunday: Charlotte vs. Gay Roman

Brian was the one who started it. We were on the roof catching up on gossip when Charlotte's name came up. "You know what I'm surprised you haven't noticed?" he said. "Charlotte is a total homophobe."

I laughed, assuming it had to be a joke. Brian and I were both gay and she adored both of us. He couldn't possibly be serious, I thought.

"Here's an example," Brian continued. "Name some of Charlotte's friends who happen to be gay."

I thought for a minute. Charlotte was rich and sharp and gorgeous so she knew a lot of people -- most rich and gorgeous New Yorkers did. To avoid confusion, then, she picked unique identifying adjectives and stuck them in front of peoples' names. If she knew two Alberts, for instance, she might refer to one as Tuba Player Albert and the other as Crest White Strip Albert. If she knew two Matts, she might call one Cat Tattoo Matt and the other Shiny Forehead Matt.

With the quantity of people in our orbits this was pretty much a necessity, though it got all of us into trouble. Gay John wasn't thrilled when Charlotte's mother referred to somebody named Handsome John and he realized it wasn't him.

"Well," I said to Brian, "there's you -- Gay Brian, Gay John, Gay Scott, Gay Stuart, Gay Toshi, ...."

"You don't think that's a little weird?" he interrupted. "A little reductive? I've designed sweaters for Gucci but really the main identifying thing about me is that I put my penis into dudes?"

I meandered from pondering his point to starting to picture it before he spoke again. "Does she do that with anybody else -- Jews, blacks, Hispanics? No, because it's offensive. Why is being gay the exception? And if she truly accepted us as equals, would she make such a big deal out of it?"

I blew it off as inexplicable but the seed was planted in my head. I had actually noticed how often she used the word "gay." As a gay man I hardly used it at all, whereas this totally-straight woman used it all the time. In fact, that morning she'd asked me if I wanted to go with her and her "gay husband" to a gay club for some gay drinking and then take a gay cab home.

A few weeks earlier, in fact, Charlotte raised a red flag when I was chatting with Joe and David, a middle-aged couple who live on the fourth floor. We were in the lobby talking about gifts for her upcoming birthday when she suddenly appeared. We immediately stopped talking, which made her suspicious.

"Ohmigod," she gasped, lowering her sunglasses and glaring at us. "If you guys are planning a three-way, I don't want to hear about it!"

We all laughed, but after she walked away we exchanged baffled glances. We agreed that her comment wasn't just clueless -- it was somewhere between bizarre and offensive. If she'd seen a straight guy talking to a hetero couple she wouldn't have assumed he was going to bang both of them.

I tried to forget about the whole thing during our usual Project Runway-watching night. While I was telling Emma about my trip to Berlin, though, she started acting weird again. "A lot of guys in Berlin have rings tattooed around their forearms," I said. "And I don't know if it's true or not, but somebody told me it's coded information about fistfucking."

"Ew!" Charlotte snapped, dropping a tortilla chip.

I scowled at her. "Supposedly the rings show how far you've gotten your arm into another guy's ass."

"That's disgusting," Charlotte sang.

I ignored her and went for the punchline. "So anyway, I'm thinking about getting one tattooed just below my fingernail."

Charlotte jumped up off the couch. "THAT'S IT!" she yelled, cranking up the TV. "STOP! I'm not going to hear about this!"

"About what?" I asked. "About gay guys having sex?"

"ABOUT ANY GUYS HAVING SEX! CAN YOU PLEASE STOP TALKING ABOUT IT?"

"FINE!" I shouted as I stomped toward the door. "I WILL! And you can talk about whatever the fuck you want, but you won't be talking to me!"

I slammed the door behind me, and after that Charlotte and I didn't speak for eight days. Before the fight she'd invited me to her birthday party, though, and when the day came I decided I still wanted to go. There would be enough people that it wouldn't be awkward, and I could leave a gift as a peace offering. I didn't think I'd done anything wrong but I felt kind of guilty, so when I shopped for her gift I went overboard. I went to a shop down the street that specialized in all the Brooklyn clichés: everything was handmade, sustainable, and organic, from the Peruvian bags woven from hand-twisted yarn to the incense made by Patagonian tribes from fossilized yak poop.

I finally settled on a bracelet made of hand-carved beads from Namibia. It was really beautiful -- as it should have been for $320 -- with chunky tourmaline and lapis beads carved with intricate tribal designs. It was totally Charlotte: it had style, it supported indigenous people, and she wouldn't have to worry about running into somebody wearing the exact same thing.

