Gay Pong

Last night I went on a blind date with my buddy’s girlfriend.

Last week, I got a call from my old friend Tom, who was in Italy. Tom is very, very dear to me, mostly because he is (or was) an incredible drunk. I won’t get into his stories here (since he might want to write a book about them later), but we rather unoriginally called him Jekyll and Hyde. He’s the only person I’ve ever known in my life whose demeanor, facial expressions, and body language would change after each drink, charting his descent into alcoholic madness. It was incredible. After his first drink, we’d say, "Uh oh - Hyde just left his apartment." The second would find Hyde on the bus, by the fourth and Hyde would be on campus. By the sixth, Hyde would be in the elevator of our dorm and shortly thereafter Tom would be half-naked throwing towels in the oven. Tremendous, tremendous stuff.

I tried to catch up with Tom before he went to Italy with his family, but was unable to. Still, I was surprised that he’d call from Italy to shoot the shit. But he didn’t want to shoot the shit. He had a favor to ask.

Tom explained that the girl he is seeing, Christine, would be in NYC for a week. Tom had mentioned her before in an email, but I really wasn’t paying attention. Tom asked if I wouldn’t mind showing her around.

My first reaction? Crap.

I love women. Love them more than anything really. Even the gross ones are beautiful in some way. Supposedly.

But the prospect of one-on-one time with a woman I’ve never met - never even spoken to or emailed - is a little scary to me. I have a lot of female friends (or had, until I alienated all of them by trying to make out with them), but again, I had no idea about who Christine was. What if she was crazy? What if she was high maintenance? What if she took offense to me staring at her lustily all night? So many what if’s.

Of course, I couldn’t say no, so I agreed. While Tom was saying that she’s a great girl, I was already thinking about breaking out the ol’ date skills. I thought that maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all. It’d be like a free lesson in dating, just in case I ever again have to spend time with a woman not in a loud bar or on an airplane or in line at the free clinic.

Yesterday, I went back to my place to shower, change, and get ready. By that point, I had already spoken to Christine a few times to both arrange our hanging out and to answer her questions about NYC and she seemed to be a very nice girl. I decided that we’d have dinner at a nice restaurant (I'd tell you where, but if you went it wouldn't be so nice once you were done...asshole).

I met Christine and right away my fears were allayed. She was not needy, crazy or handicapped in any way. She was actually quite normal and cheerful and there were no lulls in the conversation. As an added bonus, she’s in grad school studying to be a marriage therapist, particularly a sex therapist (or something). Though I was hoping to maintain my perfect gentleman facade, when she first mentioned this, I realized it was only a matter of time before I’d have too much to drink and ask her questions like, "Why don’t women like me? Is it because I steal from them when they’re sleeping? And by ’steal’ I mean ‘touch’ and by ’sleeping’ I mean ‘on the subway.’" and "Right now, my approach to sex is: 1) Start making out; 2) Count to 100; 3) Stick it in. Is this bad?"

After Sea, Christine and I went to a bar. We sat there for an hour or so, shooting the breeze. She asked me all sorts of things about Tom, and all I could think about was, "Dude, don’t say anything that’s going to get him in trouble." Tom is a rare breed. While he takes Japanese and ballroom dancing lessons, he once wasn’t allowed on a plane because he was unbelievably drunk, and one night in college I watched him pick up a passed out girl’s vomit and throw it around a stranger’s apartment. I emphasized the first two attributes and was mostly silent about the last two.

After a short stint the bar where we met up with my friends Mark and Matt and their friends and later my buddy Jeremy, we walked across the street to another bar. Then things started getting weird.

First, by this point, all of us were pretty drunk. And by this point, like I had thought, the perfect gentleman façade was dropped, especially when my friends learned that Christine was studying to become a sex therapist. We spent the rest of the night peppering her with questions about weird things that girls we did did, which she answered in turn.

Second, the bar was empty except for us and four musclehead dudes playing beer pong right across from us. But they had that musclehead look that says, “I work on my triceps for my boyfriend.” Since my friend Jeremy and I are bigots, we immediately started calling them funboys (behind their backs, of course – they might have liked men, but their muscles were still pretty big).

We continued drinking and all niceties were dropped. Soon we were discussing The Shocker (“two in the goo, one in the poo” has replaced “two in the stink, one in the pink” when it comes to Shocker slogans) and at one point I demanded that everyone proclaim me King of Vaginas [One of the things I’m most proud of is that I have had more women than any of my friends, but that’s because I was basically genitally-engineered by the Lord himself to be the sexual predator that I am].

The Funboys were getting a little looser too, carrying on and partying and getting touchy-feely. But I have to stress that they weren’t flamingly homosexual; it’s not like they were speaking in lisps and talking about Cher. They were just a couple of party boys in tight shirts getting loose.(By the way, I love gay people. I have many gay friends. I promise.) Jeremy soon left, leaving the four of us. It was a mistake on his part.

Christine and I were sitting with our backs against the wall, facing the four guys playing beer pong. Matt and Mark were sitting opposite us with our backs to them. Suddenly, when Matt was talking about a crazy Philippino girl he was dating, I looked over his shoulder to see two of the guys kissing each other.

Well.

Again, I hope this doesn’t sound homophobic, but you have to understand the circumstances. It’s an empty bar. Four guys are playing beer pong. My friends and I are sitting not six feet anyway from them. I look up and two of them are going at it.

I grabbed Christine’s knee to as if to say, “OHMIGOD TWO DUDES ARE MAKING OUT OVER THERE LOOK RIGHT NOW BUT BE COOL DON’T MAKE IT OBVIOUS” After the initial surprise wore off, I watched (maybe a little lustily) and figured out their game.

Their rules of beer pong were slightly different from the ones I played in college. The way I remember playing is that when I hit a cup, the opposing team had to pull that cup off the table and drink it. These guys added another level: after a cup was hit, it had to be pulled off the table and drank. Then the guy whose cup was hit had to kiss the guy who threw the ball.

Ladies and gentlemen, Gay Beer Pong.

So I sat there watching this game play out and watching these dudes make out, fascinated, fixated, and maybe even a little turned on. I mean, every time they hit a cup they leave their ends of the table, walk to the middle, and make out. Like, for a while. All four of them – it didn’t matter who. Fascinating.

[Again, I’m concerned about sounding like a homophobe because I’m a big deal in the gay community, but c’mon – this was my first game of Gay Beer Pong.]

[As for Matt and Mark, they were aware of what was going on, but they couldn’t exactly turn around in their seats to watch the dudes make out. I mean, I would have, but they were raised right, I guess.]

Anyway, the night ended anti-climactically (for me at least, maybe not those guys), as we decided to part ways after 1am. When I got home I was starving and sweating. So I stripped down to my boxers and sat in front of the air conditioner in my living room eating salsa with my fingers (Tostito’s were not available and would be too fatty anyway). Aren’t you glad I’m not the first person you’ve had sex with?

So what have we learned?
- I’m a nice guy to women I don’t know
- Sex therapists make interesting conversationalists
- My friends are degenerates
- Gay Beer Pong is real, very real
- Salsa is even more delicious sans shirt and with hands

Yup, pretty typical Sunday night.