improv

Behind the Seams: What Does a Queer Femme Wear to Improv Classes & Shows?

Kate Sloan

Over the past 5 months or so, I’ve been getting back into improv, for the first time since high school. (I’m 32, so high school was a while ago now!)

Yep – after literal years of saying I wanted to do so, I’m taking improv classes again. Specifically, musical improv. Making up songs, live on stage, in front of people. Yes, it is as terrifying as it sounds!! And yet it also feels like exactly what I need right now: a place where I go every week to have fun, try stuff out, play. (And it sure helps that my teachers and fellow classmates have been incredible, too.)

I knew I found the improv part intimidating, but until my first day of class, I didn’t realize quite how intimidating a task it was to get dressed for improv. A lot of my super-weirdo queer-femme wardrobe just isn’t suitable for it at all, for reasons I’ll get into this post, as I tell you my 4 rules for improv-wear, which I’ve learned from coaches, teachers, and plain ol’ experience over the years.

For example, the image above is a good demonstration of Rule #1: Solid colors are best.

Have you ever been to a show where one of the performers was wearing an undeniably distinctive shirt – maybe it featured a band’s name, a rude slogan, or a cartoon animal – and you found yourself unable to fully focus on anything else, because the shirt was so distracting? Yeah, that’s really not ideal for improv. You want the audience focused on what you’re saying (or singing!), not what you’re wearing. Even your fellow improvisors can get distracted by what you’re wearing, and it can influence the scenes you end up doing – so to avoid all that, I try to wear clothes with no visible logos/slogans or wild patterns. Just basic solid colors. (Even if they happen to be hot pink.)

What I’m wearing:

• Pink knit hat – Only
• Blue cashmere cardigan – Gap
• Pink modal tank top – Old Navy
• Jeans – Everlane (they will appear again in this post, because, as mentioned, I am a femme and don’t own very many pairs of pants, period 😂)
• Pink leather Doc Martens
• Little pink leather bag – Coach (gift from my wife)

I took this latest round of classes during a bitterly cold Canadian winter, so I became extra aware of the importance of Rule #2: Dress comfortably.

In improv, you’re making split-second decisions based on the most fleeting of impulses. Losing your train of thought mid-sentence (or mid-song) makes you look bad, makes your scene partners look bad, and makes the audience doubt you as a performer – so you gotta wear clothes that aren’t going to distract you in any way.

That means: Nothing itchy, nothing too restrictive, no dangly earrings, nothing where straps might fall down or buttons might burst open, nothing that you think you look bad in… and nothing that fucks with your body temperature to a distracting degree. In my case, we were practicing and performing in spaces that were kept pretty cold – so I wore a sweater and a beanie to class practically every single week, because it sucks to try to sing when your teeth are chattering!

What I’m wearing:

• Green knit beanie – Only
• Blue cashmere sweater – J. Crew
• Jeans – Everlane
• Black leather Doc Martens

Here’s what I wore to my showcase show for the beginner musical improv class, back in December. I was so nervous I thought I might collapse on stage!! (I didn’t.) But you know what I wasn’t nervous about? Slipping and falling. And that’s because I followed Rule #3: Wear footwear you can be agile in.

Don’t get me wrong; there are femme improvisors out there who perform in heels. I’ve seen some of them do it, and I admire the fuck out of their otherworldly tenacity. But for the rest of us mere mortals, if we’re gonna be scramblin’ around the stage, we need to wear shoes made for scramblin’.

You’ll notice, for instance, that in all of these photos, I am wearing either Doc Martens or Converse sneakers. They have grippy bottoms (ooh, great name for a gay bar if you need one!) so I know I won’t slide around on stage. They’re also comfortable enough that I can stand in them for at least a couple of hours without my feet hurting too badly.

What I’m wearing:

• White T-shirt – gift
• Black dress – from when I dressed as Bettie Page for Halloween a few years ago
• Black leggings – H&M
• Black leather Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers
• Apple Watch w/ Hermès band

These pictures are more recent and are from my latest showcase, with the advanced class. (I sang about murderous mountains and the very last pizza, among other things.) The smiley one was taken on stage, right before my first-ever solo musically improvised song. I wasn’t even nervous! Wild stuff! Improv classes are magic!

