Here is a confession.

I don’t have sensitive nipples. I spent the first year that I was sexually active pretending that I did, though. I thought there was perhaps something wrong with them or that maybe I was feeling all there was to feel. I did a lot of exaggerated moaning and groaning when my boyfriend would suck on them. Meanwhile, I could barely feel a thing. I didn’t understand all of the hype.

I have heard rumors that women with larger breasts sometimes don’t have very sensitive nipples. I can’t find anything to corroborate this one way or another. Nonetheless, when I am turned on, they are basically numb to any sort of gentle stimulation.

I finally admit this to my boyfriend and he has adjusted his technique a bit. He still sucks on my nipples sometimes because he likes to (and hey, it isn’t as if I dislike it). And he also began doing something completely delicious. He licks and kisses for ages right at the crease of my breasts where they meet my chest. Everything that I imagined was supposed to happen when someone licks your nipples happens when he does that. Shivers run through my whole body and I find myself begging him for more.

However, I’ve more recently realized that there is pleasure to be had from my nipples. It all started when I began having phone sex with A. For me, gently sucks and nibbles don’t do much but hard pulling and twisting turn out to be remarkably effective. If it weren’t for A ordering me to pinch my nipples until I was whimpering in pain and pleasure I might never have discovered how much joy I could get from treating them roughly. A side effect of this is that I have also become very responsive to the word “harder” as he often growls it out me when he wants me to step up the intensity of the squeezing. The timbre of his voice at those moments is so incredibly intense that I really can’t think about disobeying.

As a result of these exchanges, I brought the new discovery to my boyfriend. He now enjoys pinching, twisting, and biting my nipples in addition to his previous repetoire. One of these days I’ll even get him to admit that he is becoming a bit of a breast man.

Nerve published a really bad story today. It isn’t bad in the grand scheme of things, but as erotica I’m not feeling it. Priapism by Robert Lopez is infuriatingly stylized, really to the point of sillyness. If you ever wanted to know what existentialist erotica (with a hint of pure absurdism) would look like, this is it:

The man has an erection and the woman is locked in the bathroom. The children are downstairs playing with toys. The dog is in the yard. The back door has been left open and the light in the hallway is on and so is the television in the living room. There is a roast in the oven. The kitchen table is set.
The man loses his erection. The woman emerges from the bathroom. She is clothed.
It’s gone away.
I was in the bathroom.
What were you doing in there?
I was doing what I do in there.
That again.
What’s gone away?

But, Nerve redeemed themselves with a link to this clever quiz, Sex or Something Else. I did terribly, perhaps you will fare better.

I will be back in full force on Friday, I have one more big paper to finish before I can return to blogging on good conscience. However, I am doing a lot of work this semester on sex and sexuality so I thought I would hit you with some of the more provocative quotes from things I am reading and writing.

One research project is in the area of sexuality, violence, and colonialism. Frantz Fanon gives a touching and ambivilent perspective on this in Black Skin, White Masks:

Out of the blackest part of my soul, across the zebra striping of my mind, surges this desire to be suddely white.
I wish to be acknowledged not as black but as white.
Now – and this is a form of recognition that Hegal had not envisaged – who but a white woman can do this for me? By loving me she proves that I am worthy of white love. I am loved like a white man.
I am a white man.
Her love takes me into the noble road that leads to total realization. . .
I marry white culture, white beauty, white whiteness.
When my restless hands caress those white breasts, they grasp white civilization and dignity and make them mine.

There is something troubling about the female body as the site of counter-colonization but there is trouble to a lot of Fanon’s gender politics. More about that in the future. . .

I also recently delivered my paper on masculinity in the works of Kate Chopin. I’ve been delving pretty deeply into the masculinity studies literature but the best part of delivering papers with a psychoanalytic bent is watching everyone squirm in their seats when you talk about the phallus. Especially cigars conferred in homosocial gift situations as phallic symbols.

I leave all of you fellow bloggers with some words of encouragement from Michel Foucault, the theoretical ally of perverts and miscreants everywhere:

If sex is repressed, that is, condemned to prohibition, nonexistence, and silence, then the mere fact of speaking about it has the appearance of a deliberate transgression.

May the transgressions carry on!

Download Bedroom Radio Episode #6 (62 minutes 58MB) or Subscribe

Show Notes

Interview
Mr Melvis of Comfort Stand Records

Music
from Wakka Chikka Wakka Chikka Porn Music For The Masses Volume 1
Eldad Tsabary – Lophophora Williamssii
De Zwervende Keien (The Drifting Boulders) – Wooden Shoes In Tirol
mr_melvis – Whose Fantasy Is This, Anyways? (featuring R. Stevie Moore and Ms. Demeanor)

Dancing with Myself
Tord Gustavsen Trio – “Curtains Aside” from The Ground (Thanks for the song, Jeff! If you have a song that you think I should use for this part of the show, email me.)

Very Cool Podcast
He Said, She Said

Comments? Questions? Adoration? Naked pictures?
Email – bedroomradio AT gmail.com
Phone – 206-339-7357
Website – BedroomRadio.com
Blog – Lumpesse.com

Having a job that involves travel sounds sexy on paper, but the reality is a bit different. Driving in unknown cities, eating crap food, never sleeping as well as you do in your own bed, and long commutes down anonymous interstate. Flying doesn’t solve this problem either – it just involves having to share your breathing air with lots of germy people and drunk men oggling your breasts.

At the end of a work day on the road I am physically and emotionally drained. I want a glass of wine, something to eat, and a couple of good orgasms.

