Inside Gloria's Mind

FOUND: antique chastity device for sale

found via Boing-Boing, this fascinating relic of Victorian madness, an "anti-masturbation" device for men. For sale right now on Ebay.

VERY RARE ANTI MASTURBATION DEVICE FRENCH c1880 - eBay (item 190194504224 end time Feb-04-08 20:30:00 PST).

Lego X: Is nothing sacred?

from Gizmodo:

Shocking: Forbidden Set Shows Darkest Side of LEGO

I thought I got all the coolest LEGO sets in history, but a reader pointed out what's probably the most shocking, darkest non-secret in its 50 years: a minifig wearing black tanga briefs. And when I say "briefs," I mean brief. All I can ask is why? Why Mr. Kirk? Why all this painful detail? And is that David Hasselhoff, per chance?

Naked came the passenger

Couple of years ago, this was a joke:

Now it's a reality:

Fly naked on nudist holiday flight

German nudists will be able to start their holidays early by stripping off on the plane if they take up a new offer from an eastern German travel firm.

Travel agency OssiUrlaub.de said it would start taking bookings from Friday for a trial nudist day trip from the eastern German town of Erfurt to the popular Baltic Sea resort of Usedom....

Personally, I'm waiting until they fly to Usesub.

Sex tourism for women comes home

Last week, I blogged about the growing phenomenon of older Western women who travel to meet hunky young men who are happy to trade sexual favors for dinners and gifts. An American entrepreneur has seized on the idea of opening doors for rich older women to hook up with handsome young men on native soil. Strictly dating, of course - but one naturally suspects that young men looking for wealthy women are hoping for more than a kiss on the cheek.

For the mature woman who has everything: a boy toy

Wanted: rich older women interested in hot younger guys. Applicants must be over 35, earn at least $500,000 a year or have a minimum of $4 million in liquid assets, entrusted assets or divorce settlement.

That's the basis of a speed-dating event organized by a New York entrepreneur bringing together 20 "sugar mamas" and 20 "boy toys" vetted by an elite New York matchmaker.

"Symbiosis has allowed ugly rich men to attract young, gorgeous, money-hungry women for centuries; it's now the women's turn," proclaims pocketchangenyc.com, the Web site that Jeremy Abelson is using to promote the event.....

Um. If he keeps going around suggesting that this event is a natural for women who look like frogs, he may end up killing his business. Doesn't he know that every woman is beautiful in her own way?

Broadway (Adult) Babies

Lawrence Clayton as Montel, left, pleads with his lover, Skinner as Andrea, to let him be a baby in Jerry Springer - The Opera in New York, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2008. AP Photo/Seth Wenig

Do bigger brains cause bigger pains?

Today's news carried a fascinating headline,

Strange Creature Immune to Pain

For a second, I wondered if it was perchance, one of the stellar masochists I've had the depraved honor to know...but alas, nothing so exciting as that. Just some research on the itty bitty mole rat:

As vulnerable as naked mole rats seem, researchers now find the hairless, bucktoothed rodents are invulnerable to the pain of acid and the sting of chili peppers.

Some of us may remember back to the 1980s when this thumb-sized, petal-pink creature was first discovered. (If you don't, rent Erroll Morris's fantastic documentary, Fast, Cheap and Out of Control.) Since then, scientists have been poking and prodding at the little critter (not too cruelly, one hopes) trying to figure out what makes these efficient little oddballs tick.

But better than studying why a mole rat doesn't feel pain, I'd like to see more studies telling us why humans feel so much pain. It seems pretty obvious that other species have better protections against sensitivity to pain. I won't even get into the subject of mental pain, because it's so obvious that, on the whole, animals are not as depressed or crazy as people. Physically though, we've all seen animals make amazing recoveries from abuses and injuries that would kill a human. Their tolerance for discomfort is truly awesome, their ability to cope with insect bites, scratches, and other minor pains is pretty incredible compared with our own. There is no mistaking when they have serious pain. But overall, they seem to have a higher threshhold for pain than we humans can even imagine. If you live or work with animals, think how many times a particular animal gets sick in a year. Hopefully very seldom. Now think how many times in a year you're flat on your ass with a back ache, a headache, sinus problems, toothaches, a pulled muscle, a cold, etc. etc. (Or how many times you walk through the day feeling like you should be home in bed.)

Instead of pain-testing animals, I wish scientists would focus more time and energy on figuring out why humans experience more or more intense pain than other species. Is there a biological explanation? Do our bigger brains cause bigger pains?

Kravitz rocks chastity

I don't know if this a spiritual thing for him, or a moral thing, or an "I'm all fucked out" thing. But for some reason, the party-hardy Kravitz has renounced pre-marital sex.

