Sex Toy Reviews

Prostate Play & Protocol: Recommending Men’s Sex Toys

Kate Sloan

I love nerding out about D/s with my boyfriend, and one way we do that is by experimenting with protocols together.

I’ve told you before about protocols: recurring action-based rules you can negotiate and establish in a kink dynamic. They’re usually structured as “When x, then y.” Some my partner and I have established in our relationship include: “When little one takes her daily iron supplement, she’ll text Sir and he’ll send her a selfie as a reward.” “When little one gets a drink other than water while she and Sir are out together, Sir gets the first taste.” “When ordered to wear her collar, little one must continue wearing it until she completes any assigned tasks or work and receives permission to remove it.”

A few months ago, while pondering the truism that protocol should ideally enhance and enrich both partners’ lives, my Sir had an idea for a new one. Seeking to harness my sex toy knowledge for his benefit, he assigned me the task of coming up with one toy recommendation for him each month. I’m allowed to gather intel by asking him questions (e.g. “What kinds of toys do you feel are missing from your collection?” “What’s the biggest toy you’ve taken anally, and did you like it?” “Can you have prostate orgasms without external stimulation?”) and then I have to write 500-700 words about the toy I’ve chosen that month, why I chose it, and how I foresee us using it together. He doesn’t have to buy the toy I recommend, but if I make a good case for it, he usually does.

This protocol helps my partner expand his sex toy collection and therefore his pleasure possibilities, and it also helps me feel useful. I’ve loved recommending men’s sex toys in past relationships, because it felt like I was serving my partner by concretely improving his life – so it feels good that this recommendation process is actually structured into my current relationship. I love being of use to my Sir!

So far, I’ve written four of these recs – always due on the 5th of the month, a date we chose together because it doesn’t typically conflict with other writing deadlines of mine. I’ve suggested two anal toys (one vibrating and one not), one stroker, and one vibrator for penises. His two favorites thus far have been the Njoy Pfun and the Hot Octopuss Pulse Solo III (both pictured). In fact, he loves the Pfun so much that he told me he thinks one should be issued for free to everyone who has a prostate!

One of my favorite things about this protocol is that I always submit my recommendation via Google Docs and my partner makes edits, notes, and suggestions using the interface’s built-in editing tools. I’ve always been a teacher’s pet, and I have definite kink feelings about receiving feedback and a grade on my writing (when I’ve consented to that type of scrutiny!). For example, it made me feel smart and accomplished when he complimented me for researching the width allowances of a particular Fleshlight on the /r/BigDickProblems subreddit to make sure it would fit my Sir’s cock. And when I recommended a butt plug because he’d mentioned to me that he didn’t own any, he commented, “I love how closely you listen and pay attention, little one.” Swoon.

Another fave thing about this protocol: getting to use the toys with him. I mean, duh. It’s always fun to use sex toys with someone you’re super into, but doubly so when you picked the toy yourself, for this specific person, for well-researched reasons, and they trusted you enough to buy it on your endorsement alone. Good D/s is all about trust, and I feel that even moreso than usual when I’m blowing my Sir while fucking him with a prostate toy I chose for his particular ass.

I have a lot of romantic feelings about the whole idea of making recommendations. I think, when done well, they’re a way to show your partner (or friend, or family member) you really know them. In the past, I’ve dated game developers who could sleuth out the perfect iPhone game for my particular tastes, music nerds who made me mix CDs of new-to-me gems I instantly loved, and comedy geeks who could say with full confidence, “You’d love this longform improv troupe,” and be right. Knowing someone that well is a talent, and being known that well is a gift. So I’m happy to have yet another way to demonstrate to my partner how much I adore him and want to make him happy!

What about you? Got any cool protocols you’ve been trying out lately? What’s the last sex toy you recommended to someone or had recommended to you? How did that go?

 

Heads up: this post was sponsored. As always, all writing and opinions are my own!

My Favorite Sex Toys For Phone Sex

Kate Sloan

It’s funny how you can be a sex writer for 6+ years and still have so much to learn about so many areas of sex. It’s part of what drew me to this career in the first place: the sense of sexuality as a limitless space, stretching outward forever in all directions, ready to be explored.