As I got dressed for this show, I thought about a time when my high school improv coach told us we weren’t allowed to wear skirts or dresses. One of the other queer femmes on the team (there were a lot of us) piped up: “Why not?” Our coach shook his head slowly and said, “I’ve seen some shit.”

No doubt he had. Improv can take you to some weird places, and I’ve definitely seen the occasional errant buttcrack or panty-flash in certain physically active scenes, which is why I believe staunchly in Rule #4: Protect against wardrobe malfunctions.

This is a sex-positive blog, so let me be clear that I have no issue with nudity, or with bodies themselves – if you’re doing an improv set at a swingers’ club or on a nude beach, by all means, wear clothing that will spill off of you at the slightest provocation, or none at all! But most improvisors will want to avoid these sorts of slippages; they are potentially embarrassing, could make the audience feel weird, and are (at the very least) distracting as hell for audience and performers alike. It’s for this reason that I never wear just a dress or skirt to an improv class or show – in this case I wore leggings and a long-sleeved shirt under my dress, and in the summertime I might instead wear a plain bralette and some bike shorts underneath. I really don’t want to be thinking about my tits when I’m improvising, thanks.

What I’m wearing:

• Black long-sleeved shirt – gift from my mama
• Blue floral-print wrap dress – Tommy Bahama; gift from my spouse (originally purchased to wear to her birthday party last December)
• Black leggings – American Eagle
• Black leather Doc Martens
• Yellow bag – Kate Spade

Any other improv people wanna weigh in on femme-improvisor attire in the comments? I’m considering getting a pair of denim overalls next…

12 Days of Girly Juice 2022: 4 Fun Events

Kate Sloan
A staircase at the Lovehoney media dinner

As with any pandemic-burdened year, I didn’t get to go to as many events in 2022 as I would’ve preferred… but that meant that the ones I did go to were all the more special, because I was much more selective about events I considered worth attending. Here are 4 of the most memorable and remarkable events I went to this year.

 

Raaaatscraps

Once upon a time, there was an improv show called ASSSSCAT. It began in the 1990s and featured an all-star team of improvisors, including Amy Poehler (pre-SNL fame). The format was simple: a guest monologist, usually a professionally funny person like a TV writer or a character actor, tells an off-the-cuff, true story from their life inspired by an audience suggestion, and then a cast of improvisors does a longform improv set based on that story. This continued for over 20 years; the cast and crew shifted over time, but the core of the show – and its rabid audience – stayed consistent.

When the theatre at which ASSSSCAT was performed, the UCB NYC, had to shut down during the pandemic, the cast wasn’t ready to say goodbye. And so Raaaatscraps was born: the spiritual sequel to ASSSSCAT, transported to a different venue (Caveat, a cabaret/comedy theatre in the East Village) and performed every Sunday night.

My now-spouse took me to an ASSSSCAT show on our 2nd date, way back in January 2018, and it was one of the many things that made me fall in love with them. I’d grown up watching and doing a lot of improv, and still to this day it’s one of my favorite art forms; it fascinates me and informs my worldview and even my spirituality. So it felt refreshing and affirming to have a partner who understood that on a deep level and felt that way about it too.

Ever since Raaaatscraps started up, I’ve gone in-person whenever possible, but mostly have watched it via livestream every week, since I’m not usually in New York. It’s cute to see my spouse sitting in the front row while I’m watching from my apartment in Toronto, especially when we laugh at all the same jokes! The rotating cast is wildly talented and their improv is frequently incisive, absurdist, thought-provoking – and always hilarious. Some people go to church on Sundays; I go to Raaaatscraps, and I’m a better person for it. I don’t know how else to describe it except that you should watch it!

 

Jes Tom + Tessa Skara Present: Corporate Pride

Pandemic notwithstanding, it’s been several years since I had the energy and inclination to actually attend Pride events. They used to be a vital annual way that I reconnected with my local queer community as a whole and felt a sense of belonging that everyday life didn’t always allow for – but somehow that fell by the wayside, maybe after I fainted from overheating in a throng of people in the gayborhood one year, or maybe after I kept running into exes and then literally running away from them, who knows.

