Happy New Year London

It's times like New Year's Eve when I really miss London. The English are so crazy. They jump into the fountains in Trafalgar Square on New Year's in sub zero temperatures. Shit, right now I really wish I was there. Yeah, it's filthy and overcrowded, but it's full of life and fun. Haven't been back for two years now, because I have tenants living in my flat there, and somehow I don't think they'd be too keen if I popped back for a holiday, even if I slept in the bath!


This clip sums up what I love about London. Even the religious fanatics are worth watching. What is God trying to save us from? What indeed?

Affairs of the Heart

Well, everyone I know with young kids is in the same boat. We have all at some point wondered if we are married to the right man, if the tedium is really worth it, or whether we should just go out and have an affair. Or leave. Haven’t we?

Like my friend Tamara, who has a three year old and a one year old. She used to be a sex crazed woman who went down on her husband all the time, even while he was, I don’t know, doing the washing up. And then she had the kids and now she has zero interest in sex. And naturally, her husband is getting crankier and crankier, because she has no interest in putting out. And she is just about holding it together, because the little one gets up at 5.30 every day of the week. So in the evening, all she wants to do is sleep. But because he was getting really pissed off, she realized something had to give. She had to put out to save her marriage, so she bought this bra from Victoria’s Secrets with all these gel pads and a very complicated system of rubber straps, which were guaranteed to make even the smallest breasts look like cantaloupes, apparently. She’d gone down to an A since she stopped breast feeding, so she felt in dire need of an uplift.

A few nights ago, she gets home and starts dancing around provocatively in front of her husband and swings this bra in front of his face (she doesn’t have it on yet). And he says,

“Wow, that’s a lot of padding!”

Which, as you can imagine, didn’t exactly make her feel like a femme fatale.

Still she’s determined to have sex, and giving him a saucy wink says, “Do you fancy putting it on me?”

And he gets all defensive and says, “What? You’re going to make me do DIY at nine at night?” He felt under attack. He felt like it was going to take half an hour to get the damn thing on, and for what? To see some artificially inflated version of his wife’s breasts, when all he really wanted was sex. And when he’d got the damn bra on, he’d probably have to spend another half hour getting the damn thing off. It all seemed like a lot of work when all he wanted was to caress his wife’s saggy naked breasts.

In any case, the erotic charge left the room like air going out of a balloon. So, she still hasn’t had sex with her husband, and they still bite each other’s heads off about the slightest thing. Still, maybe things will look up for them eventually.

Then there’s the people I know who have had affairs. The affairs haven’t really helped very much. The only positive impact they've had is in alerting the spouse that they've been neglecting their wife. But it might be easier just to talk to your husband, I reckon, instead of getting yourself embroiled.

Sure, I’ve thought about it. I’ve more than thought about it. Sometimes when I’m low they seem like the most wonderful quick fix solution to everything. But at the end of the day, affairs are narcissistic. One wants to be desired. One wants the attention from an attractive man. The sexual gratification. And suppose one gets it? Suppose by some miracle, the reality of the crazy sex and the passionate snatched moments, suppose it ends up being worth it? There’s still the question of fallout when your spouse finds out. And somehow or other it will impact the marriage, and you'll never be able to turn the clock back.

Affairs are selfish, simple as that. Even those affairs that occur in an open marriage. You are saying, “He gives me something you can’t. And I want it. And I’m going to take it.” It’s kind of immature at the end of the day.

I almost had an affair a few times. But I could never follow through, which means, I suppose, that I’m basically monogamous. Or maybe all those almost affairs finally made me realize that I loved my husband more than I thought I did. But maybe most of all it made me realize that marriage is hard work. And you have to work at it, especially in bleak times when you are no longer communicating.

And so I say to you my friends, by all means have an affair…as long as it is in your head and not in your bed.



And on a lighter note, here’s a cheery Christmas picture of me to perk you up. Happy New Year to all of you. Thank you for visiting my blog this past year. I love getting all your comments and look forward to many mutually satisfying blogging moments in 2007.

Confessions of a Hamster Killer

I've just been tagged by Neil to tell you 'Five Things You Don’t Know About Me.' I don’t usually oblige with these meme thingamijigs, but because Neil is such a sweetheart, I will.

1. I was born with a different identity
Yes, as some of you may have suspected, I was born a man. It's been quite a tough life, but I am over the worst, and have just undergone gender-realignment surgery. Ha, ha, no, not quite. I was simply born with a different name, which was Serena. However, I always loathed it (well, wouldn’t you?) and so at nine, changed my name legally to Emma (after this girl at the Brownies who was really cool). I still hate the name Serena and love the name Emma, even though it’s a pretty common name in the UK.


Portrait of the Author as a Serena

2. I (may have) once given a girlfriend pubic lice
Once when I was living in a student house, we couldn't agree on how the rooms should be divided up, and consequently rotated every three months. On my last day in one of the rooms before my friend Diane was going to move into it, I slept with this guy in my/her bed. A few days later it came to my attention that he’d given me pubic lice. I never told Diane the guy had given them to me, nor did I ask if she’d ever got them via the sheets, which, I seem to remember, were not necessarily changed when we swapped rooms….Do you hate me now, do you?

3. I have smoked crack
I once smoked crack with some nutjob I met at a really dodgy hotel in the East Village, and am embarrassed to say it didn’t really do much for me.

4. I would not enjoy a meal of "liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti."
I am the antithesis of a picky eater and will eat anything, with the exception of innards i.e. lungs, kidneys, liver, heart etc.

5. I am a hamster killer
One winter when I was about ten, I noticed that my Syrian hamster had turned stiff and cold in his cage. Figuring, he was dead I threw him in the trash. A friend later told me that he was probably hibernating as the Syrians often do that. Yeah, I know I will burn in hell for that.

Okay, now I am going to tag Gamba, Moobs, Crankmama, Meva and Kimba.

Russian Mail Order Bride – Special Offer

Hello my name is Ivanka. I am living in Uzbekistan. I am looking for the American husband. I love your culture and your Coca Cola and your President Clinton.



My hobbies are crocheting and making the cabbage soup. I am loving very much to be making the housework and cleaning the toilets.


I am very sexy and would be loving always to please my husband. Get in touch and let us see if we can have groovy times. Yes?