One such untapped area for me, until recently, was phone sex. I never knew how much I could enjoy it until I started dating an eloquent, golden-voiced boy… who lives 500 miles away from me. Turns out that when the right conditions are in place, wow, I really like phone sex!

Over time, my partner and I have developed our own phone-sex patterns, rhythms, and techniques. It’s like having a palette of paint colors: you tend to lean hard on your favorites, but there are always other options to experiment with.

Today I’m particularly thinking about the ways we incorporate sex toys into our phone sex. Before I started dating this boy, I never gave much thought to how particular toys sounded, or how they made me sound. But after just a few weeks of frequent phone sex with this brilliant nerd, he started requesting (or demanding) certain toys. Sometimes I’d ask him, “Why that one?” and usually his answer would be, “I like how it makes you sound.” Um, let’s just say that this level of specificity really jives well with my “you knowing exactly how to get me off” kink…

Here are some of our fave toys for phone sex, and why they work so well in that context…

The Magic Wand Rechargeable is an unshakeable classic, a constant companion. When my partner teases me for a long time, not letting me touch my clit at all, it’s often the Magic Wand I eventually beg for. Its four speeds just jive with what my body craves at different levels of arousal, and it can always, always get me off.

One thing I treasure about the Magic Wand is that its simplicity and reliability allow me to take my focus off my clit and concentrate on other things: my partner’s voice, the dildo in my cunt, the plug in my ass, whatever. I need clit stimulation to get off but I don’t always want it to be my main focus, particularly if I’m trying to fantasize about, say, getting fucked or sucking cock or taking a spanking. It may seem weird to describe a vibe as big and bulky as the Magic Wand as unobtrusive, but somehow, it is, and that’s why I like it.

Sir says: “The Magic Wand sounds really, really good over the phone. Something about the frequencies of that vibrator make it audible even when it’s far away from the handset. The different speeds are audible too – when you turn it up, it’s obvious to me, and that’s nice. I usually choose it for you because it’s one of your faves so it’s always charged and it’s usually nearby, which is convenient. And it makes you come really hard.”

The Njoy Pure Wand is the most intensely targeted G-spot toy I’ve ever tried. There is simply nothing else like it. So I can only assume the sounds that come out of my mouth when I use it are also not quite like my sounds with any other toy.

See, G-spot sensations aren’t always my favorite. Unlike floaty clitoral pleasure or deep, rhythmic A-spot stimulation, the feeling of my G-spot being touched can be almost uncomfortably intense for me. It can knock the breath out of me, overwhelming me, overriding my control of my own body. But of course, my boyfriend is a dominant-leaning sadist, so sometimes that’s exactly what he wants. And I always take what he gives me, because I’m a very, very good girl.

Sir says: “Sometimes I’m thinking about your body, and I’m thinking about what parts of you I want to stimulate, and sometimes, just based on your voice and which parts of you I’ve stimulated recently and what I know about you, I decide that it’s a G-spotty day, even though you’re an A-spotty girl and typically you want that deep thrusting. Sometimes I want a G-spotty toy for you but I don’t want a big challenge, a big thick guy; I want something that’ll slip into you easily and really G-spot it up. So that’s the Pure Wand. It’s also really pretty, and versatile, and easy to handle, and it makes you make good high moany sounds.”

The VixSkin Mustang is one of the most realistic toys in my collection. When I put it in my mouth, my salivary glands kick into gear like there’s a real dick in their midst. My tongue and lips adore this toy when I’m feelin’ like a beej queen, and when it hits the back of my throat, I get all subspacey just like I do when a partner face-fucks me.

Used in more traditional ways (i.e. in my vag), this is also a highly effective dildo: satisfyingly G-spotty and pleasantly squishy. But it’s not quite as big as I tend to prefer these days, so I’ll often switch to something girthier if I intend to get off that way.

