Laurel: the number of times in like recent history that I have opened up a text message thread.

Mm-hmm.

Or a slack thread or my slack status.

Mm-hmm.

Where I think I put like, head into lunch and then I come back to my computer and that is just up there ready to click Mm-hmm.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Daniel: I consider those like the messages for Elijah.

Nichole: I did have, I had someone, , that I'm dating, send me a screenshot of the response that he had typed out. Like a day before and was like, look, I was planning on sending this yesterday. But I did it and I'm sorry,

Daniel: I, I have sent this screenshot of shame before.

Nichole: Yeah,

same.

Nichole (2): maybe I'm just so anxious that I can't type up a message and like not send it,

Nichole: I just love tasks. I love completing tasks.

Laurel: I think it's a total like a DH, D thing for me, where I've typed it out, I get distracted by something. In my mind, like I've already taken the action of writing it.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so it doesn't occur to me , that there's like another step involved there.

Daniel: What you describing, I think is one of the great hindrances of having an active imaginative life.

Laurel: Yeah. in my head, I have written the message. I've already acted out, like their reaction to it.

Daniel: Mm.

Laurel: My re my reaction to the reaction, it's all happened in my mind.

Daniel: Is the reaction usually angry?

Laurel: Depends,

Daniel: yeah.

Laurel: Sometimes it's delight, sometimes it's flirtatious.

Daniel: Ooh. Sometimes it ends in a quickie in the corner of the room.

Laurel: And I'm always like, why isn't the quickie happening?

Daniel: Speaking of sex and imagination. And whimsy. me and Laurel went to the, uh, sci-fi night at the sex club.

Nichole: Oh yeah.

Daniel: This last week. Oh,

Nichole: tell me about it.

Daniel: I wanted it to be more like a Star Trek convention. I wanted,

Laurel: that's what we often say about the sex club

Daniel: and vice versa.

Laurel: Yeah,

Daniel: like our whole mission in this podcast, I think it should be making the Star Trek convention more like a sex club and making the sex club more like a Star Trek convention.

Nichole: how do you want it to be? Like a Star Trek convention?

Daniel: yeah, more themed. Star Trek sex.

Laurel: Star Trek sex. Like, like instead of, the people in full latex suits with like gas masky things, no fucking next to us,

you wish that was more like.

cling on.

Daniel (2): Yeah. Imagine if there Were themed sex rooms, at the Star Trek convention where there was like the Klingon orgy.

I think that it actually stirred a desire in me to have more. Sex club environments that are just sex bit positive. I want it to be like bit DSM, you know, like, I

Nichole: mean, I bit DSM oh my God.

Um, but I feel like that sex club in particular has like naked karaoke and naked bingo. I can't think of anything more bitlike.

Daniel: Those are hierarchically imposed structures from the top down. I want a BYO bit. I don't wanna have to watch a comedian Or,

Nichole: okay.

Daniel: Uh, what are the other awful things? We should have a segment that's just listing the awful things that Portland sex clubs do.

Nichole: Yeah. The awful theme nights. Absolutely. Stewarts. If you have an awful theme night that you've been to at a sex club, let us know.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: Welcome to Poly Amateur Hour.

Laurel: I'm Laurel,

Nichole: I'm Nicole.

Daniel: I'm Daniel.

Nichole: I am very curious what other sex clubs do in other cities whose brand isn't weird, you know?

I'm gonna turn the sound off on my computer because it's just gonna keep

Laurel: digging.

Turn the sound off. I closed

Nichole: it. You would think that it would not do that

sorry. Laurel and I are just so popular.

Daniel: The world relies upon you or lies upon you. Sometimes

Nichole: I wish like a

Laurel: weighted blanket.

Daniel: I do that sometimes to you. Mm-hmm. I sometimes lie on you. Very, you guys do that very squarely you guys

Nichole: all the time. I always walk in on you on the couch. Either Daniel is on top or you are on top and it's just laying, it's just stacking like pancakes.

Daniel: Is it, is it more or less awkward than if you walked in on us having sex?

Nichole: I have walked in on you having sex.

Laurel: Is it more? I know so

Daniel: that's why I'm asking.

Nichole: It's the same.

Laurel: It's the same. Is it, would it be worse if we weren't face to face, but I was like back to front. So we're literally stacked up.

Nichole: Wait, okay.

Uh, sorry for a minute there. I thought you were saying like somebody is face down on the couch and the other person lying face up. But on them I was like, that would be awkward.

Laurel: That would be good. We should try that. Sometimes

Nichole: one person doesn't get to breathe and the other person,

Daniel: that's how we should resolve our conflicts.

Nichole: Is laying on top of each other,

Laurel: how is that a resolve

Daniel: facing away? Just, you know, just some time, time facing apart.

Laurel: Oh. Like when we're arguing, we just have to be back to back instead of face to face.

Daniel: Yeah. Yeah. And then, and then whoever loses has to be on the bottom

Nichole: There are no losers. In relational conflicts

only winners,

Laurel: not according to Reddit.

Daniel: Oh yeah. Have you noticed Reddit?

Laurel: I try not to, but

Nichole: I really try not to. I keep

Laurel: going back for more.

Nichole: I just have it on a browser now. Not on an app. Oh yeah. There's some shit on there that I just like. I don't need to see that. No, there's a lot of shit. It just pollutes my mind. But

Daniel: you send me in like a canary in the coal mine to go find the terrible,

Nichole: do you?

I do. I did tell you today, like, oh, you should check out this subreddit for maybe one of our segments. Yeah.

