a subtitled relationship

Sometimes when my husband and I watch American TV shows, he asks to put on the closed-caption subtitles even though he has perfect hearing. I tease him about it but of course I let him.

I find it endlessly amusing that, although he's married to an American and lived in the US for a while, he sometimes has trouble understanding Americans when they're speaking. He has particular difficulty with heavy regional accents found on shows like The Wire or The Sopranos.

He occasionally has the same problem with people in person. We were talking to some tourists from Brooklyn a few weeks ago and, afterwards, I had to explain some of what they said. Maybe they thought the same thing after they were alone.

I very rarely have trouble understanding Australians now, although sometimes I still need a translation on a bit of slang. I guess living in country for three years has completely immersed me in Aussie linguistic culture. I usually also can tell what part of Australia someone is from, based on their accent. Regionalisms are as distinct as in the US or UK.

I think I mentioned here before that I can now do an Australian accent that even fools Australians. That sometimes comes in handy when you don't want to seem like a foreigner.

I still spell everything like an American, however. No colour nor labour for me. To do that would seem pretentious, I think.

I'm consistenly asked whether I'm Canadian or American by Australians I don't know. I can see why it would be difficult for them to tell the two accents apart.

titty tweak hnt

The Husband loves to play with my boobies. He does this little thing where he gently kneeds my nipples then very quickly twists them about a quarter turn while pinching them as if dialing a tiny knob, then flicks them back. It drives me totally wild in bed, particularly as he often does this while tonguing my clit.

Out in public he'll sometimes do this in a discrete moment, scooting his hand up under my top and handling me. As you can see, I'm technically half naked here, as my sweatshirt is pushed up over my chest.

worth $800 million?

I like Tumblr and use it daily. I get lots of traffic on my own Tumblr page.

The service is free for users. It also has no advertising.

So how in the world do they make any money?

I read online the company recently raised another $100 million or so from investors to put its total worth at $800 million. I guess that means they've raised a total of $800 million since their startup.

Obviously I don't have the makings of a high flying venture capitalist because I must be missing something. It sounds like people have put up a whole lot of money for something that isn't making any money and doesn't seem to have any plans to do so in the future.

I wonder if these investors realize what percentage of the site's traffic is brought by porn posts?

second-class women

The king of Saudi Arabia announced this week that women will be able to vote in a few years for the first time. They will also be allowed to run for and hold office.

This might appear to be a landmark change, but it's more a gesture than anything significant. Given Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy, elected bodies have almost no power.

The country also has a way of all but ignoring new laws and royal decrees affecting women. Although women lawyers have technically been allowed for more than a decade, none actually practice law. They can't even buy underwear from female sales clerks, although that's been legal for quite a while, too.

Women are still not allowed to drive, which is actually a bigger issue for them than voting, since elections are mostly pointless. They also still must be chaperoned in public and must ask permission from their husbands or male family members to do many things we take for granted.

Hence a woman can effectively be made a prisoner in her own home by her husband, father, or brother. It's astounding to think this kind of nonsense is possible in the twenty-first century.

When you think about it, they only have one means of leverage: sex. They could start a national movement where women agree to withhold sex until they get what they want. No sexy time until you men agree to changes.

Pass around the vibrators ladies and start the revolution. The Arab Spring has passed. Now is the time for Arab Winter.

who are these people?

Like most everyone, I imagine, I usually dream about people I know. Lots of psychological theories exist about this. Sometimes the cast includes people now dead or those I haven't seen in a long time. Again, that seems perfectly logical in psychological terms.

What doesn't make sense to me is when perfect strangers appear in a dream, people I've never seen nor met before. They don't fulfil any role rooted in an obvious psychological reason, like a policeman attempting to arrest me or someone trying to kill me. They're just a sort of generic guest cast who interact with me and other people I know in my dreams.

I asked my shrink brother about this once. He explained it had something to do with the brain creating rational characters to address unresolved psychological issues. That would work for certain characters but not for others.

I had a dream last night that included a conversation with a complete stranger about a very mundane topic. Had I not written it in my dream book, I'm sure I would've forgotten it by now. It seems utterly lacking in a psychological explanation.

