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I am sort of embarrassed to admit that until recently, I didn’t have a decent blindfold. I know, I know, what sort of kinky pervert am I without a blindfold. I did have a great collection of sleep masks from transatlantic flights that had been standing in for a proper blindfold, but I was pretty psyched when Sextoy.com gave me the chance to review this gorgeous, leather blindfold.

As soon as it came, I tried it on and found that it was comfortable and blocked out most of the light from the room. But, I had other plans for this blindfold and they involved my girlfriend, a sex swing, restraints, and a variety of vibrators and other toys. Now, I’ll be perfectly honest with you, I don’t think that the blindfold was the focus of her attention during much of the reviewing process. But, honestly, if you’re doing a good job, the blindfold should never be the focal point. And if the blindfold is doing a good job, the wearer will stop thinking about it all together. Still, I asked her to reflect on the use of blindfolds in general and the adequacy of this blindfold in particular.

Ellie: So, how about that blindfold?
How much light did it let in?
Ariel: I got a tiny sliver of light right at the bridge of my nose
Ellie: Yeah, I noticed the same thing when I wore it.
Ariel: It wasn’t enough to let me really look at anything, but it was not total darkness
Ellie: How was the padding? Was it comfortable against your eyes?
Ariel: It felt like the perfect amount of padding for me – it’s cushioned all the way around, but it doesn’t press against my eyes the way some padding can
Ellie: Do you like being blindfolded?
Ariel: Absolutely
Ellie: Why?
Ariel: I even close my eyes when I kiss
Ellie: Doesn’t everyone do that?
Ariel: I always thought so, but I’ve been told I was wrong and now everyone keeps trying to make me look them in the eye all the time
Ellie: Hmm, that is sort of odd. I open mine at intervals but I don’t generally keep them open for kissing.
Ariel: I like the dark, it feels ‘more’ in the dark
and my sets of visuals don’t get so confusing
Ellie: I don’t like being expected to do much when I can’t see. When we all have sex in the dark I get clumsy and disoriented.
But when I’m tied up or being left in one place, it is okay.
Ariel: Blindfolds sound like a nice solution – I can have my dark and you can see what you’re doing
Ellie: Exactly. And you can’t see me not knowing what I’m doing.
Ariel: if this is you not knowing what you’re doing, in I’m for it when you figure it out ;)
Ellie: I just have an effective toybag.
Ariel: that’s just gravy

So, take it from the two of us. Blindfolds can spice things up and add a new element to almost any encounter. Additionally, the SL Leather Padded Blindfold totally met my specifications. It is high quality and well-crafted. I’m confident that it will last for a long time and that it functions quite well. So well, that it is a complete afterthought during a really sexy moment.

Thanks to Sextoy.com for allowing me to review great bondage and BDSM sex toys.

There are days when I crave his words more than his touch. Exhibit, a series of instant messages from Michael that left me gasping:

Fuck me until I cry.
Fuck me until I pass out and keep fucking me until you’re done.
Fuck me like I’ll die when you let go.
Fuck me until your name is a prayer on my tongue that I can’t articulate over my gasps.
Fuck me ragged until you scrape away the rough edges and mend my jaggedness like a river-washed stone.
Fuck me broken. Fuck me whole.
Fuck me until I forget my hangups, my catch-22 codes and the traps by which I condemn myself.
Fuck me until I remember that sex is good, love is straightforward and it is ok to just be held.

After he wrote all this, I observed that he never hesitates to turn casual conversation into poetry. He insisted that he didn’t know anything about having a casual conversation.

My gut reaction when I read about Natural Harvest, a cookbook of semen-based recipes was that I had found something that even I found a bit beyond the pale. And then I thought about it more and I’m sort of intrigued. Anyone out there cook with semen before?

The We-Vibe

The makers of the We-Vibe were kind enough to send me one a few months ago and I’ve been thinking a lot about it ever since. Let me start by telling you the procedural things about it. It is a dual-stimulation vibrator that is meant to be worn during hetero intercourse. The smaller end slides inside the vagina and the top part curves around and hugs the clit. Since the small part is pretty small, it still leaves room for a penis to enter.