Daniel: Oh, which segment is that?

Nichole: Monogamy. Are you Okay?

Daniel: That was like an amazing relay race segue. Right there. This is like great ball movement. This is like 1980s Lakers. Great,

Nichole: great ball ball movement. Oh, that's what that means.

Daniel: Sports.

Laurel: We're really moving the ball down the field.

Nichole: It's not the first thing I think of when you say ball movement.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: I'm just trying to like, be topical to try and lure our first guest from the Portland Trailblazers. One of them has gotta be Polly. They're, they're NBA players, right? They're at least mega sluts.

Laurel: maybe.

Nichole: Okay. Speaking of sports and sluts,

Daniel: this is our new Subsegment Sports and Sluts

Nichole: Stu. Pick up and read Pucking Around. Oh yeah. By Emily Wrath.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: Yeah.

Nichole: we'll be recording, with our favorite Alex Alberto.

Um,

Daniel: yes. Much better than the other. Alex Albertos

Nichole: our favorite. Alex Alberto, the Canadian one. Um, we'll be recording with them What late May.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Yeah. So you have until late May to finish this book.

Daniel: Honestly, they probably have until late June because the episode won't be edited and we can plug in their, little clips after the fact.

Laurel: oh, you want them to send in like little voice clips Oh, we're gonna pull an open Pike Night.

Daniel: the, the reference that, that Laurel just dropped

Laurel: mm-hmm.

Daniel: Reference

is to one of our favorite Star Trek podcasts, one of our favorite podcasts in general Open Pike Night. Mm-hmm. you should all go check out Open Pike Night.

Nichole: Yes. Yes.

Daniel: Everybody like it is absolute joy. they have this great format where listeners send in audio clips of them discussing what they think of a given episode. We'd like you to do this for Pucking around, and we will call this special Open Puck Night.

Nichole: Oh my God.

Can we get the hosts of Open Pike Night to read Puck?

Laurel: okay,

Nichole: Cameron, we're coming for

Laurel: you. Yes, yes. Okay. Also, I will say like, you don't even need to finish the book. Like if you just have a wild reaction to something you just read. Yes. And it, yeah, like record a voice memo on your phone and then just shoot it off to us.

Nichole: you will.

Laurel: You, you will have a reaction. Have

Nichole: a reaction.

Laurel: I had a reaction within like the first 10 pages of it. Oh,

Nichole: for sure.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: Yeah. The rash was really dramatic. It was rough, I'm going to try and, uh, multitask by masturbating while I read this.

Smut,

Nichole: uhhuh,

Daniel: as you should do with smut. So if you wanna like, send in a voice memo

Nichole: of

Daniel: you.

Nichole: No. Nope, nope. No thank you. we have to start a Patreon. They get, oh my god.

Daniel: Okay. Pump up the volume reference.

Oh God. Um, were we gonna start a segment?

Nichole: Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

Yeah.

Okay. Monogamy, are you Okay? Is when we look at examples of toxic monogamy and we ask the question monogamy, are you okay? so what do we have for us today?

Daniel: Oh, we've got a couple of spicy meatballs.

Laurel: that's what our therapist used to say to us. Do you

Nichole: remember that? That you two were spicy meatballs?

Laurel: No, like when I, when, uh, one of us like dropped a big truth bomb, she'd be like, that's a spicy meatball.

Nichole: we found this on, am I overreacting? The subreddit? And I have not read it. So here we go. Am I overreacting that if IF 30 2:00 upset my friend F 33 said she'd be mad if my boyfriend proposed to me before her wedding.

A close friend of mine. Is getting married at the end of February and I'm a bridesmaid. She and I have been friends for 10 years or so. My boyfriend recently bought my engagement ring, which I knew about and told my friends because I was excited. He's been planning a proposal that I assume was going to happen sometime early this year, but didn't have an actual idea of when this week, a mutual friend of mine and the brides, who is the matron of honor at the wedding called my boyfriend and told him that the bride would be upset if my boyfriend proposed before her wedding, which is over a month away, that it would cause tension, quote unquote,

Laurel: oh my God,

Nichole: and that anytime after the wedding is fine.

I feel like it's incredibly selfish and self-absorbed for her to think she can dictate. When my boyfriend proposes to me again, she said she'd be upset if he proposed before the wedding, not at the wedding. I haven't said anything to her because she didn't say it directly to me, but I feel upset at her and I don't know what to do going forward.

Do I just pretend like everything is fine?

Daniel: Everything is not fine.

Nichole: Update. I talked to the matron of honor and she told me that the bride asked her to say something to my boyfriend.

Daniel: Can you imagine thinking that your wedding, like. Owns the time of other people's lives.

Laurel: like you don't just, own your, proposal and wedding. You own all other proposals in the time window between your proposal and wedding

Daniel: in your, matric.

Laurel: While we're on the topic, I would like to formally let everybody know that if you get engaged

before Daniel and I get married, you're outta my life forever. I'm sorry. It'll, there'll just be tension.

Nichole: What is that? There there'll be tension. What is the tension?

Laurel: Yeah. Why, like tension that you are inventing,

Nichole: it sounds like she doesn't want anybody to take away from her special day. Right.

Daniel: they're not gonna come to the wedding.

and do like a little dramatic reenactment of their proposal.

Nichole: yeah. Or just push the bride and groom aside and say like, we wanna get married instead.

