Savage Love

I met a great girl who bugs the hell out of me. What should I do?

By Dan Savage

Thank you for your advocacy of monogamishy. (Monogamishness?) When I fell in love with my gloriously kinky and GGG wife several years ago, we were honest about our sexual desires — vast and wide-ranging — and we negotiated an arrangement that works for us. We encourage each other’s outside crushes, and we both just want to be present while one of us is banging that outside crush. Your column gave us the tools we needed to talk with other potentially kinky folks. Thanks!

Anyway, on to our question: when one is staying at a hotel, what is the protocol for engaging in sheet-staining activities? For example, if a session might spread santorum, menstrual blood, female ejaculate, etc. all over the sheets, what to do? Is it better to cover the bed in towels and stain them instead? Are dirty sheets all in a day’s work for the housekeeper, or should we refrain from such activities in hotel rooms? We don’t want to make the housekeeping staff miserable — and we always leave a tip for the maid! — but we don’t want to refrain from sex just because my wife is on her period!

— Sheets Tarnished After Intense Nooky

You’re welcome for monogamishamy — the correct noun form of the adjective monogamish — and I’m delighted that it’s helped you and the wife negotiate successful encounters with “outside crushes,” STAIN, and I trust that you and the wife strive to make sure those encounters are as rewarding for the crushes as they are for you two.

Now, about those sheets…

If you’ve booked a hotel room, STAIN, and it’s shark week for the wife or a certain former senator routinely drops in (drops out?) when you have anal sex, there’s always the option of bringing your own santorum- and/or menstrual-blood-colored/stained towels from home.

But let’s say you don’t want to bring towels from home — which is an admittedly anal-in-the-other-sense-of-anal thing to do. Should you lay the hotel’s towels down on the bed or mess up the sheets?

“Mess up the sheets, please,” said the head of housekeeping at the hotel where I happened to be staying when your question arrived. (HOH agreed to speak to me on the condition that I not name her, the hotel where she works, or even the city where it’s located.) “We bleach the holy heck out of those sheets,” HOH continued. “And it is easier to get stains out of sheets than towels. And sheets cost less to replace — at least ours do.”

Anything else someone should do if they’ve made a mess of the sheets?

“If you want to be a total sweetheart,” said HOH, “strip the bed. Pull the sheets off and leave them balled up on the floor. All the ladies know what that means, and I promise you that no one goes poking in sheets left on the floor. They toss that ball in the cart and send it straight to the laundry.”

Where they bleach the hell/blood/santorum out of ’em.

Finally, STAIN, thanks for mentioning that you always leave a tip for the maid. It made me feel less alone — I always leave a tip for the maid, too — and it gives me the opportunity to encourage others to do the same. Anyone who can afford a night or two in a hotel — on business, on vacation, on someone else’s wife — can afford to leave a few bucks for the maid.

I’m a twenty-five-year-old straight man. One of my best buddies is gay, and I’m in gay bars with him twice a week or so. (We like to drink!) My question: what’s the correct response when I get hit on by men in gay bars? If a guy comes on strong, I kind of feel bad saying, “I’m straight.” Because I don’t want him to think I’m saying, “You’re disgusting.” So what’s the etiquette for a straight guy in a gay bar? Is it wrong to say you have a boyfriend instead of just saying you’re straight?

— Not Overly Concerned Lost Useless Entity

Guys who either don’t have boyfriends or do have boyfriends but are in monogamish relationships will frequently say “I have a boyfriend” to get rid of a guy at a bar who they don’t find attractive. So be honest, NOCLUE. Finding out he never had a shot at you because you’re straight will be easier on a guy’s ego than having to wonder what it is you and your imaginary boyfriend didn’t find attractive about him.

Now, some gay dudes will be annoyed when they discover that the guy they’ve invested ten whole minutes in eye-fucking isn’t gay, but most will welcome your presence as proof that — forgive me — it gets better. Straight dudes hanging out in gay bars with their gay friends? Straight dudes who are secure enough in their own sexuality that they’re comfortable with being viewed as a sex object by other men? Sure signs of progress, NOCLUE. That some gay dudes will have to waste a few precious minutes of their lives flirting with men they can’t suckfuckrimdatemarry is a small price to pay to be reminded that we live in a less homophobic world.

I have a super-hot, considerate, caring girlfriend with a high libido with whom I share many long-term goals. The problem is that she bugs the shit out of me. She chews with her mouth open, she listens to music I dislike, and she swears at inappropriate times. I’m in my mid-30s and not sure what I should do. Settle?

— Second Thoughts

We have something in common, ST: I once met a guy who was super-hot and caring and considerate, a guy whose libido matched my own and whose long-term goals aligned with mine, and who just so happened to bug the shit out of me.

Here’s what I did: I married that motherfucker.

My husband still bugs the shit out of me sometimes, just as I doubtless bug the shit out of him sometimes. But there’s no such thing as a bug-free boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife/unicorn/gimp/whatever. LTRs are about identifying the bugs that some caring and consistent prodding can fix — like that chewing-with-her-mouth-open shit — and accepting and finally learning to ignore the bugs that no amount of prodding will ever change.

And take it from me, ST: hot, considerate, caring, similarly libidinous, and shared long-term goals isn’t a package that comes along every day. You could do a lot worse..

STRAIGHT-RIGHTS WATCH: In 2010, Americans voted Republican hoping — despite thirty years of evidence to the contrary — that the GOP might know something about creating jobs. Surprise! Turns out that all the GOP knows how to do is wage war on American women. The GOP’s attack on abortion morphed into an attack on Planned Parenthood which morphed into an attack on access to contraception which finally morphed into an attack on the 98 percent of American women who use or have used contraception. (Sluts and prostitutes, one and all, according to Rush Limbaugh.) The GOP’s war on choice, contraception, cancer screenings, and women won’t end until the fuckers waging it are driven out of office.

Pissed off? Great! Do something about it.

Go find a pro-choice Democrat who’s running for office against an anti-choice/anti-woman motherfucker and send that Dem a check or, if you live in his or her district, volunteer for that Democrat. Fight back!

Find the Savage Lovecast (my weekly podcast) every Tuesday at thestranger.com/savage.

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