Sir says: “I choose this one when I miss you a lot. The Mustang – or any realistic dildo, really – is for when I miss you so blindingly much that I want my literal cock inside you, in any of your holes, immediately, and I can’t have that, so a realistic dildo is the closest I can get to that. I also like watching you blow it on video; it’s very very good. I can get into a BJ-receiving headspace watching that very easily, which is very fucking good. It’s dual-density and I like the way you sound when you squeeze your cunt muscles on that toy specifically. It’s like a Casper mattress, you know? Just the right sink, just the right bounce. I can hear a little bit of springiness in the squeeze – I know you so well that I know what it sounds like when you contract your muscles and when you release them, and with the Mustang, there’s a little something extra on the release that’s very enjoyable to hear.”

You can’t write about long-distance sexytimes without mentioning the We-Vibe Sync, or another toy that uses We-Vibe’s proprietary We-Connect app. I always feel like I am truly Living In The Future when a partner controls my vibrator from a whole other country. The app even has built-in text and voice chat features, so it can be your one-stop shop for interactive telecommunicative pleasure.

There is nothing quite like tapping a button on your phone screen and hearing your partner moan or yelp in response, hundreds of miles away. Oh, technology, you astonishing minx.

Sir says: “We haven’t used this one recently or very much, but we should, ’cause it’s really fun! I liked hearing you while I was diddling with the app on my phone, and it stayed connected pretty much the whole time; it was reliable. It’s cool that you can control the two different motors individually. I like that a lot; it gives me some control feelings. I don’t know if it’s enough to get you off by itself; I think it’s a better appetizer than it is an entrée. An aperitif, if you will.”

The Aneros Helix Syn isn’t the exact model of Aneros my partner owns, but the differences between models are pretty subtle. I like listening to him getting off any which way, but his sounds undeniably shift into high gear when there’s a prostate toy involved.

It makes me flash back to times I’ve blown him while working a toy back and forth against his prostate, bringing forth these intensely satisfying moans and shouts. *romantic sigh*

Sir says: “This type of toy, depending on my mood and our dynamic, makes me either super subby or super dommy. It pushes me toward one end of the power spectrum, which is weird. I don’t exactly know why. It either makes me feel like you are fucking me and taking control and I just wanna be a subby good boy and take it and be good and come when you tell me to, or it’s like I’m so powerful and sexual that I can be getting fucked and fucking you at the same time and I’ll just take what I want and as much as I want. So I think I can interpret it either of those ways as a switch, I guess.”

What toys do you like using when you have phone sex? What makes them ideal for that purpose?

 

This post was sponsored by the lovely folks at Friction! They’re one of the companies helping me get to the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit this year. Check out their excellent selection of high-quality sex toys!

Why Everyone Should Own Lube

Kate Sloan

There are very few immutable truths when it comes to sex. Here are a few I think are important: No matter how weird you think your sexual tastes are, there are people out there who are into the same things as you. Informed, ongoing consent is mandatory for any activity. And lube makes everything better.

It seems to me that most queer and trans folks and vagina-having folks are aware of this fact, but a worryingly high percentage of straight cis men are not. That’s largely because the quintessential “straight” sex act – peen-in-vag intercourse – is often depicted in our culture as “not requiring” lube, even though, as with most sex acts, it can be substantially improved by throwing some lube into the mix.

There’s a common cultural narrative that you won’t need lube if you’re aroused “enough,” but of course, that’s bullshit. As sex-positive writers and thinkers like Sarah Jane and JoEllen Notte have pointed out, high arousal doesn’t always lead to high lubrication. It can depend on your body, where you are in your hormonal cycle, medications you’re on, and various other factors. There is no shame in needing or wanting to use lube! In fact, I think just about everyone’s sex life would be improved with the addition of lube if they’re not already using it (and more lube, if they are).

Have I convinced you yet? If so, here are some of my favorite lubes for various fun activities…

For PIV: Good ol’ vaginal intercourse, I find, pairs well with a vag-friendly water-based lube like Blossom Organics. Water-based lubes are ill-suited to predominantly external activities like handjobs, because your body absorbs the water after a few minutes and so you gotta keep reapplying – but since the vagina is self-lubricating for many of us, I find a little water-based lube is often enough to get me started, and then my vag supplies the rest of the moisture I need as I get more and more turned on. I like this one in particular because it’s designed to minimize vaginal irritation (no glycerin or propylene glycol here!) and its taste and smell are inoffensive (a surprisingly difficult quality to find in lubes). Plus it just looks cute on my nightstand.

