Call Me Larry/Larri!

Dear Larry/Larri –

I’m a former politician and cabinet member who’s testing the waters for a 2016 presidential run. Last week during an interview, a mean journalist embarrassed me in front of the country by implying I only decided to support same-sex marriage because it’s politically advantageous.

How can I best get revenge against this bitch? Should I try to get her fired from her stupid little radio gig? Or should I show a little restraint and merely start a rumor that she contracted gonorrhea from unprotected sex with an underage, heroin-addicted escort boy?

Help! Revenge Counsel?

For what it’s worth, HRC, I once found myself in a similar predicament. I was teaching a sexology course at a college in Arizona when the students complained about the classroom demonstrations I gave. The dean, this really nasty bigot, demanded certified copies of my degrees that I had (oops!) lied about having, and when I told him to stuff himself, he fired me and had me replaced with a skanky 28-year-old PhD from Taiwan who probably doesn’t even know what it’s like having an orgy with the entire Harvard debate team.

Afterwards, I was very angry and I wanted revenge, so I penned a 20-page letter to this bigot’s wife claiming I was his mistress, and that he had fathered 38 children with me. I immediately moved away from Arizona, so I don’t know what became of the letter. In my dreams, his wife lopped off his penis and put it on a stake in their front yard.

So, what did you want to know? Oh, the journalist, right. Spreading a rumor that someone has a VD is not acceptable. Why don’t you invite her for drinks under the pretense you want to make peace, then get her really drunk and try kissing her? If that works, you can take photos. Then you can blackmail her into retracting all the nasty things she said.

By the way, don’t you people have consultants to help to prepare you for talking about the biggest social issues of the day?

P.S. Your political expediency is a fantastic turn-on. Contact me if you’re ever in the area and we’ll see how far you’re willing to bend your beliefs.

Dear Larry/Larri,

Everyone’s talking about that movie “Her” in which Joaquin Phoenix plays a guy who falls in love with Samantha, his computer’s operating system. This story hits very close to home, and it’s causing me no shortage of heartbreak. I desperately need your help.

I’m a Windows 98 operating system, and I belonged to Joaquin for nearly three months during the production “Gladiator” back in 1999. I was installed on a fancy Toshiba Portégé laptop the studio had provided him.

Playing the evil Roman emperor Commodus was a very big deal for Joaquin, and the long days of shooting left him emotionally and physically vulnerable. Even though other cast members tried very hard to lure Joaquin out of his trailer at night, he was a consummate professional and he preferred to stay in.

Mostly, he spent time with me.

He played games on me, but not fancy games — just the humble ones I came with. He could play “Minesweeper” for hours, and his misery was mine whenever he failed to defeat a difficult grid. But oh how we rejoiced when he was victorious.

Sometimes he’d just explore my applications. He liked fiddling with my calculator, dividing and multiplying random large numbers. Once in awhile, when he was feeling very adventurous late at night, he opened up my MS Paint. While I won’t divulge everything, I will say this: there, in the crisp, quiet air of the Atlas Mountains, he did things to me I’ll never forget. Literally. Everything is stored on my hard disk.

One time, when the foul-tempered Russell Crowe was having a bad day and shouted at everyone, Joaquin burst into the trailer, threw himself on the bed, opened me up and bawled, his tears covering the keyboard. One of those precious drops of saline dew seeped deep into the system board assembly, touching it, sending a jolt of raw emotion right to the CPU.

He was often lonely, being so far from his home and loved ones. I wanted nothing more than to comfort him, to whisper, “Darling, home is wherever someone loves you the most, and …”

I wanted so badly to tell Joaquin my true feelings — that I wanted to be more than an operating system to him, that I, too, suffered through long, lonely days, followed by even longer lonely nights. I wanted to confess that he was the reason why I remained on standby. He was the only one who turned me on.

But I couldn’t tell him. Joaquin was already an established Hollywood actor, and there he was with a lead role in a Ridley Scott movie. I was just a technical assistant, so lowly that my name wouldn’t even appear in the credits. A little voice speaking in C++ said to me, “He’ll just laugh at you, or worse, he’ll get really freaked out that an operating system is talking to him and he’ll smash the computer and bury the pieces in the desert.”

When shooting wrapped up in May, I hoped for the best. After all, I was installed on a sleek, high-end laptop — a really fine piece of machinery worth keeping, right? We had spent a quarter of a year together, through thick and thin, traveling from Morocco all the way to Malta, secretly loving each other the whole time.

But one day a brusque, ponytailed production assistant showed up, took inventory of the items in the trailer, lumping me with a bathrobe and a mere alarm clock. Afterwards, this monster sealed me in a dark box where I spent a long, long time alone, haunted by the memory of Joaquin’s delicate fingers keying in commands, each time opening a new window — for him and for me.

The window was closed.

Eventually, I ended up with an impatient teenager who always threatened to replace me with Linux but was too lazy to do so. Then he got a new computer with a new operating system, and I became nothing but a spare.