Ivanka

xxx

Yes, yes, that is me. Did you guess? Being a technological retard, I only just got a digital camera, and obviously, having nothing else to do on Christmas day (well apart from go to tedious family events and make myself sick on chocolate) I took photos of myself, and was really quite pleased that they looked like they would be perfect on a Russian mail order bride site, no? So if you need a Russian mail order bride, do get in touch. This is a very special offer for a limited time only. I will give you all the details …

Creaming off the Germans

Okay, I’m thinking that I’m not going to tell you everything that went down last night because I think (don’t know for sure) that my husband reads my blog. Not to mention my mother. But all I will say is that I went out with this German girl who is really crazy. Some of the things she's been up to made even my hair stand on end. Yes indeed, her stories of strange sexual shenanigans were certainly eye opening and maybe I will share them sometime. Well, okay, here's one: once she stayed on after hours at a pub and her and several guys watched some friends of theirs screwing on a sofa and photographed the whole thing on their cell phones and then sent the pictures to all their friends. I'm not sure how common this sort of thing is, all I know is that I have never done it. But that's only because I don't have a cell phone [said in a tongue in cheek tone].

Where was I? Ah yes, my new friend. It is such a relief to have found someone who is crazier than me, and way badder. Well, the bad part wouldn’t be that hard. I mean, I’m not bad at all these days, how can I be, I’m a mom. But, actually, Sabine is a mom too. Except that her daughter is fourteen, so that gives her a lot more freedom than I have.

I went round to Sabine’s house last night to have a drink before we went out on the town. Her daughter was away at a party, so Sabine smoked a fag and said, “Oh, I can smoke in the house tonight because my daughter is out. Otherwise she would disapprove.” I thought that was kind of funny, the daughter disapproving of the mom smoking.

I always do this, hook up with an extrovert with loads of friends and then I go along for the ride. And since her ex-husband is a barman in one the pubs we went to, we got loads of free drinks. And then we went to a club and pretended to be German tourists visiting from Stuttgart, saying, “Oh, we are liking Baltimore very much. You are having the very good clubs, ja?” Some guys bought us drinks, and maybe even fell for the story. Who knows? Who cares? We got the drinks and they had a good laugh.

Sabine has one on/off lover nine years her junior, who she says is an asshole but kind of fun. And she is also dating an older German businessman, Klaus, who moved here from Germany six months ago. He’s stinking rich and takes Sabine on holidays and buys her stuff, and is a fantastic lover, apparently. Still, he’s got a ton of baggage. Three kids in Germany and a mad ex-wife who doesn’t want him to see the kids because, he claims, she’s nuts.

Talk about the grass always being greener on the other side. You’d think she’d be happy with the party lifestyle and two lovers on tap. But no. She has baby cravings and is now talking about having a baby with Klaus, even though he’s had a vasectomy. I said, “You know what, that isn’t a problem, there’s a technique where you can insert a needle into the man’s balls and take the sperm out that way. I knew someone who got pregnant that way.”

“Really?” she said. “Although we probably won’t have to do that, because Klaus still has some sperm”.

“Where does he keep it?” I said, trying to imagine where one would store the stuff. In a suitcase on top of his wardrobe? Inside a thermos flask?

“Oh, it is in Germany. Before he got the vasectomy he had two litres of the stuff frozen.”

“Gosh,” I said. “Two litres. That’s quite a lot of sperm isn't it? I wonder how many goes that took?”

Sleeping on the job

I currently find myself in the ironic position where I actually want to work, but cannot, because I don't yet have my green card (it should be with me fairly soon, assuming I am 'approved'). Recently, I have actually had several job offers to write for websites and even to write blogs for money, but my hands are tied. Wierd. I guess those would be my ideal jobs. Getting paid to spew my thoughts onto a page, with the added bonus of no human contact.

Some of you may think I am just some phantom with an unhealthy fixation with orgasms, but I'm actually a flesh and blood creature who had to toil on the coalface of corporate endeavour, along with the rest of you, for nine years in London. Nine years of my life I will never get back.

Admittedly, some of my jobs have been rather amusing, like my stint at the blind dominatrixes. But most of them were office based, boring as buggery, and about as much fun as having a colonoscopy.

When I left college with a totally useless degree in Art History tucked into my back pocket, I had no idea what I wanted to do. For some reason I latched onto the idea of becoming a journalist. No matter that I had no interest in current affairs or standing outside people's houses for hours until they came out and then asking them highly intrusive questions, I was going to be a journalist. I signed up for this course at the London College of Printing, along with a bunch of graduates who didn't have a clue what to do with their lives either. The course was taught by a bunch of florid faced ex-hacks who'd been fired from England's top papers for writing stories with little/no basis in fact and causing their papers to have to pay huge libel costs before booting them out on their ear. The course turned out to be a bloody good laugh, seeing as many of the 'lectures' took place inside pubs. The downside was that the ex-hacks tried to seduce every female student within touching distance. I resisted their sweaty advances. Well, why shouldn't I, it wasn't like any of them were ever going to get me a job on a paper, was it?

After that, I got a job on a travel trade paper, in which you had to write about the very boring world of the travel trade, although the upside was you got to go on free trips to Europe and test out new cruise liners. Well, that was all right, only sometimes you had to find news stories, yes, and actually stand outside people's houses and ask them questions about was their company going to make a lot of people redundant, and sometimes those people would tell you to fuck off. And then you had to go back to the office and write up stories that the people they were about didn't want you to write, and which made them mad. And believe it or not I felt bad about doing this! It slowly dawned on me that there was a huge impediment to me becoming a journalist: I had a conscience.

So to cut a long story short, I did what every failed journalist does, I got a job in PR. A strange choice, I suppose, for someone who has never in their life gone to a party and gone up to anyone and said, "Hi, I'm Emma. I'd really like to get to know you." I'm always the one cowering behind the punch bowl trying not to talk to anyone. Actually, apart from the talking to people part, I was pretty good at PR. I was good at getting stories into the papers and going on the radio to talk up all sorts of shitty products. But I hated all the people at the PR agency I worked for, and all the clients. And you also had to come in on Sundays to get stories into the papers for Monday. Fuck that for a game of soldiers, I thought. But still I continued in the PR game because I didn't know what else to do.

