The Blowfish Blog

[Toys] I Like It Doggie Style Strap

This simple strap adds an unexpected boost to doggie-style sex — especially if you’re a person who likes the feeling of having your partner take control (or if you like to have extra control over your partner). The I Like It Doggie Style Strap is a simple strap with a 14-3/4″ by 4″ soft pad connected to two wide webbing strap handles. Put the pad under the hips of the fuckee and have the thruster hold the handles, then get busy! The extra control from the strap really takes the whole experience up a notch — it makes the fuckee feel rather ravished while it gives the thruster extra leverage to really get the angle (and the speed!) just right. The overall effect is quite heady.

It can also be used more gently (though this is entirely up to the one holding the straps), and is a great boon to those who find their partner’s grip on their hips a bit too firm and/or bruising. The strap does not fasten around the hips, which makes this usable for a large array of body types (though larger folks might find the rubbing from the webbing straps a bit abrasive after a while). This versatility means you can use the strap for an extra hand-hold in other positions as well — put it under his back while she rides him so she can hold the handles and lean back for new adventures in woman-on-top. With this strap, you can use it doggie style, use it to spice up a favorite old position or make it easier to try a daring new one.

• I Like It Doggie Style Strap

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[Toys] Vibrating Anal Beads

You say you want to start exploring your butt, and we say, “Huzzah!” There are tons of nerve-endings back there, and butt-play provides some of the most instantly, intensely pleasurable sensations known to man- and womankind. But what to start with? You want something slender, as width is the first barrier to entry. You want something that’ll let you work up to something a little bigger, but slowly. You want something that’s firm enough to ease in, but flexible enough to bend with your body. And you want something that will feel good even if you just have to let it sit there a second while you get used to the feeling of having something back there.

It sounds like you want our Vibrating Anal Beads. These 7″ of firm, but flexible, lavender jelly beads are the perfect thing for the butt-play beginner. The first bead is a mere 1/4″ wide, which is about the size of a man’s pinky finger, and they increase gradually without ever getting beyond the beginner stage, with beads measuring 3/8″, 3/8″, 3/4″ and 3/4″. The bottom of the toy is hollow and fits an (included) matching lavender bullet that runs on an (included) 1.5 volt “N” size battery. The vibrations are stronger near the base, but travel along the entire toy quite nicely. It’s just the right amount of bendy to penetrate newbie butt-holes, but flexible enough that it will bend with your body as you gently insert the toy. In fact, the only thing we really don’t like about the whole toy is that it doesn’t have a flange — we strongly suggestnot inserting that last bead so you’ll have enough to hold onto (so it won’t slip inside). A great toy for folks brand-new to butt-play or for use as a warm-up for more advanced players!

• Vibrating Anal Beads

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[Greta Christina] Gratitude for Small Favors: “Evolve: Sex”

I suppose I should be grateful.

And I am grateful.

But it’s a bit sad that I should be grateful about something that should be ridiculously obvious — and ridiculously common.

I’m grateful for this: On the History Channel’s series “Evolve,” on the episode about sex, they say the word “penis.”

Several times. Casually, matter- of- factly, as if they were saying the word “jaw” or “kidney.” When they say, “The penis is a good example of convergent evolution,” they could just as easily have been saying, “The eye is a good example of convergent evolution.”

Ditto with the words “intercourse,” “sperm,” “sex organs,” “climax,” “ejaculate,” and more.

And, of course, the word “sex” itself.

See, here’s the thing. I actually have some genuine complaints about this program and the way it handled sex. I’m very irritated, for instance, that the show’s sole mention of homosexuality was a snarky joke about how, if dinosaurs engaged in homosexual behavior, then maybe that’s why they died out.

I understand that evolutionary biologists often ignore homosexual behavior in animals — they’re primarily concerned with reproduction, for obvious reasons. But the question of homosexual behavior — and why it exists in so very many species — is, from an evolutionary perspective, a fascinating one. If you don’t have time in your one-hour program about 600 million years of the evolution of sex to discuss homosexuality in any depth, I certainly understand — but can you please refrain from having your one mention of it be a childish, hostile joke?

