Pole Dancing - Women, Men, Dancers, Opposers duke it out

The BBC magazine site's hosting an interesting debate on the benefits of poledancing as an exercise activity. You can read it here. Some interesting comments, some downright nonsense, some male pole dancers and a surprising amount of men speaking out against it.

Choice quote:
It's exercise, is it? So you'll all be wearing trainers then? Jill Arscott, Brighton

Interesting reading.

Brain washing continues almost completely unabated

Last night I was watching some rollerblading competition on the Extreme channel. The guys had a skate off, then it was time for the girls comp.

Before we got to see any skating, though, we were audience to the delights of one hott young skater chic (Fallon Heffernan) waxing lyrical on the fun she had doing porno promo shots. The hott pics (her words, not mine) were good for the sport (apparently, again her words not mine).

Won't nudey pics of blonde hotties undermine the credibility of women's skating, and draw attention away from their talent and to their tits? I can hear you cry. That's what I thought too. But no, Fallon thinks it will draw more men (doesn't she mean viewers?) to women's competitions.

Ah, I see. So you don't want these men to come to see you skate your ass off, you want them to come to see your ass, cos that's what you're advertising love.

To further confuse and astound - Fallon is no Anna Kornikova (ie, cute looking but not so great at tennis), she's actually one of the top female aggressive skaters in the world, coming in the top 3 in world ranking competitions.

Yeh, the photo is Fallon.

Guniea pigs - designed by Nature to counteract the bad.

Letter to the man who should know better.

The past few weeks have been hard. Starting a new job is not easy at the best of times, but starting a new job when you can’t keep your head together when the ride is at its smoothest is no lark in the park.

I am hell to bear. I am nerves. I am frustration. I am disappointment. I am difficult. I am unpredicatable. I am distraught. I’m not happy.

But when I stop sulking, stop crying, stop pining, stop dreaming, the outside would have you believe it had all gone away. That’s their perception anyway. It’s a surprise when ugly comes back again, when sadness blows in again, when I crawl away, taking refuge from the world outside.

I’ve succeeded though, to go to work despite the overwhelming desperation to avoid. I have done my duty every day. Every one is nice. They’re all perfect. I am wrong.

I have to ‘get over it, to ‘put it into perspective’. Have to ignore it all and push it away.

I am so scared of failure. I am scared to fall. I have nowhere left for my thoughts to go.

I am a pain. I am an inconvenience. I am a parasite. I am ungrateful. I’m not what you thought you were getting. You can’t listen to me anymore. You yell. You cringe. You wait for it to blow up in your face.

I hate you for it.
You hate me for it.

Is this what 'last legs' feels like?

Noodle doodle

New doodle on Doodle Blog - note to self, neglect blog less.
x

The Dark Side of Porn

Channel 4 are screening a series of documentaries collectively entitled The Dark Side of Porn that might be worth a gander.

If you're outside the UK but would like to see these let me know and I can post you a recording of them. The schedule is as follows:

Monday April 10th 23:05
Amateur Porn
The season opener, Amateur Porn, reveals what really happens on the first rung of the UK's sex industry career ladder, where the girl-next-door comes cheap but the stakes are high.

Tuesday April 11th 23:05
Me and My Slaves

Wednesday April 12th 23:05
Hunting Emmanuelle
Hunting Emmanuelle takes a look at the cultural impact of the 70s porn franchise.

Coming of age

I am 1 year old. Today is my blogday.

Lets celebrate with a bottle of organic ale and a day-glo slice of cake.

I'm a goin' ramblin'

Rambling's something I think I will be doing a lot of in the next week or so. My new job is not exactly the environment for leopard print shoes, more the environment for browns, greens and walking boots.

They are also totally and utterly disorganised. Induction to them means traipsing me around some footpaths and ‘explaining’ to quickly, in language peppered with jargon, what they do and what they expect me to do. Two days in now, and none the wiser.