I toted the gift to the birthday party and Charlotte spotted me the second I walked through her door. Our eyes locked. Without a word our eyes exchanged everything we needed to say: that we both felt terrible, that we'd made a horrible mistake, and that we couldn't survive another minute without making amends.

We ran toward each other in seemingly slow motion, shoving the other party guests aside. We met in the middle of the room and hugged each other like we were never going to let go. "I'm sorry," I cried. "That's the stupidest thing I've ever done. I know you're not homophobic. I was just being stupid or I had a stroke or something, and I promise I'll never bring it up again."

"Really?" Charlotte said, wiping away tears. "You promise?"

"I promise. I'll never mention it again."

We hugged once more, and when we separated I noticed that both of our eyes were filled with tears. That's the mark of a great friend, I thought. When one of you does something unbelievably stupid, it just brings you closer together.

Naturally the party was brilliant, since Charlotte's friends were all six-foot-tall Russian models or handsome Norwegian musicians. We drank and laughed until the sun went down, and then a tipsy Charlotte took center stage to unwrap all of her gifts. She gushed over a pair of shoes, a painting, and a crystal vase before she got to my offering. She shot me an excited look and I veritably glowed with pride. She tore the paper open, pulled the lid off the box, and extracted the bracelet from the box.

With fifty people watching breathlessly, she held the beaded string at arm's length, and her expression turned from glee to disgust. "Roman," she spat like a third-grade teacher, "I never stick anything up my ass."

Repeat Monday: Surprise

I have to do something. Every morning I wake up and it's like my eyebrows have grown just a little bit bigger, until they threaten to consume my face. It looks like two squirrels are scurrying across my forehead, and very soon there's just going be to one. Years ago, though, after an overzealous afternoon with a razor blade, I learned that shaping and tweezing your facial hair is like trying to remove your own gall bladder. This time around, I decide, I'll let a professional handle it.

I don't exactly keep up with the trends, but I know about threading. I've seen it on the news, where an Asian woman wielding something like dental floss wraps a coil around a stray hair and yanks it out, faster than the blink of an eye. While I run my daily errands I pass eight or nine threading salons, and I slow in front of every one. I feel my eyebrows swelling until I can barely keep my head up. I think, why don't I just go in and get it done?

You hear all these rumors about New York metrosexuals, but I'm the only guy in the salon I finally choose. There's so much estrogen in the building, in fact, I feel like I've accidentally stumbled into Pinkberry. Mercifully, the procedure is quick and painless. Five minutes and fifteen dollars later, the woman passes me a hand mirror. My eyebrows are far apart and half their original size. The delicate arch makes me look ever so slightly surprised.

I look at the woman. She looks at me. "Well, I think they look good," she says.

I race to the bathroom of a nearby Bed Bath & Beyond and survey the damage. They could definitely be worse. They're certainly not that 30s Jean Harlow brow, the thin Sharpie squiggle dancing below the hairline. They could almost pass for natural. Still, the arch is sharp enough to change my default expression. I'm no longer bored. I'm not exhausted. If I keep my face entirely still, I'm somewhere between inquisitive and questioning. Add in even the slightest additional surprise, though, and I look like a man fleeing Godzilla.

I run my remaining errands as I struggle to keeping my face utterly placid. Inquisitive eyebrows aren't such a horrible thing, I discover. They have the attitude that I don't, second-guessing every word I hear.

I stop at a fruit stand for a mango and some strawberries. "That'll be twelve dollars," the man says. I look at him. He looks at me. "Okay, okay," he snaps. "Maybe it's just ten."

I drop in Macy's to see what's new. There's a red knit cap I almost like. I'm not sure if it works with my beige skin and ridiculous height. "You look great!" a clerk says. "You look fabulous!" I look at her. She looks at me. "You look like a lit match," she admits.

By the time I head home it's late, and the subway is deserted. Still, a middle-aged man sits down right next to me. His suit is cheap, his hair's thinning, his moustache nearly hides his mouth. "You should be a model," he says, just out of the blue. "I mean, you are absolutely gorgeous. You've got an amazing face, and it looks like you've got a really hot body. You could be, like, in one of those Calvin Klein ads, just wearing underwear. David Beckham's got nothing on you."

I look at him. He looks at me.

"Well, I wouldn't turn off the lights when I fucked you," he says, so imagine my surprise when he did.

I had a mental note to watch the movie Bait. I didn't remember when I made it or why: I just knew I had a mental note. So when I signed up with a streaming service and saw it available, I jumped at the chance to watch it.