Daniel: Or when they toast to hold the glass aloft and say, this reminds me,

Laurel: it's also kind of like a weird sentiment, and I know a lot of people feel this way, but the idea that like, your wedding is about having attention,

Nichole: I think that's, part of the thing.

Laurel: It's

Nichole: like that's, that's the draw I think for a lot of brides. I'm just gonna be like super generic about like,

probably very sexist about it, but like, you know, there's the term bridezilla.

you know, it's her day. It's her special day. Yeah. She gets all the attention. It's about her.

Daniel: Doesn't she know that you can't spell attention without tension?

Laurel: it'll make your wedding more memorable if there's tension in it?

Nichole: I just don't know where the tension would be coming from.

Laurel: Like she would just be seething. Like, I'm so mad that I know my friend got engaged recently.

Nichole: I'll be so mad that she has a new piece of jewelry.

Laurel: Ugh,

Nichole: that's really what it is.

It's not like, not like they would be announcing it as soon as they arrive.

hello, we're engaged.

Maybe it's about the boyfriend.

Daniel: Like she wants the boyfriend?

Nichole: No, like the boy.

She thinks the boyfriend is like maybe better than her husband. Maybe he's richer, maybe he's taller. Whatever straight Normy people think of

Laurel: maybe it is a polyamorous situation and her boyfriend is the fiance and the wedding.

Nichole: She just conveniently forgot to mention that.

Daniel: It feels a little like extending the rules of monogamy out into your friend group as well. Yes. Right? Yes.

Laurel: yeah.

Daniel: It's like hijacking somebody into your relationship.

Laurel: Yeah,

Nichole: yeah,

Laurel: It's

Nichole: gross.

Laurel: I am exclusive with this person and you, your whole purview of relationships needs to be exclusive to us too.

Yeah. You can't acknowledge any relationships outside of our own.

Nichole: Yeah, exactly.

Daniel: Why not just, hand out little, um. Greek saint icons of you, and your husband in advance so that you can burn a candle. Everybody who is involved mm-hmm. You know, does a little ceremony at home.

Laurel: Mm-hmm. I have a really good idea.

Daniel: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: Everyone that enters your wedding, they have to sort of ceremoniously cut ties with their partner as they enter. '

Nichole: cause it's not about

Laurel: their relationship because it's not about them or their relationship.

Daniel: I thought that you were gonna say that everybody who enters the wedding has to ceremoniously.

Cut their ring finger off.

Laurel: No, that's extreme. I was just like, you know, hold a ribbon between you two and as you walk in the bride, we'll cut the ribbon

Nichole: and it has to be the bride and every time she goes snip, thank you so much.

Daniel: is a wedding just an exercise in complete mania and insanity.

Laurel: It's like an exercise and let me show you my worst self.

Nichole: Yeah, yeah.

Laurel: So you can be prepared for like the absolute shitty person I am. Deep down inside

Nichole: and let's spend so much money to show you like how awful it can be.

Daniel: I'm really thankful for you two that we've just proven that we really don't have to spend money to show each other how awful we are.

Nichole: Yeah. We do that for free, baby.

Mm-hmm.

Daniel: we do have one more monogamy. Are you okay?

This is like the opposite of a palate cleanser. It's just something else Gross to put in your mouth.

Nichole: Yep.

Next. Am I overreacting? My boyfriend gave me a literal performance review of our relationship.

I don't even know how to explain this without it sounding fake. My boyfriend works in management consulting and is really into productivity stuff. Notion, habit trackers, OKRs, all of it. I've always kind of found it endearing. We've been together for two and a half years, living together for eight months, and he's been talking about proposing.

Yesterday he asked me to sit down at the kitchen table for us to check in, totally normal for us. We do that sometimes, but then he pulls out a printed document titled Relationship Performance Review, Q1 2026 with my name on it, like it's an actual HR form. I thought he was kidding. It had sections like strengths, areas for improvement and goals for Q2 under areas for improvement.

He wrote actual fucking things. he has apparently been tracking this in a spreadsheet for months. I just sat there staring at it and asked if this was a joke. He said, no, he believes in radical transparency and if we can't measure how we're doing as a couple, we can't improve.

Then he said he hoped I would come to the next check-in with my own review of him and handed me a blank template. I told him, I'm not doing corporate performance cycle with the person I'm supposed to marry, grabbed my stuff and went to my sister's place. I feel like I'm losing my mind. Am I overreacting?

Daniel: Now, this post has since been taken down by the Reddit moderators,

Nichole: correct?

Daniel: I don't know if it's 'cause they suspected it was fake.

But here's the thing I work with people in Silicon Valley. I don't live in Silicon Valley, but I work with like fricking San Francisco ites who I could absolutely imagine doing this kind of thing.

I've also worked at generic Pacific Northwest Sports Apparel Company. for a while, like working in the, training division, uhhuh, which is like, like CrossFit

The vibe of all these people who are like trying to like realize their like maximum potential

I absolutely am inclined to give this the benefit of the doubt and assume that it is real just because I know the monsters would create this kind of thing.

Laurel: it's is the same kind of thing where it's like there's all this like self-help and productivity shit that like mm-hmm. Has infiltrated the, like whatever the professional managerial class

Nichole: like the five hour work week.

Laurel: Yeah. That's just like after my and who moves my cheese, everything. Yeah.

And there's life hacks for everything

Daniel: Yes.

Laurel: To Be the most productive, high efficient person you can possibly be, which is just like Uber buying into capitalism. Oh, I mean, Nicole would not like to present you with

No,

Nichole: it's not. It's not a counter argument. I was just thinking I would never do this to you, I would never do this to anyone.