Today my Richard Thompson cd came. It was eagerly awaited after hearing this song and this song (sorry lyrics only) on the radio 2 folk show. It doesn’t have quite the same effect as when listened to in a small cottage on the west coast of rural Scotland – but it’s still great. It’s winter evening music, definitely, and will propel me back to the highlands upon each listen, which I appreciate.

I have to be clever with money from now on though because I want a scooter (still, I’ve wanted one since last summer) and plan to actually buy one at some point. My literally nonexistent savings can’t fund a purchase at this time though, so penny pinching will be my new plan.

I am also thinking of dyeing my hair bright red, the kind of red sported by Clemantine in ‘Eternal sunshine…’ or Lola in ‘Run Lola Run’. I am too stuck in my blonde ways though. This is something I will have to ease myself into.

Humph

I've been putting it off, and filling my time with other distractions, but I have to read all the submissons for Subtext today, and edit those still in need of it. I must. We're mocking up the design tomorrow.

Instead I want to write about pornography and erotic literature. For me, erotic literature is a-ok. I read it and get off on it, I wouldn't mind if my bed mate did either (hell, he proboaly does, I leave it lying around). I feel differently toward imagery though, and more specifically mainstream pornography of the type you see in Nuts/Zoo/FHM etc. I would not get off to this, and I wouldn't be ok about my bed buddy getting off to this either.

Where then are the fundamental differences by which I can draw a distinction?

1) Erotic fiction does not require an subject to be visually broken into pieces and objectified.
2) Erotic fiction does not focus on the appearance of a woman or her parts - rather it focuses on textures, sensations and draws shapes and appearance in the mind.
3) Fiction as opposed to visual pornography teachers the reader to build their own ideas of sexuality, sex and physicality. To read one has to be more involved in the process, and choose to give their attention to it, rather than being a recipient of imagery regardless of the type and style.
4) The male dominated realm of pornography is underminned by fictional erotica. Anyone can write it. 'Stars' can range from mundane to eccentric or stunning. It is as easy to create as it is to write a letter.
5) Imagination is a powerful tool. Through it we can explore and control what we want to 'see' and experieince.

I think I'm a bit hypo. I am bored of writing this. I pretty much constantly think about sex when I get like this. Is this what it's like to be a man?

I want to write 'stuff' but my mind is elsewhere (if you get my meaning, subtle isn't it).

Hmm, when we were interviewed about Subtext a couple of months ago we were asked if we would discuss sex much in the magazine. Maybe I will write a post on creating your own erotic fiction. LOL! I am being a moron. I think I should go back to bed.

TP goes to Paris. A travelogue.

It’s long, if you don’t have the time, skip the text and just check out the pictures.

Day miuns 1
I finished work early, because it was my last day and I could. At 8 I drove to Coventry with Him, where we stayed over with the friends we were going to Paris with, lets call them Gem and Jam.

He went to bed early, because he loves sleep and was preparing himself for the 3:30am start the next day. I went to bed shortly after him because I was preparing myself for the 3:30am start the next day. Gem and Jam are vampires and like to stay up late. They went to after 12, at least that’s what I think.

In the night we were visited by Gem and Jam’s cat – although I slept right through it.

Day 1 – getting there

Meep meep!!!!
The alarm went off at an ungodly hour. We didn’t bother to close the curtains because we were getting up so early it would be dark anyway. The cats came and investigated the voices they heard, and invaded the bed. I dragged Him out of bed – at this point he would’ve slept right through the holiday if he could.

Gem and Jam had showers! They are bonkers, it’s 3:30 in the morning! There’s no breakfast for me because I don’t eat milk and there’s no bread – so we all resolve to eat at the airport.

Bleary eyed Him, Gem, Jam and I load the car and set off to the airport. We go into the wrong carpark. When we try to leave it tells them us we have to pay £6. The carparking machine is having a joke. Jam presses the buzzer and admit to our blunder. We find the right car park, park and unload our stuff. I am carrying by far the biggest bag because I am vain and think Paris will be my own personal fashion show. As is always the case this vanity backfires later on.

We find our departure terminal and join a queue for the departure desk – except it is for Amsterdam not Paris. We would probably have been in the wrong queue until we reached the front if I wasn’t such a nosey parkers as to listen to other people’s conversations.

