Review: Tantus Charmer

Kate Sloan

(The Charmer is the pink ripply one! Other dildos pictured: Happy Valley Perk, Tantus Comet, Tantus Raptor, Fun Factory Rainbow Amor, Vixen Leo, Tantus Mark O2, and Tantus Vamp. Um, I have a lot of Tantus toys.)

The Tantus Charmer is tiny, at only 1 1/8" in diameter, and I have a habit of buying unnecessarily small dildos, which is how it ended up in my collection.

However, I’m really pleased with it. It’s like anal beads for my vag.

I know, that sounds weird, given that the vagina’s opening doesn’t widen and narrow around incoming objects like the ass does. But the feeling is still strangely similar.

The Charmer has a series of ridges along its front, which bump up against my G-spot again and again as I slide it in and out. So despite its modest girth, I can really feel it.

Mine is a gorgeous shade of pearl pink. Normally I wouldn’t choose pink over other color options but this particular incarnation of the color is lovely.

I think this would be a great dildo for someone who likes G-spot stimulation but is too tight to use most traditional G-spot toys.

It’s also a fabulous toy for anal play, and would (I imagine) work brilliantly for pegging, since it not only feels wonderful but is also small and non-representational.

The Charmer, though too small to satisfy size queens and kings, is one of the better tiny dildos I’ve impulsively bought.

Best of all, it’s in Tantus’ closeout section, so you can get it for only – wait for it – $20! I am not normally one to use the word “amazeballs” but I feel that it’s an apt word to describe this situation.

4 Ways to Bring a Little More Gay Into Your Life

Kate Sloan

As the Pride festival nears, I’m spending a lot of time pondering my queerness. Specifically, where my queerness fits into my life as a person in a “straight” relationship.

Being bisexual has always been a bit of a struggle for me, identity-wise, because ever since I came out I’ve always hated the idea of being mistaken for straight or gay (both of which have happened to me countless times). I wish people would just “read” me as bi, but it rarely seems to happen.

And now that I’ve been dating a man for over two years, and have a gender presentation that’s as cis and femme as ever, it seems my queerness always gets lost in the shuffle. Even in queer spaces, I don’t always feel understood or seen. I’ve gotten booed for kissing my boyfriend at Pride events, I’ve had people try to explain basic LGBTQ concepts to me as if they’d be totally foreign to my mind, I’ve had people give me stares that say “What are you doing here?” It makes me sad.

Bleeding-heart complaints aside, I know that there are other people who feel the way I do – people whose identity straddles some line(s) between hetero and queer, and who feel skewered on that fence. Here are some suggestions for how you can re-access the gay side of yourself, if you’re feeling like you’ve lost it a little bit.

1. Volunteer for an LGBTQ organization. There is surely one in your area, so get Googlin’! I’m using the word “organization” broadly here – you could do fundraising at your local nonprofit, get in contact with school administrators to see if you can help set up GSAs, join the street team for your city’s Pride festival, or even see if your local LGBT yoga group needs help washing mats. It can be enormously nourishing to meet new people from your community and to do good work for that community. (And baby, if you ain’t got no time, maybe you could give some money instead.)

2. Consume queer media. If you do this already, do it more! Some recommendations: books by S. Bear Bergman and Ivan Coyote, porn by Courtney Trouble and Shine Louise Houston, documentaries about the LGBT community, and The L Word in its entirety.

3. Wear a queer talisman. Granted, plenty of LGBT folks think it’s tacky as hell to wear a rainbow bracelet or gay suspenders or what have you. But, honestly, when I’m going into a situation where I absolutely do not want people to mistake me for straight, sometimes it makes me feel a whole lot better to adorn myself in one or two loud-and-queer accessories. My talisman of choice is usually my rainbow wristband – it goes with every outfit!

4. Re-read old journals/blog posts/love letters from when you had your first same-sex crush. Remember how weird that felt? How scared and yet excited you were? Remember all the concerns these new feelings raised for you – how/when/whether to come out, what label(s) fit you best, what it all meant? Those seminal experiences paved your path into a queer identity and (hopefully) community, so they’re worth revisiting if you’re feeling a little cloudy on those topics.

I know there will inevitably be people who want to tell me something like, “Just be who you are! It doesn’t matter whether people think you’re straight or whether you’ve ‘got enough gay in your life.’ Just live your life.” And they’re right, to a certain extent… but hey, queer folks should know better than anyone that sometimes you gotta engage in some self-care in order to feel okay about how people are reacting to you. And this is some of mine.

Photo credit: Sue Maguire.

Book Review: The Stripper’s Guide to Looking Great Naked

Kate Sloan

I discovered this book in a random way. A few weeks ago, while getting ready for a Body Pride workshop, I suddenly realized I was on my period. Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to sit on a stranger’s floor for hours while completely naked and menstruating, but it seems like risky business. So I opened up Google and started searching to see what other people recommended.

The Stripper’s Guide to Looking Great Naked came up on Google Books, because there’s a small section about periods in it. It told me to wear a tampon with the string shoved inside – which I did, and everything worked out great. Intrigued, I decided to buy and read the rest of the book.