From the first shot in the first minute I knew I was in trouble. Usually I love experimental movies, but sometimes it seems like they're purposely annoying. It's the same reason I have trouble with concerts: while I'm a big fan of art, I also believe you should give people what they want. Musicians have gold records for a reason, so when we pay hundreds of dollars to see them live I don't think the first words out of their mouths should be, "I'm really bored with singing my hits, so tonight I'll stick to songs by Blink-182."

In the case of Bait, I'm pretty sure the director didn't hear a ton of cinéastes demanding, "Just once in a film, I'd like some close-up, black-and-white shots of sedated lobsters."

I also like atmosphere, but at some point I like a story. Dialog. Characters. An hour into Bait, I'd heard three lines of dialog and saw eight hundred gruff sailors in rain slickers tie something with rope. I guess it was atmosphere. And I guess real art is supposed to leave you with questions. I'm not sure, though, that question should be, Why the fuck do sailors have so many different knots?

I mean, either knots work or they don't. They stay tied or they come loose. They've not like spray paint or glue, where one type works on metal, one on paper, and one on cement. Can't they make one master knot that'll work with everything? Because if we can put a goddamned man on the moon, we sure as fuck shouldn't have sailors in rain slickers looking at a thick rope and a wooden pier and saying, "I believe this calls for a double-sheep-shank twisting French Handstand."

With minimal dialog and hundreds of gruff sailors, it was just too hard to follow Bait's flimsy plot. I'm not particularly stupid, but if every movie followed the rules of Gilligan's Island, the world would be a far better place.

First, there's the character introduction. The singer declares, "There's Gilligan...", while they show Gilligan on the screen. Sure, showing a lobster tying a knot would be artier, but these guys really want you to be able to follow along. "The skipper too. The millionaire and his wife. The movie star. The professor and Mary Ann." And you know what? Years ago, instead of that last line, the song used to end with, "And the rest." Why did they change it?

BECAUSE THEY WANTED TO MAKE SURE YOU KNEW WHICH ONE WAS THE PROFESSOR AND WHICH ONE WAS MARY ANN.

I mean, one's in button-down shirts and the other has pigtails, a blouse tied above her waist, and Daisy Duke shorts on. But somewhere in Hollywood some brave executive said, "You know what? I still think it could go either way." Isn't that thoughtful? I mean, it's not a mistake that I would make, but there are adults who wear backward baseball caps.

Second, Gilligan's Island had a diverse assortment of characters, even though they were all white. (The Harlem Globetrotters showed up at some point, so I'm thinking they got all their People of Color points in one episode.) The producers and writers used different archetypes for each character. It's like Laurel & Hardy: you're never going to get confused and whisper to a friend, "Wait, which one is Stupid again?"

There's a blonde and a brunette. There's a fat guy and an idiot, a smart guy and a millionaire. Is there a problem telling them apart? Not a chance! Who's the millionaire? Oh, I don't know: maybe the dude in the BERET? Who's the Professor? Maybe the MONOCLE will give you a clue. Who's the glamorous actress? Gosh, I'm thinking maybe it's ... the BLONDE?

In a perfect world, every character would wear a name tag. I don't know about you, but if there are three middle-aged blondes in a film and they aren't introduced Gilligan's Island style, I'm going to assume there's just one lady going through some crazy shit.

Aside from confusing me, I don't understand how it happens. The director casts two young white women for his film. He gets the whole crew together, looks them over, and gets a pensive look on his face. "Wait," he barks. "I think we need another young white woman." In fact, my definition of hell is a movie where every character is young and white, and the dialog is just two lines, repeated: "Hey, I just got a haircut! What do you think?" and "Look, I bought a new outfit! Is it cool or what?"

It's why I can't watch Friends: just when you're up to here with young white people, another one walks in. At some point it goes beyond annoying and makes the viewer wonder if there's a hidden agenda. It's like when you're watching a Woody Allen movie and the gorgeous teen runs into the crotchety old man. I don't know about you, but I scream, "OH NO! NOT ON MY TV!" while literally pounding my fist on the remote control in hopes some button will make it go away.

So, I developed a system for everything I watch. Whenever a new character shows up, I give them a nickname so I can remember who's who. It usually works fine, as long as nobody changes clothes or gets their hair cut. In Bait this worked for roughly eight seconds, when Gruff Old White Guy With a Beard Who Wears a Rain Slicker All Day II showed up.

