Anonymous Mailbag

You guys continue to impress with your anonymous mailbag submissions. The number of you who have locked yourselves out of your hotel room naked is fantastic. Keep the emails coming to clay.travis@gmail.com. I promise total anonymity. 

On to the mailbag. 

“I have a friend that is possibly dating an escort.

Let me start by saying that I am not 100% sure she is an escort, but I would be willing to put the over/under at 95% and would bet the mortgage on the over that she is.

They have been dating off and on for roughly 8 months, but have been exclusive for about the last 4 months. They both are in their mid-20s, she’s high maintenance, and he is definitely more into her than she is into him.

We have a close group of guys that all went to college together, and I have told the majority of them of them of my belief that one of our own is dating an escort. All of them are telling me that I need to tell his older brother who I am good friends with and let him handle it from there. I do not believe that our friend knows he is “possibly” dating an escort, but there is always the outside chance that he knows and just doesn’t care.

Before I either tell him or his brother, I would really like to get a gay Muslim’s point of view on how to handle this situation.”

We need more info here, how are you 95% sure? If you have that high of a certainty then you have to have a STRONG amount of circumstantial evidence. I’m assuming it’s because you have seen her ad online somewhere. (Which raises the question about why you’re researching escorts? Not that we judge in the Outkick trust tree. As long as you’re an adult involved with other consenting adults, you can do whatever you want.) I’m just asking because your certainty suggests that you’ve found really strong evidence. A 95% chance is akin to a team being favored by over four touchdowns in a football game. It’s a real upset if this doesn’t happen.

If your buddy’s girlfriend then finding her photo on an escorts profile doesn’t necessarily prove anything — lots of attractive women have their images stolen online and used by less attractive people claiming to be them. (Ladies, this had better be your excuse when your husband finds you on Tinder.) So that’s the way I’d approach it. I’d go straight to your friend with the evidence in tow and play dumb. Say, “Hey, man, I think your girlfriend’s had her image stolen by an escort.” Give him the link that you found and let him handle it.

At that point he’s aware of the possibility that she’s an escort and if he didn’t know beforehand he can ask his girlfriend about it or bring the image to her attention. If he already knew — and didn’t care and hoped you guys wouldn’t find out — he can lie and say he’s telling her and that she was horrified. This ensurese you aren’t judging him and you’re bringing it to his attention in a non-judgmental way.

By the way, here’s what you would do if this were a movie — call the girl and schedule an appointment with her and see if she shows up.

I’m just saying…

“Hey Clay,

I was out grabbing some drinks at a quieter bar with some friends. I had these stomach pains, so I went to the restroom to turn two. After a few minutes, my business is finished and I feel much better. I reach for some toilet paper and of course, nothing. There’s a guy out at one of the urinals so I sit tight and weigh my options. The guy walks out and I barely pull up my jeans and button them ever so lightly and leave the stall to grab a paper towel (it was a two urinal, one stall restroom). Anddd of course, no paper towels. I retreat back to the stall and think what to do.

Do I pull up my pants and just walk out? So gross
Do I do as they do in Bangkok? Wet the hand and wipe. No way super gross and what if someone walks in as I’m doing it? (no lock on the door)
Do I use my undershirt? No because I wasn’t wearing one
Do I use my boxer briefs or socks?

I used my boxer briefs. Got as clean I could and walked out of there commando. I got back and told my buddy the story almost instantly. I had to get it off my chest.

Question for you is, was that the correct play? If so, telling my buddy was fine? Do guys go commando regularly? Is that a thing? What if I got busy that night? What do I tell the girl if she asks why I’m sans underpants?”

I think this was the right play call.

We’re on our third kid and every now and then he has poo explosions when he blows through his diaper and it climbs into his clothes. Assuming there is sufficient poo on the onesie or the outfit, we just throw it away. The rationale is simple — either you can scrub the hell out of a diarrhea laden five month old’s outfit — or you chalk it up as a loss and move on. You faced a similar circumstance only you had no back-up outfit.

