Tag: Gag

Money, money, money

When it comes to paying a professional dominant – the ‘tribute’ in the industry parlance – it’s said that you get what you pay for. My social media feeds frequently features this sentiment expressed in various different ways, both by pro-dommes and their clients. In other words the quality of the dominant and the experience she offers correlates strongly to the size of the tribute she demands. But is this true?

I can obviously only comment from my limited personal experience, which is entirely with independent and well established pro-dommes.  However, within that limited set, I’d say the number one correlation with the tribute amount isn’t the skill of the domme, but the cost of real estate in her location. High cost cities make it expensive to maintain both a playspace and a personal residence. They also tend to have a highly paid client base who can afford higher fees. So Manhattan has always had very high hourly tribute rates. San Francisco wasn’t too bad a decade or so ago, but has become a lot more expensive in recent years.  Seattle isn’t in San Francisco’s league yet, but is beginning to trend in that direction.

Keeping all this in mind, if there are any American submissives out there with cash on the hip, vacation time in the bank, and a kinky itch to scratch, my top recommendation would be to visit Los Angeles. It’s got a huge and talented pro-domme community, but its sprawling layout leads to a cheaper cost of living and significantly lower tribute rates. For example, Isabella Sinclaire is undoubtedly an outstanding domme, with the skills to match anyone in the world. Yet, her rate for 2 hours is (at the time of writing) $500, which is significantly below the SF average and way below the NYC average. She also has an amazing and well equipped play space.

I hated LA when I first visited it back in the 90’s, but it’s probably the one place in America I’d now consider living outside Seattle. If you’ve not been then I definitely recommend it. Just steer clear of the Hollywood tourist traps.

This shot is from Isabella’s instagram feed. Her contact information for scheduling professional sessions is here.

Medical Sadism

Well I’m on the topic of professional dommes producing great kinky imagery, let me give a shout out to Mistrix Sade, and in particular this medical themed post. It has some lovely imagery that takes medical play and adds a slightly unsettling undertone of horror and mad science. I think it’s another good example of taking familiar tropes and making them work afresh.

Mistrix Sade is a NYC based pro-domme. Information on scheduling sessions with her can be found here.

Absence of Activity

Sorry for the posting gap. I picked up some bug over the weekend and have spent the last few days curled up under a blanket. I haven’t felt like I could do much of anything, other than watch bad television and sleep. Hopefully, normally service should be resumed from this point on.

Talking of guys unable to do much of anything, here’s one in a similar bind. Although I guess if looking stylish counts, he’s definitely managing to pull that off.

This is from the instagram of kinkbaku (also on twitter). It’s not exactly femdom, but if you like images of bound men, then it’s worth checking out.

Dumb and Dumber

I’ve blogged about the stupidity of consent apps previously. The idea that you can swipe right to rubber stamp consent on a sexual encounter is a dangerous one. Firstly, it undermines the idea that consent is ongoing and always open to renegotiation or withdrawal. An agreement at minute one tells you nothing about what happened at minutes two through sixty. Secondly, an incapacitated or unwilling person could always be coerced to use the app, setting up a possible defense for an attacker.  On the flip-side, no jury is going to take the lack of a digitally signed consent as useful piece of evidence. After all, not using an app in the heat of the moment is standard behavior for 99.99% of people. So they clarify nothing, while working against potential victims and for potential attackers.

Of course there is no stupid technical solution that can’t somehow be made more stupid. Software people are inventive like that. In this case some Dutch tech-bro’s have managed to take the broken consent app concept and marry it with the latest tech craze – blockchain. For those that haven’t heard of this before, blockchain is the technical basis for cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin. Personally, I’m a cynic on the current cryptocurrency craze, whilst still admiring the design of some of the underlying technology. However, in this particular case, it makes no sense. A decentralized design is logical when you want to avoid a single point of attack that governments and thieves can target to take control. Not so much when you’re tracking two people ticking a consent box. I can’t see the Russian hackers taking a break from social media and our elections to go after consent apps.

When it comes to negotiating consent, it’s always important to do it before the gag goes in. You can always renegotiate at anytime, but sometimes are definitely easier than others.

I’m afraid I’ve no source for this image.

Updated: Thanks to an eagle eyed reader I can attribute this to the artist xxxx52 who has a patreon site.

Drool

Mistress Sidonia has put together a very comprehensive list of gag types, spread across a pair of posts here and here. It’s a handy reference for anyone looking for new toys or techniques to try, as well as those who like to go through lists ticking off what they’ve tried to date.

One thing that always amuses me about gags is how many dommes love the drool they produce. There may be some dommes out there who don’t care about gag drool, but if there are, I’ve never met them. I’ve seen plenty of dommes complaining about submissives slobbering over their feet or dribbling onto their outfits, but somehow gag drool is never an issue. It’s either hot, funny, cute or all of the above.

This image is by Joachim Baldauf for Paper Planes magazine.

Drinks at the Pool

We might be heading into the last few weeks of summer but, when the sun isn’t doing a disappearing act, it’s still pretty hot in most parts of the US. Perfect weather for consuming cool drinks outside. The best I can manage is a glass of wine on a restaurant patio. This lady has a much better set-up. I only hope she doesn’t drift off into the deep end. Treading water and keeping her drink above it might present a problem.

I found this on the Garden of Eden tumblr. I’m afraid I don’t have an original attribution for it. I do recognize the gag being used as Scott Paul Design one.

Update: Thanks to a very helpful comment, I can now attribute this to the lovely Mistress Ezada Sinn. You can see another shot from the same scene in her post here.

The Maid and the Lord

Regular readers will probably have noticed that I often like to do short sequences of posts connected by a common theme. This image gives me a rare twofer, combining my two most recent themes – maid outfits and disgruntled men in bondage. In this case the man is the local lord of the manor and the maid outfit is actually worn by the maid. I’ve no desire to pull on a frilly maid costume myself, but I would certainly pay money for this kind of cleaning service. Dusting by myself is somehow never this much fun.

The artwork is by the amazing Yumine Guo. If you like it then consider supporting more great femdom artwork by becoming a Patreon.

Contrasting expressions

It’s been a crazy news week in the US, and I’m very happy it’s now the weekend. I look forward to relaxing with a glass of wine and not doing or watching much of anything. I hope all my readers out there can have an equally enjoyable weekend.

I was going to put up this image and make a short simple comment about how cute and happy it was. But then I looked a little closer. She certainly has a pleased “Ahhh puppy!” expression going on, but he’s red face, angry and trying to grab what looks like a butter knife. I can’t see that cutting through his bonds. It’s kind of an odd image in that respect. I’d be a very happy bunny in his position, but clearly he’s not a fan of bondage fun.

Based on the image signature, this is by the artist Bondlicitous.