Shit, it was a strain being nice to people all the time, and do you know the hassle it involves, being an executive? You have to keep lots of sheer tights in your desk in case you get a ladder. You have to wear suits that have to be dry cleaned. You also have to wear makeup. You also have to turn up in the morning and act cheerful and go round to everyone in the office and ask if they want tea or coffee and actually remember who has sugar and who has milk while you have a hangover. Making tea and coffee for people is really one of the worst things about working in an office.

In any case, after eight years of this, I decided to get out of the rat race and just work as a temp secretary for a while. Which wasn't too bad actually. But in the year before I left London for the States, I had a secretarial job in which I lost it. I was working at a University doing, well, God only knows what I was meant to be doing. I was seriously underworked. I had to type about one letter a week. God knows I kept busy with Internet porn. I also wrote two erotic novels while I was there. I also organized a friend's art exhibition, designed and printed his exhibition catalogue and mailed it out to hundreds of guests using the University's postal system, meaning I got it free by scamming it. I also had an office affair with a man who was, quite simply, a challenge. When I first got there everyone was like, "Oh Dan will shag anyone." "God, Dan has slept with more people than I've had hot dinners." And it was odd, because Dan was really pleasant and nice looking and didn't look like he had herpes.

As you can imagine, I was angry. Christ, I was furious. He'll shag anything and he hasn't tried to shag me? Right, I'll have him, I thought. I invited him out on a date. And a very nice date it was too. He told me about what music he liked and how recently he and a friend had tried to sleep with a girl who's fantasy it was to have a double penetration. It hadn't gone at all well. One of the lads couldn't get an erection at the same time as the other, I think, maybe? I forget what the exact nature of the problem was, but I do know that the girl did not achieve her fantasy. In any case, it was all quite intriguing, and I thought we were getting on really well. Then at the end of the night, would you believe it, he walks me home and doesn't even try to invite himself up for a cup of coffee!

I was mad. I was fucking furious.

"I don't believe this, Dan," I said. "Everyone told me that you were a right ladies man, and now, what, you're not even going to try and kiss me? What the fuck's up with that?"

"I didn't think you were all that interested," was all he could come up with.

Interested! What did that have to do with anything? It was simply an experiment to see if he wanted to lure me, and the experiment had failed. Well, in the end I did get him into my flat and persuaded him that I was interested enough to give him a whirl. And very good it was too. But honestly, I've never been so insulted in my life. Is there anything worse than not being seduced by a man who you know would screw anything that wasn't nailed down? Although admittedly, looking back on it, I had gone a bit mad with boredom and probably wouldn't have screwed someone I wasn't particularly interested in, had I been feeling a little more sane.

Where was I? Anyway, I was busy doing all this stuff while at this job, but still it wasn't enough to fill the hours. I was going cuckoo. And on Fridays the temp agency I worked for would let you fax your time sheet to them in the morning (you filled in the hours you were planning to work on Friday). So one day after about eight months working there, I thought, right, I am not going to sit here all day Friday doing fuck all. For one thing, I have a fucking hangover and I want to go to sleep. So I filled in my time sheet for the week and faked the supervisor's signature and faxed it to the agency. Then I went home and went to bed and fell asleep. Well, some prick had obviously grassed me up, because the supervisor at the office phoned me at home and started to leave a message on the answer phone about, "Someone needs a letter typed up and no one can find you." No I didn't answer the phone. I'm not that stupid. I just got out of bed, took the tube back to the job, sat down behind the desk, and when the supervisor found me, told her I'd just been out for a long lunch, was anything wrong?

No, she didn't fall for it. I was fired from that job. Thank God. But at that point I realized I'd had enough of working, thanks very much. And I got myself up the duff and moved to the USA. And actually, truth be told, kids are harder work than those office jobs ever were. But after six years, yes, I do believe this lazy bitch is finally ready to take a job. Wierd how things change, isn't it?

I've done some other bad things while at work, maybe I'll talk about them sometime. I'm not sure whether going home to sleep while you're being paid to work is better or worse than actually sleeping under the desk, as some people I know have done. What's the slackest thing you've ever done while on the job?

Come together right now over me

Okay folks, this is my last word on orgasms, honest. Lennon and McCartney knew the power of orgasms to change the world and bring peace to everyone when they wrote that line. And now it's time to put that sentiment into action. As usual, I have my finger on the pulse of the cosmos, and am here to inform you that Friday, the 22 December is Global Orgasm Day.

No, I've not been smoking crack. This is an official day. A day when you should, nay, must wank.

Now, I know there are some of you out there who will be saying, I'm happy to do it, but what would I be wanking for?

A: Because the collective energy released by this Synchronized Global Orgasm will bring about world peace.

I'm not kidding. I want every one of you to make a solemn promise to wank for peace.

Q: But why should we wank?

A: Let me tell you why. The future of humanity hangs in the balance, so get your goddamn hand lotion out and your dildos and porn mags and blow up dolls and whatever the fuck else you need and get on with it.

This is a very serious business, and the mission of this Global Orgasm Offensive is 'to effect change in the energy field of the Earth through input of the largest possible surge of human energy. Now that there are two more US fleets heading for the Persian Gulf with anti-submarine equipment that can only be for use against Iran, the time to change Earth’s energy is NOW!

The intent is that the participants concentrate any thoughts during and after orgasm on peace. The combination of high-energy orgasmic energy combined with mindful intention may have a much greater effect than previous mass meditations and prayers.

The goal is to add so much concentrated and high-energy positive input into the energy field of the Earth that it will reduce the current dangerous levels of aggression and violence throughout the world.'

Got it? Okay, so let's do it. This Friday let's think peaceful thoughts while we stimulate ourselves to release wave upon wave of cosmic energy.

One thing that's bothering me in all this, what do the sado-mascochists do who need to think about giving/receiving pain in order to achieve orgasm? Is their cosmic energy going to have a negative charge? Going off to look into this.

Pass it on. Wank for peace.

