Big front page update, check it out. Exciting news — Playboy is flying me to LA to be on their Sexcetera show! I’m pretty excited, especially because they’re having me direct an oral sex scene, and from what the producer has been telling me, it’ll be the most explicit segment they’ve ever done. Yay! And you know, it’s funny — I always think of Playboy as where grown-up boys go to see their sister’s Barbies naked. I think directing sex will be fun — and at the very least, it’ll be really weird to tell other people what to do to each other’s genitals. It’s actually kind of a fantasy of mine, to direct a couple (now lick here, etc.). One couple wrote me recently asking for advice on getting their sex life back in gear, and I fantasized about giving them assignments and expecting reports. Maybe I should.

Okay, so Tony Comstock and his wife are sending me their Sybian to "borrow" for a while. Wow! I’ll have to get my own attachments, of course, and I won’t be able to conjoin it with any SRL machines because it’s not mine, but… wow! I get to try a Sybian! Thanks, Tony! But I still want to own the Love Machine, and all offers still stand.

I did literally two hours of interviews today, including a 45 minute radio show, mostly discussing the porn HIV crisis. On top of all my other work at Good Vibes — I need to slow the 40-hour a week grind. I am beat. But this is pretty cool: "Companies that don’t realize their markets are now networked person-to-person, getting smarter as a result and deeply joined in conversation are missing their best opportunity." (Thanks Loraine!)

I agree wholeheartedly. I just wish someone would listen, especially in the adult/sex toy biz. I have so many ideas about blending adult web retail and web based social networking structures… but right now, I have to watch the Daily Show and get some rest. Must hawk rubber pussies at the Dildo Hut tomorrow….

Trolling around the web today, I discovered this chilling yet fascinating article about the death of a Canadian bondage model and possible link between her death and snuff films — and a summary of other snuff film reportage.

Also, I found yet another irritating web page where girls raise money to get fake boobs — all orchestrated by the guys who run the site. It’s a creepy subculture, but I guess I shouldn’t judge people who have a surgery fetish. Oh, fuck that — eew. But it got me to thinking… How about something more positive? No one ever funded my RealDoll fantasy three-way orgy, but then again it was costly and I didn’t have a PayPal link on my site. But I do now. And just yesterday I was out shopping and came across an expensive item that I felt could really further my research — a sex machine called the Love Machine. If women who hate their bodies can get guys to buy them bolt-ons, then why can’t a girl who loves her pussy (me) seek funding for juicy orgasmic experimentation? I’d record the results here, of course, and photodocument the process. I’ll even wear a costume. Plus, I could tinker with the machine and see if my geeky friends will help me figure out how to mount a motherboard and Bluetooth onto it.

So here’s my gambit: The machine costs $400 plus tax, and I’m broke. There is a black-and-white PayPal link in the left-hand column on this page, with two ladies telling why you should donate to Tiny Nibbles. Toss a couple bucks into the kitty, and I’ll tastefully tickle mine with the Love Machine right here on my site. Donors over $150 get to suggest an outfit, or colorful sugary syrup. Meanwhile, you’ll become an esteemed benefactor for robotics and sex research, and will surely go down in the annals of dirty technological philanthropy. I’ll also write a consumer-focused product review for it as well.

No, it’s not a Sybian, the supposed Cadillac of sex machines, but asking for *that* kind of money makes me feel weird. Maybe that’s why I have six books in print and I’m still scraping and scheming. I dream of someday starting an Exploratorium for perverts. Imagine how a Sybian could marry Bluetooth, or a Flash or midi-controlled interface! So let me amend that — front for a Sybian and I’ll send you a few very (private) special photos with the machine and your kinky accoutrements of choice.

I’m getting daily letters about the porn HIV crisis. To put a human face on this, and a very positive, sex-positive one, it’s refreshing to read the Live Journal blog of Eva Lux (thanx to my girl SJ at Grand Opening!). Lux is on "the list," waiting for her results. You really get to see what’s going on from the inside here, especially all the legal wrangling. Plus, she’s a cool chick; I’d ask her for a date in a red-hot minute. She really starts talking about it on the 23rd, the 18th, and back (www.livejournal.com/users/evalux).

Well, it seems that if something is worth doing, it’s worth banning. SRL is banned in many places — we got kicked out of Japan, were banned and escorted out of Austin, Texas by officers of the law, and are banned from performing in San Francisco, our own hometown. To make my fellatio book’s "forbidden" status at public libraries official, my publisher has issued this press release.