Sans bags (already using my French!) we go up the escalator, through passport control (I think?) and through security. At which point I’m stopped. I’m always getting searched. I must look shifty, like a drug dealer. Either that or it was the studded belt I was wearing.

Breakfast was terrible and overpriced. I do not recommend departures at Birmingham airport for meals.

Arriving in Paris
Excited, we filed off the plane, onto a bus and to the airport, where they were successfully allowed into the country. All our bags arrived too, that is, except mine. Frustrated, but resigned to my fate, I asked an airport woman where my bag was in terribly phrased, broken French. The airport woman took pity on me and replied in perfect English for me to follow her.

The bag, the biggest bag of them all, a monument to my madness, was lost. Airport woman did not know where it was. I described my bag and left. Somehow loosing my favourite scarf at the same time – and not even noticing until I was on the Rossibus to the centre of Paris.

Luckily I had packed the Time Out guide to Paris in my hand luggage, so we were able to find our way to their hotel with relative ease and only a few cross words all before the rooms were available. I say rooms, but on arrival at the hotel, only Gem and Jam’s room was booked, not my room. So far it was not going well.

The man on reception at the hotel understood my pseudo-French and found a room for us, which even had a balcony. Bags were dropped off, except mine, which was somewhere in the ether, and the ‘gang’ set off into town. Most probably to find food.

There was a bakery just down the street from the hotel – this provided daily nourishment, fortifying us before we left to explore the city.

Day 1 – after arrival
Day 1 is a bit of a blur – I was missing my bag, this preoccupied my mind. Through looking through photos, I can piece together the following.

We walked down rue Saint-Michel to the Seine. It was raining a bit. We then walked the ‘wrong way’ down the Seine and came to a homeless encampment. There were a lot of tents here, under the numerous bridges the cross the Seine. We did not stay long – it was raining more.

We wandered along some more, crossing the river and heading towards the Bastille. After a LOT of walking, we found it – it’s not there anymore. It’s an opera house, and an ugly one at that. There’s a statue – but it commemorates something else. So we had coffee. Except I had tea and Gem had hot chocolate and He had nothing.

It was still raining, but I had an umbrella, and the metro was just outside the café – so we pushed onward. We had dinner. Again someone took pity on my poor attempt at French. The sink rocked.

Next, on Andygrrl’s recommendation, we went to Shakespeare and Co., a little English language bookshop right opposite Notre Dame. Crammed to the rafters. and with books in every nook and cranny, Shakespeare and Co. did not disappoint – in fact we wanted to move in and live on the beds tucked away among books in the reading rooms upstairs. The mirror of love was mesmerizing.

Now dead on our feet, we mooched about the outside of Notre Dame, then got the metro back to our hotel, where we tried to drink very cheap French wine, and I tried to call the airport in an attempt to locate my missing bag.

As I settled down to a night in travel tired clothes with dirty teeth and smudged eye make up, accepting the fact I would look a shocking sight the next day in borrowed clothes from Him I got a call from reception – my bag had arrived! It had been missing for about 14 hours.

Day 2 – the world’s longest day

Much to our confusion we woke at 10, but it was really 11, and then later it was actually 12. We went to rue Mouffetard (muff tard!) to see the market. Gem and Jam have better pics – mine sucks.

Quintessentially French looking people were dancing to karaoke outside the market. The gang then walked up rue Descartes, and to a large building that none of us could name. So we took some pictures, of it and the surrounding buildings, Frenchness oozed from them. There were yellow ribbons tied to everything – from what we could figure there was a fundraising event for cancer going on. It turns out it was the Pantheon.

This is the first time we saw the Eiffel Tower.

We couldn’t go down the road we wanted because it was closed off – due to protests and riots that had taken place the day before. The French prime minister wants to introduce an English initiative to reduce the 23% unemployment among French youth (under 26s) [tangent]which means I am still a ‘youth’, as such I should be out causing trouble not typing a million word travelogue that no one will read all the way through [/tangent]. The law, designed to make ‘youth’ more attractive to employers will mean employer’s can fire anyone under 26 within 2 months of employing them without having to give reason. This sounds pretty wank, but apparently this is the ‘probationary’ period we have in the UK.

