I'd like to thank my friends, family (especially my mom) and members of the Academy. Oh, wait. Wrong speech. No, seriously. My inaugural column for 'Michael In the City' was really a big hit. I never had so many Facebook comments, Tweets, text messages and BBM's from everyone. And I realize why, it's because I'm being brutally honest and not holding back. My recent columns are coming from my soul.
"Don't you think you've pissed off a few people," my old business partner asked me about my Art Basel coverage. My response was rhetorical. "Don't you think I like pissing people off?? This column is about opinion."
With that said, at a holiday party held at the house of my dear friend Melissa Sheppard, a new acquaintance Channing Norton (I swear I couldn't make up that name if I tried -- okay, maybe I could) tells me how much she likes my columns, but feels my morality is askew. "Michael," she said with a sense of authority, "You know the reason you're 40 and single is because you're a slut."
I did the gay finger snap. "First of all, I'm not 40," I replied, half devastated. I really am close to that number, but still. I then inserted an indignant second finger snap. "Two, I am not wasting three dates only to find out a guy has a small penis. That's never going to work for me."
And so a lively dinner debate ensues, where I argue that a big brain and heart are as equally as important as a big package and that the quicker -- and I don't necessarily mean the first date -- I gather evidence, the easier it is to draw a verdict if this is a case I should pursue. She rebuts with what I consider a lame fight: the more you make men wait, the more they want you.
A random moment happens when another table guest chimes in and says, "When me and my boyfriend go out, I make him follow me to restroom and wait while I pee." Um, okay.
The next night, I met up with some of my uber-hetero males friends where I relay Channing's thoughts of the evening. "Mike (that's my straight name by the way) your friend Channing is a player. She's the kind of girl that knows how to load the bases and then lets you strike out."
I get what they're saying. She'll let you kiss her, maybe touch her breasts, and if you're really good, slide your hand down her pants, but your bat will never get the chance to hit a homerun. That is until you slide a ring on her finger and even then there's no guarantee.
"I gave this 6-carat ring back to my fiancé," something Channing mentioned a few times. So much for that theory.
But I wasn't done with my research. I hadn't had any girl-on-girl talk that was until the Krug dinner party. Now, if you don't know Krug, it makes Veuve Clicquot seem like the poor man's champagne, so you can imagine the guest list.
Atop the dinner table, situated on the penthouse of the Tides Hotel, sat a 23-pound turkey that looked like a baby dinosaur. Guests were drinking thousands of dollars of champagne, including myself, and I was, well, feeling it. And so while the Chamber Singers from Miami Dade college belted out the holiest of songs, I asked the lesbian next to me the unholiest of questions: how long until you normally go down on a girl?
Then I paused. I really meant intercourse because oral sex doesn't really count, right? And so I rephrased the question, "How long until you use a strap on?" She points to the turkey leg and says, "Honey I'd strap something like that on if I could on the first date."
She had me speechless, something that doesn't happen very often. But it made me think, there are no rules to getting laid. When it works, it works and when it doesn't, it doesn't. We so easily fabricate insane rules and create laws that prohibit a good old orgasm. That's why when I'm feeling a dude, I apply the Nike slogan and just do it. And I'm confident that the rest will follow, or not. After all, I want to live up to Channing's stellar image of me.
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