Daniel: I feel a chore wheel coming on.

Nichole: I mean, the idea of tracking things in a spreadsheet and then seeing it like produced in bars and graphs, I'm kinda like, that's comfort food for me.

I'm kind of like,

Laurel: I kind of get it. Like

Nichole: I would never do it,

Daniel: how do you even measure love?

Nichole: You don't, it's not quantifiable. I would hate it. Don't get me wrong, I would hate it.

Daniel: You would hate receiving it, but not giving it.

Alright. let's, uh, let's get some grades. What do you say, Laurel?

Laurel: Oh, you want me to rate you

Daniel: now? No, no, no. I want to give Nicole what she absolutely wants deep down in our and get some grades for us.

Oh,

you don't wanna ruin our relationship. No, I

Nichole: think, I think do you understand what I'm putting down?

Laurel: I get the. Yeah, I get the satisfaction in seeing like quantifiable data, but yeah, every sane person knows that. You don't want to apply this to relationships in any way, shape, or, or form. Correct.

Or quantify things. Especially in like polyamorous relationships.

Nichole: Oh my God. That would require comparison. Yeah. And it would like,

Laurel: yeah.

Nichole: Fuck shit. Oh

Laurel: yeah. It would be generally bad,

Nichole: but I would be lying if I didn't say, like,

Laurel: if you didn't see any kind of appeal

Nichole: or if I didn't understand where this guy was, like, you know, he's, he's probably autistic like me and like he just, just, you know, needs it defined

Daniel: Autism is no excuse for capitalism,

Nichole: What?

Laurel: This Ask the Amateurs comes from our anonymous form on our website, poly amateur hour.com. Yeah. You can email us at Poly Amateur hour@gmail.com, or you can DM us on Instagram or Blue Sky at Poly Amateur Hour, or you can do, as this person has, and submit it on our website. How do you handle living far away from one of your partners for multiple months?

Eventually, one of my partners plans to leave the country permanently, and I'm having difficulty conceptualizing what it'll look like to be in a longstanding relationship with someone. I need to leave the country to spend time with.

Nichole: Laurel. I feel like you're best qualified to answer this.

Daniel: I feel like this is written directly to Laurel.

Laurel: I think I just realized that while reading through it,

Daniel: this is like evidence that like the stews are taking notes and they know all about our lives.

Ah,

Laurel: well, they didn't know which one.

Daniel: They didn't mention them by name.

Laurel: Well, they didn't address me specifically.

Daniel: Oh, you think that they can't tell the difference?

Nichole: Oh.

Between Laurel and I, no,

Daniel: there

Nichole: is no difference. We're the women, girls, females

Laurel: who bombs.

Nichole: Vocal fry

Laurel: bitches. Alright, go

Nichole: on

Laurel: Vocal fry bitches.

Daniel (2): This is gonna be like the third terrible play on words that I've done in this episode.

Daniel: What? You're either vocal frow.

Laurel: Yeah.

Uh, we're gonna put that one on a t-shirt. Mm-hmm.

How do I handle it? Very carefully. Yeah, like a little egg.

Daniel: Cute. That you thought that was an egg.

Laurel: Oh, you were making a jerking off motion. Yeah. I thought you were carrying an egg around.

Nichole: That's because like a Rorschach test.

Laurel: Yeah. If you saw, what do

Nichole: you see when I do then

Laurel: if you saw, if you saw egg handling, you're, you're creative.

Nichole: The new Laurel and Yanny. Okay.

Laurel: Oh yeah, my partner Sean,

you know. Sean relocated out of the country right before the pandemic hit. they were reassigned to a base in Germany, which is a little extra crazy 'cause it was also like, okay, like there is a person I can go visit.

but just kidding, you can't visit anybody anymore. You can even, yeah. No visiting allowed can leave your, leave your house.

Nichole: every relationship was long distance at that point.

Laurel: Accept your cohabiting one. it's difficult and like it sucks to know that like, oh, you're not gonna be able to see this person as regularly as you once did. and on like the plus side of things, I was like, oh, cool. Like imagining that I would go to Europe all the time, like now I have somewhere to crash, which was silly 'cause I didn't, I don't go to Europe all the time.

cause that's expensive. it's hard to like give general advice about it because each relationship is different I think what helped. That transition be smoother and, sustainable, was one that I felt a lot of security in that relationship.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: security in part because like, we had also like, worked through difficult things

Nichole: mm-hmm.

Laurel: Before and worked through like, them having other partners that felt more, enmeshed even at a time one of our like mutual partners was planning on moving to Germany with them.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: and that all like blew up for different reasons, so already like, kind of like reconciling. Certain kinds of like insecurity

Nichole: mm-hmm.

Laurel: With Sean and like, feeling like very stable in that relationship. and also like Sean and I were not enmeshed.

we've never been enmeshed in like a cohabiting or like financial or like co-ownership of anything kind of way. Mm-hmm. So it there was no disentangling in that department that needed to happen that was gonna be like a big shakeup. the time difference is difficult.

Mm-hmm. It's really hard to like connect when people are in like opposite time zones On the surface, it's like sort of obvious, like, oh, there are only, there's only a certain window of times where we can like realistically connect with each other. Mm-hmm. But I think it makes it even more difficult where it's like, it's my morning and your evening.

Daniel: Yep.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: And so we're in like

Daniel: different head spaces.

Laurel: Totally different head space. You're wrapping up your day. I'm just starting my day.

Nichole: Yeah.