And I’m very irritated indeed by the fact that they spent five minutes (a fair amount of real estate in an “hour long minus commercials” program) on how human sexuality and human reproduction are beginning to be separated, and how humans are beginning to take conscious control of their reproduction . . . with almost the entire segment focusing on in vitro fertilization, and genetic screening, and potential cloning, and other forms of techno- reproduction.

Without once mentioning birth control.

Birth control is an ENORMOUSLY important means by which the human species is divorcing sex from reproduction. And it’s an equally enormous means by which we are turning reproduction into a conscious choice. Birth control doesn’t just mean that you can have sex without reproducing. It means that you can choose — consciously, deliberately — who, if anybody, you reproduce with. It means that you can reproduce with the great person you decided to settle down with after years of shopping around, instead of with the first person your hormones pushed you towards in your teens.

That’s huge. And it’s way more widespread — more widespread by several orders of magnitude — than in vitro fertilization. As methods of consciously controlling our reproduction go, in vitro fertilization is a drop in the bucket compared to condoms and diaphragms and birth control pills.

I could go on. (To get a more complete idea of the possible complaints about this program, check out the Pharyngula comment thread.)

Yet despite my complaints, I’m willing to cut the makers of this show an awful lot of slack. Because I keep coming back to this:

The show treats sex as if it were completely normal. It treats sex as a biological system, like vision and digestion, jaws and skin. An interesting one, to be sure, and one that we find unusually compelling . . . but a biological system nonetheless. One that can be discussed in straightforward language and illustrated with film and photos and clear diagrams. One that doesn’t call for either moralizing or childish jokes, any more than digestion does. (They did use some humor to lighten the tone of the program . . . but they did that with the episode on digestion, too.)

The show treats the existence of sex plainly, as a simple matter of fact. (Just as plainly as it treats the very existence of evolution as a simple matter of fact. But that’s a subject for when I’m wearing my atheist blogger hat, not my sex blogger hat.)

And for that, I’m happy, and grateful, and willing to cut them a fair amount of slack.

And how pathetic is that?

I do like this series, and despite my complaints about it, I overall liked the Sex episode. It had interesting information that I wasn’t familiar with (did you know that sharks were the first animals to have intercourse?), and its segment on Gibraltar macaques is commendable for its recognition that, even in non-human animals, sex can serve social purposes other than reproduction. But what does it say about sex on television that I should feel called upon to mention — and praise — the fact that a science show treats sex scientifically? How pathetic is it that this should be something special?

Good for “Evolve” for treating sex as if it were normal. Bad for most of the rest of television for treating it like a freak show or a dirty joke . . . and making me think there’s something special about acting like a grown-up about it.

“Evolve: Sex” can be downloaded from iTunes, and the series can be rented on DVD from Netflix or purchased from the History Channel.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2008. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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[Toys] Nipplettes Vibrating Nipple Clamps

Ok, I’ll admit it: I’m a nipple-clamp wimp. Even though I love the way they look, I whine when they’re too tight, but when they’re loose enough for me they end up falling off whenever I move. Until now.

Meet my new favorite pair of nipple clamps: the Nipplettes Vibrating Nipple Clamps! These pretty pink clamps are covered with a soft, matte-feeling rubber coating and, even at their tightest setting, hardly felt pinchy at all when I put them on! I was pretty flabbergasted, especially when I shook, jiggled, washed the dishes, and, yes, even full-out shimmied and they didn’t fall off! I don’t know how they did it, but these are non-pinchy nipple clamps that stay on! Fantastic!