All of a sudden it hit me. This must be that arthouse film where Robert Pattinson and some grizzled old dude live in a lighthouse and act like five-year-olds play Very Dangerous Games. I've never actually seen a Robert Pattinson film, though, so I try to figure out which one he is in hopes it'll make further identification easier. The problem is, I don't know what he looks like. I spend the next few minutes trying to decide if he's GOWGWBWWRSAD I or GOWGWBWWRSAD II. Nothing happens in the movie so it's not like it's a horrible mistake to suddenly take up a hobby. After another fifteen minutes, though, I decide his transformation from hot young vampire to either GOWGWBWWRSAD I or GOWGWBWWRSAD II is absolutely astonishing, so I pause the movie and turn to Google for help.

He's neither of them. Google says that movie is The Lighthouse. This is Bait. Apparently there's a whole genre of Gruff Old White Guys With Beards Who Wear Rain Slickers All Day. It's not that crowded in the Non-Heterosexual Cowboys genre.

So, GOWGWBWWRSAD I catches fish. He sells some to the local restaurant, but he also puts some in bags and ties them to peoples' doorknobs. This is the problem with Movies Too Artsy To Have Voiceovers: I assumed he hated everybody and showed his disdain with the old dead-fish-on-a-doorknob prank. Online reviews later informed me that this actually meant he was a nice guy, because this is England's version of Hello Fresh.

GOWGWBWWRSAD II, his brother, has sold out the family business. Instead of catching fish, now he takes tourists on harbor cruises. Apparently in England this is like Jackson Pollock guest starring on Mama's Family.

"Tourists destroying age-old ways" seems to be the movie's theme. Next we see the ancestral family home that GOWGWBWWRSAD I was forced to sell. Director Mark Jenkin pulls no punches in showing us what horrific city slickers the new owners are. They actually redecorated the seaside cottage to look like -- shudder! -- a seaside cottage.

Yeah. That's what I thought too. Over the fireplace they've installed a fishing net, a couple buoys, and a porthole. GOWGWBWWRSAD I sees this and nearly loses his mackerel, but I look at it and think, "Couldn't they find any little plastic dolphins?"

As the second piece of evidence that Tourism Is Bad, there's a shot of a bachelor party boarding GOWGWBWWRSAD II's boat. One man is wearing a full-length penis costume, and my mind is off again.

It's full-length, from head-covering hood to shoe-skimming shaft. It's ridiculously unsafe. I don't know about you, but GOWGWBWWRSADs yell at me if I get on a boat and I'm not wearing an inflatable vest and don't have a whistle in my mouth.

I ask myself if this costume actually exists or if it was made by the filmmakers to bolster their argument. I've never seen anybody wearing one, and I've been to Prague. I can't imagine a logical buying process. I mean, I'm assuming the purchaser is heterosexual, since no gay man would wear such a thing. But how do you put it on and ask your friends how it looks? Any reply at all, from "It's too short" to "It's too thin” to "It's too veiny, and it has a weird bend toward the root" will make everyone involved look gay. Therefore, no such thing can exist.

GOWGWBWWRSAD I finally snaps. He breaks into the ancestral cottage and in a fit of inexpensive fury he breaks the glass in the porthole. "They pulled down mother's pantry!" he wails defeatedly.

Or maybe, "They pulled down mother's palm tree." I neglected to mention I think all the actors are faking Maine accents even though they're in England.

The two brothers then get on a boat and sail off. The film freezes on a closeup of GOWGWBWWRSAD I looking gruff. Since it's his only facial expression, it could mean he's thinking about the devastating effects of new money on ancient culture or he's picturing Vanna White naked. Then the credits roll and I realize I've missed the point of the movie by missing the very last line.

I narrow down the possibilities:

1. The newcomers pulled down mother's pantry. Maybe it was a building that meant a lot to mom. Or maybe there was a restaurant called Mother's Pantry and the cheddar biscuits were really good.

2. The newcomers pulled down mother's palm tree. Maybe she planted a coconut when the brothers were young and they watched it grow over the years and now it's gone.

I decide it doesn't matter.

But what about the boat? Did that mean anything? It looked like GOWGWBWWRSAD II's tourist boat, but with the signs removed -- which is the nautical equivalent of a haircut and costume change. Does it mean he's given up tourists and returned to the old way of life?

I decide to give nicknames to boats whenever they show up in movies. And if anybody asks me how their penis costume looks, I'll give them the Usual Gay Critique:

"If I can see your shoes, it isn't long enough."

Dear Cameo.com visitor:

Thank you for signing up for the Cameo.Com newsletter. As you know, we are an online service offering customized greetings from world-famous celebrities for a very reasonable charge.