Party boy Lenny Kravitz bans sex

US rocker Lenny Kravitz seems an unlikely candidate to embrace a new conservatism toward sex before marriage.

But on the eve of the release of his new album, It Is Time For A Love Revolution, Kravitz has revealed he has been celibate for the past three years and plans to stay that way until he meets Ms Right....

Seems a shame for a pretty man like him to put himself on a shelf. And why exactly is he doing it? Why do people go around renouncing sex and promoting abstinence? Easy. They are prudes who think that sex is bad, evil, unworthy, degrading, (insert your own Puritan blablabla) in the first place.

When someone offers me a piece of chocolate, I don't tell them, "I'm sorry, I've renounced all chocolates until I can obtain a mystery chocolate I've never yet tasted but which I one day hope to savor?" I take the chocolate and feel lucky that someone was nice enough to offer me one.

Why does sex have to be this big moral issue, this enormous spiritual crisis? Why can't people see it as simply a normal, pleasurable experience an adult is entitled to enjoy - like eating a favorite food or jumping into a favorite swimming pool?

There are a ton of reasons people don't (or can't) have sex. Most of them are involuntary, like not being able to find someone who'll have sex with them or a body image problem or health issues. But even the healthiest, most libidinous adults have sexless periods. Why, yes, dear readers, even I've gone without sex, or without certain types of sex, for periods of time. It's no big deal. It's not like I've renounced anything. I just haven't felt like doing XYZ or didn't feel like doing it with the man I was with. But I might meet someone else or feel differently tomorrow. That's life. Y'know...sometimes you're hot and sometimes you're not.

But people who renounce sex like it's some big moral statement are inwardly conflicted about sex. They may act as if choosing chastity means they're better than the rest of us. All it proves is that they're even more fucked up. There are a ton of reasons why people choose celibacy, but IMO, the only really good reason to choose celibacy is because it turns you on.

The green M&M placebo effect

Did you know that some people think that green M&M's are an aphrodisiac? Me neither!! Snopes just did a little research on the origins of this myth.

RANDY CANDY: Green M&Ms

Now I have to wonder whether there are people who bought pounds of M&M's, ate the green ones only, and then actually believed it worked. In fact, I bet if somebody set up a green M&M blog touting it as hot candy for horn dogs, there would be all these Internet idjits offering loud testimonials to its efficacy. And, hummm....with nothing more exciting than a war in Iraq, some glaciers melting, and financial markets tanking, I bet Big Media would run the Green M&M Controversy as its lead story. Especially if Koncerned Kooks for Amerika wanted to weigh in on the immorality of it all.

Happy dogs

For those who are keeping track, our new babydog Apollo (the toy killer) is getting along great guns with his sister Venus (the giant fluff ball). Here they are, during a happy play time with Leaf, their new kitten sister.

She's a tiny little Leaf who loves the dogs. But not as much as she loves her new toy.

Apollo liked the toy fine too, especially when the kitten batted it at him.

Still, he had to show the toy who was boss!

Venus is just overjoyed to have two new friends.

Subtext

"This is an actual Scrabble Gram that ran in the Washington Post last Friday. The set of first tiles seem to suggest a very dirty answer. I'm not sure how it got past their editor..."

Scrabble Gram suggests naughty answer - Boing Boing

How safe are you?

Male submissives! Would you hook up with the gal who placed an ad like this?

‘‘I’m a young robust dominant girl who likes to conquer men so I can play a nice game with them ... I’ll blindfold you and tie you up and put you in my car and take you with me to my house, where we can play all kinds of exciting games. ... I like men with a good job, suits, because it gives me an extra kick to dominate them: weaklings are no challenge.’’

Sounds like the kind of typically coy prodomme-type ad you see all over BDSM personals sites. So if she wrote you back and set up a date to meet, would you take any precautions? Would you try to vet her and find out if she was a known entity? Or would you assume that you have nothing to fear because you're a strong guy who could take a woman if need be? Would you set up a safe-call with friends or give them details, like her phone number and street address? Would you even ask for her home phone and street address before you met, or would you just jump at the opportunity to have an exciting, mysterious adventure with a domina? Maybe you'd even assume that if you saw her ad on a popular BDSM site, she was clearly "one of us" and understood all about safe, sane consensual, so you could be lazy and horny and just follow your urges.

Most of the time, even anonymous Internet hook-ups work out fine. BUT. In this case, this seemingly innocuous ad was a come-on from a woman who set out to lure a guy to her place, put him in bondage, kill him, and then steal as much as she could from his credit cards and bank accounts.