Here Comes The Apocalypse

Hmm, funnily enough I am not depressed/fed up at the moment, in fact, I am almost well, chilled out. This is partly to do with orgasms. Question: are orgasms nature's tranquillizer? I have finally realized that if I have two really good orgasms a week I can feel almost sane. Does anyone else feel like that? I'm not talking about those piddling little ones, I mean those real heavy duty ones that make you feel like you are hovering around the ceiling for a while before floating back down to earth. But you know how it is, fellow moms, you are never in the mood to have sex, and then you get crankier and crankier, until you are screaming at the kids and steam is coming out of your ears. When, as the women's trash mags say, darlings, you have to make time to get down to it. Well, I have made the time and I am reaping the benefits.

Where was I? Okay, so I am fairly happy. I guess the reality of the situation is that I am happiest when I am doing basically fuck all. Also, I am cheerful because I have something to look forward. Yes, I am going to Seattle in January to see the divine miss devylish and stunning redheaded goddess crankmama.

Although things have taken a worrying turn in Seattle recently. There was a really bad storm there the other day which totalled Miss Devylish's car:


So all I am hoping is that that crazy storm there is not the start of the Apocalypse. If it is, I need to race out and do everything I planned to do before the end of the world, like, um, maybe er, oh God, I am wracking my brains here, okay, maybe I would have sex with a woman, jump out of a plane with a parachute and go up to George W. and just poke him in the eye or maybe knee him in the groin. Or more likely, I would just sit there bawling like a baby while the roof of my house caved in.

So, I'm curious, what would you do if you knew the end of the world was nigh and you had nothing to lose by doing anything your heart desired before you were exploded into a million pieces? Do tell.

Mommies Who Drink

Firstly, thank you all so much for taking time out of your busy schedules to think of names for my dildo. Freddy, I don't care if Dubya is fucking the world these days, I am not calling it that, I don't want Dubya in my Bush or Bush in my Dubya ... you know what I mean. And I cannot call it Dynorod like your friend S does, because there is something about that name that conjures up thoughts of plumbers and those rods they stick down sinks and pull up all covered in gunk, and somehow that is not erotic.

Sean, your suggestion, The Emma Sculator, is one hundred per cent gold. But still, it lacks the human element in a name that I was looking for. Jo, Lawrence, as in Lawrence of A-Labia, is brilliant, but too funny, and I can't crack up every time I'm trying to have a frig. Amanda, I thought my suggestion, The Boss, was sexy, but you are right, thinking about a naked Donald Trump complete with frightening comb over, is not going to get anyone off anytime soon. I reckon I am going to have to go with Dirty Harry, it has a tiny bit of danger, a sprinkle of sexy Clint Eastwood, and a kind of matter of factness about it that appeals to someone as down to earth as myself. So there you have it.

And now, on to my next topic, Mommies Who Drink.

This cartoon, by yours truly, highlights the awful times one usually has when going out for a drink with other moms. The four usual outcomes are:

a. Inability to stop thinking/talking/boring you to tears about their kids, their achievements in pre-school, their ability to write their own name, or their kid's peanut/milk/seafood allergy. Yeah, whatever.

b. If they are nursing, they will not drink a drop of alcohol, because they are scared it will affect the baby's stomach, or that one glass of wine will give the kid permanent brain damage. Even I feel for this crap the first time round. But let's face facts, nursing mommies, not imbibing alcohol makes for very poor conversation, no offense.

c. They are swamped with guilt/wondering if little Tommy and Tammy will survive two hours without them, and worrying themselves ragged about whether dad will be able to cope with looking after the kids. Probably, is the answer, provided he is of average intelligence, you left him watching a football game, and provided him with enough beer to lull him into a pleasant stupor when the kids' hair pulling/verbal abuse becomes too distracting to following the game.

d. Given a tiny window of opportunity, some mommies will hit the liquor hard, get blind drunk and tell you all their deepest, darkest marital problems. Option d. is the only interesting one, especially if the confessions contain details about their sex life, or lack thereof.

Look, don't get me wrong, I was lost in the wilderness of Mommyville for a while. I was a (reluctant) follower of the belief that your life is your kids, and that you need to put their needs above yours. Well, screw that for a game of soldiers. Sure, for a while, it's a question of survival. Who in their right mind is going to go out drinking when the kids are small, when you know you are going to have to go home and have a baby wanting to nurse at five and the older one up at seven, banging on a saucepan with a spoon. Frankly, I was totally knackered for five years. My drug of choice was sleep. Alcohol was the last thing on my mind.

And then at some point you emerge from this cell, which is largely of your own making. You emerge from this world of play dates and Play-do and diapers and sippy cups and sticky fingers all over everything, and not five minutes to yourself. You emerge blinking into the sunlight. And you realize that yes, you are tired. You are tired of being someone's mother. You are tired of lacing up shoes and packing snacks to go to the park and emergency pairs of underpants for the almost potty trained one. You are tired of thinking about a hundred child orientated details a day.

You know you are tired of all this and yet you have no idea who you are any more. You are a blank piece of paper. Okay, I did write a lot of fiction over the last few years to keep myself sane. I am not a totally blank piece of paper. My piece has a few hundred thousand words on it, but still, I did not know who I was. And maybe it will take me a while to get my groove back. All I know is, I am partially on my way to finding it. And I know I do not have to get shitfaced to do so. These days I am becoming, almost (whisper it) mature.

Take a recent incident, when I was out at a bar/tapas place with my friends Christine and Kate. Believe it or not, I was the mature one that night. A couple of years ago, Christine had a botched piece of stomach surgery for a hernia, and recently had it corrected, to the tune of $5,000 (because the insurance company termed the procedure cosmetic). The only funny thing about that is that they removed so much skin that she lost her belly button (which isn't funny for her, but funny when you look at her stomach, which is as flat and as undented as an alien life form). Christine is stressed out. The family have a lot of financial worries, plus Christine has two little kids at home, as well as a work from home job, and is going cuckoo.

Anyway, that night, it was obvious that Christine had decided that she was going to go all out. She's thin as a reed and doesn't look like she eats more than a granola bar a day, but as soon as we get to the tapas place she starts ordering tons of food and cocktails. I say, "Do you think that's wise. I mean, do you usually drink?" (Me! I actually said that! Unbe-fucking-lievable). To which she says, "No, I haven't drunk in about a year, but I feel like letting my hair down."