For butt stuff: I’m ride-or-die for Sliquid Sassy; it’s a known fact. Recently I told my boyfriend I like lots of different lubes and he clarified, “But you’re a Sassy girl at heart,” because he knows me. Sassy is a water-based lube with a thicker consistency than most, so it’s longer-lasting than your average water-based lube and tends to more-or-less stay where you put it instead of dripping all over the place. This makes it a pleasant choice for lubin’ up anything that’s gonna go in your butt, though I use Sassy vaginally a lot too. I appreciate that this lube has only five ingredients and is effectively odorless and tasteless: sometimes you just want a lube that works well without adding any bells or whistles to the experience.

For oral sex: Sliquid Swirl is one of the only actually good-tasting flavored lubes I’ve ever tried – and, crucially, unlike almost every flavored lube on the market, it’s glycerin-free. It comes in lots of different flavors and all the ones I’ve tried have been at least passably tasty, if not outright delicious. Some people find flavored lubes confusing as a concept; I’d invite them to remember that we all get a case of dry mouth from time to time, so sometimes you need a little help with lubrication while going down on your sweetheart. Flavored lube can also just be a silly novelty, for when you want to mix things up – ’cause sex is supposed to be fun!

For handjobs: Whether you’re strokin’ a dick or a vulva, I would heartily recommend The Butters. It’s a smooth, whipped lube made of natural ingredients like aloe vera gel, apple cider vinegar, shea butter, coconut oil, and grapeseed oil. It’s long-lasting and its texture feels divine on the skin. As a bonus, its taste isn’t objectionable at all (to me, anyway), so you can transition from hand stuff to mouth stuff without much trouble. And your skin will feel moisturized as hell afterward!

What are your favorite lubes? Which uses are they best suited for?

 

This post was sponsored by Peepshow Toys, who are generously helping me get to the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Summit this August! Check out their fine selection of lubricants. As always, all writing and opinions in this post are my own.

Review: Cowgirl

Kate Sloan

What kind of person would spend $2,000 on a sex toy?

I kept wondering this whenever I would read about the new rideable vibrator from Alicia Sinclair (of b-Vibe and Le Wand fame), the Cowgirl. I just couldn’t figure out what would motivate someone to drop that much money on a sex toy. A friend of mine once spent $956 on a Venus for Men, but that’s a basically automated, hands-free blowjob-in-a-box. I would consider buying a toy that pricey if it would essentially give me effortless orgasms, too, if I could afford it.

But there is nothing effortless about the Cowgirl.

Based loosely on the infamous Sybian, the Cowgirl is a vibrator roughly the size of an ottoman. It’s heavy as fuck – 28 pounds out of the box – so I had to get my mom and brother to help me transport it from my parents’ house (where I had it shipped) to my apartment across town. Fortunately for me, my family is chill as hell.

The Cowgirl is marketed as essentially a slicker, more luxurious update to the Sybian. Alicia Sinclair has a habit of doing this: she previously called her Le Wand “a refined classic wand massager with upgraded features and gorgeous design,” despite it being a buzzier, louder, reskinned Magic Wand Rechargeable. I will admit, however, that the Cowgirl does indeed have some advantages over the Sybian. It’s covered in soft, luxe leather, making it more comfortable and more aesthetically pleasing than its predecessor. It has handles, making it more portable than the Sybian (well, as portable as a 28-pound, 16.7” by 13.4” by 10.9” sex toy is ever gonna be, anyway). It has fewer attachment options available – just two, an external one and an insertable one, versus the 17+ different attachments Sybian currently offers – but the all-black attachments are more aesthetically harmonious than the Sybian’s, and are also made of 100% silicone, a claim which only a few Sybian attachments can make.