Anyway, it was healing and lovely to attend an actual Pride event this year, albeit not an “official” one. This comedy show’s bill was packed full of queer and trans comedians, telling jokes, performing songs, improvising and dancing. My partner and I sat in the front row and roared with laughter all night long, discovering many new fave performers along the way. We had fake cash shot at us from a money gun, applauded one performer as they announced their new-ish pronouns, laughed and cried and celebrated. It was exactly the queer communion I needed.

 

Into the Woods on Broadway

Into the Woods has been my favorite musical since I was a kid, when my mom or my aunt (not sure which) showed me a fuzzy pro-shot VHS of the original cast performing the show. Over the years, I’ve seen it wherever I could, and have always found it interesting to see how different theatre companies handle it. It’s a story that intertwines several classic fairy tales – Jack & the Beanstalk, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, etc. – and like those tales, Into the Woods itself can be interpreted and reinterpreted in countless different ways.

My partner was able to score us a couple of tickets for the current Broadway production, and I loved it. Of particular note to me was Gavin Creel as Cinderella’s Prince (he is hilarious), Cole Thompson as Jack (incredibly moving), and Kennedy Kanagawa puppeteering Jack’s cow, Milky White, in a way that felt mournful and touching. It’s wild to see a show you know like the back of your hand, presented in a way that feels both classic and respectful to the text, and new and fresh, all at the same time.

It was also very emotional for me to see a Stephen Sondheim show relatively soon after his death in November 2021. He was one of the great geniuses of our time and I’m so glad I got to live at the same time as him for a while, as cheesy as that may sound.

 

Lovehoney media dinner

I’ve been invited to a lot of press events in my time and many of them have been somewhat uninspired, if nonetheless luxurious: an open bar, a goodie bag, a brief talk from the company’s education rep, and that’s it. But the Lovehoney press dinner I was invited to in October was quite different.

In addition to letting us take whatever products we wanted from their current lineup and providing education about those products, the company had also put together a menu of custom cocktails, served oysters on ice, and – most incredibly of all – hired the chef and team at Patois to serve us an 8-course meal inspired by sexuality and sensuality. The whole affair made me feel very fancy and respected as a journalist, and I also got to chat with lots of fascinating folks from my industry, something I don’t often get a chance to do.

I went home in an Uber paid for by the company, carrying a huge bag of sex toys and a takeout box of beef brisket, rice and peas cooked in delicious spices. There are times when my job feels grueling and thankless – like when I’m hunched over a Google Doc, enumerating the virtues of clitoral vibrators for the 8th time that week – but then I’m invited to events like this, and I remember how glamorous my line of work actually is, and how grateful I feel to be in it.

 

What were your favorite events – online or off – that you attended this year?

12 Days of Girly Juice 2020: 4 Fun Events

Kate Sloan
Wow. Remember crowds?

While plotting this blog series, I considered swapping out this list of my fave events of the year for something more… timely. After all, as far as in-person events go, we’ve seen better years, to say the least. But as far as virtual events go? This was very probably the best year on record.

So here are the 4 events that stuck out most in my mind this year – some in-person, some virtual. I’m immensely grateful to everyone involved in making each of these happen, because this year needed a whole lot of brightening and they managed to brighten it.

(I’m not going to write about my wedding here, by the way… not because it wasn’t one of my favorite events of the year, but because that feels like a cop-out!)

Get On Your Knees

How could I have known what comedian Jacqueline Novak‘s one-woman show Get On Your Knees would be like? All I knew about it was that she was funny and well-reviewed, and that the show was about blowjobs. There are so many different ways a person can talk about blowjobs – I should know – so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

What ensued was a meandering and deeply personal show-long monologue about Jacqueline’s formative fellatio experiences. Her fears, her insecurities, her failures – and also her triumphs, her joys, her successes. She stalked around the stage, mic in hand, ranting about scrotal skin, vulva shame, and the inability to turn off her racing thoughts while giving head. Each and every observation felt fresh, relatable, and outrageously funny.

