More The Merrier
Sep27
So I guess this is going to make people wince. GOOD.
What a week it’s been. Lord. I quit my old day job for a new one. The new one was not only worse than the last one, it was insufferable. Literally a work environment so hostile and fucked up, I quit after 2 days. Back to the job hunt.
Now would be a really, really good time to buy one of the FTF book collections, a shirt, or one of our many other novels and other assorted merch. We’re not starving yet, but flying by the seat of my pants is not something I enjoy.
Whatever. Onward! Onward, through the fires of adversity!
Great music choice 😉
Wait, so if they’re her girlfriend and boyfriend, why were they all “who?” when Mick was asking if they knew her? I have definitely known the name of everyone I’ve ever called my girlfriend. With that and a reasonable description, they really should have known. (Maybe they were somehow covering for her since she’s famous?)
I get the feeling that use of the term girlfriend and boyfriend was meant more to be easy for Mick to understand, than to be totally descriptive.
Yes. Explaining to the sexually and relationshiply conservative is often difficult. Like, there isn’t necessarily a language to cover it. See: “Stranger in a Strange Land” by Heinlein.
Pretty much so.
Even if you’re only a little bit kinked, it becomes clear that pure vanilla foks don’t have a frame of reference. If you’re more than just a bit kinked, the conversation quickly goes ‘Off the Map.’
Polyamory is perhaps the thing that pushes the conversation off the map quickest, because the only referent people have for it is either Mormon-style polygamy, or cheating.
Well, the key to people not being shocked is to communicate at the BEGINNING of the relationship. It’s often easier to talk about it over coffee at the end of the second or so date than it is to have it brought up like a’ this.
In my experience, most folks actually grasp Polyamory fairly easily. It’s not as alien, say, as a fetish for being beaten until you resemble ground beef. Or being crapped upon.
Yes, I know someone who gets off on those.
And yes, those strain even my comprehension. I can intelletually comprehend the mental wiring and psycho-sexual wiring involved, but wrap my head around it? Difficult.
she was going by her club name. everyone’s different but her persona in the coffee shop is a little different – you start referring to them by their other name not even thinking.
not only that, alex is a pretty common name…
Sure, about half of my friends are folks that don’t go by their legal name. But anyone I’ve dated, hearing their full legal name and physical description would be enough of a bell ringer no matter what I normally call them.
http://ftf-comics.com/?comic=freaks-in-our-midst
With that kind of data, it seems weird that neither of them twigged.
To reply to this one is to give minor spoilers:
– When Z&Z knew Alex, they only knew her as Elle.
– She did not have a mohawk, and her hair was not blue.
– “Arm tat” is not specific enough.
The comic you linked? They haven’t seen Alex in a while. Possibly for quite some time. Mick’s description doesn’t do anything for them.
ADD: On names.
As noted in another comment, I dated my first wife for almost 4 months before I found out her real name was Jennifer. EVERYONE else, as well as I, only knew her by her nickname. I was staying at her place one night, she told me to answer the phone while she was in the bathroom. The caller asked for Jennifer, which led to a hilarious conversation.
Furthermore, Sparrow (who is commenting here) is a close personal friend I’ve known since the year 2000. It only occurred to me to ask her real name a couple years ago – mostly because nobody I know calls her that. Even her husband calls her Sparrow most the time. Also, Mel goes by Mel, and not her full name Melissa. Took a couple months of dating to hear it, from one of her family members.
Ah, okay, that makes sense. Thanks! (I don’t mind spoilers, but other people might.) The only two scenarios that I could come up with that resolved that data were that they were covering for her in case Mick turned out to be a creepy stalker that she didn’t want to talk to, and they’d take their cue from Alex/Elle, or that she’d started dating them after the coffeeshop encounter but before now, with concomitant increase in intimacy. I look forward to letting the story play out and hearing how it all goes!
Re: names, sure. My mother once plaintively asked me if I even knew anyone with a normal name any more. But tons of the people I know with handles or unusual names have made them legal (I was once on a mailing list for people named Raven, heh), and all three of my longest relationships have been with people who got their chosen name put on their drivers’ license. Thinking about it, I realize that since I often do long distance relationships, I end up buying a lot of plane tickets… so making travel arrangements necessitates full legal names. (Mayhem and I had a pretty good laugh about that — the first time I ever called him anything but Mayhem was at a TSA checkpoint. I used his given name, and he gave me a look like, “Who?”. But yelling, “Hey, Mayhem” at the TSA would have made for a more festive time than either of us wanted, so I’m glad I had a fallback plan.)
Oh, darlin’. Let me reassure your mother (because, of course, I do that so effectively) that “Raven” is a “normal” name at this point. I mean, there was even a girl on the TV who had that name. 😉
Heck, I even know three or four other “Ogre”s.
“Poster is named ‘Wolf’ or ‘Raven'” is a square in Polyamory Bingo: http://www.julisana.com/polybingo/bingo.php Play it with random trainwreck-y posts on alt.poly or LJ “polyamory” or any other such forum.
Having an extended set of “Burning Man” in-laws, I don’t know hardly anyone’s “real” name…
this was the bit that bugged me. though they may have put up a front? don’t know. fishy, though. really fishy. and i say that as someone who’s had multiple sweeties who all knew each other.
this girl fails at the whole “communication” part of a poly relationship.