The HIV in porn issue rages on within the industry, and discussion among fans, performers and producers on messageboards and other places has reached a passionate, fevered pitch. I posted a link to an AP article about AIM’s Sharon Mitchell and was met by this link to a discussion thread, and apparently much in the industry is being called into question now. It should be noted that I love Adult DVDTalk, and highly recommend their discussion boards. It’s good that all of these questions are finally being asked, and I hope they are answered. One woman wrote:

"I guess I’m mostly lamenting the fact that right now, I don’t feel I can fully trust even the supposed "good guys" in this business. I’m disappointed by things industry leaders have said; I’m even more disappointed by things some fans have said. My attitude about porn these past few weeks has become very confused and not terribly positive.
Somebody restore my faith, please."

My response earned me a lot of email, so I’m reposting it here:

After reading the Adult DVD Talk thread, one thing I’m sure of is that there are two women I don’t want to be right now — one is Condolezza Rice and the other is Sharon Mitchell.

This post may get me in trouble too, and it is all from my POV, but here goes…

Porn industry, meet the sex ed industry. The sex ed biz is a can of worms, and it is equal part scammers, backstabbers and bullshitters, and the rest are continually educating themselves, honest, and work on the front lines helping people. It is often hard to tell these people apart.

There are plenty of people who are accredited in a dozen different ways (and not) who give false or misguided sex information out, advice that can be dangerous. Just read the SF Bay Guardian or the Playboy Advisor, or even any number of "sex ed" books from people who do no more than play parts on TV shows (Kim Cattrall, Sex and the City, et. al.).

I do know that school has a bad rap among the other sex ed communities here in SF, especially among those who work the front lines answering crisis phones and working in clinics, but I don’t know why. I visited them for an opening one night, and no one there had any idea who I am. (hope that’s not too egotistical) What I do know is that their students have come into our stores on field trips, and I have given them "store tours" that last for about an hour. They often have little knowledge about how sex toys work, current sex ed books out there, and safer sex supplies. They leave the store knowing more than when they arrived, and I’ve had them hang around afterward and ask me further questions about things like cock rings.

I don’t know what Mitchell’s other education might be, but I would hope that she will get a chance to explain to the porn community any supplementary education she might’ve had, hopefully, say in HIV crisis clinics. But the thing is, she’s the most qualified person for the job in the porn community, and the most accepted. No one else has ever really given a shit about the performers as far as I can tell. So maybe she’s not a doctor, and she needs to watch her step very carefully right now, but she’s been fighting guys for years like Jim South who attack her for "scaring off new talent" when she educates new starlets about the physical and mental aspects of the biz. She at least has Nina Hartley working with her at AIM, and Hartley is an RN.

I am right there with you, angered by comments from industry people and fans alike. But I have to say, I’ve felt this way for years, more so when I wrote my porn book and included a chapter on safer sex in porn. I felt that my role was to at least educate viewers, and become a viewer advocate, since the industry could care less about both their viewers *and* performers.

We are after all talking about an industry, that for the most part, derives its revenue from sexual shame. It’s up to us to make it a sexually healthy place, mentally and physically, for ourselves and others who care to read what we write.

And for me, that means picking and choosing sexually healthy videos, bringing attention to people who want to celebrate healthy sexuality through their careers and work — and being loud, obnoxious and disliked for drawing attention to things like racism (comments by starlet Violet Blue; what Sean Michaels lived through), abuse (Max Hardcore), murderous sex practices (John Holmes, et. al.), and blatant disregard for the sanctity of other peoples’ lives (Jim South, AVN, August 2003, page 60).

Believe me, worse things are happening with HIV transmission and lies in our own country, as well as in places like sub-Saharan Africa. At least we can talk about it, and make a difference every chance we get.

It’s long past time for the porn industry to grow up and meet the level of sexual sophistication and intelligence of its viewers — and especially its critics.

Random notes from a wonderfully random day. Spoke with a reporter at CNN about women as porn viewers; I may go on a point/counterpoint discussion, which would be a whole lot of fun, especially if my opposite is a religious fundamentalist. Arguing with those people is always a laugh riot.