I’ve only tried a Sybian once – three years ago, at my friend Epiphora‘s house, while eating pizza and watching Fifty Shades of Grey with a bunch of sex bloggers – so I can’t give you an in-depth comparison of the two, sensation-wise. However, I seem to remember the Sybian being buzzier (i.e. possessing higher-pitched vibrations) than the Cowgirl. Both are embarrassingly loud, especially at the higher speeds. Both create what I can only describe as weird intestinal feelings as I get into the higher settings – not exactly a sexy sensation for me.

The Cowgirl is a few inches bigger than the Sybian in all dimensions, which would, I suppose, make it more comfortable to sit on for certain kinds of bodies. However, for mine, it’s definitely less comfortable. I have a hip condition which makes it painful for me to spread my legs wide, especially if I’m putting weight on my knees at the same time. My knees themselves also have some mobility and chronic pain issues; keeping them bent for long periods can be agonizing. So, as you might imagine, rideable vibrators aren’t exactly my favorite thing. The Cowgirl requires my legs to splay wider than the Sybian does, so it gets painful more quickly for me. There’s been many a Cowgirl testing session when I’ve climbed off the toy only to collapse in pain, needing to stretch out my hips and knees for long minutes before I’d feel normal again. What could be a sexy foreplay toy or even the “main event” for some people is so physically debilitating to me that I usually can’t do much of anything after using it.

Theoretically, if you, too, have trouble with the straddling position, you could lie on your back and tilt the toy toward you, like the Sybian FAQ recommends doing. But the Cowgirl is bigger and heavier than the Sybian so this is trickier to manage.

In addition to its corded remote control (which is blessedly easy to use and plays nicely into my vibrator-as-hysteria-treatment fantasies with its vaguely clinical aesthetic), the Cowgirl can also be controlled either locally via the company’s own Bluetooth app, or long-distance via a different app. (Consolidating these two would’ve been way better…) The app setup is so complicated and labor-intensive, however, that even my app-developer boyfriend was like, “Nah, fuck this.” My kingdom for a We-Vibe-esque plug-and-play ease of use.

Besides its bulkiness, heaviness, unreasonable noise level, unreasonable price, and overcomplicated setup, my other main grievance with the Cowgirl is its name. It’s 2018; there is no longer any excuse for making a toy for people with vulvas and telling consumers (even implicitly) that it’s only for women. When companies do this, they alienate potential customers who have vulvas but are not women, they alienate women who don’t have vulvas, and they proudly show off how behind-the-times they are in their understanding of gender. I brought this up with a PR rep for the toy and she told me, “I’ve definitely been thinking about gendered branding… and I’m sure it’s a conversation we’re going to continue to have here,” which is nice, I guess, but feels pretty empty. We shouldn’t need to point these things out to companies at this point; they should know these things by now.

Is there anything I like about the Cowgirl? I guess. It’s pretty to look at (depending on your tastes), relatively easy to use once you’ve got it set up, and has vibrations strong and rumbly enough that they can probably get you off, if you can comfortably maintain the position the toy demands of you. I might be able to recommend it if it was less shockingly loud, or more comfortable to use, or less prohibitively expensive, but alas, it isn’t. I asked my boyfriend – with whom I’ve tested this toy a few times – what he likes about the Cowgirl, if anything, and he replied, “I like that it’s black, and I like dials.” Not exactly a rave.

If you have $2,000 to drop on a sex toy (?!) and want one that’s sure to impress and confuse, maybe you need a Cowgirl. But maybe, instead, you just need a Magic Wand Rechargeable, a Stronic Eins, and an uncomfortable chair to sit on. The net effect would be about the same.

 

Thanks to SheVibe for letting me try the Cowgirl!

Mini Reviews: We-Vibe Gala, FemmeFunn Ultra Bullet, & Sensuelle Point

Kate Sloan

My “toys to review” pile runneth over at the moment, so I thought I’d bunch a few together… Here are 3 clitoral vibes I have some Opinions about!

We-Vibe Gala (available at SheVibe)

We-Vibe sent me this at my request, because, from the moment I saw it, I desperately wanted it on my clit. It has a two-pronged, bunny-ears-esque shape reminiscent of the Jimmyjane Form 2, which I liked, as a person with a very sensitive clit that can’t handle direct stimulation most of the time. Having the option to surround my clit with vibration, rather than attack it head-on, always piques my interest.