Laurel: And so like,

Daniel: it's kinda like Lady Hawk,

Nichole: oh

Laurel: fucking egg.

Nichole: God,

I'm never seeing this movie.

Laurel: No one has, it doesn't exist.

Nichole: It only exists in your head, baby. But I wanna, I, out of protest, I will not watch this movie.

Daniel: I had a stubbert slash a prospective guest tell me that what was really like meaningful and connective for them was that I was the only other person who they had ever heard talk about Lady Hawk.

Laurel: This is like how we feel about the rainbow goblins.

Daniel: Yeah. You and me, we have the rainbow goblins.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: And now I have the Lady Hawk

Laurel: with somebody else.

Daniel: Yes.

Laurel: No,

Daniel: this is what polyamory is for is like, I need to be able to like satisfy my need for Lady Hawk time.

Nichole: Lady Haw. I just have random references that neither of you get.

Daniel: So how did you work through this particular challenge?

Laurel: there are a few things where it was like one, It is good to like make an effort to stay connected but what I think backfires sometimes is putting a lot of pressure on having, I was about to say Skype dates.

Nichole: I mean, back when you first started dating

Laurel: on having like zoom or video chat dates mm-hmm. And putting a lot of pressure on those To be a particular way. I think this like same thing can happen for like coated relationships where when you're always expecting someone to show up as their best, shiniest, most intensely engaged self.

Nichole: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Laurel: that's really hard to do. And when you feel that distance with somebody, you put in a lot of expectations into those moments that you can connect.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: To be intimate and special and you want it to have some kind of idealized feeling that you retrospectively think every one of your dates had in person.

Mm-hmm.

Nichole: Do you lower the pressure on those connection times? Or do you let go of the expectation

Laurel: I think a little bit of both. Sean and I are both like very flexible people and so it's also really easy to understand that like, a lot of times, like real life takes precedence.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And especially if they've moved somewhere new Yep.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: And are experiencing and trying to meet and make connections with new people, that it's like really important for them to have time. Yeah. And capacity to do that. and likewise, I have, relationships or priorities that I like, wanna maintain in my life.

Mm-hmm. So not expecting like, you know, that you're gonna spend Saturday night. On the phone together. Right. Kind of thing. Right. even though it's this thing where it's like, oh, if you really love me, you'll do that and that'll be the best use of your Saturday night. Yep. But like the reality is like, no,

Nichole: no,

Laurel: no.

for me particularly, phone and video dates just aren't the same. Like of course not. It's just you can't connect in the exact same way. And there are gonna be things that are just like distracting around you or whatever. Yeah. And so you have to accept that to a certain degree, otherwise you can get really upset and resentful.

Nichole: Yeah. I think the security, the security in the relationship is probably one of the core

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Pieces of this. In my long distance relationship. Like we started long distance.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Right. because we'd known each other and we had lived in the same city like 14 years ago.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: and lost touch, and then reconnected and we don't see each other very often.

Yeah. Like we were being able to see each other like maybe once a month when he could like, come down here. but like we text pretty semi-regularly. Yeah. But really what it is, is that like I just feel secure

mm-hmm.

Nichole: In that relationship. Yeah. Yep. I don't feel like he's, I don't need to like, check in with him to make sure that he still likes me.

Laurel: Right, right. Yeah.

Daniel: And that's both about security and the relationship and just security within yourself,

Nichole: that's true.

Daniel: Yeah. Like some people, them being out of sight will make them much more anxious no matter what, even if the relationship is solid just because that's. Right. How they feel.

Laurel: actually a really interesting point. 'cause Sean is, can very much be an out of sight, out of mind person.

Daniel: Yeah.

Laurel: So I should feel extra like, oh shit. Like I'm gonna be out of sight for 90% of Sean's time. Like,

if I were to be activated by anything, that would be like a pretty sane thing to be activated by.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Laurel: but there is that like security where it's like, I know that Sean is paying attention to what is in front of them.

Nichole: Right.

Laurel: It doesn't mean that they've like forgotten about me or don't care about me, or will not come back around to me.

Daniel: Yep.

Nichole: Considering how often we've seen Sean and. How often we communicate with Sean through you.

Like I just don't think that's a, I don't think that's a thing.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: Calm down Laurel. Yes.

Laurel: I'm

Nichole: freaking

Laurel: out guys. I'm freaking out. Freaking out man. I gotta text Sean right now.

Daniel: I think one thing that I am garnering from this conversation, and I have to kind of, you know, take in and rephrase 'cause I don't have this really point of experience

Nichole: mm-hmm.

Daniel: is that the relationship is going to change.

Nichole: Yeah. Yes.

Daniel: You cannot expect to have the same relationship that you currently do under the new circumstances and you have to be comfortable with having a different relationship. And the question is like, whether or not you want that type of new relationship.

Mm-hmm. I think it works very well for certain people. like, Laura, a lot of your relationships have transitioned to not being as physical or sexual in the long run. and so that makes it easier, I think, to be able to have relationships where you're not seeing somebody and having physical proximity with them as often you don't need the physical proximity.

Laurel: yeah,

Daniel: the, the regular sex in order to feel that romantic connection.

Laurel: That is true. Yeah. It's that is not first and foremost what relationships are or even like a necessary component of relationships to me.

Daniel: on the flip side, you also are somebody who can really get into the conversation cadence of others.

Laurel: Yes. Yeah.

Daniel: And you're often available and energetic about your digital communications, right? You have, you know, big flourishing text conversations that are kind of ongoing. for both of these like reasons I don't feel that I'm as suited.