I often jot down a few key words about dreams on a pad by the bed after we've had morning sex. I might just put something quick like "discussion with stranger." Then later I'll write a longer desciption in my dream book. As long as I write just a few words, I can remember highlights of the dream later for a longer entry.

feel the hate

The New York Times recently reported on a new "reality" TV show where ordinary people vent about a particular manufactured celebrity whom they don't like and then are shanghaied into a confrontation with that actual faux celebrity. The program purports to "teach lessons about hate."

Professional narcissists scheduled to appear as "celebrities" include "reality" flotsam like self-pornographer Kim Kardashian, chronic leach Levi Johnston, and media whore Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi.

What I found particularly offensive about the writeup is when the show's producers equate trampled faux celebrities' egos with bullied and victimized children. They all but say that if people stop trashing the likes of Heidi and Spencer Pratt, teenagers will stop picking on introverted classmates.

According to one producer, the show provides "an important anti-bullying, anti-hate message."

Give me a break. These reality "stars" have reached a new low by exploiting someone else's pain for their own self-aggrandizement and perpetual media pimping. Shame on them and shame on the CW for peddling this ilk.

There's a vast difference between contempt for some talent-impaired media whore who never met a microphone she didn't like and venomous hate cruelly targeting a troubled child in deep pain.

When you throw yourself on the public and constantly promote yourself without shame, you have to expect not everyone will adore you nor hang on your every insignificant word. So boo fucking hoo if your fragile little over-inflated ego is hurt. You are not a victim. You are a self-inflicted catastrophe.

I hope the show is a resounding flop.

need a fake girlfriend?

I was somewhat amazed to read about various services that will allow any male to have a fake girlfriend. The faux inamorata delivers text messages and recorded calls to anyone who doesn't want to appear like a total loser in front of friends and acquaintances.

Apparently there's no cost to this deception. Now some might think this was pathetic, but maybe it keeps lonely guys from feeling depressed, so that's not a bad thing.

One provider rationalizes the deception with the claim "the easiest way to get a girlfriend is to already have one." Care to back that up with some statics?

An enterprising woman could take this one step further. For only $25 a week, say, she could send you customized erotic text messages and even a few naked photos. Maybe such a thing already exists.

greatest pickup artists ever?

Salon has a lengthy new article lavishing praise on a YouTube channel featuring three young guys who film themselves trying to pick up girls. The writer, who is a young male, clearly idolizes the trio.

They do seem to have some success, but of course we don't see their failures which end up on the proverbial cutting room floor. Nor do we see what transpires after they obtain the numbers, which may not work anyway. It's the oldest trick in the book -- give a guy the wrong number so he'll leave you alone.

I am not at all impressed by the three males. I think two are outright losers and one is a semi-loser. If I was single, I might consider fucking the one semi-cute one but strictly on a friends-with-benefits arrangement and only when my regulars weren't available. He would be forbidden to say more than a few words because he sounds like a total douchebag.

As for the others, I might give them my litter to throw away for me but they would not get my number let alone into my panties. Sorry boys.

boob flash hnt

While we were stuck in traffic recently, a common occurrence in Sydney, my husband started taking my picture for no particular reason. So I gave him a boob flash, which happened just as a van was creeping by, and the middle-age female driver gave me a smile and a wave, too.

prime suspect

Like many people, I love the BBC series Prime Suspect starring Helen Mirren. If you've seen it, you know what I mean. It's in a class by its own.

The U.S. television network NBC will premiere an Americanized version of the show this week when it unveils many of its new shows. If you love the original, that news is something like hearing about plans to repaint the Sistine Chapel. There is the original. And then there is the imitation.

The US version is getting generally good reviews. It stars the phenomenal Maria Bello. So it will probably be pretty decent, although it seems to embrace some standard American TV cliches.

But it's still not the real thing. And by attempting to imitate the British series, the program potentially will be less original than a show like The Closer, long been compared to the Mirren classic, which was more an homage than a remake.