Cruising around my regular web haunts, I read a smart excerpt from a Larry Flynt commentary on the HIV/porn industry/mandatory condoms issue. I agree with Flynt on almost everything, especially about HIV infections increasing if the mainstream industry goes underground. But I still don’t think that porn is that much safer than the general populace; at least until every performer is educated about transmission and risks. You can have the world’s best tests every month (and they do) and still get infected from a desperate double anal with a guy who thinks that a test every 30 days gives him a Teflon dick (or a girl a Teflon pussy). By the way, Daze has been a terrific source for factual news on this topic, so check regularly if you’re interested. This topic is ruling my life these days; I spent the past several days going back and forth helping Carol Queen research her upcoming article in the SF Chronicle, and even when I went down to SRL today, Mark and I spent a good amount of time chatting about it.

Also web haunting, and on the subject of bodily fluids, hats off to Bacchus at Eros Blog for his reaction to the jerk whose date sprung a leak.

In non-virtual haunting, I just have to say — it’s like summer here in SF. And if you’re here and it’s warm and beautiful, and you happen to be in the Castro under that big rainbow flag like I was this sunny, jasmine-scented afternoon, surrounded by happy hairy bears strolling sweetly hand-in-hand, stop in the Castro Cheesery next to the beautiful and ornate Castro Theatre. No, I don’t know anyone who works there or anything like that. I’ve been going there for years, and they make the most delicious frozen, blended espresso drinks from freshly-ground and -dripped espresso. They even make them for me with no dairy, because I’m a lactard. And sometimes, on a sunny day, when pairs of guys, girls and even mixed gender couples (gasp!) are pushing strollers, window shopping, and doing a heck of a lot of smiling for no apparent reason, those drinks are just the best thing in the whole wide world.

Last but certainly not least, I found out that during downtime at one of the Good Vibes stores, Chriso and Megaboobs have been masterminding a graphic novel comic series starring… me! As I blushed furiously, they told me all about "The Intergalactic Adventures of Violet Blue," a sexually explicit (of course) comic about promiscuous goody-two-shoes sex educator Violet Blue, zipping around space (imagine ponytails and a fifties’ fishbowl-style helmet) saving the universe from vibrating cockring leeches and the like. They are even dreaming up sidekicks for me, such as a sexy French maid whose feather duster shoots feathers at enemies — her name is "French Tickler." Oh la la!

To start, a big, wet, sloppy smooch and thank you to people who have sent me emails o’love. Two things have cheered me up today. One is evil and wrong. When passing by a group of 10-ish schoolkids waiting for the bus, one of the young girls hurled an insult at another: "Michael Jackson fucked your brother!" Oh, those kids. The other is this picture from the last fiery SRL show we did, in Los Angeles at the POST Gallery, July 4, 2003. That’s me on the left, in front of the flame from the Boeing jet engine, bent over slightly holding the remote control and operating the Running Machine (machine obscured by fire; click to enlarge).

I am cranky. I have been cranky for over a week. It’s been a lousy month at work for me, and just when I think it’s really crappy, it gets worse. Then, to top it all off, the only light of my life in the crack whore, junkie haven neighborhood that my office is in, leaves. No, not my buddies Thomas R. or Carol Q., I’m talking about Raging Stallion Studios, the gay porn company (formerly) around the corner from the GV offices. It used to be that trudging to work, avoiding stepping on needles walking through SF’s SOMA district, I’d occasionally get to see shirtless, hot gay male porn studs loading equipment in or out of vans. Ahhh, it was an oasis of carefree, heavily-hung boy-nymphs, in a sea of (often literal) shit, blood and puke. I work in a really, really bad neighborhood, and now the muscle-bunnies that added cheer to my life have departed to surely better pastures, ten blocks away.

Also, I am now an official living member of the "banned books" authors’ club, according to my publisher, Cleis Press. Apparently the concessions made between the right-to-lifers/decency groups and the library system is that only one book now need remain behind the counter — my fellatio book. This is very troubling, considering that free access to accurate sex information about basic sex acts — and fellatio is as basic as it gets — is difficult for folks with no money, the exact people at the highest risk for STD’s and viruses like HIV/AIDS. The good news is that both oral sex books are being translated into French — double entendres, anyone?