Woman killed man she lured with S&M

Think twice and then three times before you agree to an SM hook-up with a stranger. Demand facts, details, information that can prove the other party is sincere. Nothing and no one can protect you in situations like this, except your own sense of self-preservation. USE IT.

FOUND: Antique Jades

Found on eBay: Antique Erotic Asian Jade Figurines.

Alphabet clamps

Thanks to Mike for pointing me to the most interestingly artistic alphabet I've ever seen. Wait for it to scroll.

FOUND: Big Ass Cigarette Case

I like to be descriptive. :)

Link: Antique Sterling Silver Erotic Cigarette Case 1900c

SM Vocabulary Builder: reader chimes in

Funniest email of the week:

Dear Blog Editor,

Please accept my neologisms for your very hilarious SM Vocabulary Builder section. Since I have never submitted to you before, I feel I should demonstrate some of my qualifications.

I am the two-time D/scrabble champion for the East Coast, and a former Porno Password champion for the Mid-Atlantic region. And, I was fired from Reader's Digest for suggesting the magazine change its column "It Pays to Enrich Your Word Power" to "It's Slaves Who Enrich the Words 'Power Exchange.' "

My offerings:

Poontangy (POON-tang-ee) adj.: A vagina that tastes piquant, often said following cunnilingus. Mmm, hun ... I love it when you're poontangy.

Fuctose (fuk-TOHSS) n.: sweet juices from a woman's pussy. Jane's fuctose has tasted mildly poontangy since she added more citrus fruits to her diet.

Bonus:
Kneeallajism (nēˈäləˌjizəm) int. A portmanteau exclamatory command, usually by a dominatrix to a male submissive, to kneel and lap up ejaculate (jism). Kneel! All the jism! Now, slave!

Thanks, Quill! :)

Depressingly dumb SM death

Thanks to Scott for sending in this bad, sad story about how stupidity and SM do NOT mix.

This was a completely, easily avoidable mistake.

'Bizarre sex' kills woman

....police discovered Toby Taylor attached alligator clips on the end of a stripped electric cord which he attached to her breasts, according an arrest warrant affidavit. He would then use the off and on switch on a power strip to shock his wife, according to court records.

The jolt of electricity is believed to have triggered the heart attack, said Police Chief David Sterner.

“This was some bizarre sex,” he said.

Thanks for weighing in with your moral opinion, Chief. That really helps matters.

The most bizarre part to me is that the guy didn't have the sense to learn about what he was going to do BEFORE doing it. So depressing. Rule number one of electroplay: NEVER EVER create a full circuit through the upper body. Oh yeah, and Rule number one of SM: Don't do hardcore stuff until you know wtf you're doing.

Best Come Hither review ever

Awww. Received this incredibly lovely letter from some readers of Come Hither a couple days ago, and with their permission thought I'd share. It just made my day week month! I count my fans as my life's greatest blessing.

Dear Gloria,

I have just finished reading your book, Come Hither, with my wife of 24 years.

I have tried to come to terms with my need for kinky sex for many years. I know that the feelings and needs go back to being a small child, well before I had any idea about sex, I just knew that some things felt really nice, for example wrapping myself tightly in the bed clothes so I couldn't move and the feel of the satin edge on a particular blanket.

I have recently made considerable progress in how I feel about my needs. I have previously tried to discuss them with my wife but without much success. I bought one book written by a Prodom that Amazon recommended as an introduction. I asked her to read it, the end result was not good and left her feeling pressured and uncomfortable.

I then found your book and it has been a revelation. It is easy to read, full of humour, warmth and humanity.

Your book has enabled us to talk honestly and openly with each other about our feelings about kinky sex. My previous attempts to do this were pretty much along the lines of the less than successful approaches you have described in the book. Not quite the "Diver Dan surprise" approach but the coy, guilty, negative make your partner feel unloved thing was definitely in evidence.

The quiz near the beginning of the book made me realise that my wife is far kinkier than I ever realised. It got us talking and has really helped to deal with our feelings towards each other and kinky sex.

The outcome is that we both feel like 17 year olds again. It is like an enormous weight has been lifted off both of us and a whole new chapter of life has opened up for us. I am so excited I can hardly sleep.

Your book has been an enormous help to both of us and I wanted to thank you.

I wish you a long happy and healthy (and kinky of course) future. I hope that you will continue to write as I am sure that there are countless others out there who could benefit from reading your work. I feel that your work is of particular value to couples like us who are unlikely to join the club scene but who are quite happy to be regularly kinky in the privacy of our own homes.


