Okay, kids, Roman is off doing the pre-Kinkfest Death March of ropemaking at the shop – complete world domination doesn't happen by itself, you know - so we're a teensy bit behind on the Weakest Kink contest update. But we do have the submissions, and woo-hoo, do we have some opinions on them. Either later today or tomorrow, I swear.

Other than that, I don't have a whole lot to say at the moment…So I'll just wave hello to some of my friends. Like the sweet foot-kissing man I met this week, who's on his way back to his native country right now. Hope you find your way to Seattle again some time…

And I'm thinking of another dear friend who's on an extended visit to yet another romantic foreign country right now – I hope the food is as delicious, the art as lovely, and the women as beautiful as they are reputed to be…See you in May!

Speaking of old friends, I will be at the Wet Spot tonight to give a big hug to a great local guy, S, who's just returned from military duty overseas. It's been a long year for him and I'm so glad he got to come home - and in one piece, no less. This guy gave a lot of parties and reached out to a lot of new kinky people here in Seattle, and that makes him a good guy in my book. Okay, sure, sometimes he reached out with a very sharp object in his hand - but hey, it was meant as a sign of affection. He's a good-hearted guy. In a sort of a nasty, twisted sort of way, y'know. And I'll always remember fondly those times he let me do sadistic electrical things to him.
He'll only in town a short while before he heads off to join his sweetie, so come out tonight if you want to see him.

Oh, my god, did we get an amazing "Weakest Kink" entry from one of the contestants yesterday. Those other girls are really going to have to come up with something good to beat it...We'll post results tomorrow.
The new column and the Kink Calendar are up, so in the meantime, be amused by those. And no, none of those personal ads are direct quotes, from the Lustlab or anywhere else. I made them all up, based on conversations with friends and - unfortunately - some personal experience.
And now, I have a sweet man from a foriegn country coming over to spend some quality time kissing my feet, so if you'll excuse me...

More work with doorways. I have jokingly referred to this image as, "The X-Files photo", because I used to be a fan of the show, and to me it kinda has that, "Here come the aliens!" look to it. Other people have commented that it suggests someone praying. Depends on your point of view, I suppose.


Self-portrait from 2002. Digital capture with one tungsten spot, and sepia toning added in PS.

In other news...a cute kinky story by Liss about her adventures with a creative top. I was at this party - you should've asked me to X you, Liss. I'd of been nice. Really. Hey, stop laughing!

Girly Fashion Stuff

I'm in love. Or at least, deeply in lust. And who can blame me, with such sexy Spaniards like this around?

#9674, Itali Negro Rock Negro, Malicia Tacon Acero. Even the name sounds sexy. I'm lusting from afar for today, but I really don't know if I'll be able to restrain my passion...

I'm in pre-KinkFest shopping mode, you see - it's only two weeks away! On Monday, I went over to see Rose, of Imp Of Satan to order some new tight-n-shiny clothes. She does such great work, and it's so nice to have her right in the neighborhood. She's going to make me some yummy blue PVC pants and a matching top, with black mesh insets down the sides. While I do wear fairly traditional fetish outfits when I'm in my dungeon, for social events these days I'm drawn to fetishwear that looks sort of like Italian motorcycle gear, or like it might have been designed by Nike. Something different - you don't want to go to a conference and be one of seventeen women in a room all wearing a corset, miniskirt and thigh-high boots. Oh, the horror!

Rose makes all kinds of fetishwear, but one of her specialties is catsuits. Now, I'm generally of the opinion that catsuits look best on taller people - say, five-foot-eight or better. (Although I did see a small woman at a party recently wearing a bright red catsuit by Rose, and she looked smashing.) However, Max decided he liked the idea of me in a black catsuit, so we bought one of those, too. I have to say, while I still don't think it's my absolute best look, Rose's catsuit makes me look far better than any other catsuit I've ever tried on. That's talent.

My other fashion designer friend, Orion, is also making me an outfit, so I went fabric-shopping for that - and naturally would up buying a ton of stuff, enough for three or four pieces. But it's gotten so I hate buying fetishwear off the rack, because most of it is so badly made, and so wildly overpriced for what it is, that it just drives me mad. So, custom-made is the only way to go. I see that another local girl I know, Tonya Winter, is doing custom latex clothing, I should think about getting something from her sometime.