So she orders six portions of tapas, plus, as an afterthought, a bowl of calamari. I eat about half the calamari and I am pretty full. This is the most exciting thing that has ever happened to me, I actually feel totally full after a meal the size of a child's cereal bowl. I used to be able to just eat and eat and eat and eat, and now, I can't. It's fucking fantastic.

So Kate and I hardly eat any of this food, while Christine eats plate after plate of delicious but greasy tapas, and I think, where the heck is she putting it? And soon Christine is telling us all about her sex life, or lack thereof, which I promised not to blog about, but which was pretty, er, eye opening, and we all talk about this topic while Christine drinks more cocktails, weird ones like blood orange and mango flavored martinis, which I only have one cocktail and some wine.

Eventually, at one, I tell Christine we should maybe be making tracks. I only suggest going because, well, I have to be up in five hours and also, she is giving me a lift. Well, she doesn't really want to leave, but in the end she does. Of course, the next morning she phones me and says, "Did you get food poisoning from that meal, because I have been up all night vomiting." And I just think, I don't think it was food poisoning, it was just eating an incredible amount of food when you're not used to eating much and imbibing an incredible mix of drinks when you're not used to drinking.

Don't get me wrong, Christine is a scream. But it an attempt to get away from the huge amount of stress at home, it is sometimes tempting to go a bit over the top when you go out. And it's just going to make you hurl.

But let me tell you this. You do need to get out there and act the fool once in a while. Because having kids does not necessarily turn you into a boring old cow. Or at least, it doesn't have to.

Praise God for whoever invented rubber

Oh my! Today I am walking around with a smile on my face, a skip in my step, after some fabulous orgasms last night. Yes, you've guessed it, I am in love! He is quite well endowed (eight inches), and he is always ready for action. Actually, yesterday my husband joined us, which was fun, but usually it is just me and my new guy. Who is this wonder stud? Why, my new dildo of course. Why do I have a plain old dildo when there are so many more technologically advanced sex toys out on the market? Because I find vibrators just plain annoying, that's why.

Anyway, this new fella is getting a bit annoyed because I just treat him like an object, calling him a giant rubber schlong. He says he's not just in it to give me orgasms, he wants to feel like I like him as a person too. Whatever. Well, maybe he does have a point. So basically, I'm asking for your help, loyal readers, to help me find a name for my new friend.

I have come up with these so far:

A) Dirty Harry
B) Pimp Daddy
C) Jimmy Ream
D) Bongo in My Congo
E) The Boss

Choose one of these or give me one of your own. Thanks!

Penis Envy

Penis Envy is one of those phrases coined by um, a man, obviously, specifically, by Mr Freud. I guess I find the male member sometimes stimulating, exciting, arousing or even amusing, but can't say I've ever had a burning desire to have one myself. Why would you want something you have to fiddle around with to get it into a comfortable position in your trousers? And then there's also the problem of having erections at swimming pools when you're a teenager.

But the one thing I am kind of interested in is, what does the male sex drive feel like? How does it feel to be sexually excited as a man? Is it really true that men are always thinking about sex and poised for action?
Is the male sex drive like a constant incessant pain, a constant drum beating in your scrotum, desperate for relief?
Or does it vary from day to day?
Is it only inspired by looking at a particularly beautiful woman, or can it sometimes be any woman, any pair of tits?
Does it feel unbearable to desire a woman like mad and not be able to sleep with her?
And is there some analogy you can use to compare the experience of being aroused in a way that a woman might understand, like maybe a food analogy? Like maybe, being starved to death, and being tied to a chair with the most perfect, most delicious piece of chocolate on the table in front of me for 3 days…Is that what it's like?

They fuck you up

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.

Larkin's poem is so true. And Christmas is an odd time, because you get letters and cards from people you haven't heard from for a long time. Like from my dad. My dad (who lives in London), is very peculiar. For one thing he is under the impression that we have a 'normal' father-daughter relationship. I.e. he writes to me sometimes like we have a whole history of jolly outings and family holidays and wonderful warm memories, when we don't, or at most, maybe a tiny sprinkle of them.

My mum and he dated for a year or so when he was a student at London University in 1970, and she was working as an au pair (she's Austrian). Anyway, she got pregnant, he freaked out. She had the baby (me), he didn't want to know. But in any case, I did see him now and again while I was a child and I was quite fond of him. Although mostly I remember going to visit him in his flat which was full of dusty wine bottles, and him being at a loss as to how to entertain me, which is quite endearing really. But visiting him wasn't so bad, it wasn't awful, although he did cook some weird meals like boiled fish.

But the whole situation was very antagonistic between my mother and him, and eventually she said he couldn't see me any more (not that I think he particularly cared one way or the other). And even though he is an eccentric composer who is totally self-centred and has really never done a thing for me (the only thing he has ever done was let me store my belongings in the basement of his house when I moved to the States). Even though he has really ever expressed his love for me, I still love him, and that is the strange thing about life. Even though the relationship is totally non-existent in any concrete way, it still moves me when he writes in his letter:

"I often go through or past Regent's Park, and I remember so well you playing there when you were about 6 or 7. Do you remember hunting for the Easter eggs? I do. I also remember playing in the sandpit."

You can never not love your parents. Well, unless they did something really awful. But they do fuck you up, they may not mean to but they do. Or at least mine did. Only at some point you have to stop blaming your mum and dad and start defining yourself, don't you? But it's hard, I guess. When you don't really have a dad, I think in some way, some totally irrational way, you sometimes think you are unlovable. And all the love from your mum, from friends and boyfriends and then your husband and kids, and all the rest, I don't think it ever compensates. And you think, why should it matter, that he didn't at least try to love me? And then you understand that maybe he did try, but couldn't manage it. Because, I think that despite everything, it is there. He does love me somewhere, buried deep. Maybe that is all that matters.

Jolly Christmas Thoughts

I wonder how many people have considered committing suicide after listening to Lennon’s tune:

So this is Christmas
And what have you done
Another year over
A new one just begun

He sings 'A very merry Christmas and a happy New Year' like he’s singing ‘If I have one more Christmas of forced cheerfulness, I will kill myself.’