Thank You

Dumber than Janet's nipple

Thanks to NightHeron for catching this piece of absurdity. The FCC's slapped ABC with a hefty fine for a re-run of an old NYPD Blue ep which shows a lady's tush. Apparently buttocks are a sex organ AND an excretory organ.

Huh. I never thought of it that way, but now that I'm thinking...that's kind of hot! Maybe next time I spank someone I oughtta tell 'em to hoist their excretory organ in the air. Ooh, so dirty.

Nude Buttocks May Cost ABC $1.4 Million

FCC's definition of indecent content requires that the broadcast "depicts or describes sexual or excretory activities" in a "patently offensive way" and is aired between the hours of 6 a.m. and 10 p.m.

The agency said the show was indecent because "it depicts sexual organs and excretory organs - specifically an adult woman's buttocks."

The agency rejected the network's argument that "the buttocks are not a sexual organ."

NightHeron comments: An interesting paradox. Aside from the sheer stupidity of the the charges, there is the question: even though the ass can be used or viewed sexually, is it a "sex organ"?

Erotic Art Show - Dora Maar

The last show today is devoted to the talented female photographer Dora Maar, another woman better known for her life than her art. In Dora Maar's case, it wasn't her affinity for Bohemian circles so much as her liaison with Pablo Picasso that brought her enormous attention. As Picasso's mistress and frequent model, Maar enjoyed the artistic limelight; but, unfortunately, her own work has languished behind the shadow of her famous lover's reputation. Perhaps this is why it is so much easier to find images of Maar (and particularly paintings of her by Picasso), then to locate her photography. As scholars are increasingly acknowledging, her work deserves a wider audience. For an interesting perspective on this artist, I recommend this review of Dora Maar's Photography by Donald Goddard.

I'll start with three works by Picasso in which Dora Mora was either the subject or the model (as in The Minotaur below), and two famous photos of her: one which appeared on a book about her love affair with Picasso, the second a photo of her shot by Man Ray.

And now on to Maar's photography. First, a note: these were all credited to Maar on the Net...but it's the Net, after all. A couple of them look like her (hmmm...perhaps self-portraits?) and at least one (in the furnished room) doesn't share the style of the others. If someone familiar with Maar knows more about the origins of these works, please leave a comment and let me know.

Erotic Art Show - Mina Loy

The hardest thing about researching and preparing this show and the next is that the two women artists have been more famous for their lives than they were for their art.

I start with the exceptionally gifted Mina Loy. One could devote a show simply to the many fabulous photographs of Ms. Loy among many of the greatest writers and artists of the early 20th century or posing in vampy, exotic outfits. Indeed,it was a lot easier to find photos of her on-line than to locate her art. Perhaps it's because she counted many of the most famous Bohemians of her time among her friends: Ezra Pound, Jane Heap, George Brancusi, Djuna Barnes, Tristan Tzara, Man Ray...the list goes on and on.

Although she and her work fell into obscurity, a biography published about her some years back created renewed interest in her extraordinary life and especially in her neglected works of poetry. As a free-thinking, adventurous, talented Bohemian, Loy has naturally become a popular subject of feminist scholarship as well. To learn more about Loy, I recommend this Interview with Mina Loy Scholar, Carolyn Burke.

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Some images of the artist:

Erotic Art Friday - 01/25/08: Pierre Molinier

I'm featuring three 20th century artists today, all of whom are famous, infamous and obscure, all the same time. They all achieved artistic fame; all three were infamous for their controversial lives and subjects; and all three are barely known outside of the worlds of arts and literature, where it is mainly scholars and coterie audiences which have kept their work alive and created renewed attention in their contributions.

I'm starting with Pierre Molinier (1900-1976), the greatest sex radical of the three. His themes, and presumably his life, were obsessed with transsexualism and sexual fabrications. Though he started out working with conventional themes he eventually drifted into surreal, haunting sexual dreamscapes that revolved around his personal fetishes. Using props, dolls, and himself as a model, Pierre Molinier created unforgettable landscapes of hermaphrodism and transvestism. His death was as strange as his imagination. Following in his father's footsteps, he killed himself in his 70s, leaving behind a suicide note written in chalk on his door that simply said, "I killed myself. The concierge has the key."

You can read about Molinier on Wiki. ArtNet has an excellent biography as well.

Before the astonishing work, a famously wicked quote from Moliniere:

Pierre Molinier

"Notre mission sur la Terre est de transformer le monde en immense BORDEL."

(Our mission on Earth is to transform the world into an enormous WHOREHOUSE.)

Intimations of Immorality

My panties are in a twist over tomorrow's Erotic Art Show.

