Oh, The Media!

First, I have a new column over at The Stranger. And yes, it's about the "Alexa Dicarlo" issue. If I had had my way, this column would have come out two weeks ago. Alas, one cannot always have things as one would wish. Still, it's my hope that if I inspire any fresh debate on the matter, it will be calm, civil and reasoned. Although really, there's not much more to be said, is there? Perhaps my remarks will serve as a finale.

On a much sexier subject: last weekend, my darling Monk went to Vegas for the Adult Video News awards - the Oscars of porn, if you will. He taught a bondage class at the Erotic Heritage Museum, and he arranged with Carnal Nation to be their roving reporter. There's lot of fun videos of him, including one where he interviews Bobbi Star and they talk about me. Eek!

More clips:
A Look At Male Chastity Devices
Talking to the makers of wireless, musical vibrators.
Monk interviews Princess Kali
Monk talks to the Porn Church - and remains amazingly polite.
Monk putting "I Love Anal" stickers on people.

There's lots more on the CN site, so go check it out...

Random Sexiness


I love this video clip. Love. It. I don't know about the rest of you ladies, but I do not intend to have a sexless old age. Nope. So go on, you sexy old ladies. And old men, too!
Video yoinked from The Sexademic.

Oh, and because I know you want to know: eighty-six. He was a small man, an native-born Irishman who stood about five feet tall and weighed perhaps a hundred pounds soaking wet. I think he'd been a jockey.

But he'd have himself a few sips of single-malt, and he'd get as frisky as a twenty-year-old. This was when I lived in Florida, and I recall thinking that this guy was probably quite the Lothario, among the "mature living" trailer parks and apartment complexes. Lot of bored and restless older ladies there. I teased him about it, and he winked at me and said, "Well - I will say, I don't have to cook me own dinner very often."

Maybe those ladies served vanilla ice cream for dessert...

The latest installment of the web-cast series about polyamory, Family.


I can't say I really understand where this is going, plot-wise. But it seems to be getting good press: Newsweek did a nice piece on the Seattle producers. And Dan Savage weighed in on it here. So I won't quibble on artistic grounds...

I just watched this video from CNBC about “high-end prostitution”. And it made me roll my eyes a lot.

Okay, on one hand, it’s really not bad at all. They have some great people in it, like Veronica Monet and Carol Leigh. They're fabulous. And the escorts they interviewed were all bright, articulate women who represented themselves and what they do very well. So from a strictly PR point of view, it’s fine.

What exasperates me is the fact that it’s a 40-minute slog over the same old clichéd ground. I didn’t see or hear one new thing in this video. In fact, I'll save you forty minutes and sum up the whole thing for you in a few lines…

“Women sometimes exchange sex for money. (Here’s some sexy pictures of women.) Sometimes a little money, sometimes a lot. (Here’s some more sexy pictures of women.) Some women like this and do it freely. Other women don’t. (Here’s some MORE sexy pictures of women.) Some people think this is bad, while others think it’s no big deal. Doesn’t seem likely to stop anytime soon. And, that’s our report. (Oh, here’s a few last sexy pictures of women.)”

That’s it. There was some focus on how the internet has changed sex work, which it very definitely has. For well over ten years now.

So - can any of this really be news to anyone past puberty? I mean, come on, people. This is not news. Perhaps you might classify it as a documentary. Perhaps. A rather dull documentary.

It’s like the editor had a staff meeting and said, “Okay, it’s time for something titillating but journalistically defensible. Give me a Number 317.”
“Okay, boss. That’s Expensive Call-Girl Story, right? Just the usual?”
“Yeah. Spin it out for forty minutes. Lots of pictures off the internet, and stock video footage of women putting on stockings and looking out windows. Put some footage of streetwalkers in there too, we gotta have some of those. And make sure you use that one voice-over actress, the one with the suggestive lilt. She could make a fast-food order sound like phone sex.”
“Sure thing. Have it on your desk by Thursday.”

This is a cookie-cutter story. It’s boring. It’s old. I mean, it’s really, really old. I think you can find the very first version of this story painted on a cave wall somewhere in picture form.

