Dear Avi: Couchless in Seattle

Dear Avi,

I’m not one of those rich gays I’ve seen on TV and through the windows of Panevino. I don’t even own a couch, which is the problem! Can I still successfully date dudes without a couch? All I have are some chairs and my bed. All my money’s going to food and rent and a really shitty IRA with like 5 bucks in it.

-Couchless in Seattle

Dear Couchless,

I just saw a free couch on the street. Though someone had tagged it. Sorry ’bout it. I agree with you (bet you don’t hear that too often) that not having a couch is a huge problem. No middle ground between sitting and fucking. Because there’s no romance in sitting, unless you romantically sit on your kneecaps while your guy’s romantically in a romantic chair, which I can tell is not your style. And if you invite a guy to lay down in bed with you, you need to fuck or suck him or stuff like that, even if you don’t want to. And that’s what successful dating is all about, Charlie Brown. Learn how to have sex you don’t want to and you’ll be super popular.

Here’s how. Focus on how lonely you feel and how the only reason anybody would like you is for your body and how your actual sexual interests are too kinky and fucked up for anyone to be into them and even if you could find someone into them he wouldn’t be the kind of person who would even ever want to sit on a couch or go to the movies or go to Chipotle and split a $7 burrito. That’ll make the cock go down so much easier. If you go into it knowing you won’t like it, there’s no disappointment.

It’s safe, sane, consensual for the new millennium. Safe because you’re not out in some bathhouse and nothing unsafe can happen in your apartment. Sane because when two people are alone together and both are insane, neither can tell, so then both are sane, which is math. And consensual because even though you’re not having sex you want to have, the guy you’re with doesn’t know you don’t want to have sex with him so he’s not the one forcing it. No doesn’t mean no if you say it doesn’t!

You could also make a couch out of construction paper and masking tape. If it gets messed up, just make another one. Or just describe your bed as a couch. Say “Let’s sit on the couch.” Then hand him a banana and say “Here’s a champagne.” Guys like when you tell them something that doesn’t match reality. It’s a type of brainwashing. Go for it.

You really should be living in some group fag house though. Do they still make those in Seattle or are they out in Shoreline now? All I’ve seen on Craigslist rentals section are guys way out of your league renting out an extra room in their condos to new-to-town A-listers. Isn’t it interesting how Seattle fills up with more and more people who are all better than you? I mean, you wouldn’t even know what to do with a $14 burrito. Hint: the answer is not eat. Duh.

Technically you don’t need to own your own couch if you can do the roommate thing. I don’t know if you’re a roommate kind of guy or not. If you can answer yes to these three questions, then maybe you are:

1. Can you make small talk with the friends of your roommate even if you hate those friends and they hate you?
2. Are you overcome by embarrassment and likely to implode in self-shame-hate if someone sees you being your horrible self doing [insert horrible thing here]? And you know what you did (and do).
3. Can you find a roommate who is never home because the couch would be in the living room so you couldn’t make out on it much anyway so what’s the fucking point? When in doubt, just ask yourself what’s the fucking point. It works for lots of issues.

Too bad you don’t live in Renton. You could ask a guy out to Ikea. But that’s more what married gay guys do for adventure. It’s not for decidedly unmarried guys on a first date. And whatever you do, don’t date a guy who doesn’t care that you don’t own a couch. That’s weird. You don’t want to be weird.

Just remember, when you get a couch (and I recommend something that allows for easy liquid clean up because you’ll just fall asleep on it alone and drool) other problems will reveal themselves. And when they do I’ll be here to help.

Your best friend,
Avi Danger

Have a question for Dear Avi? Send it to strangeways@seattlegayscene.com and he’ll pass it along.

Disclaimer: If you follow any advice from Avi Danger, you’re a fucking idiot. So don’t. But if you do, then anything bad or good that happens is totally your fault.