With thousands of celebrities in our catalog, we have the perfect fit for you. Want a birthday greeting from a Baywatch star? Congrats on your anniversary from a Denver Bronco? Get a friendly "Have a great day!" wish from an extra on Dragon Ball Z? That's why we're worth nearly a billion dollars.

Enjoy perusing our catalog, and if you have any questions don't hesitate to ask.

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Cameo.com Customer Care

Dear Cameo.com friend:

In my last email I said, "if you have any questions don't hesitate to ask." Well, a lot of you took me up on that! More than a few people wanted to know why the first customer reviews for so many celebrities were identical.

Why, I didn't even notice! Perhaps that is a little odd, though I wouldn't use the word "suspicious." Sometimes a whole lot of people just have the same word in their heads, and "Awesome" is a common word in customer reviews. Maybe reviewers on some websites go on at length about the service and price and blah blah blah, but I guess we're just an "Awesome" kind of site.

Besides, mark my words here: I'm pretty sure it was just a weird phase and before you know it all the reviewers will be saying something else.

Your friend,
Brenda
Cameo.com Customer Care

Dear Cameo.com visitor:

I'll be honest: I don't understand you. You write me and scream that it's "suspicious" that so many of our "customer reviews" are exactly the same. And right after that it changes, just out of the blue, and then everybody is suspicious again! Are you people NEVER satisfied? Customers have different opinions! It's a fact of life! I'm sure the reviews will change again very soon to something completely different and it has absolutely nothing to do with me!

Enjoy our service.

Your friend,
Brenda
Cameo.com Customer Care

Dear Cameo.com patron:

Okay, you caught me. I knew I should have just put two exclamation points after "Thank you" instead of three. What can I tell you? I'M ENTHUSIASTIC!!!

Look, I'm also paid ten dollars an hour: you really think I'm going to struggle writing realistic reviews? Like, "Hortensia did a wonderful job. In fact, let me tell you about the heartfelt video she recorded for my Paw-Paw." Not a chance! If I can finish the job with three minutes of cut-and-paste then that's what I'm gonna do.

Besides, what do you expect from this place? Did you look at our client list? I told you in my first email that we had celebrities from every walk of life, but that's not quite true. Actually, we're a bit oversupplied in psychopathic Trump sellouts and media majors who ruined their careers by sucking up to Donald Trump but weren't hot enough for the move to Fox News.

We're funneling money to Sean Spicer, a Trump press secretary who a New Yorker headline said "Will Be Remembered For His Lies" and who once hid in bushes to avoid meeting the press.

We're a nice source of income for Jack Posobiec, someone we've dubbed a "political commentator" who is actually more like prankster scum who got famous by going to left-wing protests holding a sign that read "RAPE MELANIA."

We also call our client Jacob Wohl a "political commentator," but it's a little misleading here too. It probably makes you picture a guy in a suit talking to a news anchor instead of an amoral little twerp who allegedly paid a man to tell the press that Pete Buttigieg tried to rape him while he was drunk.

We're giving a platform to Will Witt, an alleged "political influencer" who tweeted that "many leftists would rather see the world continue to collapse from the corona virus than see Trump be successful in stopping it." Unfortunately, he's temporarily unavailable. Maybe injecting Mop 'N Glo to cure a virus isn't as successful as he thought?

We provide financial support to Fox News shill and Apprentice contestant Gretchen Carlson, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (who had his felony conviction for bribery commuted by Trump), and Anthony "Mooch" Scaramucci, the White House staffer who was so bad at his job that even Trump noticed he was incompetent. Did you see the listing for Tomi Lahren, the Fox News personality who compared "Black Lives Matter" protesters to the Ku Klux Klan? And don't forget Kaitlin Bennett, the right-wing "Gun Girl" who's famous because she took an assault rifle to her graduation ceremony at -- wait for it -- Kent State.

As Cameo CEO and co-founder Steven Galanis says, "It's really cool to see people ... be able to make life-changing money really quickly." Don't dwell on the fact that one of those people, Roger Stone, is a felon ex-Trump "adviser" who called a CNN personality a "fat negro" and then a "stupid negro." Hopefully his "life-changing" might include a swerve away from racist pig but don't bet the farm on that.

Anyway, that's me for now. Knock off the angry letters. We're a website! If you want moral integrity, head over to GoFundMe and give a non-felon your extra bucks.

Keepin' it real,
Brenda
Cameo.com Customer Care

Disclaimer: This is a work of satire. "Brenda" does not exist, and her emails are fictional. The suspicious customer reviews, however, are real.