But the awesomeness of these clamps does not stop there. They’re waterproof, they vibrate (with a push of a button on the end of each clamp), but they’re also wireless. They’re adjustable to even looser settings (though if you make them too loose, they might lose their stay-on-during-shimmying properties). The vibrations are nice and tingly and translate well to the nipples, though these are more of the “turn-me-on” variety of vibrating nipple clamps than the “bring-me-pain” variety.

Do note that if you wear these for a long time — which is possible, since they’re so comfy on — you will experience that sweet pain from the rush of blood back into your nipples when you take them off. If you’re a wimp like me, you might want to limit yourself to wearing them for shorter play sessions (or for only part of one). The widest you can adjust the clamp to stay open on its own is 5/8″, though it will open even wider than that — up to 1-1/8″ wide, which is wider than most thumbs. 1/8″ gripping surface, 11/16″ by the end of the vibe, 2-3/4″ long (including the button). Takes three watch batteries (batteries and back-up batteries included) for each clamp. With their sleek design, fashionable pink-ness, and gentle stay-on power, the Nipplettes are a fashion accessory all on their own!

• Nipplettes Vibrating Nipple Clamps

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[Videos] Jimi Hendrix: The Sex Tape

Now, I normally don’t give a hummingbird’s fart in a tornado about celebrity sex tapes — why would I want to watch some badly-lit, badly-blocked, grainy sex video when we have access to well-produced, well-lit porn in quantity? But the Jimi Hendrix Sex Tape is a sex tape featuring a guitar god, and I admit, my interest was piqued when I first heard about the film’s discovery a few months back. I finally got a chance to see it, and it’s pretty interesting. Keep in mind: the film is only forty minutes long. And that’s not forty minutes of rockin’ sex tape goodness. Much of it is a sort of mini-documentary about Hendrix and the ’60s, with commentary by Cynthia “Plastercaster” (who once made a cast of Hendrix’s member in plaster) and Pamela Des Barres, the infamous “supergroupie” who dated the bass player from the Jimi Hendrix Experience. There’s lots of stock footage from Woodstock and the streets of San Francisco, and Des Barres going on and on about how awesome the ’60s were and how great free love was, and so forth.

We do finally get to see the sex footage itself. All nine minutes of it. Sure, it’s on the grainy side, but the quality is better than I expected. The film features Jimi (presumably) and two brunettes, and opens with a double blowjob. The weirdest thing about the video is how essentially immobile Hendrix is — he literally just lies on his back with his eyes closed most of the time. (He does briefly rouse himself to give the girls head, and there’s some thrusting of hips near the end, so: not a Hendrix-shaped sex mannequin! Possibly just a dude who looks kinda like Jimi wearing a bandana, though.) The best part is one of the special features: the sex tape footage alone, with audio commentary by Des Barres and Plastercaster.

After the sex footage, the remainder of the running time is dedicated to the authenticators insisting that yeah, totally, no doubt, absolutely, it’s Hendrix, for sure — I was tired of the argument by then, though, and no more convinced than I was at the beginning. I don’t know if it’s Hendrix or not, but hell, let’s say it is. Then for historical curiosity alone the flick is worth a look, and as an amateur sex tape it’s pretty hot, and as a mini-documentary on the ’60s it’s cool, even if it’s not quite the HUGE INCREDIBLE SEX TAPE EVENT Vivid would like it to be.

• Jimi Hendrix: The Sex Tape

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[Videos] Under the Covers

Director Candida Royale has a gift for oddball feminist porn, and Under the Covers is no exception. It’s a rather sweet, sometimes funny, always warm and playful look at peoples’ secret sex lives.

Some funny moments — Charly Carlyle, as the doctor, goes out of her way to say size doesn’t matter, that it’s the motion, not the meat, and etc . . .. but then we see her slip into a sex shop and buy a simply enormous dildo, which she takes home and breaks in thoroughly. Maybe size isn’t essential, but it sure can be nice . . . she later goes online looking for a man with a giant-sized cock, too, when the toy fails to fully satisfy, and gets fucked by a big dick in her living room. Well, the heart wants what it wants . . .