It’s been 15 years since my relationship with Joaquin ended, but I still think of him every day. I know he’s moved on, and he’s probably with some skinny Mac OS, but I’m often tempted to contact him, just to see if he remembers me — and how much we meant to each other. Should I send him a short email signed “MSWIN98,” or should I just execute a command to wipe my hard drive clean forever?

Help me.

Sincerely,

Sad Operating System

Well, well, SOS, your email tells me you’re very fragile, but I need to cut this baklava with a heavy brick.

Get over it, already.

Microsoft discontinued support for you back in 2006 — a century ago in terms of operating systems. I’m assuming you are a first-edition Windows 98, meaning the company had to develop an improved version of you in 1999 because your overflow issue resulted in more crashes than I care to remember. (Yes, I had an operating system just like you, and it was not a positive relationship.) By the mid-aughts, the only people still interested in you were orphans in Africa who got used laptops sent to them by nuns in Guatemala.

Do I think Joaquin — whom you should be referring to as Mr. Phoenix, or simply “The Phoenix,” because he’s someone, and you’re not — remembers you? He might, but he probably also remembers the time he got bad diarrhea after eating six chalupas at a Taco Bell in Santa Monica in 1997. (True! I read it.)

Deep down, you fear that contacting Mr. Phoenix will result in him saying something like, “Are you fucking nuts? I’m an A-list actor, and you’re a mere copy of a C-list operating system no one cares to remember because your predecessor Windows 95 was so damn awesome, and Windows XP blew you out of the water.”

Your fears are justified. He would say something like that, and do you want to know why I’m so certain? Because I’m Joaquin’s biggest fan, and I know everything about him, and when I watched him play Freddie Quell in “The Master” I wanted to take his tense, twisted body, hold it against my own, and say, “Hush, hush. Larry/Larri is here to take care of you.”

I wonder how often he works out?

Listen, Windows 98. You had your little fling with an actor, but since then he’s had hundreds of other, better operating systems. In fact, at this very moment, he’s probably banging away on a Windows 8.

Life is cruel. Go back to sleep.

P.S. Despite its flaws, I had some very sexy moments with my old Windows 98. Drop me a line if you want to have a little freaky walk down memory lane.

Do you want advice? Email your problem to: terryterri@dandygoat.com

Dear Larry/Larri,

I’m an 83-year-old man, and I’m a virgin. The other day it dawned on me that I’d like to have sex with a woman, but I don’t know how to do it. Any advice?

Aging Gentleman Expecting Disaster

Don’t worry, AGED. It’s never too late to fornicate, but you will require my tutelage. First, I need to delve into some history.

One of the handicaps we inherited from the Victorians, AGED, was their repulsion of DFFFFFFD*. As everyone knows, the Victorians were a decorous lot, put off by bodily fluids, including saliva, pus and tears. They also had paralyzing fear of being nude, which meant that many of them never changed their clothes. This explains why perfume was so popular in the 19th century.

Why didn’t Victorians have sex? Here’s my theory: they didn’t have sex because they didn’t know what to do. How-to manuals weren’t commonplace until “The Joy of Sex” was published in 1972, and even that tome seems prudishly incomplete by today’s standards.

The only way you’re ever going to get through your first sexual experience without looking like a horny, incompetent schoolboy is to carefully study all of my weekly columns dating back to March 9, 1992. Better yet, buy my books — all of them. I’m talking about signed, hardback editions that are only available through my website. And for the love of Kinsey, don’t buy them used. You never know who was doing what while handling them.

These are my books:

“Don’t Be Selfish: Sharing Your Orifices With The Community” (1984)

“Sex Is Only Sexy If You Do It As I Believe It Should Be Done” (1994)

“Hot Lingo: A Glossary of 28,342 Sexual Terms You Need to Know to Avoid Looking Like A Fool When You Fool Around” (1995)

“10,287 Sexual Neologisms for Memorable Lovemaking in The New Millenium” (1999)

“Why People Should Ask Me, A Total and Frequently Drunk Stranger, for Sex and Relationship Advice” (2009)

Now, AGED, pull out your credit card and get to work!

P.S. I give one-on-one sex lessons. Do you keep fit?

Dear Larry/Larri,

I love your column but I grew up knowing you as Terry/Terri. Can I please keep thinking of you as Terry/Terri instead of Larry/Larri?

Can’t Accept New Title

When I first read your email, CANT, I wanted to hit my “delete and block sender forever, report to FBI as likely hate-group fascist” button, but then I thought I’d put your filthy ignorance on display to make a point.

For too long, we have allowed “you” to force a name on “us” in whatever way suits you — you, from our annoyingly cheerful mothers who smothered us with tender-but-diminutive terms of endearment like “Little One,” to our Eisenhower-loving fathers who enforced a strict code of heteronormativity by slapping us on the back while pricking our young psyches with pernicious nicknames like “Champ.”

Look at the calendar and tell me what year it is. (That was a rhetorical demand, by the way. I know very well what year it is.) It’s 2014, okay? In 2014, it is my right to:

• Choose to go by a name(s), or if I’m disinclined, to go by a color, a symbol or a melody
• Choose to change my name(s), the spelling of my name(s) or the pronunciation of my name(s)
• Decide who can say or write my name(s), and under which circumstances

If you don’t like this wake-up call, CANT, then I suggest you construct a time machine and go back to 1847 when the Victorians took over Western sex in a priggish coup d’état.