Now if I just knew a shoe-store owner, I'd be all set...

Greatest Hits

Congratulate me. I've now been blogging, quite steadily, for just over one year. I think that's an accomplishment.
For those of you who are new around here and haven't gone all the way back through the archives, I've picked out some of the best/most popular entries. ("Most popular" being gauged by the number, and the passion, of the comments.) I only went up to January of 2005, because even if you just this minute found me, you should at least have read back a few weeks.

Opinions, experiences, and general musings on life
Human Interest Story
Thoughts On Being A Pretty Girl (This may well have been the most controversial post I've written.)
BDSM Word Of The Day
Mr. Defensive
Open Secret
The Sixty Four Thousand Dollar Question (The other "Most Controversial" candidate.)
and the follow-up post: Comments On Female Clients
What I'm Not
Word Whores: The "Not My Dog" post
Poly Stars In Alignment
Public Encounter
You Dirty...
French Farce Weekend

About Max:
Fifth Anniversary
More About Max

About Roman:
The Naked Truth
He's Just A...

Playing with my boys:
Flying High Again
My Idea of a Good Time

Conversations about the biz:
Advice on Clients
More Advice
Dinner with Miss K: Furniture Fantasy
Conversation with Miss K: Her Weird Phone Calls

And, everyone's favorite category: Strange Communiqués From People: The phone calls, the emails, and the voicemails.

The Thirty Seconds Rule
Near Goddess Experience
Sexual Darwinism
And This Would Be My Problem Why?
Legend In His Own Mind
New Cell Phone - Old Memories
New York State Of Mind
Master and Commander
Weirdass Email Of The Week
Phone Messages
I Couldn't Make This Stuff Up
From The Malebag
More Email Silliness
Freakazoids

Okay, so now that Roman has posted the results of "The Weakest Kink: Week One", I will issue the next challenge to our remaining contestants...

Go to a pet store that does custom pet tags and get a pet tag cut with a name you'd like Roman and I to call you by. Could be your real name, if you want. But it could a play name - perhaps something more...creative. Or it could be your name, plus a descriptive phrase of some sort. Like, "Ann - the little pain slut". How bold can you be in a Petco?

We'll want to see a picture of it, obviously, and make sure we can read the inscription. Happy shopping!

All About Kissing
I kissed fifty-eight people in two hours at the Kink Carnival last night. That's definitely some kind of record for me. And I'm quite sure I wouldn't care to try and beat it, because I was wiped out afterwards. I'm still a little wiped.

Some of you wrote to me asking why I was in a Kissing Booth, and not, say, a Spanking Booth. Well, there's a bit of history there. Aiden, the extremely cute tranny boy who's one of the Kink Carnival organizers, is an old friend and lover of mine, and he and I did a Kissing Booth one time before, years ago, at a Gay Pride event. (This was when Aiden was still living as female.) We had a good time with it then, so he thought it would be fun for us to do it together again. I agreed, and without really examining the idea too much, I also made the assumption that this would be a somewhat similar experience.

Wrong.

When Max and I arrived, the event was jam-packed - you could hardly move in there. It looked like everyone was having fun, though. We did a loop of all the different booths, talked to some friends, and then I dropped Max off at the Bondage Booth and made my way to the Kissing Booth. And pretty much as soon as I got there, it got busy. I thought, based on my previous experience with Aiden, that it would be slower paced. But it wasn't, it was two hours of non-stop sexual performance, changing partners every two minutes. And yeah, I can do that - but it takes a lot of energy, and I was exhausted afterwards.

Max was quite busy over in the Bondage Booth, too. Several people came up to me with rope on them and said "Look, look, Max tied me up!" It was very cute.

And a lot of the people themselves were very cute. I had several couples who both wanted kisses – that was sweet. There were some sexy boys, some of whom kissed my boots and my latex-pants-covered ass as well as my lips. There were several women who said they hadn't ever kissed another woman before - that was fun. Love to cherry-pop.