I get it that they have to fill up the hours. I get it that a lot of what’s called “news” is just entertainment. But good lord, with the resources at their disposal, you’d think CNBC might produce just one vaguely new and interesting thought in forty minutes.

This one made me laugh because... I, um, know some people who doe that thing about storeing food and water and stuff for an earthquake or swine flu or some other emergency. I tease them a little about it. And they reminds me that I'll be singing a different tune if there ever is an emergency when we need it.

My other thought was: I'm sorry, if one of my partner's partners was hanging around my house, drinking heavily at 9am, there would be some serious conversation between he and I about that. It would go something like this: "Take this girl out of the house, and never bring her back." There are a few simple but crucial rules for dealing with me, and one of them is: Do not bring your drama to my doorstep. Because I hate drama. You like drama? You have all the drama you want - somewhere else.

And a woman swilling jumbo cans of malt liquor in the morning and calling it "paradise" is drama waiting to happen. That's not a red flag, it's a red circus tent. No, it's a bright red hot-air balloon, and it's going to fall to earth very unpleasantly somewhere. But not on my house, no no. Because bottled water does not help you when that sort of disaster strikes.

Another episode of Family, the polyamory web-cast series... Enjoy. (If you like train-wrecks, that is. Yeek.)



Amusing trivia: I've been to St. Cloud's. It's not terribly far from the Big House. I certainly have not ever witnessed a scene like this one, though.

I love popular-science author Mary Roach's writing so much. If you have not read Stiff and Bonk, you're missing out. (Her other book, Spook, is okay, but not as good.)

Now here she is to tell us some very odd things about sex - both human, and animal...

So this week, for a 12seconds video, I talked Monk into showing me his naked push-ups.

Well, I sort of tricked him into it. See, he always tells me about the mean stuff his personal trainer does to him - you people think I'm sadistic? You have no idea! I sometimes get really envious that this guy gets to hurt my boyfriend so bad. And I don't even get to watch!

(Monk would let me sit in, but he usually goes early in the morning. Nu-uh. Not even for hot boy-on-boy action do I get up at that hour.)

So tonight when we were talking gym-porn, I casually got out my phone, hid it behind my back, arranged my face into an innocent expression, and said, "One-footed push-ups? I don't understand, darling, what are those?"

These. Aren't they nice? (Probably not safe for work. )

There's no new episode of the polyamory web-series "Family" this week. They are doing interviews with the three main actors, though. So, here's eight minutes with performer Ernie Joseph, who plays Ben.

One of the interesting things about this interview is that there's no discussion of Mr. Joseph's personal views on polyamory. I imagine that's at least partly due to career concerns, a concern I don't condemn him for.

But one of the benefits of a show like this is that it raises people's consciousness. I'd be interested to know if the actors who do not identify themselves as poly feel that they now have a greater understanding of polyamorous culture. Perhaps we'll have some discussion of that in the future.

The Bindings Project - Teaser from Aaron Nanto on Vimeo.

This is a teaser for Monk's show at SEAF. It's going to be great!

What am I doing this weekend? Well, while ya'll are all basking in the glow of great sexy art and going to workshops by Mark Yu, I am going... to Orlando. Yes, it's my brother's wedding. I could kill him for picking this weekend, but - c'est la vie.

So watch for my Twitters about the Shakespeare-on-the-Gulf family-comedy that will no doubt be transpiring in Mousetown. But at least I get to catch the Thursday night show. Yay!

I had planned to actually write something for today, but I wound up taking my elderly and irascible cat into the emergency vet last night, and I didn't get home until about 3am. It's my hope she'll be okay soon. Watch the Twitter feed if you want up-to-the-minute updates on that.

And for now, enjoy the newest installment of the web-series about polyamory, Family.



EDIT: Apparently YouTube doesn't like poly, or something. The video got pulled, I have no idea why.

2nd Edit, later: And now it's back up on Youtube. Weird. But, okay, whatever.

Perhaps in revenge for last week's video of him with nipple clamps on his eyebrows, Monk took a video clip of me in the shower. (I wanted to take one of me doing something terrible back to him in retribution, but we agreed that 12seconds people probably wouldn't like any videos that involved his dick.)