Nonetheless, I will probably watch the American Prime, provided I can access the stream via a proxy. American TV program websites are usually blocked to international viewers. But I know it won't be as good as the Brit version. I'll just pretend it's a cop show that happens to share the same title as one of the greatest TV programs of all time.

the world's tallest dog

This canine, named George, is massive. It's a good thing George is friendly because he could eat you alive.

Apparently he's rather famous because he's been on Oprah's show. When you go on Oprah, you automatically become famous.

You can read more about George here and visit his very own webpage here.

the commodification of sex

Salon has a new article titled "Buying Stock in Love" which examines how love and sex have been reduced to financial commodities like something traded on Wall Street.

The writer describes relationships as an "economic model where women trade sex for money, gifts and, ultimately, marriage." I don't deny that's true for many and perhaps most women. I also find it depressing.

Some women do not fit this model. I certainly didn't in my single days. I just wanted a hot fuck. And often.

I guess I traded sex for a relative certainty that there would be more sex. I wasn't looking for a relationship. If anything, I didn't want one. But I didn't want to keep going out there and looking for sex. If you were a hot guy looking for a "friends with benefits" arrangement who could deliver in bed, then I wanted to meet you. It was as simple as that.

I know I'm not alone because I have other female friends who think the same way, or at least to the extent that they really enjoy and crave sex. And, I've noted over time that, with a few exceptions, I've never had strong friendships with women who don't feel the same way as I do about sex.

This makes me wonder if these sociologists and other eggheads who study the commodification of sex shouldn't instead study women who really love sex, who don't reduce it to an equation, who don't fit the classic stereotype of the semi-frigid woman out on a husband hunt.

That would be more interesting, at least to me. I imagine some men might think the same way. Rather than study the women who usually say "no" or "maybe," how about more on those of us who say "yes please!"

kinky sex results in manslaughter charge

The Daily Beast is running a new article with the title "Europe's Dangerous Sex Craze" which is mostly about about one criminal case in Italy, where a man is charged with involuntary homicide for the death of his girlfriend during bondage sex that went very wrong.

The defendant, with the improbable name of Soter Mule, was practicing Shibari, a complex form of bondage, with his girlfriend and another female friend when the one fainted, causing the accidental asphyxiation of the other. Before the fatal event, the three had been drinking heavily and smoking hashish.

The article's author makes the rather bizarre statement: "the real question is whether accidental death by orgasmic accident should be treated the same way as other accidental deaths." She then goes on to mention, without citing any statistics, various criminal cases where people were charged with crimes after engaging in sex acts that led to accidental death. I suppose she's making some kind of inference that sex leading to death is dealt with more harshly.

Only a casual reader of the news comes across plenty of instances where an accidental death occurred where no sex was involved and criminal charges resulted -- e.g. vehicle and firearms mishaps.

The author seems to forget that heaving drinking and drugs were involved. Maybe that's the problem, toots, and you've completely missed the proverbial forest for the trees in your rush to whip up a salacious article. Had the trio played their little game stone-cold sober, perhaps the accident would not have happened or, if it did, then no criminal charges would have resulted.

Ya thunk?

look closely

I didn't notice at first what this image was saying. When I realized what was what, I had a good laugh.

In our age of instant gratification, channel surfing, and tweeting, sometimes you need to look at something for more than .3 seconds to really see it. I am as guilty of that as the next person.

life imitating porn

You may have seen news reports recently about a New Mexico state police officer who was caught on tape having sex while on duty with a woman sprawled on the hood of her car.

In a nutshell, he met up with his lady friend in a remote field for a boisterous quicky while her little dog ran around them. The whole thing was caught by a security camera nearby. The resulting video looked more like porn than actual security footage with him slamming away and her writhing in ectasy.

All sorts of public outrage resulted because of what he did, and now he's been fired. Considering their clandestine location, you have to image one or both of them are married to someone else.

What really intrigues me is how the pair must've been absolutely lust-crazed. They just could not wait. She didn't even have time to close her car door nor get her jeans all the way off. He still has all the cop stuff hanging from his waist. Now that looks like a memorable fuck.

My husband and I have done it in the desert on more than one occasion. There's something magical about being in the wide open, miles from anyone else, and just having at it as loud as you can possibly be without restraints.

I hope the officer and his lady will continue their relationship. Because it sounds like they have a really hot time.