It’s not written by actual strippers, but rather, by women who interviewed hundreds of strippers. I admit I would have found it more interesting if the book was primarily direct quotes from real strippers discussing their real techniques, rather than just a summary of what was gleaned from interviews. But there’s still a lot of valuable stuff in here.

I was reading the book mostly out of a desire to look better while doing casual naked activities – lying in bed, maybe playing Strip Scrabble at parties, that kind of thing – and not so much to learn about how to actually strip. So, I mostly skimmed over the parts about dance moves, choosing songs to get down to, and how to set flattering lighting for your show. But that stuff is in here and many aspiring bedroom dancers would find it useful.

What I really appreciated were the aesthetic tips and tricks: how to choose a flattering hairstyle for your body type, how to achieve a strippertastic “smoky eye,” how to make your boobs look bigger with bronzer, and so on. There were also some quirkier tips, like how to create a makeshift bra out of masking tape and how to do a beauty routine if you’re stuck at your boyfriend’s house with no supplies on hand. This is all good info for any femme lady – though I don’t know if it’s stuff you need to buy this book for. Much of this information can be found in beauty magazines and YouTube tutorials, truth be told.

My boyfriend, who was reading over my shoulder for part of this short book, thought it was funny that the authors recommended massaging coffee grounds into your ass to temporarily reduce cellulite. As for me, I thought it was funny when they recommended using a handheld vibrating massager to get fat deposits moving – with no mention whatsoever of using it to vibrate more interesting areas. Come on, ladies!

So, while The Stripper’s Guide to Looking Great Naked was a fun read, I’m not sure I actually learned much from it that I hadn’t seen in Cosmo or Vogue or maybe even Seventeen. But if you’re thinking about making stripteases a regular part of your life, this would be a good primer.

3 Non-Sexual Things That Made Me Better at Sex

Kate Sloan

I find it simultaneously comforting and awe-inspiring that sex is such a holistic activity. It uses your body (obvi!) as well as your logic, your emotions, and sometimes even your spirit, if you believe in such a thing.

If you think of it that way, you start to realize how much your various life experiences have made you not only a better person but also a better sexual person. Here are some of my recent revelations in that regard…

1. Owning a pet.

No, y’all, this is not about bestiality!

When you own a pet – a pet who you love and touch and spend time with – you have to be attuned to that animal’s moods and responses. If you stroke your cat too lightly, it could tickle her, but if you push down too hard, it could hurt. If you give your dog too many snuggles, he might feel smothered and take off, but if you give him room to breathe, he’ll probably chillax. Get my drift?

Learning how to love your pet is a great way to learn how to walk right up to a sexual partner’s affection/pleasure threshold without crossing any lines that might cause them discomfort or pain. Of course, non-pet-owners can and do learn these skills too, but surely having a pet is more fun!

2. Volunteering at a support hotline.

I may have mentioned that I sometimes work at a phone line where youth can call in with questions about relationships, sex, or whatever’s troubling them. It can be emotionally draining work and I have to keep up with my self-care in order to do it, but in a lot of ways it’s also very fulfilling.

One of the things we learn in our training is a “basic listening sequence,” i.e. a series of active listening techniques. It involves things like asking open-ended questions (“How does that make you feel?”), mirroring emotions (“Sounds like you’re feeling angry”), normalizing (“Yes, a lot of people have that same problem”), and avoiding giving direct advice (“What do you think would happen if you were to try x?”). And guess what? A lot of these techniques translate well to having hard conversations with your sexual partner(s).

I am a firm believer in having occasional check-ins with your lover instead of just letting things always remain the way they are. It’s good to ask, “Are you happy with our sex life?” “Is there anything you’d like me to do differently?” “Is there anything new you’d like to try?” Asking these sorts of questions, and then actively listening to the responses, has taken my sex life to amazing new levels time and time again.

3. Yoga.

Oh, man. Even just typing the word “yoga” makes my body feel all buzzy and calm and blissed out. It is a mega restorative practice for body and mind.

This barely even needs to be explained, but: anything that makes you more aware of your body (how it moves, how it feels, what it is and isn’t capable of) will naturally make you better at sex and more able to enjoy yourself during sexual experiences.

Not to mention, a lot of the slow, methodical, meditative breathing stuff that you learn in yoga classes is sorta similar to the mindful breathing that tantric practitioners preach about.

What non-sexual practices make your sex life better?

Photo credits: YouWall, SelfAssess Listen, Women’s Health.

Sharing the Sexy #23

Kate Sloan

• A quadriplegic man learned to have orgasms with his thumb instead of his penis. Amazing!

• Lelo and We-Vibe are having a legal battle. So sad, ‘cause I love ’em both.

• Queer sex advice for straight ladies! This article is all about breaking down sexual scripts and having sex the way you want to, not the way society dictates. Yes!

• SPIT, a feminist porn collective, is raising money. Go donate and you can get a membership!

• Happy endings for women, hooray!