I think this video clip thing could become a Thursday night habit.

So I was lying in bed with Monk last night, with toys and rope and bottles of lube strewn around the whole room, like a kink bomb had gone off. Which indeed, it more or less had....

I said, "Oh God, I can't go to sleep, I have to get up and write a blog post. "

Monk replied, "How about if you just take video of me doing this?" And then he proceeded to do something really silly with nipple clamps. I laughed, grabbed my Blackberry, and took a 12 second video of it. (Worksafe, actually. It has sound - of me, laughing.)

Then I went to sleep.

The newest installment of the web series about a polyamorous triad, Family.

I was pleased to see that they got some good press in the Seattle Times. Nice when art overlaps with activism. Enjoy...

So, I'm flying to Las Vegas today with the ever-rockin' Elvis. I think we're going to have much fun, and I'll be Twittering and Flickering and perhaps even 12second-videoing, so stay tuned to all that.

I'll be there until Saturday, so I'll be around for next week. I will return messages as soon as I can. As always, email is best.

***

Speaking of video, I found this via The Rumpus: Jay Smooth of Ill Doctrine:



I think it's very cool. Obviously, it's about how to call someone on racist behavior. But actually, it's excellent advice for talking to anyone about any kind of unacceptable behavior. He makes excellent points about staying focused on "this is what you did" and not getting sucked into the losing strategy of "this is what you are."

I also love "No Homo."

Episode #8 in the Seattle-produced web-series about polyamory, "Family". It's Part II of the "Meet The Parents" espisode!

Today I come home from Portland and see just what sort of remodeling activity has been going on in my house while I've been away. My contractor assures me all is well, but still, color me slightly nervous.

Meanwhile, enjoy the newest episode of the web-series about a polyamorous triad, Family. Warning: there's a sex scene with a full-frontal naked guy, and it's quite charming, but probably not something to watch at work.

It's another episode of the polyamory web-cast series, Family. In this one, Gemma meets some of the neighbors...



I'm enjoying these very much, and I know other folks are too. I have only one critique of them. I want more, now!

You see, I am trying to be patient while the filmmakers build what is obviously going to be a layered story-arc, but I am not naturally inclined to patience. I want to learn some more about the main triad. Thus far, we haven't seen any exposition about how they came to be, and how the relationships work. Were two of them in a couple before the third came along, or did they all get together at more or less the same time? We understand that Gemma is sexual with both Ben and Stuart, but are Ben and Stuart sexual with each other? There are references to Stuart having other partners, but it's not totally clear if that's true, and what about Ben? I feel like I don't know these people very well, and I'd like to.

One of the rules of writing dialogue is: never have your characters talk about things they already know. Thus, backstory can be hard to do without sliding into this kind of thing: "As you know, Gemma, I was poly for a long time before we met, but Stuart is new to this..." Bad. It's the dreaded "info dump" that you'll see unwary writers do, usually about chapter two, in novels.

So they aren't falling into that trap, which I appreciate. I'd simply like to add more to my understanding of the characters. However, this episode ends with one of the previously-hostile neighbors making a friendly overture. Maybe if that storyline develops, we can get some history and outline, as they explain it to the new people.

Good Information To Have: a video from Red Light Chicago about what exactly happens if you get arrested on a misdemeanor prostitution charge. It's helpful in terms of planning what-if scenarios, and gives specific little details worth knowing. For example, because it's a collect call, you can't call a cell phone from jail, you can only call a land-line. So whoever you'd want to call in such an emergency, you need to have a land-line phone number memorized for them.

It's Part Two in the Know Your Rights series, but the whole site is worth checking out. I think these women are way cool!

For further information about your legal rights - everyone's rights, not just sex workers - in the event of an arrest, read this: Beat The Heat: How To Handle Encounters With Law Enforcement. This book is done in sort of a comic-book style, so it's VERY easy to understand, no legal education required. It's just the basics, this is no substitute for a real attorney. And I hope none of us ever need it, but hey, knowledge is power, so empower yourself.

While I'm off engaging in mean and delightful activities... Enjoy the newest episode of the polyamory web-series "Family".