And I understand where he is coming from, completely. I think I used to like Christmas, in fact I’m pretty sure I did. But I don’t any more. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s great for kids. Although since Scarlett is not even six yet, I am going to do my usual ‘dupe the kids’ thing where I don’t tell them which day is Christmas, and consequently they don’t get up early and open presents at four, jump on my bed at five and make me lose the will to live at six.

It is just that Christmas always brings it home to me just how awful this society is that we have created, this so called zenith of human endeavor, this monster called capitalism, where many are exploited so some may be rich. Yes, I know some of you will say, what’s the alternative, do you want to live under a dictatorship or communism? No of course I don’t. Others will say, what are you complaining about, don’t you know how good you have it? Yes, I know how good I have it, and I also know how bad others have it to provide me with this standard of living.

And at Christmas I can’t help wondering, what are we doing, what are any of us doing? Why are we buying our kids hundreds of pieces of plastic junk, manufactured via sweat shops and child labor all over the globe, toys which have no benefit to anyone with their inane bleeping and flashing lights, save to make a profit for some big corporation? Toys that will sit in landfills, bleeding chemicals into the environment? What is the point?

Well, at least I’m not guilty of that. I’m not buying the kids any presents, save a few tiny ones. All I’m saying is, there is no point to it.

When people from Europe first come to America, they cannot believe the state of the place. It is exactly like people living in communist countries who are shown brain washing videos about how great communism is and how bad capitalism is, only in reverse. Before I lived here, I had the usual weird view of America, all sun tans and very straight white teeth and wealth and huge cars and anonymous suburban houses with white picket fences.

Then you get here. It was kind of enlightening actually. Because while at home I would be considered a middle class, pretty well educated person, here I was classed as a foreigner, basically, according to the system, a piece of worthless scum.

Okay, when we got here we were poor and took the bus everywhere. There is nothing wrong with taking the bus, but God, the things I saw. Don’t imagine I have had a privileged background, I haven’t. God knows there’s poverty in England, but this? Streets and streets of empty houses, desolation, grinding poverty, drug addicts wandering the streets. I mean, come on, I asked Americans, doesn’t anyone give a shit about these people? And basically, not many people do. Oh, they should pull themselves together, get themselves a job, is the answer of many. Right.

How can you pull yourself together when society considers you nothing, nobody, a piece of shit on the sole of their shoe? It was kind of interesting actually, when I came to Baltimore. In US society’s eyes I was nobody, nothing. Okay I hadn’t thought it through, and I was six months pregnant, but you would have thought giving birth would have been a fairly simple procedure. Now I know it’s not the hospitals’ fault that insurance policies are the way they are, but can you believe no insurance provider would take me on in Maryland, because pregnancy is a pre-existing condition, akin to cancer? So basically, no one will insure you. So basically, no hospital will take you. They look at you like you are scum and see you have no insurance and talk to you like you are retarded. Well, I cried a few times over all that back then, let me tell you. And this is what a lot of poor people have to deal with every single fucking day.

You want to say, look, where I come from, you may scoff at socialized medicine, but at least everyone gets free health care. And here is it basically, have you got good insurance, if not, you can be treated on Medicare but it will be the crappest treatment you have ever had and if we ever find out that you ever earn any money, we will come round and get it. In the end, I did manage to shell out for some astronomical insurance policy, and I had a horrendous experience with the first birth and the shitty healthcare system you have here. I’m not going to go into details, but it was the usual situation where the hospital fuck up with some medical treatment, cover their tracks, send you a bill for $6,000 and when you try and argue, heck, even sue them, they just re-jig the evidence so you haven’t got a snowflake’s chance in hell of winning.

I haven’t thought about all this for a while, because after a few years of relative poverty we are now (hilariously) pretty well off for American standards (median US income is only $43,389!!), which in any European country would be not well off at all, but for the fact that America is made up mainly of poor and a top layer of rich, with the middle classes squished in between.

At Christmas, I think back over my time here, and one of the main things I have noticed is that hardly anyone cares about those who have nothing. Well, sure, some of you will say you care, you do your bit for charity, but I mean politically, politicians here actually think, most of them, that there are some people who are better than others. That homeless people are not as good as you and I, nor are immigrants, people who can’t speak English etc. etc.

What the fuck’s that all about? I suppose the Scandinavian countries are the gold standard in treating people, well, as if they were humans. I don’t want to say where I think America comes, but it is pretty low down in the list of countries that understand that a person is a person despite his race, religion or socio-economic status.

Which is why I find myself going to church these days. Sorry if I have shocked you, but I am actually quite a spiritual person. And okay, I was brought up Catholic, and I don’t believe that is a good religion, causing as it does, massive amounts of guilt. So now I go to this Presbyterian church, and okay, I can say the people there are too earnest and the songs are corny and all the rest of it. But there is a sense of spirituality there, a sense that there is something - I don’t mean God, I don’t mean there is a God who cares if you have anal sex or covet your neighbor's wife, I don’t really believe that an all seeing God exists - but while you are at church, you feel that maybe, just maybe, there is something more to life, more than our petty concerns of trying to make money, trying to lose weight, heck, even discussing the pros and cons of breast implants. And okay, it is only a drop in the ocean, but the people who go to that church actually do work for charity, they actually help the homeless. They don’t actually think that homeless people are low life scum.

They actually care. And sometimes I find that despite the fact that I want to look away from all the awful poverty around me, I can’t. I find that I actually do care. But I also know there is not very much I can do about it. Which is defeatist, I know. So, which charity should I give some money to, do you reckon, if I'm going to, which I think I am?

To lift or not to lift, that is the question

You have to make an utter ass of yourself to get on reality TV, everyone knows that, but most, it seems, simply don't care. So, yesterday, I was watching this reality TV show called Make a Twat of Yourself on TV and have all your colleagues snigger at you when you walk into the office Monday morning. Actually, God knows what it was called, but some woman (not the one above) had decided she was going to make an idiot of herself in order to get cut price plastic surgery. Now, this woman, who was a single mom, was thirty, and there wasn't anything wrong with her apart from her tits were saggy from breastfeeding two kids. Apart from that, she maybe needed to lose ten pounds. But obviously, she was having the lipo, a Brazilian butt lift (aparently Brazilian butts are the gold standard), breast implants which ended up looking like car air bags, and something intimate I'll get to in a minute.