Your options were either to walk around with a filthy ass all night or use an article of clothing as toilet paper. I think this is an easy call. What are a used pair of boxer/briefs worth to you? A dollar at most, right? That’s like the price of a soda in a machine, a third or a fourth of the cost of your beer. This was a no brainer. The only potential flaw in your plan would have been if you had been witnessed walking out of the stall with a shit-stained pair of boxer/briefs. Then the other guy might have thought you shit yourself. But you could have covered that by remarking, “Law of the jungle, man, there’s no toilet paper in here.”

As for what you say if you take a girl home and she sees you’re rolling commando, it’s easy, you tell her you worked too much this week and forgot to do laundry.

Just be careful with the zipper.

“I recently got married this past summer. Not the fall. I still don’t know why people are so terrible, but I digress.
My wife is great. Great personality, hilarious, can hang with the guys or her own group of friends, funny, loves to cook, cleans more than her fair share, the whole nine yards. I’m for sure lucky. The only problem is that since we have been married she’s put on some pounds. Nothing absurd, but enough to where clothes are no longer fitting and she’s buying new ones… And she’s well aware. She’ll openly say that she’s gained too much weight since the wedding. The problem is that she’s not motivated to do anything about it and I feel like it might continue to snowball.

Surely this happens all the time, but I’m trying to figure out how I can walk the fine line of not hurting her feeling, but still motivate her to go to the gym. I’ve repeatedly invited her to join me, and suggested going for a run, hike, tennis, etc. but she’s never interested in being active. Do I keep at it? Try to get some of her girlfriends who are in to running to invite her? Something else?

Or am I just being an asshole and I should leave it alone?”

I don’t think you’re being an asshole at all, but this is a delicate situation.

In general, I feel like both people getting married are making an agreement with one another that they’re not going to go completely to shit once they get married. That is, both guy and girl are agreeing that you’re not going to suddenly become totally different looking than you were when you were dating. Sometimes guys or girls let themselves go when they get married because they don’t feel like they have to try and attract another person anymore. I think that’s dangerous thinking.

Some thoughts here, you’ve made your suggestion that she hit the gym with you or engage in physical activities that would be more healthy. She’s not helping you out there. I think the girlfriends idea is a good one, plenty of guys or girls stay in shape not so much for the physical activity, but because it’s fun to hang out and talk while you work out. So that’s a good play too. You could potentially even encourage her friends to ask her to come with them. Then they’re making an effort as well. But what else can you do?

What about the food you guys are eating? Lots of times when couples get married the guy gets healthier — because women tend to shop and eat healthier than single guys do — but the women eat less healthy — because we are slobs and they take on some of our bad dining habits. (Also, we can eat a lot more calories than they can because we’re generally much bigger.) So can you control the food you’re buying or the meals you’re eating and pick healthier options for her?

Here’s a broader question, does she seem depressed? Most women beg for their husbands to do things with them. If she’s not interested in healthy activities with you — or her friends — is she not that interested in other things too? She may be in a post-wedding, newlywed funk. The added weight may be a symptom of a larger issue rather than the issue itself. Good luck. 

“For many years, my wife was pretty adventurous in the bedroom. She fought all marriage norms with ferocity. Back door- check. Fool around with one of her girlfriends- check. All post wedding. She has also been a fan of me, um, finishing on her, which I was happy to do.

Then she read some Stephen King book about a guy that dies on top of his wife during sex while she is handcuffed to the bed. In this story, King describes the smell of semen. My wife, who is familiar with me in these ways, was so profoundly affected by this description that she put an immediate halt to any exposure to it. Back to condoms, even though she has an IUD. No oral unless there is a t shirt or towel to trap everything.

Is a Stephen King novel possibly the single dumbest thing to ever change great sex to moderate sex?”

If this is true, you got totally fucked by Stephen King. I’d want to beat his ass.

But I think something else had to happen.