HIV is on my mind, of course, because of the outbreak that just hit the hetero porn industry based in LA — halting production in many (but not all) studios until June. Though I am not surprised, not at all. They do have access to the best testing you can get, the PCR-DNA test administered by AIM Healthcare, and a neat system for monitoring performers, testing them every 30 days. But despite the system, performers and directors are still not aware/educated, are ignorant, or just plain don’t care about risk assessment and transmission. It’s also possible that they don’t take risking peoples’ lives seriously, or have self-destructive tendencies. Regardless, if the porn I see is any indication, performers and whoever is in charge of making decisions around sex acts take risks that consistently undermine the use of (any) condoms on camera. Many also regularly make offensive and dangerously wrongheaded statements about HIV being a "gay" disease, whereas the gay porn industry simply practices *thoughtful* safer sex precautions, assuming that *everyone* is a carrier and acting accordingly (except for the shunned-but-fetishized barebacking fetish videos).

It’s not just porn performers and directors who are unaware/ignorant of HIV transmission; it’s practically the whole world. Which, by the way, the World Health Organization (2003 stats) puts HIV infection at 40+ million, with over 5 million new infections yearly. And with (currently) 26-28 million of those in Africa, and over 90% of those cases hetero transmission, you’ve got not only an epidemic, but a hetero — not a gay — plague. In the US, hetero transmission is the #3 way to become infected.

To me, that means that porn is a high-risk job, even if you’re one of the lucky ones that get tested regularly for working with the bigger studios — and you’re not a desperate performer with a pimp fucking with your head, or you live in Prague or Brazil (plenty of porn is shot in these inexpensive, no-condom, no testing locales), or you’re just too young or uneducated or addicted or depressed to know or care. Not everyone has the privilege to make informed decisions about risk. But in a job where you risk your life every day just to make a buck ($1600 for the non-condom double-anal that gave Lauren Roxx HIV), you at least should have the right to know the details on those risks. Of course, AIM does their utmost to educate new performers about physical and emotional risks, but there are vocal people in the adult industry who oppose this education, worried that AIM will frighten off the "new talent." (AVN, August 2003.) It’s making me really embarrassed for the whole human race that people willingly make others do things that might — nay, *will* — kill them to fatten their pockets, from certain pornographers to certain American presidents.

And yes, wearing a condom and then pulling it off to shoot come all over a girl’s pussy, ass, in her nose, or eyes, completely undermines the use of the condom altogether — for *many* infections and viruses, in addition to HIV. Get it? "Any percutaneous or permucoasl exposure to blood or bodily fluids…" That’s broken skin, open wounds, cuts and mucosal membranes — mouth, eyes, vagina, anus. (Source: WHO) Granted, the possibility of oral transmission of HIV is very low *in ideal conditions.* Lesson: don’t learn sex from porn. Check the safer sex chart.

So I’m cranky. I’ve lost many friends to HIV/AIDS over the years, and I just wish the world, governments, religions, and stupid "family" organizations didn’t stigmatize non-reproductive sex education. Also, I loaded OSX on my laptop and fucked it up — and last Friday I got pushed out of the SRL panel lineup by an egomaniac dude who never works at the shop but brags that he does, while I was stuck selling videos, having men and women ask me all night if my "boyfriend is in SRL", with a gash on my arm (now a scar) from working all day that day to build and haul robots to the venue for the show. But at least there are these cute pictures of me that day working on the big bots wearing one of the guys’ "Dum Bitch" hats.

Got this great, juicy email over the weekend. Check out her blog, it’s deliciously nasty:

I checked your site out, LOVE it! Will be back for more. :) Thought I’d share my Viagara experience, after reading yours. I am a woman who tried Viagara a few years back. I was a sexual BEAST on it, and I had multiple orgasms during that session. It was absolutely amazing, and I didn’t even take the WHOLE pill!
 
As it is, my sex drive is VERY high 99% of the time to begin with, but back THEN it certainly wasn’t. So that’s saying a lot, as well. :) Viagara does work for some women. :) Anyway, great site! I have a sex blog, at;
 
http://sashasecrets.diaryland.com/index.html

First, I won’t be updating my blog again until after the weekend — I’m about to disappear to work on the SRL event this Friday, where you can see scary and amazing things, and I’ll be interviewed as "Woman who operates deadly machines." Unless something *really amazing* happens, for the next few days I’ll be among the machines getting dirty and feeling generally at peace with a wrench in my hand.

Second, I want any Good Vibes supervisors reading this to know that we never, ever have fun in the stores like the fun you read about below in view of the customers. It only happens off the clock on our own time, or in other sex toy stores belonging to the competition. When it is slow and no customers are around, we work *even harder*.

