HOWL AT THE MOON

The man in the apartment adjacent to mine has a new girlfriend. Not that I'm listening, but I can hear them having sex. Well, to be accurate, I can hear her when they're having sex, and it's somewhat interesting to note that her orgasms sound like a (highly amplified) pitch-perfect blend of Meg Ryan's diner scene in When Harry Met Sally with those yappy-ass, shampoo-fetishizing women in the Clairol Herbal Essences commercials.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not necessarily attempting to cast any aspersions on the, er . . . authenticity of the next-door orgasms. Far be it from me to even care, and believe me, I'd just as soon not have been placed in the position of even having to speculate on this to start with. Is it just me, though, or does anyone else find it somewhat off-putting that an entire generation of women are possibly emulating and/or simulating their orgasms according to the industry standards of Meg Ryan movies and shampoo commercials?

Here's the thing, though. My cat Yuki is a bit of a prima donna and has a lot of complicated rules by which residents of the other apartments, people congregating outside the house and in the neighborhood at large, and well . . . the whole world, really, are pretty much expected to comply. These rules might include No D-O-G-s Allowed (in fact, the word "d-o-g" must always be spelled out at all times and never articulated out loud in her presence); That's My Chair; Don't Fuck With My Feet; I'll Poke You If I Want; and No Talking, Laughing, Shouting or Other Noises From the Neighboring Apartments. To name just a few.

So, needless to say, the loud sex thing from next door really chaps Yuki's ass. As soon as it starts up, she expresses her displeasure by going, "Grr!" When this doesn't put an end to the infraction, she gets louder, and goes, "Grrrrrr!!!" When this doesn't put a stop to things, and, in fact, it only begins to get louder next door, she becomes agitated, and starts noisily jumping and thumping around the house, and going, "GRRRRRRRRR!!!!"

This is the point where whatever resources of Emotional Maturity I might normally be able to at least pretend to possess completely abandon me. The girl next door's yippee-kayay-ing away, Yuki's thumping and jumping noisily and growling at a decibel I'm convinced is, in fact, audible to the next-door neighbors, and I just can't help myself . . . it starts out as a suppressed snicker, and then modulates into a stifled tee hee, working itself into a not-so-discreet giggle, then finally explodes into a full-blown guffaw.

So the neighbors may, in fact, think I sit in my apartment and laugh at them when they have sex. Hell, maybe they think I'm the one that's thumping around and growling too. Either way, it's chagrin-inducing, and I must somehow maneuver to never, ever, ever run into them. Ever.

I suppose it could be worse. I dated a Screamer, once. We're talking full-out, no-holds-barred screaming. Quite frankly, I found it quite . . . disconcerting. A little bit upsetting, actually. The first time it happened, it shocked the hell out of me. It was definitely a step-back, fall-off-the-bed, Jesus-H.-Christ-on-a-Raft-what-the-fuck-was-that kind of a moment. (Quick sidebar . . . does anyone ever wonder why the middle initial "H" and why on a raft?)

And from there, it just became more extreme and demented. It was so loud that it woke people up in neighboring houses. It was so loud that my friend M., who lived in the next block, thought someone was being murdered . . . and this was without his hearing aids in. It was so loud that all the dogs in town sustained damaged eardrums and the sonar of local bats was permanently fucked up. It was so loud that bands of coyotes began to assemble on the top of the bluffs overlooking the river valley, and they all began howling at the moon . . .