After eating (the search for food was a key feature of this holiday) we went to Notre Dame. Inline skaters were turning tricks for cash outside.

The tower tour was worth the queue, and the view was fantastic. We even saw the famous chimera (which was in Scooby-doo this afternoon, they were in Paris – I recognised all the sights!) and the bell. No hunchback though.

From the top of the tower we could hear saxophone, and through my monocular (a leaving gift from work) I spied a band playing on a bridge from the island over to the right bank. This is where we headed next.

They were a jazz/blues band and they were taking turns to perform with a guy and bicycle, while one was performing the other was having a break.

Next we headed to the Louvre, passing theses ingenious ‘shops’ on the way – boxes attached to the walls along the Seine.

We didn’t go in the Lourve, we just checked prices, tried to find food, and in the end headed back to the hotel, agreeing to go see the Tower in the dark, before getting some dinner and going to a jazz club (ooh la la).

The Eiffel Tower was fantastic. Heavily guarded by armed soldiers, but fantastic. Brilliantly lit, amazing views, bats flying past us, little tiny birds, fascinating structures and workings (for me, I’m a geek) and hardly any people. The hourly light show was on while we were up there.

I don’t know how long we stayed, though it was about to close when we finally left at what must have been about 11:30. We rushed to the station, the metro closed at 12:30, and took the train to Notre Dame for dinner.
We sat down, to our salads in bread bowls, at about 1 am. Washed down with a Chardonnay and a game of cards, we didn’t make it to the jazz club in the end – it had already closed.

Because the metro had stopped running we knew it was going to be a long walk home to the 13th arr.

Day 3

Our feet were pounding by now, mine throbbed. Resolving to do less walking, and take the metro more we set off around the Maraias. Walking.

After getting a bit sidetracked, we located the main street and were aghast at the prices. I have no pictures :o(.
Next we were off to the Eiffel Tower again, this time to the top floor. Gale force winds, I swear. Three helicopters flew past.

We had crepes, banana and chocolate for me, before walking to the Arc du Triomphe. To be honest, it was a bit disappointing, as was the Champs Elyeese – though I did get two cds after going against Andy’s advice and going into Virgin megastore. My excuse is they’re French, and chanson no less.

After walking all the way down the Champs Elyeese (remember, we weren’t supposed to be doing much walking today) we tried to go to the Louvre.

We missed out though, because it closed at 5:30, just as we were arriving (we were oblivious to time for the entire holiday). I took some pictures of the pyramid though.

Exhausted, we headed back to arr. 13 for dinner. After soaking aching feet we planned to find a chanson bar recommended in the guide as being the smallest venue in Paris and having over 2000 instruments on the walls. It was neither of these things – though it was worth the walk. It was called La folie un tete; the bar man laughed at my French.

Here am I, after ½ a bottle of wine and a Kronenbourg. Rockin’ the leopard print.

Day 4
For the past 3 days we’d heard news reports about riots and protests planned to take place throughout France, and particularly in Paris on the 28th, the day we were scheduled to leave. Our hotel had recommended we book a shuttle to the airport, tourist information had told us public transport was likely to be off, CNN reported it was gong to be severely affected. We took our chances though.

The metro was running a reduced service – but out line was not hit (phew!). We got to the central station where we could catch Rossirail, the bus we caught from the airport was not running at all due to the strikes. Gar du Nord, the main station, was a warren of platforms and tunnels. The signs were all in French, and the pace was so fast my GCSE French just couldn’t cope. We were totally perplexed – and we looked it. Lucky for us, a young French woman noticed, and advised us twice where to go. We tried, but we were none the wiser. She spotted us looking lost again, and because she was some kind of wonderful woman, guided us through the station right to our train. A train we would never have found if not for her.

Despite what you might hear, everyone we met was nice, friendly and helpful, especially this woman. Don’t believe what 'they’ say about the French.