Part of the reason I do what I do here at Girly Juice is that women have traditionally been discouraged from talking openly about their sex lives – especially if they enjoy sex, especially if they’re critical of the men they have sex with, and especially if the types of sex they prefer to have are considered non-standard. To see a successful female comedian speaking frankly about sex on stage – in a manner both vulnerable and hilarious – reinvigorated my courage and drive to do what I do. I’m so happy Jacqueline’s show got the critical acclaim it deserved, and I know she’s changed the comedy landscape for the better.

The Beaches & Goodbye Honolulu at the Danforth Music Hall

Remember February? Ahh, ignorance was truly bliss.

On February 28th, I flew home from a weeks-long stretch in New York. The reason I’d picked that day was that on February 29th, I had a ticket to go see my brother’s band open for the Beaches. All I knew about the Beaches, going into this show, was that Max’s band had toured with them before, knew them pretty well, and respected them a lot. I knew they were an all-girl group, and some internalized misogyny led me to assume that they wouldn’t rock as hard as Goodbye Honolulu does. Well, I was very wrong.

Sitting in the cushy balcony of the legendary Danforth Music Hall with my parents, I had a quasi-religious experience at that show. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, at least not for the bands; they played their guitars and drums and basses, sang and screamed into their mics, strutted around the stage in hot outfits. But it had been a while since I’d been to a proper rock show, and I felt high even though the only “substance” I’d consumed was a beer from the bar downstairs. I was completely captivated by these bands – first the boys, and then the girls – their talent, their drive, their intensity.

Afterward, I walked out onto the snowy street, dazed and cleansed. I didn’t know, at the time, that this would be the last music show I’d go to in-person for a very long while. But knowing what I know now, I couldn’t have picked a better last hurrah before lockdown.

Abolish Police in Canada teach-in

It had been a few years since I’d been to a political rally, so attending an No Pride in Policing teach-in/rally at Nathan Phillips Square in late June was powerful.

Black and Indigenous activists spoke, read poetry, sang, and played music – some from afar via Zoom, some right in front of us – about the harm police have caused to their communities, and the structural changes that need to be made. Matt and I sat on the pavement, surrounded by hundreds of other (mostly masked and socially-distanced) rapt onlookers, and listened, clapped, and cheered.

The opposition to the event, while expected, was still disheartening. Police on bikes swarmed the perimeter; racist anti-maskers sprayed droplets with their enraged screams. But people attending the event, either as performers or onlookers, dealt with these threats in peaceful and purposeful ways, usually just blocking the opposition’s path to the stage so they couldn’t disrupt the proceedings further.

Since it happened around the same time Pride usually does, and was put on by the No Pride in Policing coalition, this was decidedly a queer community event. It felt so amazing to gather with other queers in service of a vitally important goal – defunding the police and redistributing their budget to other, more worthy causes – during Pride month, a time that’s always been political for us. The work being done by Black Lives Matter Canada (not to mention the organization’s other chapters worldwide) is absolutely phenomenal; I only hope that privileged policymakers start actually listening to them sometime soon.

Theatresports Online

The Bad Dog Theatre has been one of my favorite places for over 14 years. Unfortunately, now, it’s no longer so much a place as a community – both because the pandemic has prevented in-person gatherings, and because the pandemic has caused the Bad Dog to have to give up its physical space for the time being. They’re looking for a new one, but until then, we still have online shows to look forward to.

The programming put on by the Bad Dog this year made every week feel about 15% more bearable for me. Whether their improvisors were performing impromptu plays about love and sex, playing Dungeons & Dragons over Zoom, or interviewing fake “experts” about their fake books, they made me laugh so hard I cried every time I tuned into their YouTube channel.

Theatresports is the Bad Dog’s flagship improv show. I think the first time I ever saw an improv show in my life (that wasn’t an episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway), it was a Theatresports show. It’s a competitive shortform show where two teams go head-to-head to see who can create the funniest scenes and games. In its online form this year, it was hosted every week by Tom Hearn, a vivacious beacon of brightness forever wearing elaborate drag makeup and randomly breaking into song between scenes.

Every time I had a hard week, whether related to pandemic stress, work stress, family stress, or literally anything else, I always knew I could sit down in front of the TV on Thursday night and the Bad Dog crew would keep me company and crack me up. They helped get me through this hell year, and I know I’m not the only one they helped in that way. I can never thank them enough for the laughs they served up in 2020.

