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I mean it pretty literally: an employee sat down, explained what I was doing wrong, what the expectations for that specific space was, what likely failure modes I'd encounter if I continued as I was doing, and some alternative approaches.
I dunno what the guy's specific job was, but one of the older employees sat down and gave a ten or fifteen minute spiel, starting with the simple stuff like explaining what someone buying you a drink meant (only strictly speaking requires a conversation, but impolite to accept if you aren't looking for something more, with expectations of reciprocity, and how the tab worked under those circumstances) and how to handle it if the drink was unacceptable but the company wasn't (tell the bartender or waiter when you order your first drink that you're a teetotaler, even if you're not), that customers purchasing less than two beers worth were going to unspecified issues (hint hint), normal don't leave drinks unattended and know your limits for alcohol when you do drink. Eventually, what I'd missed about the name (a marijuana reference), what event nights were active for 'mostly' social stuff (poker or
betting onwatch football) and which were much more heavy on either hookups or otherwise might be a little too ribald for me (here's a flier; yes several include drag and/or guys in glorified speedos), and other spaces that might be easier to get friends to go to the bar with (admittedly, not very helpful given three of the recs were explicitly political orgs).I have no idea how many of those conventions were even common back then and I'm sure many aren't common now.
Uh... yeah. One of my first crushes was on a straight guy, and it wasn't the only such crush, add in a general shortage of tops, and there's a lot of reasons it works as a fantasy. And while I've never pursued it, you only really need one or two closeted guys for it to feel like it could work.
Maybe? I dunno how much of it's kidding on the square. A lot of soccons have looked at the number of younger generations self-identifying as bi and then not doing anything about it, but there's other explanations for that behavior that could end up changing pretty fast.
But that may just be me assuming many other people share my interests, and there definitely are starting to be people who try to take that approach and get surprised to find out exactly how poorly it works in practice.
Hah! Fair point. Even 'always up for sex' isn't anywhere near realistic, and that's assuming a lot of frot that straight or 'straight' guys aren't probably gonna be feeling. And it's very much just a different sort of drama, and not even that different, rather than as overt a difference in quantity as a lot of straight guys expect.
Hell, some of the times you don't even avoid the shoe-explosion.
Interesting. I'll have to put some feelers out; this seems like the sorta thing where everyone involved was sure they were just presenting the most palatable experience, but by the end of the game of telephone it's somewhere between useless (like dental dams, PrEP for lesbians is probably not a high impact field: I think there's been literally one case of cisF/cisF HIV transmission through oral sex documented) and actively counterproductive (expecting partners to use a drug they can't get and wouldn't be helped by).
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