I will say, it’s weird that the famously litigious We-Vibe blatantly ripped off a toy design from Jimmyjane. You would think they’d have picked up some anti-plagiarism scruples at some point while they were suing other companies for stealing their innovative couples’ toy design. But I digress…

I like the Gala’s motor better than the Form 2’s; it’s rumblier and stronger, but not by much. We-Vibe didn’t use their mind-blowing Tango motor in this toy, as far as I can tell, and that seems like a mistake: the sides and shaft of my clit appreciate rumbly vibration even more than the head does. I can get off with this vibe, but it takes a while, and I always reach a point where I’m like, “Seriously? I’m at the highest setting already?”

On the plus side, this vibe optionally pairs with the We-Connect app, so you can control and customize the vibrations more precisely than the toy’s buttons allow for. You can even use the app to create a mode much like my favorite setting on the Form 2, where the vibrations flicked back and forth quickly between the vibe’s two ears, feeling a little like a skilled lover’s tongue. Neat!

Unfortunately, it’s hard for me to take advantage of the Gala’s unique shape because the space between the ears is just slightly too small for my (average-sized) clit, especially as I get more turned on. I was explaining this problem to my boyfriend and said, “I can get it in there if I really kind of, like…” and he supplied, “Jam it in there?” which is exactly the right phrasing. I should not have to jam my genitals into a toy to make it work. It’s not painful, exactly – just slightly uncomfortable and annoying – but that’s enough to put me off using this toy most of the time. This could’ve been fixed by making the space between the ears slightly bigger or by making the ears more flexible. Better luck next time, We-Vibe.

FemmeFunn Ultra Bullet (available at Spectrum Boutique)

I tried this for the first time while on the phone with my boyfriend, and after listening to me using the FemmeFunn bullet and the Sensuelle Point bullet (see below), he correctly observed that I definitely prefer the FemmeFunn. (Dating attentive nerds is fun, y’all.)

I requested this vibe from Spectrum Boutique because my friend Bex had often mentioned it was a surprisingly strong and rumbly bullet for its price point. It’s half the price of the Tango and more-or-less matches it in strength and rumbliness, amazingly. Plus it’s cute as hell: I can’t resist anything turquoise and pink, try as I might.

I don’t like the way it charges: you have to jab the pointy end of a cable through a hole on the base of the toy and blindly hope you’re doing it right and aren’t breaking the toy. Can we do away with toys that charge this way, please, now that it’s 2018 and we have better technologies available to us?

This bullet’s slight flexibility makes it comfortable to use internally, if you don’t mind your penetrative objects being small. However, because the toy bends so easily, it’s also hard to put pressure on my clit with it, so if you like to press vibes into yourself, this might not be the best choice.

I still lean toward my Tango because the FemmeFunn’s squishy silicone makes it conduct vibration slightly less well than the Tango’s hard plastic, and because it’s much more annoying to scroll through the FemmeFunn’s 20 (!) settings than the Tango’s 8. But for its price and its size, this is a remarkably powerful and pleasurable vibe, and definitely my fave of the three highlighted in this post.

Sensuelle Point (available at Spectrum Boutique)

This is resoundingly my least favorite of the bunch, which surprised me, as I’d heard good things about it. It’s a simple, larger-than-standard-size bullet vibe, along the lines of the Tango or the VeDO Bam. However, it’s buzzier than either of those, slightly desensitizing both my clit and my hand after just a couple minutes.

The Point has 20 different speeds and patterns, but they don’t vary much in intensity, so I can’t get the boost in power I need once I’m getting close to orgasm. This toy feels too intense when I begin using it and not intense enough once I’ve been using it for a few minutes. Bummer.

That said, it’s a solidly constructed rechargeable at a reasonable price point ($55) and is made of smooth, luxurious, matte silicone that’s easy to clean. I’d still overall recommend you grab the cheaper-and-better FemmeFunn bullet instead, though, or spend a little more and get a Tango.

Thanks to We-Vibe and Spectrum Boutique for sending me these products to review!