And there were some very pretty girls who clearly had kissed other girls before, including a pair of sweet young things who both kissed me so sweetly and passionately that I almost tied them up and took them home with me. Mmmmnn…

But, wow, it was just very intense. I had people waiting in line most of the time, and when they were shutting down the event at 10, people were still hovering around with tickets in their hands, looking at me hopefully. Aiden had to shoo them off. Crazy. It's sort of flattering at some level. But tiring.

We went over to a friend's party afterwards and I got a nice back and neck massage from Malixe, who gives the best massages, and put my head in pretty women's laps, and watched other people do mean things. That was nice.

And today I'm going to go lie on the couch, and later, Roman is going to come over and bring me Chinese food. That's about the extent of what I have planned. Mellow.

Okay, I'll tell. Several of you did guess, or reason it out, correctly. There is just one model - me.

I did this self-portrait by putting two long skinny mirrors into a V-shape, I arranged myself with my feet in the point of the V, I reached out and hit the shutter button (with the ten-second-timer already engaged), and then I arranged my head and arms. There are so many of me because the mirrors are reflecting both the original me and the reflections of me, if that makes sense.
I had no idea exactly what this shot would look like, but I figured it would be interesting. The lights were brighter than I'd wanted, but it kinda worked out okay.
Taken in 2001, I believe, with the Nikon digital.

I think there will be a post later today about the next challenge for The Weakest Kink contestants, and you should check Roman's blog for updates on who we kicked off the island.

But I am planning on spending some quality time at the gym this afternoon, before going and being all sexy tonight - to someone else's financial benefit, for a change. Not only will I be in The Kissing Booth this evening, Max got a last-minute plea to be in The Bondage Booth. All this at The Kinky Carnival - so drop by, get tied up by him and smooched by me, between 8pm-10pm.

Also, for your reading pleasure: The newest column and the Kink Calendar are up...

Visual puzzle for the day: How many models are in this photo?

Ring Ring!

Me: Hello?
Caller: Is this Mistress Matisse?
Me: Yes, it is.
Caller: Well, Mistress, I just wanted to apologize to you. I mean, you don't know me, I live in Texas - but I feel I've been very disrespectful of you.

Hmmnn….I have a feeling this guy's about to launch into some kind of emotional manipulation game. I tend to chew through such attempts like Pac-Man chewed through those little balls, but let's give him the traditional thirty seconds to see where he takes it.

Me: I'm afraid I don't know what you mean.
Caller: Well, you know your website? I found it a few months ago, and I've been looking at it a lot ever since. At the pictures of you, I mean. And, (pauses) I've been…I've been…thinking inappropriate thoughts.

I don't say anything.

Caller: I mean, sexual thoughts. About you, Mistress. I know that's very wrong of me. I know you wouldn't want me to do that, it's very disrespectful.

I still don't say anything. I see what he's doing – he wants me to scold him and tell him what a bad, bad boy he is. But I didn't consent to this little scene, and I'm damn sure not getting paid for it. So I'm simply not going to give him the response he's hoping for.

Me: Mmmmnnn.
Caller: And Mistress, I have to confess something else. I didn't just think…I, I touched myself. I mean, I stroked myself. My penis, I mean.

Oh, well, that's a huge shock, now isn't it? Imagine, someone masturbating to pictures on the internet. Who knew such things happened?
Frankly, I don't care if this guy is wanking off to my pictures every ten minutes. They're supposed to get people excited, that's why they're there. I don't care if his keyboard is so sticky that he types the entire alphabet every time he touches a key. But I'm not interested in hearing about it, and he's clearly not going to stop of his own accord, so it's time to wrap this up.

Me: You know what? This whole conversation is inappropriate. You need to stop talking to me about this, and –
Caller: Oh, Mistress, I'm so sorry! I've offended you, I'm such a bad boy, please, Mistress, I'm so sorry!
Me: Stop talking! I'm going to hang up, and I don't want you to call me again.
Caller: Mistress, please, I'm sorry –
Click. I hang up.

Jesus, I hope this doesn't catch on. If everyone who's ever jacked off to a picture of me calls to tell me about that, my cell minutes are going to go through the roof.

This and that...

This seems like poetic justice somehow: Prostitution Vigilante Hooked For Pimping. What an asshole. (Link snagged via Daze Reader)

Interesting "Poly Contract" written up by one couple. Max and I definitely don't do everything the way they do – which is only to be expected. But this piece would certainly provide some food for discussion in any couple considering poly.