Boots nipple cream a shoo-in

UK mega drugstore, Boots, is selling a nifty cream to ease nipple discomfort for breast-feeding moms. Hmm. Soreness. Discomfort. Dryness. HMMM. Any UK pervs ever try this after some hard-core nipple play?

Gotta love their wild ad:

Link: Boots nipple cream ad escapes ASA ban

FOUND: Classical three-way

This has been sitting around in my archives so long I can't remember where I found it. Roman era, I think. So next time someone suggests to you that poly/swinging/bisexual romps are a modern invention, you could flash this at them.

FOUND: Erotic Buddha

Think I found this on eBay, and don't recall if it's a modern copy, a modern invention, or an antique (I'm guessing it's a repro)...but wow, I think it'sone of the most erotic little Buddha pieces I've ever seen.

And, in international anal news

via popbitch.com

Men in England and Wales are twice as likely to die as a result of having a foreign object in their anus as they are through being struck by lightning.

Fur babies come home

Note from your normally acerbic blogger: If you don't like animals, or women who get sappy about animals, move on. Otherwise, prepare for a big gush of sappy animal love. You've been warned.

---

Our fur babies are home at last. YAY! It's been a long and arduous process to get them home -- I'll write more about that grisly series of events another time. But wow it was all so worth it.

Our first adoption was a tiny little dog now officially named Apollo (the companion to his mini-poodle sister, Venus). As of this afternoon, we are joined by a kitten (formerly Mary) whose renaming has not yet been finalized.

When last you (regular readers) saw Apollo, he had a handsome pouf of silky white hair on his head. It gave him a kind of Elvis-sexy, Einstein-smart allure.

But his rescue person clipped off his beautiful do just before we got him, so he looks a little more like a Terrier mix than the powderpuff Chinese crested that he is. Forgive a mom's prejudice, but I still think he is a very dashing fellow.

Apollo made it his business to fit in. He is the most unbelievably well-behaved, loyal, affectionate, eager-to-please, and delightful little dog. I'm amazed at how quickly he's adapted to us. He knows how to make friends with everyone. Even the cats quickly accepted him. Last night, he and Venus curled up together to sleep (**MELT**). Venus, who mourned the death of our bichon very deeply, seems measurably happier. Her laugh is back. I think she knows Apollo was picked to be her special friend. Besides, who could resist his charms?

Meanwhile, Jen brought our babycat home from the pound today, and she too is unbelievably sweet and cute. She's spent the entire evening curled in a happy lump on Jen's chest -- looks like she's stuck to Jen by velcro. Not that Jen minds.

Babycat won the Dog Popularity Contest too. To our shock, all three dogs were simply thrilled to meet her. Even our big bossy grumpy old border collie, Bobo, loved her. He thought she was a tiny sheep we'd given to him to guard, and soon began trying to herd around.

Of course, not everyone shared our joy. Jasmine aka Evil Spawn of Satan, formerly known as The Kitten, did not appreciate having a vile usurper kitten move into her space.

Hopefully in a few days, Jasmine will begin to see Babycat the way we do, as the cutest sweetest little friend you could ever hope to have.

Cirque de perve'

So...if you were a pervert, you might look at this lovely picture of handsome Cirque du Soleil acrobats, and think to yourself, "Why, I bet if I clamped some tight nipple clips on that middle one right now, he would have no choice but to hold still and take it." At least that was the first thought that flashed through this pervert's mind.

Mayan virgin sacrifice a myth

Apparently all those bad 1950s B movies got it wrong. But it made for pretty fantasies, didn't it?

Ancient Maya sacrificed boys not virgin girls: study

The victims of human sacrifice by Mexico's ancient Mayans, who threw children into water-filled caverns, were likely boys and young men not virgin girls as previously believed, archeologists said on Tuesday.

Notice they don't mention if the BOYS were virgins. Come to think of it, why did people assume the girls were virgins? It's not like anyone performed forensic gynecology on their bones or found intact hymens among the remains. I mean, REALLY. Did a little Greek mythology and a whole lot of Judeo-Christian fantasy get layered onto Mayan history here?

How far out should we go?

What do you think? Is it okay to walk your pet in public, or is it something you should restrict to times and places where you're among people who get it?

"Pet" girl kicked off bus for wearing leash

A British bus company has apologized to a girl who is led around on a leash by her boyfriend and describes herself as a human pet after one of its drivers threw her off a bus.

Tasha Maltby, 19, told British newspapers she was the "pet" of her 25-year-old fiance Dani Graves.

Pictures showed her dressed in black Gothic-style clothing with silver buckles on a silver chain -- which the driver of a bus from the firm Arriva took exception to.