 

What events made you happy this year?

Monthly Faves: Dildos, Diamonds, & Democracy

Kate Sloan

This month has been a weird one… but then again, I think I’ve been writing some version of that every month here since March… or maybe even since November 2016… *sigh* Anyway, here are some of the things that brought me joy this month! What are yours?

P.S. Uhhh, happy Halloween, I guess? Here’s a couple of relevant things I’ve written in the past, incase you wanna get into the spooky spirit a li’l bit: a review of the “Batcock” Vixen Leo dildo, and some thoughts on what a grown-up Wednesday Addams would keep in her sex toy drawer.

 

Media

• I re-watched American Horror Story: Cult with Matt this month and could not believe how relevant it felt to our current moment, geopolitically and socioculturally. AHS pulled no punches in calling out the gaslighting, fearmongering, and fascism of Trump-supporting sects, and it all felt eerily prescient.

• Someone on Twitter spoke highly of the 1997 thriller The Game so Matt and I checked it out, and… wow. It’s very unsettling, astonishingly well-acted, and reminds me a lot of the kink concept of “consensual non-consent.” Would recommend if you’re into CNC and/or the feeling of being consensually gaslit by a piece of media.

• The new book Ace by Angela Chen is a must-read if you’re interested in asexuality, whether you’re ace yourself, uncertain, or just want to understand asexuality and ace-spectrum identities better. I loved how this book covered the history of the asexuality movement along with the present-day obstacles it faces.

• If your Thursday nights are wide open these days, due to lockdown or other factors, I would highly recommend you join me in watching the Bad Dog Theatre’s live online improv show Theatresports for the next several Thursdays! It’s hosted by the incomparable and hilarious Tom Hearn (who showed up last week wearing the most over-the-top and beautiful false eyelashes and drag makeup) and really reminds me that, even though I love longform improv the most, shortform can be fall-off-the-couch funny too!

• The virtual play Circle Jerk – produced by Jeremy O. Harris, whose brilliant Slave Play was recently nominated for 12 (!!) Tony awards – was a delightful quick-change satire about, among other things, the problematic tendencies of the white gay male community. I’ve been fascinated by all the inventive ways that theatre artists are using the Zoom (etc.) medium for their art this year, and this was a particularly inventive usage!

• I just started reading Eleanor Herman’s book Sex with Presidents, which tells the tales of presidential sex scandals through the ages, and also speculates on the psychological and sociocultural forces that shape political leaders into sexual rulebreakers (or that lead sexual rulebreakers to pursue careers in politics!). Really interesting stuff for sex nerds and politics nerds alike.

• My favorite porn creator of the moment is Velvet Veronica, a soft-yet-mean femdom with a Canadian accent. She gives some of the best handjobs in the biz (IMO) and is a cocktease extraordinaire. Respect!

 

Products

• I tried out the Satisfyer app this month when my partner wanted to “go down on me” during phone sex, and it worked way better than I was expecting it to. As much as I adore We-Vibe products, I’ve had a ton of connectivity issues with their app, so I was surprised by how comparatively stable and reliable the Satisfyer one is.

• The Laid D2 granite dildo is still a current fave! My partner likes using it on me, too.

• I bought packing cubes in preparation for my journey to NYC (don’t worry, the airline was actually great about temp checks, mask rules, contact tracing, and social distancing, and there’s even free COVID testing available at LaGuardia now) and they have changed my life. Such a genius way to simultaneously organize all your clothes (underwear in one, T-shirts in another, etc.) and compress them down to a suitcase-friendly size!

• I’ve really been enjoying false lashes lately! (Meandering philosophical blog post on this topic to come, trust.) So far, my favorite pair I’ve tried is these House of Lashes ones in the “Cecile” style. Will prob wear them to my wedding!

• A recent findom gift from my love: this ultra-cute, tiny black leather crossbody bag with a chain strap. It’s kind of the perfect bag for the COVID era, in that I never really need to carry much more than a phone, a debit card, photo ID, and an extra mask when I go out these days… I’m hoping that in some far-off future, I’ll get to carry this to soirées, dance clubs, comedy shows, etc.!