I just don’t buy that her adventurous bedroom life coming to a close because a horror novelist graphically described the smell of semen in a book. I mean, presumably she’s actually smelled semen before, right? So what difference does it make if someone else describes the smell? I think there’s something else going on here. My first thought is she — and I’m sorry for the hypothetical here — had a miscarriage and it was so devastating to her personally that she hasn’t even told you about it yet. (I know that she’s on birth control, but that isn’t 100% effective).

Now she’s afraid of getting pregnant again because she doesn’t want the potential pain of another miscarriage. In other words, I think the semen terror is a symptom of a bigger issue, not the issue itself.

I think something happened other than a book passage and you probably need to be supportive of her until she feels able to tell you what that is.

If it’s really the book, you need to scour a bookstore for the best description of the magical qualities included in semen and try to counteract the negativity. You need dialogue like this.

One hot woman talking to her hotter friend: “Tell me your secret, why do you never get wrinkles?”

MILF: “I’m glad you asked! It’s because my husband ejaculates on my face every night at the end of my blow jobs! Doesn’t my skin look fabulous!”

“So this might be a bit to heavy of a topic for the mailbag but I honestly don’t know what to do and it’s potentially life altering so why not give it a shot.

I graduated last May from a small (3000 undergrads) religious college. We were college students so a good portion of us still had fun and partied and did our best to have a hell of a time. I started a twitter account where people could anonymously send confessions about themselves, friends, or people at our school and I would post them (this twitter account will play a big part in the issue I have now). Anyways one of my best friends started dating a girl a year younger than us about halfway through our senior year. Things for them didn’t seem to be very serious and none of us really expected them to stay together very long after graduation (and the constant sex) ended. Well we were dead wrong and they’re still together now almost a year later and seem to be getting really serious.

So back to the confessions twitter account I started; a few months ago I got a confession that said his griflriend had gotten an abortion. The person submitting it swore up and down that they knew it was true for a fact and I don’t have a reason not to believe them. But at the same time I can’t say that I know without a doubt that she did have an abortion. I haven’t told anybody because I don’t want to risk bringing it up and it not being true. But at the same time I feel like he should know if she did actually have the abortion. I know that he wasn’t the guy that could have gotten her pregnant because he would have told us. So now that they are getting really serious should I bring it up and risk the friendship? If so how do I bring it up like “Hey dude by the way I heard that your girl had an abortion”? I honestly don’t see anyway that this could possibly end well for everyone involved but I feel like I’m not doing my job as a friend if I don’t tell him. And since we went to a religious college and she is still a student there it would definitely harm, if not ruin, her reputation because rumors spread like crazy there.

Again I realize this is probably way to real world, super serious of a topic to bring up in the mailbag but any and all guidance would be greatly appreciated because I have no idea what the hell to do.”

Don’t say anything at all.

First, you have no idea if this is true — the tip came to an anonymous Twitter account and you said you don’t know if it’s true — second, you assume that your friend would tell you if he knew. Why do you assume this? I would think most people reading this who got a girl pregnant in college and then knew that she had an abortion wouldn’t tell their friends about it. If you would tell your friends — knowing that they would judge her for it — it’s a total asshole move on the guy’s part. This is particularly true at a religious college where I will guarantee you there are currently tons of students who have had abortions. Third, what if the abortion happened when she was fifteen or sixteen years old? Should he really not date her because of a mistake she made in high school? If that’s the relationship standard that we’re all employing in life, then no one should ever date anyone.

 

The only reason why I can think that this fact should change their relationship status is if she had an abortion while dating him and it wasn’t his kid. That is, she was screwing someone else. Otherwise it’s entirely her decision. 

I think you’d be stunned by the percentage of women who have had an abortion at some point in their lives. It’s a massive number. Most of these women just aren’t ready for children, but will later go on to have children later in their lives when they’re ready. None of them make that decision lightly. I would much rather someone have an abortion than be a shitty parent. (In fact, it’s a provocative theory, but the guys who wrote Freakonomics argue that the reason our crime rate has plummeted since the early 1990’s is the ease of abortion. The theory, which I believe, is that people who aren’t ready for children frequently turn into shitty parents. Shitty parents create shitty kids who are more likely to commit crimes.)