Pictured below is the duo in question. You'll notice her little dog running around nearby while they bang away in oblivion.

way uptown hnt

When I was a child, my grandmother frequently chastised me for sitting in "unladylike" positions. I was constantly reminded to "keep my legs together -- always." My grandmother was the sweater set sort with pearls, even if doing errands in town.

Sometimes when I was wearing a skirt and my legs were not properly clenched, she would admonish me with "gracious, I can see way uptown. Legs together!" She also said once, "the world returned to a semblance of civility when the miniskirt went out of style."

I have to imagine my grandmother would not approve of Half-Nekkid Thursday nor would she think much of thong panties.

giggle pigs

Somehow at one point I discovered the web comic Pigs in Maputo which is both cute and witty. The topics sometimes are sex-related but other ones are about work and relationships.

Interestingly the cartoonist is an Asian woman with a PhD in math now living in Mozambique. You can read more about her here.

Below is a sample of her work. She posts at least one new cartoon a day on one of her several blogs. I recommend subscribing.

why does the female orgasm exist?

Salon is running a new article exploring the biological and evolutionary reasons -- or lack thereof -- for female orgams. It's an interesting and quick read.

The article includes one evolutionary theory for orgasms that, at least to me, seems the most logical: the more receptive women are to sex, the better the chance for the species to survive. Primitive man wouldn't bother with a woman who hid and fought against having sex, when the slut in the cave by the waterfall was happy to put out because she experienced fantastic orgasms. Hence, more of the species was created, thanks to slutty orgasmic cave women who were always available for a quick shag.

The article states, however, that some theories about female orgasms "have been empirically discredited." (Which specific theories, however, are not detailed.)

Emperical evidence can be flawed by human subjectivity. Medieval theories about astronomy are some good examples of that flaw. Emperical evidence can establish conclusively that water boils at a certain temperature. When analyzing behavior, however, I don't think it can be so exact.

Whatever the reason, I am certainly glad female orgasm exists. Imagine if it didn't. Sex would be as much fun as clipping your toenails or taking out the garbage -- something that must be done but never enjoyed.

it's my birthday

I started this blog three years ago today. I have posted daily through all that time. I didn't think I'd last this long but I did and plan to keep on going.

It's also my twenty-sixth birthday. Eeek, I'm closer now to thirty than twenty. But I think where I was and how I felt three years ago when I started this, and I see how far I've come. I'm happy with that. I like the me at twenty-six much better than the twenty-three-year-old me.

I can't believe my hubby and I have only been a couple for three years. It seems much longer, like I've known him forever, but I think that's very good -- time slows down when we're together.

So onward and upward (an expression I've never actually quite understood) into year four and beyond.

ten years on

An ordinary post today seems inappropriate.

With the advantage of ten years of hindsight, I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say that 911 will be one of the pivotal events in American history. The country shifted into a different gear after the attacks, as happened with other defining events, like Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775; Fort Sumter on April 11, 1861; Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

The same may be said for September 11, 2001. How much our world changed after a single day.

The attacks came the day before my sixteenth birthday. I've written here before about how I dropped out of school at that time and also obtained a legal emancipation. So for me, 911 marked a distinct line between my childhood and when I had to fend for myself.

I landed my first full-time waitressing job a few days after the attacks so I was usually too tired and otherwise occupied at making ends meet to pay too much attention to the news. When I did, the media was filled with dire, dark accounts and sadness. People were hurting all over the country but there was no real way to reach out to them. This only exacterbated the feelings of loneliness I had at the time.

In our lifetimes, I hope we have no more catastrophic events like 911. Perhaps this will be our century's only pivot point.

Be safe today. I miss being in America now. I love it here in Australia, but the US will always be "home" for me.

good movie but tasteless marketing?

Everything I've read about the new film Contagion sounds great -- killed cast, great writer, brilliant director. It doesn't open here in Australia until December.

The movie is about a deadly virus outbreak. The tagline is "nothing spreads like fear."

The New York Times wrote that the movie's financial "success means getting the audience to worry a little more at an already worrisome time." Warner Bros. is openly promoting the film's scare factor with posters and promotions that read "Don’t talk to anyone" or "Don’t touch anyone."