The We-Vibe is silicone and rechargeable and comes in a nice little carrying case. The construction of it seems to be high quality. And I enjoyed trying it out.

Jay and I actually played with it on our first day at Dark Odyssey in order to christen our newly made-up camp bed. I was wet and we added more lube to the toy to get it nice and slippery before sliding it in. The vibrations instantly felt very nice and I wiggled it into place with my fingers while stroking his hard cock in my hand. When he slid into me, I felt instantly extra-full. The bit of additional bulk from the toy stretched me nicely and his cock made the internal part press harder into my g-spot.

As we fucked the vibrations remained just intense enough to keep me at the edge and I came very quickly. In short I loved the thing. Breathless after my orgasm, I looked up at him and said “so, what do you think of it.”

“Eh,” he replied, “I can’t really feel you the way I want to. It feels like fucking plastic.”

I frowned and furrowed my brow and we agreed to take it out for the rest of our playtime.

So, my experience of the We-Vibe? Excellent. His? Neutral at best. Ladies, I think that this could be an amazing solo-play toy and I also think it can be a great addition to partner sex. However, I don’t buy the couple aspect of this, the utility seems heavily skewed toward the female in our experience of it.

It is a detached brand of frantic that I’m channelling as I watch the eggs poach. I fiddle with the gas, poke at one with a slotted spoon and furrow my brow. Ariel’s sister comes in the kitchen and hands me a champagne cocktail and I distractedly thank her. I begin to lift the eggs out of the poaching liquid and glance at the hollondaise that is sitting nearby in a warm water bath.

I do a double take. My creamy, rich emulsion is distinctly separated. The butter floating on top and the rest settling in blotchy mess at the bottom of the bowl. My heart doesn’t really sink until my frantic whisking has no effect.

“The hollondaise broke.”

A few ears perk up. Jay has no idea what it could possibly mean for a sauce to break. Michael has some but no idea how to fix it. Frazzled, I decide to start another sauce and curse myself for breazily agreeing to attempt Eggs Benedict.

With some assistance in clarifying the butter, the second sauce comes together quickly. And just as soon as it is luscious and gorgeous, it, too is a mess. I get clever and decide to add some cream to bring it back together. Then I get desperate and decide to add a corn-starch slurry. Nothing works.

Tears are stinging my eyes and I feel my face flushed. I wonder if I’ve ever had a moment before when I was this embarassed. I dejectedly announce that there will be no hollondaise unless someone else makes it. I can’t breath very well and I feel tiny and incompetent and I wander to the back of the house where Michael is in the bedroom.

He sees the utterly stricken look on my face and tells me to lay down on the bed.

“I broke the sauce again and I tried to fix it. I failed.”

I know how dramatic I am making this seem but this feels like a real tragedy to me. I wanted to desperately to please everyone and have everything be perfect. I wanted to make them all love me. But, instead of generating this perfect emulsion, a culinary feat, I’ve destroyed an entire pound of butter and have a runny mess to show for it.

Michael is running his hands through my hair while I babble about my failure. He places a palm on my chest, covering my heart. This is a move that Barbara Carellas taught me and that I taught him and it doesn’t matter where it comes from, it makes my entire body relax. I breath deeply and listen to him speak.

“You know that Ariel’s sister doesn’t care if there is no hollondaise. And she already adores you. I know this because you make Ariel so happy and that is all she wants to see. Someone that makes her sister happy.”

I listen to his words, ones I already knew to be true but that bear repeating. The warmth from his hand is radiating through me now and I feel calm again. He kisses me on the forehead and asks if I’m ready to face the world again.

I am.

Most people that read this blog know that I have an intense relationship with music. My podcast started out being about sex and music and the level to which I sexualize music is pretty clear if you listen to episodes of it. But, I’ve never really written about the stumbling blocks I’ve had with music through the years.

When I met C in 2002 he was my destined to be my first for a lot of things. One of the fundamental pieces of our early romance was music. It was a love affair conducted via file transfer and mixtape. His excitement for me was carried with outpourings of new sounds and arrangements I’d never imagined before. I learned to use music to love and to share music as an act of devotion.