Third, in response to a few reader emails, yes, Dita does indeed have fakers. To prove it, waltz into any Good Vibes store and look at the tags attached to any of our products from Sportsheets, such as the Tethers. There you will see early pictures of a younger, fresh-faced, A-cup Dita. One of my pals, a professional fetish model, bemoaned Dita’s boobjob in a fit of boobified cultural sadness, saying that she was the "last of the A-cup fetish models."

Fourth, more reader response: To make a highly specialized weapon out of a pocket pussy is a simple feat. But it is a deadly and sure weapon, the weapon of choice for evildoers and one-woman army-types — so you must take care that it doesn’t fall into your opponent’s hands. Remarkably devastating and packed with tacky flair, a blue cyberskin anus or lavender molded softskin pussy harnesses the powers of painful cuffing unlike the world has never seen. Plus, they’re handy and portable. And guys like to fuck them. Should anyone displease you, or try to make you ring up customers while on the clock, grasp the pocket pussy firmly by the base — away from the end you would stick your cock into, if you have one. The fucking end is the dangerous end, the weighty striking end, and you should handle the puckers and folds as if they were made of sensitive and explosive nitroglycerin. With a small degree of skill, grip the soft end and begin to swing the heavy Smurf-orifice in a circle — any technique is fine; overhand, underhand, or wildly over your head like a helicopter. If you have a battle cry, this is a fine time to use it. Advance upon your enemy, brandishing the wild swing of your now-lethal pocket pussy, inching closer to deliver stunning blows. Caution: pay special attention to the swing of your deadly pussy, as it requires slight athletic ability, and you do not want your secret weapon to accidentally take you out with a blow of painfully dense fake pussy or ass to the head.

Yesterday was a slow and boring shift at the Good Vibes store I worked at. The other stores rocked, while I sat around and quickly degenerated into a total dork. I blame it all on "underpants-on-the-outside-guy." He’s a regular, comes in once a week or so, and is a bona-fide crazy street person who, as you may guess, likes to wear his undies as outies. I was behind the register with a dyke I work with and she said, "hey there’s my boyfriend." I turned around to see underpants-guy with his back to us, staring down our stack of free newspapers and fliers by the door. Undies on the outside — check. Shirt — none. Lacy black underwire bra — check. Hardhat — check. Our free literature was really bothering him, and we watched him rearrange it with unrestrained frustration into a system that, well, maybe you have to wear your underpants on the outside to understand. After we left and we were rearranging the stacks, my pal told me that last week he came in, dressed as usual (though sans hardhat) and holding a book titled "Are You my Daddy?" It was a gay humor book, with all these different gay male archetypes in it. He wanted to look through it with a sweet gayboy employee, and told him that there was no page for our gayboy, but if there was it would be "SATAN FATHER FUCKER" and then he erupted into peals of laughter, squishing his gnome-like face into a twisted rictus of glee. I could only imagine our sweet employee recoiling in horror, while my dyke pal laughed along with underpants-guy. She really does admire underpants-guy, she says he "has style."

Later, I found myself playing with the Ecsta-sleeves with an employee I’ll call Nurse Yum. The sleeves are scary to me — not because I judge any man’s desire to fuck the little pocket pussies, and in fact I’ve heard they feel pretty good, but the purple vulvas and blue anuses remind me of dismembered Smurfs. Plus the material smells weird, like wet asphalt, and they’re kind of oily. The freaky thing is, the material picks up dirt in a way that balls up and looks like gray Smurfette genital warts, and Nurse Yum and I took turns peering into the orifices and freaking ourselves out. We decided to put clean floor models out, of course, but I couldn’t resist making the two orifices kiss and sing little songs to each other in an attempt to make Nurse Yum pee her pants in hysterical laughter. When that failed, I handed the vulva off to a coworker I shall call Miss Megaboobs, and we pretended we were in a Kung-Fu film, fighting the stretchy sleeves like nunchucks.

My mind was gone. And I’m sure I will be taken to task for this report. But I managed to out-dork everyone when I discovered the bin full of men’s leather jock straps with zippers up the front. The cups in these things are ridiculously spacious, I mean, you could pack a porn star horse cock in there and still have room for your wallet, keys and a sandwich for later. I managed to wrap one around my head, with the cup over my face and mouth and the elastic straps over my ears — and I snuck up on coworkers breathing heavily and saying "Hello, Clarice. It puts the lotion in the basket, Clarice." There was a photo taken, and I’ll post it as soon as Miss Megaboobs can figure out how to get it off her cell phone…