I have three kids. They are fantastic, the highlights of my life. But this is an important lesson for those of you without kids: THEY ARE FRUSTRATING AS HELL AT TIMES AND ALSO UNBELIEVABLE TIME VACUUMS. I can’t emphasize this next sentence enough: IF YOU ARE NOT CERTAIN THAT YOU WANT KIDS THEN DO NOT HAVE THEM.

Ultimately, I don’t really care if a girl had an abortion at some point in her life. Neither should you. And if it’s really that big of a sin I’d rather be in hell with all the women who had abortions then in a heaven where getting an abortion is a disqualifying life event. The rest of you in heaven would be so jealous of our parties in hell. They’d be badass. You’d always be trying to get invited to our parties.

Okay, now let’s have some absurdity. We got tons of emails about people getting locked out of their hotel rooms naked. These were the best.

“Keep this anonymous as I don’t want this getting back to his current wife.

So this didn’t happen to me, but I have a funny story about someone getting locked out of his hotel room naked.

I played minor league baseball during the 2001 and 2002 seasons throughout the Midwest. Outside of making millions of dollars in the league, this was the next best thing and the greatest “job’ I’ve ever had.

One of the pitchers on our team was nicknamed “Hurricane’ because when he got drunk he literally turned into a natural disaster and there was a pretty good chance he would take his clothes off wherever he was and go to sleep.

On one road trip, the home team would always put up the visiting club in a hotel that was next door to a casino. Bad idea for us, great idea for the home team. They knew most of the players would spend each night getting no sleep, getting drunk and gambling our money away, greatly increasing their chances of winning the next night’s game.

Anyway, Hurricane came out in full force one night and when he tried to go back to his hotel room, he found a note on his door that his roomie left that read “If this is (insert real name), use your key and come in. If this is Hurricane, find somewhere else to sleep”

In his drunken state, he took this literally and proceeded to get naked and lay down to sleep in the hallway outside his room. This was about the time that other hotel guests were starting to get up for breakfast, so needless to say this caused quite a bit of fuss. I’m not entirely sure how long he was laying there in full display before the first guests found him, but I would pay to be a fly on the wall to see the reaction on their faces.

Hurricane had struck again and we were asked to find a new hotel to stay in.

P.S. We swept the 3 game series on basically no sleep, way too much alcohol and one epic story.”

You know any email that begins — Keep this anonymous as I don’t want this getting back to his current wife — is going to be good.

We need more minor league baseball stories.

“I love your website – good stuff. Been a reader a long time but this is the first time I’ve emailed – or to any website actually…

Anyway, just got done reading the Anonymous Mailbag on Feb. 24. You responded to a guy that got locked out of his hotel room after boozing too much and you wondered what would happen if you were naked. Well, this happened to my dad – for real. I think I was in high school when it occurred.

He was on a business trip – I forget where – but booze was involved and he passed out at the end of the night. This was before he had Lasik eye surgery, so he was still blind as a bat (seriously, legally blind) without his glasses or contacts.

So he comes to as the hotel room door slams behind him. He’s looking around and the world is a blur, but he knows he’s naked in the hallway of the hotel. He paws at the door and can’t get back in. It’s the middle of the night and he’s naked, slightly boozed up still and blind.

He literally fumbles his way down the hallway by feeling the wall. Somehow, someway he finds a courtesy phone and gets the folks at the front desk. He explains himself and they say they will send security up.

He somehow finds a used room service cart – complete with clanging dirty dishes and empty glasses – and hides behind it and waits. A bit later this huge, black security guard finds him and asks him his name. My dad explains what’s going on. The guy says he needs some ID, which my dad assures him he can provide as soon as he gets back into his room.

Once in the room, he grabs a towel, his glasses and wallet. After checking the ID, the security guards gives him a nod and is gone. My dad passes out again.

The next morning he is sheepishly checking out as the front desk girls are snickering and laughing to themselves when they realize that my dad is the naked man who stalked the hallways the night before. He grabs his receipt and leaves in shame. I’d love to see the security cam footage of that night. I’d play it at my parent’s 50th Wedding Anniversary.”