The Stranger is looking for a woman to blog about her sex life - and they'll pay you. But only for a month.

And speaking of sexy blogs, the intrepid Candy Girl did indeed post about her recent scene with Max.

Not kinky but interesting: From Gawker Media, the site LifeHacker, which promises to, "saucily decipher the latest in personal productivity technology and reveal the million ways hardware and software can improve our busy lives." God knows I could use some help, given that I'm only modestly techie.

Oh, a social note for the Seattle folks. Want to kiss me? I'll be in the Kissing Booth at the Wild At Heart Kinky Carnival this Saturday from 8-10pm. Check out the website for more details…

...Addendum: Rossi has posted her half of the double-suspension story...

Great class this weekend. Great party last night. And I'm hoping someone else blogs about Max's double-inverted-suspension scene, so I can be lazy and just link to it, because the last two days have been completely non-stop, and I'm feeling rather weary.
Now it's Monday again, and I've got a busy day at the dungeon, and then a date with a treadmill at Gold's, and then, hopefully, a short romantic interlude with Max, before I start working on the Stranger column. Now, I generally regard "Valentine's Day" as nothing but crassly commercialist crap, cooked up by Madison Ave to sell useless, tacky chatchkes. I don't need Hallmark to tell me when to feel lovey-dovey, thankyouverymuch.
But romantic interludes with Max are always a good thing. However, that means no long post today. Perhaps tomorrow - if I'm feeling caught up with my life.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Roman has put up the page showing all the contestants, so that means it's time for: This Week's Challenge to The Weakest Kink Contestants!

This week, we want to see how creative and imaginative you can be about BDSM. So here's the challenge. Take five dollars, no more than that, and go buy the most interesting pervertible you can find. Take a picture of it and send it to use along with a description of how it would be used in BDSM play. Ideally, it should be something you can imagine being used on you.

Some of you may be thinking, "What the hell is a pervertible?" So glad you asked. The term "pervertible", coined by leather activist David Stein, is used to describe objects intended for some non-sexual use, especially everyday household objects, that can nonetheless be appropriated for BDSM play. I wrote a column about this once.

However, the pervertibles I mention there, while fun, are rather obvious. Roman and I would like to see something…different. But don't go thinking you can go buy any old thing and claim it's a BDSM toy. If Roman and I aren’t convinced of it's pervertability, we will have to see some pictures of it in action. And if you wind up winning – well, expect to have your pervertible used on you, by us. So be sincere in your toy shopping, and may the nastiest mind win!

Well, after a fun date with Roman last night, we're getting ready to post the first round of "The Weakest Kink" contest info. So look for that quite soon.

Meanwhile, the new column and the Kink Calendar are up, so check those out…Fans of my weirdo-callers entries will enjoy the column particularly.

And here's something I enjoyed reading...It's presented as some advice for writers, but I think parts of it are actually applicable to many life-situations. Certainly I intend to steal some of it for my future "advice to aspiring pro dommes" rants.

This is a photo from the very first porn shoot I ever sold. It was shot in 2001, and I sold it to a magazine called - you're gonna love this - "Naughty Neighbors". It was an "amateur" magazine, as you may have inferred, presenting the models as "real, girl-next-door" types. The illusion of potential acessibility is powerful for some men, it seems. Odd, when you consider that even Playboy Bunnies have to live next door to someone.
It wasn't the best set technically - note the shadow from the studio strobe. But I had a beautiful and very enthusiastic model, the lovely Rose Algren, and she made it work. This is just a sort of mood-establishing shot I took at the beginning, which of course the magazine didn't use because what the fuck do they care about establishing mood? They used the ones with the shower going and the wet t-shirt - and then with the shower going and no clothes at all. And naturally Rose looks scrumptious in all of them. But she looks so happy in this shot, with her little band of dildos. And somehow, they look sort of happy, too. (I suppose that's to be expected, given what she does with them.)
I'm on a picture posting jag lately, aren't I? I'm working on another writing project, you see, and can't spend as much time here as I would otherwise...But never fear, I won't desert you entirely.

Missing Persons Bureau - or Employment Agency?

Phone message left a few days ago…

BEEP!