Like I'm an example of somebody who would not be so good at this one because sexual energy, and if not sexual energy, physical proximity, holding, being in the same space is like really foundational for me about how I feel connected to people.

Laurel: Mm-hmm.

Daniel: and I'm a terrible digital communicator because it's kind of like my, it's my job all day.

Mm-hmm. So I'm like writing and writing and writing and it takes a lot for me to be like, okay, now in the time that I have away from this, I'm going to be writing, writing, writing. Right. Right.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: that's interesting. I feel like I'm right in the middle between you two.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: As usual,

Nichole: because sex is really important to me.

Daniel: Yeah.

Nichole: It's pretty foundational in a relationship. I don't need that physical proximity to like one, be sexual with somebody because I love sending semi nudes, and sexting. So like, that's just fun.

Daniel: as a reminder Gilbert, if you leave a five star review and get five other people to leave five star reviews and get screenshots of those, Nicole will send you a semi nude.

Nichole: you have to come with receipts though.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: come with receipts.

Laurel: You, yeah, you have to have a CCBs and then you have to take a picture of that and send it.

Nichole: Please don't

Laurel: Oh, that makes sense because I have the longest long distance relationship. Yeah. You have the second long distance relation and you have no long distance relationship. And we should graph that.

Nichole: It would just make me very happy if you did.

Daniel: You're just saying that because your long distance relationship is gonna get the best grade

Laurel: because I win.

Nichole: Oh, shall we move along home?

Daniel: Oh, let us move. Whatcha guys in the mood to do, to close out the evening?

Laurel: You're pretend like we don't have one choice.

Daniel: You know, there's so many possibilities for a little nightcap. I am in the mood for a little pip iop

Nichole: poly in public invasion of provi

Daniel: PIP iop Poly in Public Invasion of privacy is the segment where we discuss encounters with polyamory out there in the wild. Mm-hmm. It could be in our personal life. It could be in celebrity news. Mm-hmm. It could be in an advertisement, it could be in a anonymous envelope slid under our door containing a mysterious powder.

A mention of Pollyanna.

Laurel: What

is this a thing?

Daniel: It is now

Laurel: someone please send us

someone. Slide an envelope under my door. I have already given my address out on the internet,

Daniel: only to people overseas who cannot actually show up. this particular pip eye op is the second of a series. Mm-hmm. That I will just now be calling weird poly flyers on telephone polls.

Nichole: Oh my

Daniel: God.

Nichole: Really? Oh

Daniel: yeah,

Nichole: another one.

Daniel: Wow. So, formerly, I think the last one was a

Nichole: unicorn. Hunter. Hunters

Daniel: was a unicorn hunter Hunters, this one more falls in the category of pip iop.

'cause it's not really the same.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: I found this at first by googling around for poly news I enter in, polyamory and then like, select in the, the Google options. Mm-hmm. News. News.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: And I got an article from out about a posting on Twitter that contained this flyer on a telephone poll that then links to an online form.

Laurel: Whoa. This is, This is News today.

Daniel: Uhhuh

Laurel: an article about a Twitter post that's a picture of something else.

Daniel: That links to a Notion page.

Laurel: We didn't mention in the monogamy or you Okay. That, the review? The peer evaluation or whatever. Mentioned, a notion tracker cause one of the complaints on the form was, they were only initiating physical contacts so many percentage of the time and that, and part of their improvement plan would be to track weekly and notion how often they were initiating. Oh, my physical contact, God.

Daniel: Oh my god,

Nichole: dear Lord. Okay.

Laurel: And what I think this was, it actually probably was taken down because it was all just a promotional ad for notion.

Daniel: Is that what this is too? Are we just uncovering a.

Laurel: Deep, weird notion Advertising scheme.

Daniel: Well, I mean it would make sense for them to advertise to poly people. Right? Like you get like us collectively using Notion docs.

Laurel: Yeah.

Daniel: Like this molecule.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: Seeking new Poly member.

Laurel: Okay.

Daniel: The flyer on the telephone pole begins.

We recently had a defector in our poly

Nichole: defector. Oh my God.

Daniel: And are seeking a new member.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: A bit about us. Fun-loving, diverse, ragtag, bunch of lover people. So far, so good.

Nichole: Mm-hmm.

Daniel: We love long walks on the beach in a line or three, four formation.

Nichole: No.

Daniel: Trying new restaurants. We share dishes. Family style of course.

And watching romantic comedies chosen by majority vote while cuddled up on our Excel couch. Needs must live on site. Rent is must

Laurel: live on site.

Daniel: Can't be remote. Remote, poly member, rent is $1,570 a month, including utilities must commit exclusively to our molecule.

Laurel: Wow.

Daniel: Absolutely no sneaky links. What,

Nichole: what does that mean?

Daniel: Is that like when you, when you sneak a sausage, is that a

Laurel: That's what

Daniel: I was sneaky. Oh

Laurel: gosh. You like the seven 11 and snap into a slim gym.

Daniel: And Slim is just the sketchy guy that you,

Laurel: oh my God,

Daniel: Any gender welcome. Must be sexually open to all our members. Five. Five to five 10. Preferred for, for practical positioning reasons,

Laurel: like for sexual positions?

Daniel: I think so.

Laurel: Okay.

Daniel: Apply here tiny url.com/join-poly. Cool.

Laurel: And you went to the link?

Daniel: I did.

Laurel: I can't tell if it's a joke or not. Me neither.