The only thing worse than being locked naked outside your hotel room would be being blind and locked naked outside your hotel room. 

“Several years ago, at a work convention in New Orleans, I found myself locked out of my hotel room, naked.

What had happened was (I think) I had been on Bourbon Street partying until very late, and went back to the room alone. I stripped and went to bed. Sometime in the early morning I got up to relieve myself, and thought it would be a good time to go in search of “companionship”. When I heard the door click, I realized that I was naked. Thank God (or Allah, in your case) it was after the complimentary USATodays had been distributed. I made a loincloth of the paper and went to the desk. I’m 6’5″ and about 235, so you can imagine the shock when I got to the desk. Security brought me back to my room with a towel, and made me produce ID after they opened the door.

I just wish I could remember where I thought I was going! That click of the door was the loudest sound I’ve ever heard.”

Okay, I know what you’re thinking, do hot chicks ever get locked out of their hotel rooms naked?

Yep.

Here we go.

“I am at work typing this to you instead of working. I just read the mailbag about getting locked out of a hotel room naked. Well, last year my smoking hot girlfriend won an incentive trip to a five-star hotel on Grand Cayman with the pharmaceutical company that she worked for. About three nights into the trip we were both three or four sheets to the wind when we finally passed out from drinking copious amounts of free alcohol all day.

At about 3:15 a.m. I heard some knocking noise. This is pretty amazing because I am a heavy sleeper, especially when having been drinking heavily. I looked in the bed next to me and – nope, she’s not there. Checked the bathroom – she’s not there either! So I look through the little fisheye thing and sure enough – it’s my completely naked girlfriend knocking on the door! Of course, I opened the door and let her in, laughing my ass off. She had made a wrong turn on the way to the bathroom and locked herself out. Neither one of us has any idea how long she was out there or how many other hotel guests may have opened their doors to see what the commotion in the hallway was.

Later that morning I was awakened by my own laughter as the memory of this event crept into my unconscious mind.

That same trip – and the anonymous mailbag – inspires a question for you:
What percentage of people between the ages of 20 & 50 would have sex within eyesight of others (in a pool, in the ocean, on a balcony, etc.) if they thought there was little chance of getting arrested?

For a gay muslim, you seem to be an expert on such matters and I hope to read your thoughts in an upcoming mailbag.”

In response to your question, I think it’s nearly 100% of men on the balcony. If you’re on the balcony that’s your space. Others have to make an effort to see you and it’s on them if they do. The number who would have sex in a pool or the ocean is a lower because you’re definitely in the public then. Someone could video you and publish it.

I have no idea on the percentage of women that would do it, but I know they’re the ones making the call here, because men don’t make rational decisions when sex is involved. 

“So, to set the scene. My wife and I and another couple were going to Rodeo Cookoff in Houston. If you’re not familiar, it is basically 3 nights of unlimited booze at over 300 tents leading up to the Houston Rodeo. As 30 something’s with kids, Cookoff weekend equals getting hotels and partying like we’re 20 again. Last year we decided to get rooms Downtown so we could take the light rail home from the Texans stadium after our day/night of debauchery. So we throw on our boots, pearl snaps and head out.

First things first, we shut the place down and head back to the train. About halfway back downtown my buddy projectile barfs on the train. A couple of gay guys were on the train and one says as sassy as possible, “I may be a skinny bitch, but at least I can hold my liquor!”

Then it gets good. The next morning we get together to nurse our hangovers and hear the story about his wife. She woke up in the middle of the night, totally nude, and walked into the hall instead of the bathroom. She couldn’t figure out which room was hers and just started knocking on random doors. Some guy opens his door and sees her supremely drunk and naked. He gives her a towel and tells her to go to the lobby. She does as instructed and ends up getting let back in her room by security. We decided the Jell-O shots might not have been necessary.

As you can imagine I am really looking forward to Cookoff this weekend.”

Incredible. 

Keep the anonymous emails coming to clay.travis@gmail.com