Hi, Mistress Matisse, this is Bob The Artist. We've never met, but I gave a ride to a young woman last week and she said she was a licensed dominatrix. I wanted you to give her a message for me. Her name was Vanessa, she was in her mid-twenties, with a ring in her lower lip. I can't find a listing for her - she said she had kind of a limited practice - but since she said she was licensed I thought you'd know who she was. I wanted to track her down because I have had some intriguing ideas about some mutually benficial business opportunities that I wanted to share with her. So would you have her call me, please. I go by 'Bob The Artist' and my number is XXX-XXX.

You can just imagine how I'm responding to this one so far. This guy apparently thinks I'm some kind of fucking den mother to every little wandering goth chick who says she's a dominatrix. Oh, excuse me - licensed dominatrix, whatever the hell that means. I myself have got a business license, which I would bet money "Vanessa" doesn't – but there is no license-granting body specifically for dominatrixes. Not even if they have "a limited practice". If I thought such a thing would keep out the riff-raff, I'd vote for it, but I doubt it would even put a dent in the hitchhiking-Mistress population.
But wait, it gets better.

So, if you could just tell her I wanted to talk to her, that'd be great. But let me also tell you about myself – I'm Bob The Artist, I'm a very intense guy in my forties, well-built, good size, not into pain, but with fantasies of domination. So if you ever need a well-built, middle aged guy, intelligent, full head of hair, Scottish background, clean and STD free, for your sessions, we should talk about that. I'm fixed, too – don't know if that matters, heh heh. As an artist, I'm very intense. So if you need a drone or a stud, or anything like that, for your sessions, just call me, I'm Bob The Artist. Okay, thanks, and thanks for passing that message on to Vanessa.

He definitely wants me to know he's intense, doesn't he? And the Scottish thing – what is it with people telling me their ancestry lately?
And, of course, now I know exactly what the "mutually beneficial business opportunities" Bob The Artist wants to share with Vanessa are. The thing about these pitches that never ceases to amaze me is how guys like Bob The Artist always think they're making me a unique offer. Because, yeah, a girl like me just doesn't get men offering themselves to her for sexual services every day.
Oh – wait. Actually, I do! Actually, not only do I have people offering up their bodies to me for every imaginable use – and a few even I can't quite visualize - there are people who would pay me money to fuck someone else as part of a scene with me. (Not that I arrange such things, you understand.) And while he doesn't explicitly say so, I have a very strong suspicion that Bob The Artist would want me to pay him for his stud services. I could be wrong – but I bet I'm not. Historically, anytime a strange guy calls me up and starts talking to me about "business opportunities", what he always wants is A) to have sex, B) to get paid for it, and C) for me to make that happen.
Bob The Artist does get points for one thing – he didn't specify that he would expect to be fucking women only. Usually with calls like this, the guy will make sure to state that he's into pretty much anything – but no other men, of course! He's straight! So either Bob The Artist isn't straight - or it just didn't occur to him.
So, sorry Bob The Artist, but I don't have a license to pimp out well-built middle aged guys, even they are very intense. Guess you'll just have to drive around again until you find Mistress Vanessa.

Another video snippet, in which Roman and I muse about just what we might do to our "The Weakest Kink" contest winner.
By the way, if you're wondering what I'm talking about with the "chopsticks" reference, I will refer you to the top image on the page of genital torment pictures I put up back in October. If you're new here since then: this is a graphics-heavy page, the images are fairly intense, and it is oh so very not work-appropriate.

By Request
Some of ya'll said, "Why don't you post a picture where you're facing the camera?" Okay - here's one. Self-portrait, early 2003.


Photographers info: I shot this on a Nikon Coolpix 950. I've done a lot of different shots involving this set of pocket doors, they're great. For this one, I put two cheap tungsten spots on the other side of the door, and taped white tissue paper all along the opening to diffuse the light. Then I shot through the glass panels of a French door. I intensified the grain slightly in Photoshop. It's one of the "Filtered Nudes" series.

The Mistress's Saturday Night

Last night Max and I dropped by the SNM Underworld party for a little while. I didn't think I was really in the mood for a party – we came over right after working out at at the gym, and I was feeling rather low-energy. But Max, who is actually much more of a social butterfly than I am, insisted.

