It was an offbeat month in my sex life, full of strange kink insights and trippy adventures… Here are some highlights!
Sex toys
• The biggest news in my toy drawer this month was that my precious Eroscillator Top Deluxe BROKE while I was in Portland! After 3 years of loyal service, I guess it decided I had dropped it one too many times (sorry, pal), because two different segments of the body of the toy fell right off. I tried in vain to piece it back together, and then eventually gave up and ordered a new one. It really is that good; I considered whether I could live without it and determined that I could not.
• I got an email from Dame, a sex toy company from whom I didn’t own anything, offering me a toy of my choice. The Kip clitoral vibrator was an obvious selection for me; it’s vaguely Tango-esque and BRIGHT YELLOW! I will probably review it in full at some point, but for now, just know: this adorable little vibe is rumblier and stronger than its small stature would indicate, and it has a lot of features I’m always yelling at sex toy companies to implement, like an up AND a down button, and a travel lock. Well-played, Dame.
• To continue to give Dame kudos: their new aloe-based lube, Alu, is pretty damn good. The ingredients list is impressive (no glycerin, parabens, or propylene glycol) and you can even order a $4 silicone sleeve called Grip that goes around the bottle to prevent you from dropping/throwing it when your hands are lubey. So smart.
Fantasy fodder
• My partner and I have wanted to do a “strangers at a bar” roleplay for a long time and this month we finally got around to it. On one of our free days in Portland, I took a book to a cocktail bar near our hotel, ordered a daiquiri, and sat alone reading – one of my favorite solo date activities. Sir came in a few minutes later, sat a stone’s throw away, and started chatting me up after a little while. One thing led to another and we ended up back in “my” hotel room… This was a super fun roleplay that I would highly recommend, and apparently my vagina agreed, because (uncharacteristically for me) I had an orgasm during PIV – whoa!
• During one of our many late-night phone calls, my Sir asked me what I’d been fantasizing about lately, and I mentioned enjoying the thought of someone going down on me because it’s their job – like a sex worker or an unconventional masseuse. Because my Sir is a genius, they quickly conjured a roleplay in which they, my daddy, had hired a male escort to give me head for my birthday, which he would do while Sir gave him moment-by-moment instructions. This scene pinged so many of my kinks – and also made me laugh a lot, when Sir said the escort was “setting up his supplies” and I couldn’t imagine what “supplies” someone would need for plain old puttin’ a mouth on a vulva!
• I’ve been thinking a lot lately about mental blankness. It helps that I’ve been reading a lot of Sleepingirl‘s hypnosis stories, but more generally, I’ve been pondering the ways intoxication, trance, and subspace can each help me float away inside my own brain during scenes when that’s what I want. For someone like me who’s constantly anxious and overanalytical, sometimes nothing is sweeter or more necessary than just shutting down the ol’ brain and receiving pleasure in absentia. Sir and I did a scene exploring these themes recently through hypnosis and “bimboification”; it was really fun, in a way, to feel my faculties draining away from me.
• Speaking of Sleepingirl: I commissioned her to write me a short story about a sub getting through the airport security line with the help of their hypno-savvy dom. It’s so cute and emblematic of how romantic hypnosis can be.
Sexcetera
• This year I got to attend the XOXO festival for the first time, and it was phenomenal! Some highlights for me: going to a social meetup of language nerds and playing a loud word game led by Gretchen McCulloch, hearing Harry “Hbomberguy” Brewis talk about raising money for Mermaids by live-streaming himself playing Donkey Kong, seeing Amelia and Emily Nagoski talk about the perils of burnout, the entire live podcast lineup, and meeting some readers of my blog (hi)!
• I participated in the Smutathon on Saturday, sex writers’ attempt to write for 12 hours straight to raise money for the National Network of Abortion Funds. My final word count for the day was 13,336 – that’s 11 blog posts (many of which will go up here over the next couple months), 3 newsletters, and 4 poems. The fundraiser has pulled in almost $3K so far – we’d still love to get that up to $5K!
• My Sir and I guested on the Off the Cuffs podcast together this month! It was really fun to sit down with two of my favorite people, drink cocktails, and chat about kink. We covered erotic hypnosis, sleepy sex, long-distance relationships, coming out as kinky, and more. Matt also guested on Question Box; we competed to see who could answer the most personal questions. You know what they say: the couple that podcasts together, stays together… or something…
• Sextistics: This month I had in-person sex 13 times and phone sex 21 times, totalling 34 sessions.
Fashion & beauty
• XOXO gave out adorable pronoun pins to its attendees and I’m so into mine. If we’re gonna normalize sharing our pronouns by default, which we absolutely should, we might as well do it in style.
• I ordered 3 new lipsticks from Sugarpill and they’re all great, though Bliss is disappointingly almost my exact natural lip color (plus glitter), so I doubt I’ll wear that one as much as the other two. My favorite of the bunch is Hijinx, a berry shade overlaid with blue glittery iridescence. Incredible.
• I have a mega-crush on model Alexa Chung (I mean, upon seeing her, who doesn’t, frankly), and lucky for me, she has a YouTube channel now where she does makeup looks, hair tutorials, and more. It’s very good and she is very pretty.
Media
• You owe it to yourself to check out this episode of Punch Up the Jam about the Ghostbusters theme. I was present at the live recording and have honestly never laughed that hard during a live podcast before. You’ll learn a lot about this iconic song and you might also wonder what the hell Ray Parker, Jr. was thinking at times.
• I kept hearing good things about Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion by Jia Tolentino, so I tore through it, and it was great. I’ve been thirsting for more essays from introspective women ever since devouring Esmé Wang’s The Collected Schizophrenias, and this hit the spot. It touches on reality TV, “late-capitalist fetishwear,” the beauty myth, Southern hiphop, drugs as a gateway to the divine, and more.
• Current song obsession: “Favorite Show” by Great Grandpa. I keep waking up with this tune lodged in my head lately, so I’ve been groovin’ to it a lot.
Little things
Sleeping together over the phone. Our incredible guests on Question Box. Laughing with Max in his sunny back yard. Getting a window seat on planes. The Multnomah Whiskey Library and their fancy bartenders. Going to the rose garden while really high (um, would recommend). The photobooth machine at the Ace Hotel. When you can tell who’s the dom and who’s the sub in a photo. Hanging out with Epiphora and her wonderful cats. Wandering through Powell’s for hours. Matt bringing me coffee in the morning. “I just want everyone to know that I’m very gay.” Serendipitously sitting next to actors I admire at the theatre. Client projects that fascinate me. Sir sending me ramen when I was sick (and then, later, watching this video of a pastry chef attempting to make gourmet instant ramen from scratch). Seeing Lane Moore and DeAnne Smith do Tinder Live at Comedy Bar, from front-row center. Attending the Bi Arts Festival with a queer femme friend. Going to see movies by myself. Shopping with friends. Solo cocktails-and-reading dates at the Library Bar.
