For Pet Me Not

This weekend I was enjoying the first truly beautiful New York day of 09 on the 44th street pier. I was standing with a group of gays, just talking, chatting, hanging out, when up walked a friend of ours with his dog. Suddenly, all conversation stopped, and it was all about the little monster. No chatting could continue, as it was constantly interrupted by shouts of “Condom, Stop it! Condom, sit! Condom, don’t eat that! Condom, what’s in your mouth! Condom, why can’t you be good?!”

Much like a small child, when a dog is present it immediately commands all attention, regardless of how many people are there, who they are, or what they’d rather be talking about.

There is a guy I’ve known for several years, an artist who lives downtown. I’ve always found him gorgeous, and over the years we’ve had a complicated relationship that skirted the lines between acquaintances, friends-with-benefits, a couple attempts at dates, and just friends. Through it all, he’s owned a dog. And through it all, the dog ruled the relationship.

Multiple times I went to his apartment for dinner, or drinks, or to “catch up,” all of which I saw as possibly opportunities for naked time. I liked going to his place as I have a roommate, and he has always lived alone. Every single time I’d go there however, the conversation was always about the dog. “Isn’t Poochie cute? Isn’t Poochie sweet? Oh I spent the day with Poochie.” Or worse, rather than talking to me, he would talk to the dog. “What are you doing Poochie? Do you want to go out? Do you want a snack? Are you being a good boy?”

HELLO! I’m sitting here, I’m drinking a bottle of wine with you, I’M being a good boy – why don’t you come over here and rub MY underside? I always found it infuriating, and even though I would try to hook up with him a few times a year, I think the dog was a serious part of the reason our relationship never progressed further.

It wasn’t just the artist though; almost all dog owners I know are the same way. And cat owners are no better. In fact, sometimes they are worse.

A couple months ago I hooked up with an adorable boy I met online, we’ll call him Puss ‘N Booty. I went to his apartment, again because he lived alone, and discovered he had a kitten. Cute as a button and annoying as shit. (The cat, not the boy. Well, in a way, both.) Needless to say, the cat jumped all over the apartment, all over him, all over the bed – and of course he lived in a studio so there was nowhere else for the cat to be. Again, it was all about the pet, though this time was a bit different, because the cat was annoying Puss ‘N Booty as well, especially as we were trying to hook up and the cat kept jumping on the bed.

“Pussy, get out of here! Pussy, go away! Pussy, stop being bad!” He would grab the cat and lightly toss it off the bed – it of course landed on its feet, looked around for a minute, and jumped right back up. Because it was a kitten and not yet spayed or declawed, it was full of energy and just wanted to scratch things. Several times, while we were having sex, the cat would jump on the bed and on top of one of us. Puss ‘N Booty would act annoyed and throw it off, I would actually BE annoyed, and eventually I started to do whatever I could to just speed things along and get it over with.

When we were finished, laying there still naked, the cat jumped on the bed, and landed right around my knees. It looked right at me. I stared back. Some survival instinct automatically moved my hand to cover my exposed crotch.. just at the cat lunged, claws tearing my fingers.

“Ouch!” That bitch just tried to scratch my balls off! Puss ‘n Booty grabbed the evil creature for the millionth time and threw him of the bed, which was lucky because if I had grabbed the thing and threw it like I wanted too, it wouldn’t have landed on its feet. But instead of taking out my annoyance on the boy’s pussy, I just got dressed and left. He was hot, but I refuse to go back.

But for all my bad experiences with pet owners, by far the worst (or best) story happened to my friend MartiniFun. We were on vacation together in Atlanta, and one night while we were out we both met guys and went home with them. The next afternoon, we caught up over Bloody Marys.

“OK, so we make out for a while on the dance floor, and then he drives us back to his place,” MartiniFun told me. “We walk into his apartment, it’s cute, and up runs this dog, all excited to see him. Then, I see that he has a second dog, also trotting up. Ok fine. So we go into his kitchen, and I see that he also has a cat. I’m like ‘Oh you have a cat too?’ and he says ‘I have three.’”

“Jesus it’s like a zoo in there!” I exclaimed.

“Just wait,” he continues. “So we start making out again, and after a few minutes he drags me to the bedroom. He opens the door, and I see like four fish tanks.”

“Fish?!”

“Not just fish. Fish, frogs, turtles... and then I hear this squawking – and see behind the bed is a cage with two birds in it.”

My jaw dropped. MartiniFun just nodded, and said, “Oh yeah. It was Noah and the fucking arc in there.”

“What did you do??” I cried.

“What do you think – we had sex! But wait. So it starts out ok, we’re fooling around, and then we start going at it, but as we get more into it, he starts moaning and groaning, and when he does that the dogs start barking. And at first he tries to ignore them, and then he yells at them to stop, but nothing works. So finally we stop, he gets up, puts both dogs outside the bedroom, and closes the door.”

“They were in the room?” I asked.

“Oh yes,” he replied, “and so were the cats. They still are at this point. So he gets back in bed, and we start going at it again, and now it starts getting really intense and he starts morning and groaning, and so outside the door the dogs start barking. But we ignore them, and keep going, and soon we’re really going at it, and he’s getting louder and louder, and as he does the dogs are barking louder and louder, and soon they’re fully howling outside the door. And he’s screaming ‘Ignore them! Faster! Harder!’ Ok, so now we’re going crazy, and the bed starts shaking and banging against the wall, and somehow it must have also been hitting against the birdcage... because the next thing I know the door of the birdcage is somehow open, and the two birds are out of the cage and flying around the ceiling.”

“What?!” I shouted.

“Seriously. And then the cats, who have been on the floor, jump onto the bed, and are leaping in the air trying to catch the birds. And he’s ignoring the whole thing, screaming ‘I’m close! I’M CLOSE!’ So I just ... kept going. He’s screaming, birds are flying, cats are leaping, dogs are howling, turtles are snapping ... I had sex on Animal fucking Planet.”

“Wow,” I said, stunned.

“I’m making a new Rule!” MartiniFun announced. He loved to make rules. “From now on, no sex with men who have pets!”

I raised my glass. “No dogs, just doggie style.”

“Cheers.”