Meanwhile the cute clerk at the sex shop can’t resist trying out the toys, even though it’s revealed that she’s an undercover abstinence-before-marriage crusader out to convert the heathen (or spy on them, or something). She plays with vibes, rides a dildo, and reads Naughty Spanking Stories A to Z. Another virgin converted!

The other characters are equally varied and interesting, from newlyweds embracing oral sex to a reporter stalking an erotica writer to a mistress and her slave. There’s some good dominatrix stuff, and a masquerade sex party that ends with some surprise connections once the masks come off. Overall it’s smart, cute, sexy stuff.

There’s even a funny ’80s-movie-style ending with photos of the various couples and text describing their fates (the newlyweds become porn stars, the therapist embraces her size-obsession and marries the prostitute, the avowed virgin becomes a sex toy tycoon, the reporter joins a polyamorous triad, and so on. Good extras, too, including a long behind-the-scenes feature.

• Under the Covers
• Naughty Spanking Stories A to Z

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[Champion] Champion is Hell on Wheels

Shine Louise Houston’s new movie, Champion is now in post-production… but you can race away with a Champion Skateboard now! The first in our new line of Champion merchandise, this is indeed the coolest thing you can possibly imagine.

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[Caught in the Net] Superherophilia

Summer is ending, and with it the glut of superhero movies (a straggler or two aside) which made the summer so superpowered and explosion-tastic. Since porn is (among other things) the dark mirror of pop culture, I decided to go looking for some superhero porn, and found more than a single column can possibly contain. Some highlights:

In the twisted-and-talented category, we have Ponderosa’s slash fan art, featuring some really very accomplished reimaginings of Batman movie The Dark Knight, including Harvey Dent in a straitjacket with the Joker dressed as a fetish nurse, and Batman and the Joker making out, and Batman plowing the Joker’s ass (as seen above). You seldom see this level of talent in illustrations of superheroes and villains fucking each other!

Some people try to make their own superheroes, as in this Lazer Babes flickr set, subtitled “These women are trying to kill each other with their super powers.” They’re basically standard lesbian porn images, only the women are shooting deadly lasers from their eyes and nipples and several orifices. It’s . . .. weird, but interesting.

Others attempt to get a little superherophilia going in their own lives, like the guy who wrote in for this installment of the “Savage Love” sex advice column, saying in part, “I’m a 42-year-old gay man with a superhero fetish . . . The first time I did it, it was incredibly hot, but since then, it’s felt like something’s missing . . . At times, I even feel a bit ridiculous . . .. Am I just being too uptight, or are there some fantasies that are better left to the imagination?” Dan Savage’s reply is non-judgmental and helpful — as he usually is — and might be helpful to the rest of you out there who feel conflicted about your desires to dress up like a dude who dresses up like a bat prior to doing the nasty. Excuse me. The super-nasty.

New Phoenix Filmworks is an independent movie producer — which insists it Is Not Porn! — that specializes in live-action superhero DVDs, with homegrown heroes like PowerCat, Darkfury, and RetroGirl kicking low-budget ass in skimpy costumes. Maybe it’s not technically porn, but I gotta think their core audience is a certain fetishist set. I mean, to some extent, porn is in the eye of the beholder — as I’ve written here before, there are people who get off to the image of a bare foot pressing a car’s accelerator, or fondling a chunk of the Berlin wall. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that, as long as the car or the wall consent.)

And if that’s not enough, I’ll let the good people at Fleshbot do some of the work for me — a couple of years back they compiled a nice collection of superhero porn links for your enjoyment. Excelsior, true believers!