Okay, I'll get to it now. With a cheerful expression, like she was talking about the fact she had an irritating zit on her nose, she said, "Since I had my boys, I lose bladder control several times a day and have to wear a pad in my pants all the time."

I blinked. Sorry, did you just go on national television and tell people you wear Depends at thirty? Americans are weird like that. They simply don't have an embarrassment gene. I've been known to say some pretty revealing things, but if I had the problem of peeing in my pants at thirty, maybe I would shut up about it. Hello? Your colleagues watch this crap. And your sons' friends. And everyone you've ever known. And you're surprised you don't have a boyfriend? Do you mention this on your first date at a restaurant?

Depends wearer: "Hi, I think we should be open with each other. I lose bladder control during sex, even through walking about. Are you okay with that?"

Date: "Waiter, check please!"

Okay look, I'm not unsympathetic, I know this sort of thing happens. But a little part of me must be utterly British, because that is not a topic for public conversation. Especially not telling some satanic looking doctor about it.

Depends wearer: "What about my bladder problems? Can you help with that?"

Satanic doc: "Say what? You are going to have the Brazilian butt implants aren't you? I feel like Michaelangelo when I create one of them big butts. They are so fashionable right now. They're big! They're huge! You're gonna have such an authentic looking Brazilian butt, people are going to think you're from Rio."

"I told you, I want the Brazilian butt. Now what about my incontinence?"

"Birth causes major trauma on the birth canal. Your muscles are all stretched out. We need to do vaginal rejuvenation surgery on you to tighten that love canal and stop you wetting yourself." I'm not sure that's exactly what he said, but that was the gist of it.

"Great!" gushed the woman and was rushed off to surgery.

Two months after the surgery, she had bagged herself an (admittedly ugly but still genetically male) boyfriend. Maybe he was an actor, who knows. He probably was. He'd known this woman two weeks and was already hanging out with her and her kids at Disneyworld where she demonstrated how unselfconscious she was about her tits now that she could jump in the water and have a wet t-shirt hanging off her car air bags. It was a bit embarrassing actually, the message that if you have yourself carved up like a turkey and vaginally rejuvenated you will find the secrets of pure happiness.

But here's the even more embarrassing fact. Not as a result of that program, but I am seriously considering having breast augmentation (lift) and implants.

I was always one of those people who laughed at the idea of people who have implants. How vain! How superficial! But that was when I had nice firm breasts, i.e. before I breastfed two kids.

And now, they are, how shall I put this politely? Not so nice and firm. And let's face it, gravity being what it is, things can only get worse.

My friend Kira says you only need implants if you are divorced and going back out on the market, but I disagree. I just reckon it would be nice to, well, to have nice tits. And it only costs $5,000. Bargain.

No, I'm serious. I quite fancy it. Look, don't get me wrong, I don't want Pamela Anderson type things. Just a C. Well, I'm a C now, a saggy C, so it would just be a plumper fuller C.

Most people tell you that you can get up and walk around the day after the surgery, which pisses me off no end. Of course I want to lie around for a few weeks and be waited on hand and foot, but these plastic surgery places want you out immediately, unless you want to pay an extra $2,000 a night. I've heard you can go to Thailand and have your whole body remodeled for practically nothing, and stay in some luxury complex for weeks to recover, like a vacation, for about three hundred dollars. But say what you like about saving money, you'd be worried about standards of medical procedures in Thailand, wouldn't you?

So, I'm thinking this over. My main problem is, I want them to look natural and not like some of the crap you see on these programs. Also, I sleep on my stomach and I'm wondering if the stuff (saline/silicone/what's the difference?/maybe I should research this topic) feels like you're sleeping on an air mattress or disperses so that you can actually lie down.

Women: Are you fed up with the state of your breasts after the kids have sucked the life out of them? Would you have implants? Or if you have had implants, were there complications? Are you pleased you had them? What do they feel like? Are you aware of them sitting in your chest?

Men: Has anyone actually felt a woman who had implants? If so, does it feel natural or like a bowl of Jello?

Idiot proof condom

Okay, I admit it, I pinched this bit of info from andie d. who highlights this cute little ad for a new condom which even idiots like myself could probably put on in the dark without somehow messing it up or putting it on inside out or tearing it etc. This nifty condom was developed in Africa to encourage condom usage and prevent HIV. Well, it's probably a more more useful idea than Georgie Boy's abstinence campaign for AIDS ravaged countries.

This is a pretty funny advert, but I don't get why he wants to have a shower after putting a condom on a dildo. And why the heck is it only available in South Africa? Sigh.

How to become an obnoxious internet cam whore

In my last post, I highlighted a unique business opportunity for people who want to put sex tapes of themselves up onto the Internet and make money off the desperate individuals who pay to watch such activities. I know that some of you have already started work on your masterpieces and will soon be raking it in. It's not that I haven't considered it. My husband is game, my body is in pretty good shape and I am keen to get paid for doing nothing (well, practically nothing). My main problems are these: the lighting isn't very good in my front room, so that either means buying special lighting or going to stay in a hotel to film the action at $200 a pop. I'm still trying to figure it all out. Do I need to style my hair before I film myself getting down to it, or will no one be looking at my hair, or at least, not the hair on top of my head? Which leads to more problems, like pubic hairstyles. Which ones are in and which ones are out these days, when trends change so fast? And what about protecting my privacy? Maybe I should simply wear a paper bag over my head? Also, do I need to disguise my voice so that no one will recognise me (like say, my mum or my daughter's teacher), even through the paper bag? So far, I can do a pretty good Scottish and South American and a passable Korean.

It's a minefield, I tell you. I'm beginning to think the less glamourous world of internet cam whoring may be a better bet for me. For those of you who are still scratching your heads at how to get started in this lucrative field, help is at hand. Just go here and all will be revealed in five easy steps.

And for those of you not interested in either of these job opportunities, here's another another brilliant Armand Van Helden video, which really cracks me up. By the way, do any of you happen to know of a video where a nerdy woman is surrounded by three gorgeous men? If you do, let me know.