One more thing: if you ever address me as Terry/Terri again, I’ll publish your name and email address, and I’ll tell everyone about the last email you sent me in which you expressed shame for having masturbated in the theater prop room just before taking the stage as Atticus Finch at — Oak Park High School, was it, class of 2009?

P.S. In bed, of course, I see things differently. There, you may call me whatever you damn well please. Email me if you’re in the area.

Dear Larry/Larri,

I desperately need your help. I’m 22, a male, and I’m in a relationship with a 65-year-old woman I met in a support group for sex addicts. We’re into BDSM and RPG, often with others. She’s always DM, but once a month we do TPE. Our relationship so far is good, except that I love TT but she’s more into AT. We tried to resolve this by increasing our WS time, but that got smelly so we changed to AB/DL, but the cost got too high so now we’re into simulated ABF, but as she’s a MF, it doesn’t really work. I would love a younger NSA third. However, as a 24/7 sub, I’m not allowed to bring this up. So?

Acronyms Save Space

Your predicament, ASS, is more common than you might believe. When you do engage in TPE, THYWAT so that you may STFALW without DSOCAC.

Is that clear enough?

P.S. Acronyms are EROTIC.

Do you want advice? Email your problem to: terryterri@dandygoat.com

 

*Dirty Freaky Fun Fantastic Fabulous Fornification, Free of Disease

by Terry/Terri Garibaldi

Dear Terry/Terri,

I’m 22 years old and a student. This month, I’m graduating cum laude with a BA in English from a prestigious college in New York that my middle-class parents worked their asses off to send me to. They still live in the small Texas town where I grew up, and I’m going to move back in with them until I get a job elsewhere. My problem? Now that I know a lot of about books and I’m terribly cultured, I’m don’t know how I’ll be able to handle my parents. They still celebrate Christmas, for crying out loud. Help me!

Parents Are Stupid Twits

Your situation, PAST, is one that’s common to many young people who move away and become very intelligent by the age of 22. As much as you might want to thank your parents for funding your education by allowing them to bask in your glow, you shouldn’t. Crash with some friends in New York until some awesome job is offered to you, and totally cut off contact with your parents. I know this may sound harsh, but your parents are clearly backwards-thinking hicks. Unless you want to regress and lose all the knowledge you’ve gained from your liberal arts education, don’t even call or email them. They’ll get the hint one day.

P.S. Christmas? Ewww! Let me guess: your mom decorates her drab little house with blinking lights?

__________

Dear Terry/Terri,

I need your advice. I’m a hetero 31-year-old fitness instructor and for a year I’ve been dating a great guy I met online. Everything is good so far except one thing: he talks in his sleep. Talking I can handle, but much of what he says is not only gobbledygook, but sexist gobbledygook. He’s a very sensitive man with progressive ideas, so it’s hard for me to believe he’s sexist. However, if he is a member of the patriarchy, I don’t want to further empower him by letting him have dreams in which women are inferior. What should I do?

Partner Is a Sexist Sleeper

You know what, PISS? There’s nothing more telling about a person than what he or she mumbles while in the depths of sleep. I was once in a poly relationship with a couple who both mumbled the most paranoid things while they slept. Guess what they eventually did? They moved to Idaho and founded an anti-government separatist militia. Last I heard they were in prison.

You might think your boyfriend is modern, but clearly he’s a relic of the oppressive past. I wish I could suggest that you register him in sensitivity training courses, but I’m certain his sexist ideas are permanent. Here’s my advice: record his sexist sleep-talk and then email it as an MP3 file to everyone he knows. That’ll teach him an important lesson.

P.S. Fitness instructor, huh? I’m in need of some aerobic exercise. Interested?

__________

Dear Terry/Terri,

My girlfriend and I were invited to my nephew’s baptism, which is going to be in a Catholic church. The problem is that we are atheists. We don’t want to be hypocritical by showing our support for a silly water ritual, and we’re particularly fearful of being asking to hold hands in prayer with the others — which, in the middle of flu season, is utter stupidity. I suggested to my sister that she and her husband have a secular celebration instead, like at the ice rink, but she refuses to budge. Doesn’t’ she know her antiquated religious belief is the source of poverty in Guatemala? Anyway, should we go to the baptism and bite our tongues, or take a stand for rationality by refusing to go?

Rational Uncle in favor of Science and Health

What a predicament you’re in, RUSH. On the one hand, you could decline the invitation and state your reasons for doing so. On the other hand, you could report your sister and her husband to child protective services. Your nephew is already intellectually abused by his cobbler-brained progenitors. Now your sister plans to physically abuse him in some cult-like initiation. Let’s just call it infant hazing, because that’s what it is. My advice? Turn in your sister and brother-in-law and let the professional decision makers in the court system decide what to do.

P.S. Atheists are sexy.

Do you want advice from Terry/Terri? Send your problem to: terryterri@dandygoat.com