More Forum Fun

I've exceptionally lucky to have some great places to write for - and one of my favorites is Forum UK. In fact if you rush out to your local newsagent (if you live in the UK, that is) you might even be able to find not one but two issues with contributions from little ol' me.

The first is in Vol. 44, No.1: The Sensual Art of Caning. Here's a taste:

“Are you ready, Worthless Slave?” Mistress Nastina growled with disgust, tapping one of her finest birching rods in the palm of one of her shapely, though frighteningly strong, hands. “Y-Y-y, Mistress,” the quivering male kneeling before her said. “Then it is time for you to receive PUNISHMENT!” Nastina hissed, a serpent preparing to strike, the cane arcing down with a blurring, moaning sweep towards his pale, gleaming ass ....

Whoa -- just hang on there a second Mistress: More than any other S/M activity, caning has perhaps the greatest gap between serious enjoyment and literary depictions (unless you are speaking of Pat Califia or Laura Antoniou -- who know of what they write). Go after someone with a “blurring, moaning sweep” and you are not going to have a delighted submissive, but rather one really pissed-off bottom screaming his, or her, safeword louder than Pavoratti with his nuts in a mousetrap.

The second is in the next issue, Vol. 44, No. 2: The Forum Guide to Surviving Valentine's. Here's a taste of that one:

For a holiday supposedly about love, Valentine's Day isn’t – for a lot of people anyway – about the fun, and very physical, side of it.

That's really unfortunate, since if there was ever a day that should include some sexy celebrating it should be February 14th. You could blame the holiday industry and our corporate overlords who pump incessant holiday music into our skulls months before December. Or the gradual de-sexing of the so-called civilized world. But the real tragedy of Valentine's Day is what it does to the minds of otherwise healthy, sexy, people.

Put simply, it stresses the hell out of guys and always disappoints women.

For more of each ... well, you're just going to have to buy the magazines, aren't ya?

A Sexy Yet Spooky Article In Forum UK

If my fans in the UK run out to their nearest newsagent they can pick up the newest, October, issue of Forum UK (Vol. 43, No. 11) and find an essay by yours truly on sex and fear called BOO! Why A Good Scare Can Be Great For Your Sex Life.

Here's a teaser:

You can't run. You can't hide. No matter how hard you try, it creeps up on you, tenses, pounces, and then traps you in an terrifyingly inescapable truth: a good fright –a really nightmarishly fine bout of terror – can really put the libido into overdrive.

There are as many theories about why scares and sex go hand-in-bloody-hand as there are movies featuring unstoppable forces of demonic fury. In other words, a lot. In fact one popular idea about why we have such a strong connection between the two is because for many folks, the first time they are introduced to anything really sexual, it’s thanks to a horror flick. Or, to put it in UK terms, because they'd watched a video nasty.

And no wonder it's a popular idea: From Jason to Freddy to Michael (that silly fisherman guy in the pathetic I Know What You Did Series), the formula is the same: boy meets girl, girl gives boy head, boy (and then girl) loses head. For lots of teens, these kinds of films are the first time they'll see anything really sexual, even if it's just the first sight of bare boobs. You don't have to have a degree in psychology to figure out that if the next scene has those same jiggling tits sprayed with arterial blood there might be a connection between getting rabidly turned on and getting totally freaked out. Add to this that, for a lot of people, a horror film was the first chance to get really close to the opposite sex, even if the embrace was one of terror. Think of it this way: no one ever got lucky after a Disney matinee.

[For the rest yer gonna have to buy the mag]

If You Live In The UK -

(and I know some of you do) then check out the newest issue (Vol 43 No 6) of the very excellent Forum UK magazine for an sex-ed article by myself called "Happiness Is A Warm Bottom" (about the theory and practice of submission).

Here's a taste:

Invariably it happens. Sure, the workplace, the volunteer center, the family gathering, the "straight" friends, may not be the perfect place for my predilections to come to light but often they do. In my case, which I admit is rather unique, it's usually because I'm a writer of explicit materials (AKA "smut") and as such instantly become the expert in all things sexual -- but I also know some friends who just get tired of the inane jokes, the goggle-eyed mocking, the "would-you-believes" around things like body piercing and the "Dominatrix Love Triangles" on the Jerry Springer Show and just have to say something.

Once out, that's it: every stubbed toe, every sore back, every social interaction becomes shaded by their giggling discomfort. "But you like that kind of thing ("stubbed toe"), "Oh, and how did you -- wink, wink -- hurt it?" (sore back), "We know what Chris is going to do -- laugh -- this weekend. Just don't come back bruised."

They just can't get a grip on anyone who, in their eyes, likes to get hurt ....

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