Tag: Photograph

Cocktail Hour

One thing I’ve missed this year is making cocktails for friends. That’s such a pleasurable activity. Making a cocktail is much quicker and simpler than cooking a meal, yet still has those elements of handcrafting and artistry that makes it fun to do. There are endless recipes to try and minimal knife skills required. Plus, you end up with drunk happy grateful friends.

This image is obviously from the Play Girl magazine and features Alex Hawn as the man with the Martini glass. The first version I found of this image had been weirdly edited to chop his head off and photoshop out the gun from her hand. I kind of get the cropping to remove the logo and make the woman more center frame. That’s a pretty common tumblr type edit. But who simultaneously hated guns yet loved this image so much that they spent the time to photoshop the gun out?

Twinkle Toes

Just after writing my previous post on the subject of kink and shame, I stumbled across this Savage Love column. I think the first letter there is a good grounding point for those of us who spend a lot of time on BDSM sites and following like minded people on social media. It’s easy to get blase about kinks and forget that for a lot of people they can come as a shock.

The letter in question features a guy whose boyfriend is into feet and has a thing for painting toe nails. As kinks go, I can’t really think of a more harmless one. A foot fetish is very common and painting a partners toenails seems kind of cute whatever the gender combination. Yet the letter writer – someone who regularly read Savage Love and claimed to be GGG – seemed weirdly freaked by the idea. I think Dan nails the answer, but the fact the writer felt the need to pose the question is a good data point in itself.

When it comes to foot lovers, Quentin Tarantino is an obvious go to. This is him in a publicity shoot with Diane Kruger for his movie Inglorious Bastards. It was shot for the NY Time Magazine.

The Chicago Studio

I’ve previously covered the difficulties playspaces are having right now with Covid-19. The latest example to reach out for help is The Chicago Studio owned by Mistress Simone. They’ve set up a GoFundMe to help it survive here.

I’ve unfortunately never played with Mistress Simone, but I have been lucky enough to use that space multiple times with Mistress Mara Mayhem. It’s a great space with some excellent equipment. I particularly like this padded table with its sturdy metal frame and a cut out section. That combination allows for all sorts of fun bondage set-ups while leaving the body of the submissive very much available for tease or torture.

If you can afford to make a donation, then I’m sure all the Mistresses who use the space would very much appreciate it. I personally just donated. I’m very much looking forward to playing more when the virus is finally under control, and it’ll be very depressing if there’s nowhere left to do so by then.

This is Mistress Simone in a photograph from her web site.

Valerie Leon

I’m moving on from C S Lewis, but sticking with kinky button pushing moments from childhood. This image is Valerie Leon with Peter Sellers from the movie ‘Revenge of the Pink Panther‘.

The original scene – viewable on youtube here – now comes across as horribly dated. It leans into all sorts of uncomfortable stereotypes. However, back when I first saw it in the mid 80’s, it was my first awareness of the dominatrix role. There were plenty of screen characters who’d pushed my buttons already (like Catwoman and Miss Peel), but nothing as sexually overt as Valerie Leon’s role here. For all its cliches, it helped me connect some of the dots around sex and kink. This whip wielding dominatrix might be played for laughs, but the fact that type of character actually existed was a big part of putting together my kinky puzzle.

The White Witch

Most kinky people can point to moments in their youth where they had a sudden awareness of their kinky side. It can be almost anything – a scene on TV, a particular outfit, a movie character – but whatever it is, their kinky wiring goes ‘Bzzzzz!’ They might not even understand exactly what is happening or why, but there’s a sudden rush of both excitement and curiosity.

My favorite version of these are the really early ones. The ones that triggered me even though I was too young to know about sex or kink. Where I remember a strange attraction to something, but it’s only obvious in hindsight why. The existence of these events before I reached adolescence speak to the very deep and intrinsic nature of my kinks.

I discovered a new one recently. A tweet mentioned the White Witch of Narnia, from the books by C. S. Lewis, and suddenly a penny dropped. I think I was around 9 or 10 when I read them and I remember being fascinated by the White Witch. Particularly the scenes where she seduces Edmund with warm furs and Turkish delight. There was also her habit of turning disobedient creatures into statues. In hindsight the idea of a cruel, powerful and sensual woman with a taste for objectification and fornophilia would be an obvious draw for a young paltego. It’s just taken me a few decades to realize why.

This is Tilda Swinton in the role as Jadis the White Witch, from the 2005 movie.

Hustle (updated)

Last month I wrote a post where I expressed surprise that sex workers hadn’t jumped on the idea of selling masks made from their intimate apparel. Given a lot of pro-dommes sell used panties and socks online already, why not turn them into masks and also plug into kinks around exhibitionism and subtle public play?

It turns out that at least one domme was already plotting in that direction. Madeline Marlowe recently put up this tweet with the fact she’s sold 48 pairs of well scented pantie masks. That fact does not surprise me at all. Round 2 of production is apparently opening up, so check out the instructions in her tweet if you’d like one of her unique masks.

This image is another shot from Madeline’s twitter feed. It features her with Will Havoc in a docu-series called ‘Chastity’. You can see more from it via her Only Fans.

Good Advice

Vice magazine has a pretty decent article on how to find a kink positive therapist. For anyone living through the dystopian hellscape that is the US right now, therapy is close to an essential resource. Just below bread flour and slightly above toilet paper. Finding someone who works well for you always involves a degree of trial and error, but this article seems like a good starting point.

This is of course the amazing Mistress T. She’s not actually a therapist, but she does play one on TV.

Troupe of Slaves

A helpful comment from a post earlier this month pointed me at  Troupe of Slaves. It’s a fun site, with a lot of interesting images, although I’m not exactly clear on who or what is behind it. Is it the artistic spin-off of a local kinky group? A bunch of friends having fun? A one man art project?

Regardless of what it is, there’s definitely a lot of great sexy images to enjoy. I particularly liked this one entitled ‘Polka Dots‘.

 

Party Fun

I’ve no idea what the context for this is, or who these people are, but it looks like a fun time. I like to imagine he’s being used and abused, a toy to be played with and then cast aside. They’ll snap some pictures for their friends, take their pleasure however they desire, and leave him a sweaty, disheveled and incoherent mess.

I’d guess this is from a CFNM themed porn shoot, but I’m afraid I haven’t managed to track down a link for it.

Dronification

I love the fact that after many years of immersion in kinky culture I can still stumble upon new things. For example, I give you the kink of dronification, which is totally new to me. In hindsight it seems like an obvious combination. Obedience, latex, objectification, submission and hypnosis are all hot button kinky topics. Why wouldn’t people put them together? The hive dynamic, with it’s singular queen and mindlessly obedient worker drones, is ripe for twisting in this way. Plus, its masks and visors make it totally suited to a world of coronavirus.

This image from Reflective Desire isn’t strictly a dronification image, but it has a lot of the elements. There’s latex, objectification, submission and all sorts of fun stuff going on.

If you like this image I’d urge you to check out the Reflective Desire site. They have a ton of great content like this.