Daniel: I think it must be a joke.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Yeah.

Daniel: But it is fucking brilliant and it's gotten picked up and gone viral. So Uhhuh like out is doing an article about it.

Yeah. Yeah. Right. this is all over the place and really one super pissing off Polly people who do not get the joke

and two. Really pissing off monogamous people who do not get the joke.

Nichole: Yes.

Daniel: And think that this is real

Nichole: great. Okay.

Daniel: So

Nichole: what happens when you go to tiny URL?

Daniel: Yeah. Well you get to this notion page.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: Join our molecule. Exclamation point. Welcome exclamation point.

Thank you for your interest in joining our qu. We are very open here and wanted to share a bit about ourselves before we learn a bit about you. For the first time in three years, we are opening up our molecule to a new member. We recently went through a breakup with an after taking some time to heal. We are ready to find his replacement.

We wish him the best and remain on cordial terms.

Nichole: Oh my God. Oh my God.

Daniel: We call ourselves the Norman molecule, named after our leader, Norman.

The president position is rotated every six to seven years.

Laurel: Six, six to

Nichole: seven years. Oh my God. This has to be a joke.

Laurel: Yeah. Yeah.

Daniel: I think we can proceed with the

Nichole: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Daniel: With the assumption. Unless it is a poly Q who is simultaneously making a joke,

Laurel: yeah. Is it a poly qe with a little bit of sense of humor about. Stereotypes about poly people

Nichole: Or is it a bunch of roommates who need a roommate and they're like, you know, it'll be funny if we like fool people into thinking we're of poly cool. And like you know what? No thinking the long game, that would not work. Backfire. Yeah, that would backfire. Real quick,

Daniel: this is how, this is how Laurel found all of her previous roommates.

Laurel: We need a video component.

Daniel: How would you describe the look Laurel gave me,

Nichole: I see

Daniel: there's six of us, but we believe seven is the lucky number.

Nichole: Whoa.

Daniel: prior Poly Q experience is not required, but some experience handling multiple lovers is preferred, simultaneous, long-term partners, 10 plus threesomes, or five plus orgies, et cetera.

Nichole: What, what does that mean? 10 plus three? Like that's the number of threesomes you have had in your life.

Daniel: Yeah, and it, and it becomes, they're just, they're, they're just doing by like, , bulk, right? So it like takes fewer orgies, but more threesomes.

Laurel: So it's like 10 plus threesomes or the equivalent

Daniel: in orgies.

Laurel: Oh my God. Oh

Daniel: no. Oh no. I'm gonna do another one.

Laurel: What

Daniel: I think this, a comparison is really apples to orgies.

Nichole: No. What?

Keep reading

Daniel: our members in no hierarchical order. Melissa 24, artist and Lover. The spiritual leader of the group runs tantric meditation sessions for us. Douglas 25 ex Morgan Stanley, who did some inner healing. Now a consultant.

Nichole: Oh my god.

Daniel: Norman 31, current president.

The strong but silent type. Nine fingers.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Yeah,

Laurel: yeah.

Daniel: Deborah 65. She helps us mature and we keep her young. The mom of the molecule, What do you have against, uh, older women getting theirs?

Nichole: I love older women getting

Laurel: theirs. It's that they position her as the mother in that situation. Situation.

Daniel: Do not

Nichole: like

Daniel: that. It's just 'cause they all, nurse Mackenzie, 25, spunky blonde software engineer. Bring her to the beach and see what happens.

Nichole: What? What she,

Laurel: is she an inflatable?

Nichole: Does she get carried away by birds? What? Damn it not again.

Daniel: I was thinking it was like she just walks off into the ocean. Oh, no. Tragic surprise Ed. 22. The baby of the molecule and the least favorite. Ha ha. Just kidding. That's one of our inside jokes, which you'll get to know if you end up joining our pcu,

our home. The top floor of a beautiful Victorian house in no Valley Rent controlled

Nichole: Noey

Laurel: Noey Valley. Yeah. Top six of six people living in the top floor of a Victorian.

Nichole: Not gonna happen. Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

Daniel: I mean, I think we just need to like open our minds to possible living arrangements you guys.

Nichole: remember how we were describing earlier about you guys stacking each other, like stacking on top of each other? That's what this is.

Daniel: Four bedroom, 2.5 bathroom. You will share a bed with one of our lovely members as the newest member. You can select which member to share with first. We rotate on a monthly basis to avoid any jealousy or playing favorites. This is a joke, right?

Laurel: Mm-hmm.

Daniel: Yeah. But one of the very first, like polyamorous, cults.

Laurel: Mm-hmm.

Daniel: To exist, and I can't remember what they were called, but it was the one that coined the term compersion.

Laurel: Oh yeah. Mm-hmm.

Daniel: They had a policy like this where you had to rotate in order to avoid jealousy.

Laurel: That's so annoying.

Daniel: As, as did the triad who went on Dr.

Phil.

Nichole: It also reminds me of like the first house that we toured together. I. Like on our house buying journey. Yeah. We talked about how, oh

yeah.

We could set up an alarm to go off every month and that would be the sound that when we had to switch rooms that it's all equal amongst us.

Daniel: That's sensible.

Oh god. And ads for some variety. And it would make it so Laurel cleaned to room at least every month.

Nichole: That's true.

Laurel: That is true. I gotta be prepared.

Nichole: But for whatever reason, I was like, and we only have two minutes to just like, it's just self-imposed. Yeah.

Daniel: It's like a room

Nichole: fire drill.