The movie was originally set to open in the US and other countries in late October. But the release date was pushed up as the scare factor was dialed up in the promotions.

The movie opened two days before the ten-year anniversary of September 11, when people would be on edge, worrying about fresh terrorist attacks.

Talk about in poor taste. Yes, let's use a national tragedy and fear mongering to market a movie.

X-rated enigma

This vintage photograph is certainly a mystery. Why is a woman giving a blowjob to a soldier while dozens others watch? And why is the naked woman standing nearby fixing her hair?

This certainly can't be a training exercise. I asked my ex-military husband what he thought and he speculated it was some kind of prank or perhaps the rest chipped in for some hookers after the lucky fellow on his back won a bet.

Imagine opening up Grandpa's dresser drawer, thumbing through his old military photo album, and stumbling on this. You'd finally learn why all his friends had always called him "Lucky."

deep water hnt

This was taken last summer one day when the husband borrowed a friend's boat. It's too cold now here in Australia for this sort of frolicking. Warmer weather is just around the corner as spring seems to be in the air.

amusingly inappropriate

I would never buy this for my child, but I thought it was nonetheless pretty funny.

how people in 1900 saw the future

These are prints from the year 1900 predicting what life would look like in the year 2000. Many more can be found here.

Looks like they got a lot more wrong than they did right. I wonder if the same will come to pass for predictions made today about the year 2100.

The housewife in the first image is a good example of how they only saw technology as an expansion of what they already had. Devices are automated, but they're still attached to some sort of machine. I guess the idea of robots was not yet developed.

The third image seems to be some sort of picture phone. The 1900 mindset was still limited by the idea that one would need both an operator and a user.

The last one is arguably the only one that came close with the helicopter-like contraptions. You get no sense, however, about how they might have operated. Perhaps the artist had no idea, either.

another porn AIDS scare

The Daily Beast has an interesting article up now about another AIDS scare that has affected the porn industry. Last week, a male performer tested positive for HIV. No word yet on how many women he may have infected. This follows a similar incident less than a year ago when one male tested positive after infecting as many as twenty women.

This is a problem with no easy answer, given the rapid evolution of the porn industry, which is no longer California centric, part of the reason these incidents will probably only increase in the future. Condoms, of course, would significantly curb the possibility of infection, but their use usually is the kiss of death in porn.

Porn might actually become riskier than prostitution, where condoms are widely used. Yet prostitution is usually illegal, in part because of arguments that it leads to the spread of sexual diseases. While that might have been true in 1955, it's laughably absurd today.

in the alley for something naughty

This is a fantastic picture that makes you compose a little erotic story in your head. (You may have to click on it to see the full effect.) She appears to be performing oral sex, but if you look closely, you'll see that a woman's hand holds her head, as revealed by the red fingernail polish.

So is she meeting a woman in the alley for lesbian cunnilingus? Or is the woman with the red fingernails guiding the kneeling woman's head down on a man's cock? If so, is she getting off watching another woman sucking her man? Is the woman on her knees a prostitute? Then who left the wine glass on the ground?

This story could go so many ways.

apology in advance

When I was a child, I had no interest in dolls. I did, however, dress our pets up in clothes. Perhaps that's why I can't resist videos like this.

I apologize in advance to anyone who hurls chunks over the extreme cuteness factor. The original page with a larger video can be found here.

There is an irrelevant fifteen-second commercial before the show begins. Don't worry if you can't speak French because that's just marketing spiel.

the joys of fisting

Fisting is another one of those kinks I do not understand at all. I have zero interest in trying it, particularly as the recipient.

It strikes me as about much fun as a visit to the gynocologist. Just because a woman has several holes doesn't mean you need to try to stuff oversized things into them.

Is this about some form of humiliation by making your lover physically uncomfortable? According to Wikipedia, all kinds of horrible things can go wrong while fisting. Talk about an embarrasing obituary that would make.

squeaky clean hnt

Sometimes when I look on my husband's hard drive, I find pictures he took of me without me knowing. Apparently he was perving on me when I was in the shower one day and here is one of the results.