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[The Pro Circuit] The Love Song of Ernest E. Borgnine

Remember Ernest Borgnine? Though he’s been in lots of, you know, good movies, Borgnine first thrilled me in the early-’80s TV show “Airwolf,” a show that made me know exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wanted to be a Vietnam vet helicopter pilot with a stolen top-secret gunship. I also wanted to hang out with Mr. Borgnine, who played the scrappy, earthy, sarcastic mechanic to Jan Michael Vincent’s angry depressed ex-military brooder who, each week, didn’t like to blow things up, but just had to because people pissed him off. Borgnine’s spunky mechanic, “Dom,” had the job of voicing things the other characters didn’t want to hear but ultimately would prove to be right.

Apparently the “spunky” Borgnine was, and is, thrilling himself as well, and still saying some spunky things other people don’t want to hear. A week or two back, the 91-year-old actor — appeared on “Fox & Friends,” where he was told by the effusive host that he looked like he was in his 60s. “How do you do it?” he was asked by host Steve Doocy. “I can’t dare tell you,” says Borgnine. Then he leans close to Doocy and, as they say, spills it.

It’s really worth watching for yourself, but I’ll cut to the chase: “I masturbate a lot” is what Borgnine said, causing Doocy and his two couchmates to collapse into fits of embarrassed hilarity. “So, have you ever been on YouTube?” guffaws Doocy in response — almost eerily prescient, these Fox guys.

Sex therapist Marty Klein was quick to chortle his approval of Borgnine’s “secret” and his expectation that the media would freak out, saying in his blog: “Is the phrase ‘I masturbate a lot’ as dangerous as a half-second of Janet Jackson’s breast? As bad as soldiers saying ‘fuck’ as they approach death in Saving Private Ryan?’ I hope Fox gets two or three complaints from high-profile erotophobes like Morality in Media. Then everyone will see the clip and discuss it for weeks, as happened with Jackson’s nipple.”

Dr. Klein, however, was not nearly as quick as the porn industry, which, with its trademark level of class, put out a press release. “Online adult video rental service XRentDVD has offered mainstream actor Ernest Borgnine a free subscription to its XRentDVD Preferred program,” said a story in Xbiz. The story quoted XRent DVD VP Vincent Sorvino: “Mr. Borgnine is 91 and he looks like he’s in his 60s. he has obviously found the fountain of youth, so we are offering a Hollywood legend some free product so he can continue along the road to the fountain of youth. We will create an account for him. He can create his queue and put as many titles as he wants in it.”

Whatever, dude . . . I’m guessing a guy who made it to 91 through self-love has figured out how to get porn on the interwebs. But regardless of whether Borgnine’s disclosure nets him free porno by mail, the media firestorm is not yet over because it . . . never began. Dr. Klein’s wish that Morality in Media should get all hopped-up over the motions of Borgnine’s right hand remains unfulfilled, and in fact the silence is deafening.

Borgnine’s statement reinforces the idea that it’s great to jerk off at 91 (or 60, or 70, or 80). As Dr. Klein observes, It sends the message to adolescents that they don’t have to cram their sex lives into the next five years, and also tells adults that what they do is OK. I’m not sure I was waiting for Ernest Borgnine’s approval to masturbate, but maybe somebody was.

But not WENN, which provides news for IMDB.com. According to them: “Movie veteran Ernest Borgnine refuses to retire from movies, claiming acting has helped him live to the age of 91 . . ..The Oscar winner is still as busy as ever and has three new films out in 2008.” Nothing wrong with keeping busy, as well as “busy,” I always say, but WENN also quotes Borgnine as saying “These guys who say, ‘I can’t wait to retire. Hot dog!’ And after about a week they’re ready to pull their hair out. Keep busy and you’ll stay younger and healthier, and you’ll be around a hell of a lot longer.”

Notice something missing? Apparently Borgnine’s self love has been disappeared, and replaced with a love of acting. The two may not be mutually exclusive, but a family-friendly source like IMDB doesn’t want to mix up the children. The incident made the blog rounds. It’s particularly telling to read Huffington Post’s search engine tags, obviously staplegunned there in anticipation of a huge media firestorm. “Borgnine Masturbate, Ernest Borgnine, Ernest Borgnine Masturbate, Ernest Borgnine Masturbates a Lot, Ernest Borgnine Masturbating, Ernest Borgnine Masturbation . . .” — WTF, dude, we got it!!