Make money doing what comes naturally

I'm afraid this post will be a little spacey due to the fact I really do have a fantastic hangover. I went to a pretentious bar last night where the people were actually very sexy and dressed up. I have never seen people this attractive walking around Baltimore, maybe they were out of towners. It's been an unbelievable couple of days for me, I have been out drinking for two nights in a row. Last night I was out until one and I did not feel tired. In fact I felt exactly like I did when I was twenty-four, full of energy and ready to go on to a club when I thought, fuck no, the kids will be jumping on my head at six (they were). Why does the meaning of life and my happiness have to involve drinking, cocktails, flirting with cute young guys, dancing and all the rest? Why couldn't it have involved Buddhism or learning to love opera or getting into folk music or origami or flower arranging? Why?

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, my spacey post about making money doing what comes naturally.

Here's some questions for you.

Are you:

A real exhibitionist?

Want to be the next Pam, K-Fed or Paris?

Want to earn money doing it?

Well, it's really this simple.

Create your own sex tape - upload your dirty home videos and phone clips and get paid for every minute other people watch.

I've already earned buckets from my home video, which was filmed in my country manor in Berkshire. I'm the lady with the long sleeved shirt on. It's a very British video, in that the people are queuing quietly and without anger, and not even really very much looking forward to being spanked.

And before anyone writes me an irate letter, no corgis were harmed in the making of this video. Enjoy.

Whiskey is the devil's drink

Today I woke up with a teeny tiny hangover, and I thought to myself, it is nearly seven years since I have been drunk. When you have not been drunk for that amount of time, you look back on the killer hangovers you used to have with a certain amount of nostalgia. And while you maybe do not miss the hangovers themselves, you missed the benders you used to go on.

The first time I remember being drunk, although there may have been others, was when I was fifteen and on a coach full of package tourists headed for Kitzbühel, Austria, with my mother. Since my mum is a notorious skinflint, (and, unfortunately, through a Google search has started reading this blog), we had to take the cheapest route to a skiing holiday, which was, naturally enough, thirty hours via coach and ferry from London to Austria. Well, what else is a girl meant to do to fill the hours than buy a bottle of whiskey on the ferry?

Like I have mentioned, my mother is a bit odd about matters of sexuality. It was always all about, wait until you love somebody before you give the precious gift of your body to him yada yada. But then if she did catch me doing anything sexual, she didn't seem to care. So that made a lot of sense.

Take this trip to Austria. I don't really remember too much about it. I know it was the middle of the night and we were somewhere in Belgium and I was sitting between two teenage boys in the back and we were passing the whiskey back and forth (my mum was sitting a row ahead). I recall that everyone else was asleep, and yet I was singing something at the top of my lungs (which was a tad inconsiderate), and getting off with one (both??) of these lads. And then? Blank, until I woke up in the morning with the mother and father of all hangovers at some God forsaken service station where I was trying to force down a cup of coffee.

My mother then informs me that I was all over those boys "like a vine", before vomiting all over the floor and passing out. I said, "Why didn't you try and stop me?" To which she replied, "Ah, I thought it would teach you a lesson, not to drink so much." I suppose she did have a point. Since then I have never been able to touch whiskey.

The only time I had a sexual experience I can't remember (apart from the above) was when I was maybe mid-twenties, and I went to a party and drank quite a lot of tequila. I sat down on a sofa and started chatting to quite a sexy guy and we drank more tequila. Then the next thing I know it's the middle of the night and I look down and see that this dress I was wearing, which had about a hundred buttons down the front, has all the buttons open, and this guy is next to me telling me something like, "I can't do this. I have a girlfriend." Well, for one, he had obviously done quite a bit already. And for another, how the heck had I got off with this guy and not been able to remember a thing? Before I could quiz him further, he roared off into the night in his sports car.

The next day he told my friend that he really liked me and that we'd had a great night (had we?), but he had a girlfriend and so couldn't take it any further. Note to self: never drink tequila.

But where was I? Ah, hangovers. This is how we deal with them in the UK. You wake up feeling like shit, and some bright spark will always say, "Let's go for a fry up." For those unfamiliar with the concept, this involves bacon, eggs, sausages, baked beans, mushrooms and bread, all fried in industrial grade oil and served in a café full of builders who chain smoke and put their fags out in the yolk of their fried egg. Those fried breakfasts were… heaven. And they do 'sort you out' for a few hours, until you feel there is a vat of congealed grease sitting in your stomach like an ominous gremlin. At that point you complain to your friends that you feel a bit green. And they usually say, "have a fag, that will sort you out." And you have a fag, and that doesn't sort you out, and then, invariably, even though you know it doesn't make a bit of sense, you go out Sunday night and have a few pints and finally, finally, that does sort you out.

I guess years of this kind of lifestyle is why it has taken me about two years to get myself into good physical shape. I can't imagine having stayed in the UK and not drinking a lot, because it is just that sort of place. At some point I used to hang out with some Alcoholics Anonymous people, who were convinced I was an alcoholic, probably because those people are always desperate for new converts. I said I didn't think I was, because I had no compulsion to drink. If there was no alcohol in the house, I would not go and buy some. Yes, they said, but you are still an alcoholic. Right. Whatever. In their eyes everyone is in denial.

Which brings me to my final point. Do you have any drunken experiences where you can't remember what the heck you got up to? Of course you do. But do you have any you want to share?

We are not worthy

Why do we blog? Most of us don't know. Most of us aren't very good at it. But praise where praise is due, and some people are amazing at it. Which is why they should get lots of cash, both for lifting people's spirits during bad times and for making people pee their pants laughing, for both these are skills, my friends. But because I don't have any spare cash, I am reduced to handing out a paltry Perfect Post Award to Steve Novak, for his hilarious take on sexual fetishism.

For those few people who do not know about Steve, you have been missing a lot. Despite the fact that Steve didn't get laid in college, and has a self-confessed piss poor anti-social personality, he now has legions of cyber groupies who hang on his every word. While most blogs contain bleeding obvious commentaries on politics, religious rants, photos of people's cats and/or genitals, Steve takes the genre, massacres it and creates a horrible kind of roadkill that makes you want to look at it again and again. This man is so wierd and brilliant and original, I don't care if he is a sociopath. Run don't walk and check him out.

To see the other Perfect Post Awards, go to Suburban Turmoil or MommaK.