Yeah, although I think that’s a major part of the story here. I know I don’t even invite a potential new partner out for coffee without letting zier know I’m poly nor without at least letting my existing partners know I may do such a thing. (Not that I’ve had the time or energy to add a new partner in several years! Know your limit and all that, I guess!)
I dunno. My first wife went by the name Irish for years. We’d been dating for almost 4 months before I found out her legal name was Jennifer.
Huh. Learn something new every day.
I’ve known people that went by a nick so prevalently that their real name didn’t come up for years. You get used to it. One guy in particular I was dating for awhile before I realized I didn’t know his real name. It dawned on me mid sentence when I called his work and asked for him.
I knew James for over a decade before it dawned on him to ask what my real name was. Unless you associated with me through work or my relatives you probably wouldn’t have heard it used. He now uses it when ever he wants to grab my attention to make a serious point in a discussion and that is rather annoying.
For my wife and I, it’s actually the opposite. Our mundane names are so…mundane. If she wants to get my attention, she has to call me Calum – Mike only exists at work and on legal documents, and I tune it out outside of there. 🙂 Pretty much the same for her.
Oh, I don’t think he’s doing it to get my attention. More likely it’s in the manner of using someones full name when they’re in trouble. It’s possible that I get in trouble a lot.
I call my husband by his nick so much I often blank on his legal name. In fairness, his brother’s legal name is almost exactly the same and they’re twins. And, yes, I question they’re parent’s desire to just fuck with people for naming them that way.
I’ll be honest, when I think of you, I just think “Sparrow.” Your real name, as you noted, is something I have to use on purpose,a nd I don’t associate it with you mentally.
“Wince”? That made me laugh.
Is it weird that the only problem I have with this so far is the whole “fingered her at the coffee shop” thing? Seriously, there’s a line. Past about seventeen that’s just trashy.
Sounds like a normal relationship to me. Actually, probably on the simple side, as there’s only four people (that we know of) involved.
When the worlds collide, hilarity ensues.
Mick’s Roger Rabbit eyes, tho. HA.
Suckitude on the job situation, Du. Sending JobHunting Mojo your way.
I have to congratulate you on having the moral courage to walk away from the toxic job, though. Not many folks as are willing to stand up for themselves in that manner, and it requires more than a bit of intestinal fortitude. Hopefully your courage will pay off in good job karma.
Ohhh I can’t wait to see how this plays you. You can almost hear his brain want to blue screen.
LOL!!
At this point, I expect to see the entire cast… all at the same play party before too long.
Mick bumping into Omar in a pile of flesh should be highly entertaining!
Good on you for not whining about your bad luck and just continuing to be awesome. In situations such as this lots of folks would be wallowing in self pity and feeling sorry for themselves.
Also for having learned enough skill and having enough value that finding a job isn’t an insurmountable obstacle. Well done.
Thanks. Around the age of 26, I learned that self pity is a luxury that one cannot afford to overdo. Sure, feel sorry for yourself for half an hour if you like. But that’s it. Then get up off the floor and start kicking ass. Otherwise you cannot succeed – self-pity never fixes a problem. Get the fuck up and fight.
All too often, self-pity is a luxury you can’t even indulge in, when a real crisis occurs. Not for one second.
The fun part is when you try to indulge in just a small amount of self pity then learn about even worse things that have just happened to your friends. Good luck on the job search.
you learn pretty quick in my field that wasting time on self pity only allows other problems to occur.
while wallowing in sorrow, three other things just caught fire. pick your ass up and fix em!
All too often, self-pity is a luxury you can’t even indulge in, when a real crisis occurs. Not for one second.
Too true.
Oh, and..um..YEAH! RARR!!
Well said.
And I thought you were just a struggling, starving, comic book artist. Now I have to add ‘while working a dead end soul sucking day job’ just like me
I have put out dozens of short stories, thousands of comic strips, and multiple novels, all while working 40+ hours a week, for the last 14 years.
And my friends often wonder why I don’t have a lot of free time.
Just ordered the year one collection. (:
Woo woo!
Yeah, as another poly/kinkster, Mick done f’d up by slipping it in the crazy again, but Alex also f’d up by not being up front about her relationship status and dimensions … level ground has been achieved, but footing is still slippery until things get cleared up.
(BTW, JLGrant, Unwoman did a birthday show in Oakland this week in which she evidently RickRolled the entire audience.)
Rock on!
I entirely grok the whole “wait a minute, what’s your real name?” thing. Can you say, “34+ years in the SCA”, boys and girls? I knew you could. Further confused by the fact that while I don’t yet have a Playa name, I DO have a Burner / Ranger callsign / radio handle.
*sigh* I really don’t have any nickname, and almost never have had.
Dammit.
In fact, I only ever had one, in high school, just for a couple of years. Maybe that’s why I enjoy having online usernames.
comics arrived today. already going to be reader
copies even though they showed up mint.
congratulations and thank you.
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-omQpUAOq3k4/UkebALn-gwI/AAAAAAAAAH0/O0PPaw1JRKw/w346-h258/ftf+year+one.jpg
Thanks, you folks are making me feel positively normal. 😉
William, the Nick-less, old-fashioned straight monogamous dude
Pants? I could have sworn seeing a picture of you in a kilt of some sort. 🙂
Yeah, but I can’t wear kilts all the time.
Damn wage-slave jobs. And briars.
So…only when you’re sporran, then?
Wow other then the last panel this sums up how my last relationship started.