It turned out to be quite crowded – good news for Sam, the owner. The new shop looks great – from what one could see of it, given that it was stuffed with people. A lot of Goth kids in wild outfits, some kinksters I'm sort of slightly acquainted with, and a handful of what I think of as "my crowd" – Allena, Malixe, Lydia McLane, and few other folks.

I was hanging out by the food table stuffing grapes into my mouth – we hadn't gone to dinner yet – and being amused by the fact that I was one of the most non-fetishy looking people there, if you went purely on clothing. Many of the other guests had really pulled out the wardrobe stops – there was a lot of PVC, leather, rubber, corsets, you name it.

Now, I do own a fair amount of fetish gear like that - but you know, most of the time, it seems like a lot of bother to wear it. I dress up a bit for my clients because they deserve that, and I can enjoy getting all decked out for big-deal fetish occasions. But while Sam is great, and I wish her continued success, there's no way I was going to put on a rubber dress and thigh-high boots to come to the store opening party. Nine times out of ten if you see me at a local fetish event, I'll be wearing some skimpy, stretchy little cotton tank top, leather or PVC pants that are cut like jeans and are thus comfortable, and a pair of New Rock boots. Sexy, but comfy.

Last night I hadn't even bothered with that. I was wearing what I almost always wear when I need something slightly nicer than jeans: black slacks – from The Limited, no less - a plain black long-sleeved T-shirt, and boots. There was a time in my life – long ago and far away – when just wearing all black was a "statement", and people regarded nervously someone who was dressed so. That day is over. Soccer moms wear all black now. But I just haven't quite admitted that to myself, because I am so not a fashionista.

I noticed that almost all of my friends were also dressed down. Max was wearing jeans and a cotton shirt. (Though it was black.) Allena was wearing jeans and one of Monk's tank tops. And I'm pretty sure I remember Malixe wearing basic black jeans and shirt. So I was smiling to myself over the fact that three of the people who I knew to be quite advanced and ferocious BDSM players were really not dressing the part. Four, if you count me. (Lydia was the exception. She was dressed up in a very fetching little fetishy outfit, and she is a disturbingly creative sadist. Lydia has a way of laughing that makes even me a little uneasy.)

But I've observed this phenomenon more than once at Seattle fetish events over the years. I wouldn't exactly say that the newer/less truly kinky the person is, the more dressed up they are – that's not quite right, although sometimes it would be an easy conclusion to jump to.

But I do think that once you get to a certain place in BDSM, you realize that fetish clothes really don't matter so much. You no longer need to bolster up your sense of yourself as a kinkster, or to prove something to other people. If you just like them – and lots of good people do, including me occasionally - that's fine. But they become non-essential.

In spite of the fact that Max wasn't dressed up, he apparently got a bit toppy with one woman. A female acquaintance approached him, bringing with her a second woman, who promptly informed him that she was there to grovel to him. Max has no philosophical objections to strangers groveling to him, but as he said to me later, he likes to know why.

After some more conversation it became clear that she was groveling with the hopes of getting into the sold-out Bondage Intensive class he's teaching next weekend. (She wasn't actually down on the floor, in case you're wondering. This was apparently to be sort of a verbal groveling.)

Max kindly but firmly said no dice, the class is full and that's it. They had a discussion about some private lessons, which she seemed interested in. Max finished by saying, with a smile, "And by the way, I like the wrist cuffs you're wearing, and I'd be happy to take a rain check on the groveling."

Looking slightly startled, the woman allowed as how she was really more of a dominant than a submissive.

Max replied, "Well, if you're dominant, you should make eye contact with me when you have a conversation with me." Because she wasn't. Looking down and away while you talk to someone isn't exactly the best way to come across as all domly and shit. (Never mind the whole issue of groveling and wearing wrist cuffs.)

He was telling me this story over dinner afterwards, and I asked, "So? Did she make eye contact with you after that?"
"Yeah, she kinda did that slightly wide-eyed, I'm-not-looking-away thing."

Oh, that's not quite right either, although I'm not really sure what the truly domly thing to do what have been there. And Max has a way of putting one in a position where no matter which way you go, he's gotcha. Either way, her fetishy outfit didn't seem to be doing her much good.