But there was no firestorm, and now Borgnine’s secret has been bizarrely cleaned up. The YouTube clip is still around, obviously, but it apparently doesn’t have the staying power of the really important news.

Does Borgnine’s secret really provide the fountain of youth? I don’t know any more than Ponce De Leon did, but it sure as hell can’t hurt.

Thomas Roche blogs about espionage, international relations and fart jokes at thomasroche.com.

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[Greta Christina] The Eroticism of the Olympics, and the Inherent Hotness of Variety

A couple weeks ago, I wrote here about the eroticism of exercise.

Today, I want to write about the eroticism of watching other people exercise.

I’m talking, of course, about the Olympics.

I’ve been getting very sucked into the Olympics this year. I’m finding it fascinating as a social phenomenon. And of course, I’m drawn in by the beauty and drama and ridiculous display of discipline and skill.

But I’ve also been watching it from the perspective of the erotic connoisseur/ drooling pervert.

And I’m finding it fascinating from that perspective as well.

I’m only occasionally finding the Olympics arousing to the point of being pornographic. I’m definitely enjoying the parade of beautiful athletic bodies in tight, skimpy outfits, and I will admit that I’ve been watching women’s wrestling with one hand on the remote and the other on a vibrator. (And can I just say: Actual, top-level female wrestling? So much hotter than the fake stuff in porno.) So far, though, women’s wrestling is the only Olympic event that I’ve been treating as actual porn.

But there’s a broader, more diffuse sort of erotic pleasure I’m getting from the Olympics.

And that’s this: In the parade of beautiful athletic bodies in tight, skimpy outfits, there is an astonishing variety: a variety of physical forms that the bodies take which I’m finding beautiful, and inspiring, and tremendously erotic.

It’s all too common in our culture to mistake athleticism for body fascism. “Physically fit” is too often used as a euphemism for “approaching a single ideal of perfection that all bodies are supposed to aspire to.” I’ve fallen into that trap myself: I’ve definitely felt lumpy and out of place at the gym as a chubby middle-aged lady in a weight room full of Venuses and Adonises. (It doesn’t help that I work out at a university gym, populated largely by grad students in their twenties.)

But watching the Olympics is a lovely, sexy reminder that even top-level physical fitness comes in a delightful variety of forms.

There’s the long lankiness of the runners. The cheery robustness of the volleyball players. The sleek curvaceousness of the female divers. The sleek compactness of the male divers. The agile wiriness of the fencers. The pure muscularity of the male gymnasts. The deceptive petiteness of the female gymnasts. The massive power of the weightlifters. The solid, almost stocky fireplug build of the female wrestlers.

All of them at the absolute top of their game.

I’ve always found variety, in and of itself, to be erotic. It’s always been at the heart of my big complaint about mainstream porn: the bodies of the performers, and the sexual acts themselves, fall into such small, confining, repetitive little boxes. I have nothing against the bodies and the acts themselves: I just get tired of seeing the same ones over and over again.

Variety, in and of itself, is erotic. And if you can tear yourself away from the big-ticket sports and spend some time with the quirky, lesser-known ones, the Olympics give you a parade of physical variety that is breathtakingly beautiful, and kind of ridiculously hot.

And best of all, it can give a huge boost to your own sexual self-esteem. If all I watched were the gymnasts and the runners, a night with the Olympics might make me feel pretty lumpy and unsexy. But with the time I’ve spent watching the dazzling variety of forms that physical fitness can take . . . well, the next time I step into the weight room, I’m definitely going to feel a whole lot less lumpy, and a whole lot more hot and beautiful.

Especially since, of all the athletes I’ve seen at the Olympics, the ones that my own body most closely resembles are the female wrestlers.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2008. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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