Daniel: It's a root Goldberg machine that just flips us, like with giant spatulas out of our beds.

Yeah.

Laurel: It's always in the middle of the night.

Nichole: But we do this to ourselves.

Daniel: Parking. We share one car. A comfortable seven seater. We love going on road trips.

Our rules, no playing favorites. Each member must spend to the best of one's ability and knowledge equal time with each other member.

Nichole: Okay. how much longer is

Laurel: this? Yeah, yeah. Someone spend a lot of time making this,

Nichole: like the flyer I get as a joke.

Laurel: Yeah.

Nichole: Funny joke, but like, I

Laurel: don't, but why not? Why not just have the URL lead to like, you know, like a rick roll or something?

Nichole: Yeah, exactly. Why do we need this convoluted backstory that we know is fake?

Daniel: You're like, why art?

Nichole: You're right, you're right. Baja Bug.

Daniel: multiple infractions of rules may result in reasonable corporal punishment, voted on and forewarned three to four days in advance of punishment.

Nichole: Okay.

Daniel: We would like to have three to four kids. We are considering having Melissa breed with Norman or Zaid.

Laurel: Oh.

Daniel: And or Mackenzie with Douglas, as we believe these would be the genetically optimal combinations.

Laurel: Oh, no. Eugenics poly, ah.

Daniel: As you would be a newer addition to the molecule, we would need to get to know you for two to four years, depending on good behavior before considering adding you to the gene pool.

Nichole: What?

Daniel: I mean, there is an update of a video from Ed, the least favorite of the molecule because people were concerned about him and so they put this update.

Laurel: it's a video.

Daniel: It's a video. Shall we play it?

AI or not ai. Or not ai.

Nichole: Not ai. And hilarious because he's blinking a lot and so it's like blink if you're in danger. Yeah, that's good. That's good.

Daniel: I think that is just the artist probably who did this whole thing,

Nichole: Oh, for sure. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Daniel: ed, if you wanna really join a poly, get ahold of us here at Poly Amateur Hour.

You're in,

Nichole: uh, Ed's 22.

Daniel: well, he can be the least favorite of our poly fuel.

Nichole: Okay. Form,

Daniel: uh, the Norman Poly application, what? Your name is Poly Amateur Hour.

Laurel: Uhhuh tell

Daniel: me, unless we're coming up with a

Laurel: No, that's fine. No.

Daniel: Okay. Age. How old are we

Laurel: Just put 43. And then parenthetically put average

Daniel: waste

Nichole: just waste in inches. Yeah.

Laurel: It says, and then below it says, self-explanatory.

Daniel: How about e equals mc squared?

Nichole: Sure.

Daniel: All right. Because like our waste is where space and time come together.

LinkedIn required.

Nichole: Just put a link to our, our website. Website?

Daniel: Mm-hmm.

What is your special move? In scare quotes, if you are under 25 and haven't figured it out yet, you may skip this question.

Nichole: My special move.

Daniel: Okay. I'm going to just by observation say that your special move is judgy eyebrow.

Nichole: That's good. Yep.

Daniel: Okay. Uh, what talent skills would you bring to the molecule?

Nichole: Sex bits.

Daniel: Oh yeah. Sex bits. Sex bits. Rolly, polley

Six bits. Does male pattern baldness run in your family? If so, what is the expected age onset?

Nichole: Yes. And Hmm.

Daniel: Since we said we're 43, what if we said 43 years? Uh, four months and, uh, two days and 13 minutes.

Nichole: Nice.

Daniel: Are you interested in entering the breeding pool after the aforementioned trust period? If so, please provide a brief family medical overview.

Laurel: Yes. Dead.

Daniel: asterisk. We did not do it. Anything else you would like to share with us?

Please come on. Poly amid. Sure. Hour. All seven of you

and accept your corporal punishment. Are we ready?

Laurel: Yeah. Submit it.

Daniel: Submission, yeah.

Nichole: Hover your finger over that submission,

Daniel: right? For a good

Nichole: 30

Daniel: seconds. Um, uh, do

Laurel: it.

Daniel: Oh. Wanna blue ball you? So bad? Okay.

You're almost there.

Laurel: Oh, no.

Daniel: we get this popup that says you're almost there. Sign in to start building in Notion today. So maybe this is really bringing it together.

Laurel: Oh my God. It was all a fucking notion.

Promotion notion. The notion promotion.

Nichole: Is this where we know that there is general acceptance of polyamory? Is when they start like this meta joke

Laurel: yeah, 'cause it can only really be funny to people who have some conception, albeit probably very misguided conceptions of what polyamory is.

Uhhuh

Uhhuh.

Nichole: Uhhuh.

Sorry. That would be a wild marketing team pitch. Like, Hey guys, we got this idea. Alright, we're gonna put flyers on telephone poles.

What you say? Flyers on telephone poles.

Laurel: Just listen, we haven't done that in 70.

Oh God. Well, can't wait to hear from the Norman Poly fuel.

Daniel: Oh my God. Norman Notion.

Nichole: maybe we're just reaching for a conspiracy at this point.

Laurel: it's really just some asshole 20 year olds in San Francisco.

Daniel: Yeah.

Laurel: Yes.

Daniel: And they think that we are what they are making fun of.

Laurel: Yes.

Daniel: like, I feel a little bit like they're stealing our brand a little bit and just in a way that's completely like facetious, but like we have already taken back the stereotype of the ridiculous fucking molecule.

Right.

Laurel: Too late. Norman.