When C and I broke up, this left me in a peculiar place. Plenty of couples have a few songs that they consider “theirs” and of course those songs can, in turn, bring back either wistfulness or painful memories. The problem with my relationship with C is that music was such a big part of it (he a record label owner and club DJ and me being a radio DJ) that it wasn’t particular songs that reminded me of him or even particular artists, it was music itself.

Melody and lyric had been the language that we loved each other in and thus they were too painful to hear when I lost him. This might sound dramatic and silly but it was a reality for me. I was ruined on music for awhile. When Jay and I fell deeper in love I wanted to share it with him but painstakingly picking through my music collection was still too raw. Instead I brought an external hard-drive to his house and dumped a few gig of my library onto his computer and let him sort it out for himself. It was heartless and impersonal.

Finally, years out from my breakup with C, I am falling in love again. This time it isn’t bittersweet because Jay and I cling together, steadfast in our dedication to each other and our life together. He is my cheerleader in my new, fragile loves with Michael and Ariel. And I am, in turn, his. The greatest revelation has been that music has come back to me.

Driving home from visits to see Michael and Ariel, Jay and I found ourselves singing silly love songs at full volume. As I opened my heart to many loves, it opened to old and new melodies to express them in. Every song was about me and I’ve never been so grateful for being a trite cliche.

So, here is a mix CD that they got in the mail from me yesterday (a few tracks are missing because they weren’t on Grooveshark). It is a lot of silly love songs, inside jokes, swelling melodies, and love.

Fun Factory Paul and Paulina from VibeReview

I have had a difficult relationship in my life with rabbit-style vibrators. The first one I owned had perfect girth but the ears were a bit too firm and pokey and the pearls inside were awkward almost to the point of painful. The next I tried was the Lovely Rose which I very much enjoyed but it still wasn’t quite perfect. This time I fretted because the “ear” portion tended to slide around and not rest in the perfect spot.

So, when it came time to try Paul and Paulina I had a whole lot of hopes and expectations tied up in this toy. It is made my Fun Factory so I expected a lot and I found that Paul and Paulina really delivered. It is made of 100% silicone which is a rarity for these types of dual-stimulation vibrators and something that I really appreciated.

I found that Paul and Paulina seemed to deliver on what I was looking for in a lot of crucial ways. It is girthy, the speeds are quite variable, and the clit stimulation is significant and strong. I enjoyed this toy greatly. Unfortunately, I was still left feeling that I might find something more in a dual stimulation toy. The Paul and Paulina isn’t my savior but it has moved up to being leader of the pack.

The breath catches in my throat as I feel the fullness slide into me.  I feel the sudden urge to survey the scene from outside of my own body and look at Jay and Michael who are surrounding us. Then I look directly up at Ariel and see her eyes shut and lips parted. My hand goes straight to her long hair and pulls her towards me for a kiss. With this movement the toy slips deeper into me and I gasp against her lips and shudder.

“This feels amazing, darling.”

Her only response is an angelic smile and I suddenly feel grateful. Profoundly so.

I can’t say that her movements were like thrusts. We rocked together. Happy, content, clinging.

Jay’s hand is stroking my hair and forehead and Michael is behind Ariel caressing her curves and then. . . something more. As her reactions increase in intensity, I’m overcome with curiousity. I look up at Michael, trying to catch his glance but I find myself rocked by an intense thrust and lose track of my objective.

“What is he doing to you, sweet girl?”

Her lips are clamped shut and she is concentrating. When my voice breaks her reverrie she can only look at me with a look of concern and mild alarm. I wait patiently for a response but she just nods.

“Oh sweetie, please tell me what he is doing?”

My objective has just changed. I know I can ask one of the men for this piece of information but my new desire it to hear something filthy come from Ariel’s pretty lips.

Between gasps as the dildo slides into me, I keep enough composure to tease her mercilessly. Taunting her to speak.

“Is he playing with your pussy? Is he fucking you?”

By now the boys have figured out what I was up to and Michael helpfully suggests that she is speechless. I had noticed.

But, as the enormity of this moment sets in on me and as I felt my impending climax, I am suddenly happy for the silence. I cling to her harder, holding onto something about the particular, precious sliver of time and know that, despite her lack of words, she is speaking to me with grace, precision, and deep affection.