• I mentioned The Sims 4 here last month and it still rules. Just wanted to add that if, like me, you are a non-monogamous and/or slut-positive Simmer, you can hit Ctrl+Shift+C and type in the cheat “traits.equip_trait trait_Player” and it’ll make it so that your currently active Sim can kiss/date/WooHoo with as many people as they want and no one will get jealous about it. Pretty perf.

• Um, obviously I would be remiss not to mention my engagement ring here?! It is still the most stunning thing I have ever owned… or maybe even seen… The other day we went and looked at wedding bands and I spent most of the time just staring at my engagement ring instead, tbh!

 

Work & Appearances

• The CBC asked me to write a piece on what dating is like when you live with chronic pain. It was fun/sad/cathartic/healing to dig up some of these old stories from the days when I was more active on the dating scene (and didn’t know as much yet about how my pain worked)!

• I was invited onto the What Women Want podcast, along with brilliant kinky writer Daphne Matthews, to discuss the kinds of messages/dates/etc. that put us off people and the kinds that actually excite us. It was an interesting chat that touched on kink, consent, respect, and gender, among other things!

• My friend Brent asked if I’d join him in guesting on the Man-Thing Minute, a podcast that celebrates Marvel’s Man-Thing comic. We had so much fun and I laughed so hard I cried!

• I also chatted with digital marketing expert Tod Maffin about how I wrote 1,000 blog posts. Tod and I have known each other online for nearly 2 decades so it was fun to catch up with him on his show!

• This month I put together ukulele arrangements for, and made videos of, two of my favorite songs at the moment: Alone Again, Naturally by Gilbert O’Sullivan, and Saw You in a Dream by the Japanese House. My partner and I have a new-ish protocol where I have to learn (or write) and record at least one song a month, and it’s been really fun so far!

• On the Dildorks this month, Bex and I did a two-part series about sexual boundaries, and then discussed 24/7 D/s dynamics and sexual sensitivity.

• In my newsletter this month, I wrote about how body dysmorphia fucks with sexual arousal, why so many of my Sims are queer, doing my first (sorta) cuckolding scene, where I fall on the asexuality spectrum, and why I love my engagement ring!

 

Good Causes

• Since the U.S. Supreme Court for some reason just gained a member who seems to think people with uteruses should be stuck in the past forever in terms of our rights and freedoms, now would be a great time to donate to an organization that fights for reproductive rights and/or offers sexual health services, such as the Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund, Arkansas Abortion Support Network, Yellowhammer Fund, or any of the other orgs on this list.

• The National Center for Transgender Equality could also use your donations now that the Supreme Court has stepped back into the dark ages.

• The ACLU is doing some fantastic work across multiple areas of the fight for civil liberties. Toss ’em your money in this scary time so they can do their best to fend off the darkness of bigoted fascism.

• Please, friends in the U.S., make sure you vote in this election! Obviously I want you to vote for the candidate who’s not a fascist megalomaniac angling for a dictatorship, and who hasn’t been directly responsible for the death of over 200,000 citizens of his own country, but hey, you do you. If you’re confused about voting for any reason (where to go, what to bring, where to drop off your mail-in ballot, etc.), check out IWillVote.com or BetterKnowABallot.com for all the deets. If you plan to vote in person, especially on election day, make sure you bring some snacks + water + entertainment, because you may have to wait in line a while. And wear your mask! (God, I sound like I’m trying to be your mom. Hey, whatever works.)

Monthly Faves: Pillows, Podcasts, & Powerful Memoirs

Kate Sloan

Hope your COVID summer has been as stress-free as can reasonably be expected, loves. Here are some things I loved in August…

 

Media

• After devouring all three episodes of Netflix’s longform improv special series Middleditch & Schwartz when it came out, my partner and I started watching some similarly-structured specials performed by TJ & Dave. Longform improv is truly one of my passions and makes me feel so happy and hopeful even when the world sucks.

• The brilliant sex writer Girl on the Net went through a breakup recently and I really feel for her, especially since she writes such beautiful things about her feelings, in addition to the blisteringly hot erotica she’s best known for. I decided it was the right time for me to finally read her book, Girl on the Net: How a Bad Girl Fell in Love. It’s full of sexy and romantic stories, along with incisive commentary about what it’s like to be – and to date – a sex blogger. Needless to say, I loved it!