I’m not horny in any sort of sensible way. I don’t have a particular fantasy running through my head, I don’t think about kissing or groping or fucking. Hell, I don’t even think about another person. My focus is wholly selfish and personal; I just want to get off, hard. If I had another person at my disposal in this moment, I would be the worst lover in the world. I would barely let them touch me except for a back rub and cunnilingus. After that I would banish them to cuddling, I wouldn’t even pretend I cared if they got off.

After a day of teaching, sublimating my needs for everyone around me, this sort of selfishness makes sense. My feet and legs ache, my back is throbbing, and my throat is worked hoarse from being a peppy teacher all day. All I can think about is taking my mind off of it all with bath and an orgasm.

So, after a passable dinner at a local restaurant (I’ve learned to take a chance as I can’t fathom another meal at Appleby’s) I head back to my hotel with a singular mind on my trusty vibrator. At times like this, I am too lazy to use my fingers and I know that the toy will get me off fast and well.

Fuck fuck fuck. Reason #1 to pack the night before. My vibrator is nowhere to be found and I recognize that it is probably sitting on the kitchen counter with random other things that I pulled out to pack but that never made it to my suitcase. (Sidenote: If anyone looked at my kitchen counter right now, they would think they were dealing with a psychopath. I reckon it is the home of some dirty dishes, my birth control pills, a massive purple rabbit vibrator, and a pencil sharpener. I mean to pack everything but the dirty dishes.) It seems silly but the absence of my vibrator almost brings me to tears.

Possible solutions:
1. Go solo and succumb to a meek orgasm.
2. Suck it up and ask the concierge about a sex shop nearby.
3. Blog about it while I consider the dilemma.

As promised last week, I interviewed a real bonafide rock star and asked him all sorts of sleazy questions. You know you love it!

Download Bedroom Radio Episode #5 (128k – 26 minutes) or Subscribe!

Show Notes

Interview:
David Lewis Gedge of The Wedding Present and Cinerama

Music:
Cinerama – “Lollobrigida” – Disco Volante
Cinerama – “Tie Me Up” – Torino

Dancing With Myself:
Curve – “My Tiled White Floor” – Gift (Thanks to Si for the great pick! If you have ideas for songs for me to “dance” to email them to me.)

Public Service Announcement:
“How to Pick Up Girls at the Library”

Call for Submissions!
I want to know what song was playing or what song you wish had been playing when you lost your virginity! Call the comment line to share.

Comments? Questions? Adoration? Naked pictures?
Email – bedroomradio@gmail.com
Phone – 206-339-7357
Website – BedroomRadio.com
Blog – Lumpesse.com

I’ve been missing in action for a few days because I’ve been dealing with laptop meltdown. The conclusion seems to be that my Dell 300m is completely fucked with little chance of it getting de-fucked. So, I’ve had to move the operation over to my desktop and am frantically searching for a cheap laptop that will get me through November when I’ll be working out of town every weekend. I don’t want to hear anything from the Apple-owning peanut gallery right now. I’m still sensitive over the loss of my sweet little Dell.

Anyhow, at risk of becoming a “this is what I read in Nerve this week” blog, I had to share this essay on talking dirty because it could have been written by my boyfriend.

When my breath returned, I restarted my pushing. Her face strained in anticipation. Still, I said nothing. Another minute passed. No longer able to bear the suspense, she closed her eyes. My mind raced with possibilities: “I like my penis inside you.” “You’re beautiful.” “I am going to fuck your brains out!” “I like your pussy.” “I am so horny for you.” “You have great tits.”
It all sounded to me like lame cocktail patter at a swingers’ party. My dick was getting soft just hearing these thoughts run through my head.
Then it just happened. Under all that pressure, I coined the phrase, “You like that?!”

This essay plays out all the insecurities that the guy feels at being asked to talk dirty. I have made a similar request to my boyfriend usually in the form of asking ridiculous questions during sex like:
“What are you thinking about?”
“How does that feel?”
“Do you like that?”
He usually just sort of nods and raises an eyebrow. The only thing I can say that guarantees a verbal response is “I love you.” This is always answered with an “I love you too.”

This isn’t to say that the poor boy hasn’t tried. On occasion he will get industrious and say something about how good my pussy feels. Largely, though, he doesn’t want to talk much at all and I try not to push him. There seems to be little worse than fucking someone that is trying desperately to come up with their next line. It makes the whole thing feel like small talk.

Lately, though, as we’ve been playing with domination a bit in bed, C has gotten a bit more talky. I think that last weekend he actually said, “Do you like being my little whore?” Wow, big steps for a guy that barely moans. I loved it but I can tell that he isn’t 100% there and this is all still an act to amuse me.

Men out there. Are you self-conscious about talking dirty? Do you do it anyway? What works for you? I want to figure this out and I don’t want my boyfriend to be humiliated!

The talented Lisa Carver has an excerpt of her new memoir featured in Nerve today. She writes about her experience working as a prostitute between tours with her band Suckdog.

I get to change my personality five times a night, stepping into other people’s ideals. I can guess — from a man’s greeting, from his clothes, his eyes — who his dream woman is, and I become her. I take on her bearing, her speech, her interests. It’s a lot like my shows, except I don’t have to come up with my own character or new rhymes.

The comparison between prostitution and live musical performance caught my eye. Carver’s book is billed as a post-punk memoir so it is expected that she would tie these elements together. However, I think there is more to the comparison than convenience. While I have had little peeks into various elements of the music industry through the years, one thing I haven’t been is a musician myself. The idea terrifies me as much as it excites me. That means my opinion on this question has to be taken with a grain of salt.

Still, the analogy seems to pan out at least a little bit. It also tells us that even the most innovative/independent performers, commonly assumed to be outside the realm of commercial influence, feel the impetus to sublimate themselves before the audience. Even when money isn’t the driving factor the imperative to please the audience means that the performer (sexual or musical) has to change themselves to meet someone else’s fantasies.