• Next I dove into Glennon Doyle‘s memoir Untamed, which is about how this “Christian mommy blogger” (god, I hate that so many people’s voices drip with misogyny when they use that term, but it is the most widely-used term for the type of blogging she’s known for) fell in love with a famous lesbian soccer player and then made the decision to uproot her entire life: leave her husband, restructure her family, and marry her new love. It’s a beautiful book containing a lot of wise insights about love, parenthood, and systemic sexism.

• I’ve been introducing my partner to The O.C., a show that I found very influential when I was 12-13. We’re watching (or re-watching, in my case) season 2, in which the stunning Olivia Wilde plays bisexual icon and punk bartender Alex Kelly, a characterization that I credit with making me realize I was bi all those years ago. It’s every bit as good as I remember it being – all the smarts of a nerdy primetime drama, crammed into the format of a syrupy soap opera.

• It’d been a few years since I played The Sims, but this month another wave of quarantine boredom hit me (what else is new, right?) so I bought The Sims 4 and a few expansion packs/add-ons. Been enjoying building elaborate houses and watching virtual lives play out on my computer in this weird era when our own actual lives can’t play out as planned.

 

Products

• After dealing with recurrent neck pain for a few weeks that seemed to be the fault of my flat-ass old pillows, I decided to splurge on Wirecutter’s most highly-recommended pillow, the Nest Easy Breather. It was absurdly expensive for what it is, especially when you factor in the currency conversion and import duties, but I figure there are few things more worth spending money on than the object I lay my head on each night. Anyway, it’s blissfully comfortable, as you would expect. Maybe one day I’ll be able to afford a whole set…

• These black sequinned Ugg boots were on sale recently and I’ve wanted Uggs for years – my old winter boots are falling apart – so I bought a pair. Since it’s still summer I’ve just been wearing them around the house like slippers, but OMG, they are so cozy and comfy. I think me buying Uggs is a good sign re: divesting myself of toxic fashion-industry norms.

• Is it weird to put cornstarch on this list?! I recently learned that rolling around your (pressed, cubed) tofu in a blend of cornstarch and spices before pan-frying causes it to crisp up real good. I feel like a culinary genius whenever I cook it this way, even though it’s actually pretty easy.

• My partner gifted me their old Apple Watch a while ago when they got a newer one, and I’ve been enjoying using it primarily as a step tracker during the coronavirus debacle. When I’m not getting nearly enough exercise, and I know exercise is good for my mood and my chronic pain, it helps to have some kind of external motivation imposed on me to get my steps in, even if that’s just seeing my step tracker tick upwards on a watch screen.

 

Work & Appearances

• Bex and I celebrated reaching the 200th episode of the Dildorks by telling silly stories of our various sexual milestones! We also interviewed the delightful Aryn about sexual astrology, chatted with two whip-smart researchers about their new book on sex and social media, and discussed subspace and topspace.

• In my weekly newsletter, I wrote about having romantic/sexy dreams about people you know IRL, three kinky fantasies my partner asked me to expand upon, the room where me and Matt first kissed (and which we were definitely not supposed to kiss in), and our first financial domination scene, which involved luxe lingerie and a lot of negotiation.

• My brother is a fantastic guitar player, and we teamed up to cover the Hippo Campus song “Vines” when I visited my family recently. Always a pleasure playing music with Max!

• A lot of my work projects this month were things I’m not able to talk about in detail: another potential book project on the horizon, a game I might be developing for a publisher, and some ghostwriting for a pro domme client. Exciting stuff! I’ll tell you more when I can.

 

Good Causes

• The death of Chadwick Boseman from colon cancer this month was a shock to many. Donating to organizations that support Black people facing medical difficulties, like the Black Health Alliance or the Sisters Network, would be a lovely way to commemorate him and help other folks who are struggling like he was.

• J.K. Rowling is unfortunately still being a transphobic monster, so why not donate to an organization that supports trans people, such as the Black Trans Femmes in the Arts collective, the Trevor Project, or the Homeless Black Trans Women Fund?

• The Glad Day Lit Emergency Survival Fund is still raising cash to help support queer and trans artists impacted financially by COVID.