Not a Post for the Faint of Heart

Nor the weak of stomach. You have been warned.

I don't really use snail mail much. People keep sending me stuff that I don't want or need so that my paper shredder won't feel lonely, but I let it back up for a while before I deal with it. So this morning when I needed to clear off the table so that we can have some friends over for brunch tomorrow, I had a whole pile of Bijou DVD sale flyers to go through. They take you right back to the good old days of black & white porn, those flyers do. I was ogling the guys in their 70s haircuts and reading the descriptions when I came across (so not literally) this one:

CLUB MANDOM 1

Glory hole hog Tom Caserta produced, directed, edited, and stars in Club Mandom 1, an intense, anonymous blow job video that focuses on uncut cocks. The film's subtitle is Blue Collar Cheese Factory. Caserta doesn't merely suck dicks with foreskin; he relishes and savors the cheesy schlongs of working men. This ain't no pristine suck flick: everything that comes along with the extra flop of skin that covers a penis head is highlighted here, and the footage is explicit. Each scene features lots and lots of smegma -- gooey, creamy flecks of cock junk that cling to each penis like wet popcorn. Caserta ceremoniously sniffs, licks, and eats the cheese before swallowing bone, which in itself is no mean feat given how large each of these men are. All of the action occurs in a dirty back room, and Caserta's men remain anonymous: we are only shown swatches of dirty denim, a bit of flannel, or a cropped view of leather through the glory hole. The little we see indicates that these are rough, hard-working guys. Some must do heavy physical work because the amount of smegma on their cocks is astounding. (Pre-condom, 1990)

When you're talking about penises (and, really, you're always talking about penises, even when you think you're talking about something else), there are two things that are sure to make my viscera shrivel and send me kermitting from the room: sounds and smegma.

I should probably 'fess up that I've had no direct experience with either s-word. I do think that uncut cocks are god's gift to men, and almost every time I run into a man with a hood, I'm envious that he's perfectly accessorized in a way I never will be, but the uncut men I've met have all been very good about the penile hygiene. But as much as I like cheese and believe that it should be served at room temperature, I have trouble imagining that anything that's been hanging around inside a foreskin for a few days would be very appetizing -- the great and obvious exception being the cockhead -- or have much gustatory resemblance to a nice feta or chèvre.

But really, it's the word that gets me. Smegma. Ssssssmegma. I'm sure there's an actual etymology for the word, but the idea of looking it up makes me a bit nauseous. I prefer to think that it arose from the petulance of the divine, in some sort of conversation among the powers that be:

Power That Was: What do you suppose is the ugliest word in the English language?
Power That Is: "Cheney"?
Power That Will Be: We have a winner!
PTW: Ok, but I was thinking of something less context-sensitive. Something that just sounds ugly even if you don't know what it means.
PTI: "Smarmy"?
PTWB: This would be so much easier in German.
PTW: How about something that isn't a word yet? Maybe the ugliest concatenation of syllables you can imagine.
PTWB: "Concatenation" is quite a nice word, I think.
PTW: Focus, please.
PTI: Well, let's say we come up with this ugliest word. Don't we have to come up with an ugliest meaning?
PTWB: Oh, that's easy. Remember that plumber you did last week?
PTI: Ewww. I'm trying to forget him.
PTW: I see where you're going with this. Remember the surprise you got when you, um, unwrapped him?
PTI: Are you sure you want me to name that?
PTWB: Everything needs a name.
PTW: Yeah, go for it.
PTI: "Smegma."

[Exeunt omnes, arms flailing above heads.]

The first time someone asked me whether I was "into sounds," I said that of course I was. After all, I'm an auditory thinker and a pretty good singer, and I love music and sounds of all sorts.

Um, no. For any of you who may now be as naive as I once was, a sound is more properly a "surgical sound," or a piece of metal that is inserted into the urethra. The medical uses mainly have to do with reaching the bladder. The sexual uses largely escape me, but apparently they have to do with providing your partner sexual pleasure by ramming a piece of metal down his cock. (Not that there's anything wrong with that.) Unsurprisingly, their use is pretty much limited to the S&M crowd.

I've never sounded anyone. I've been asked, but only by guys who quickly lost interest when they learned that I didn't have my own set of sounds. If a submissive with his own set of sounds asked me to push one or more of them into his urethra, I might do it, but probably only after I'd already gotten off since I'm pretty sure that sounding another guy's cock would make my own undetectable.

What I'm about to tell you as a serious incursion into the land of TMI. You have been (doubly) warned. My squeamishness with sounds comes from a somewhat related personal experience from when I was married and had to be tested for an STD that I did not have. Believe me when I tell you that it is best that I spare you further detail.

There is, of course, a third sexual s-word that many people find revolting, but upon long consideration, I have determined that scat is an urban legend. Think about it: everyone knows someone who knows someone who says that he's into scat (or has read the blog of someone who knows someone who says that he's into scat), but no one actually knows someone who's into scat. I'm sure that if you go to the right bar in New York, you can find someone who actually claims to be into scat, but if you go to the right bar in New York, you can also find someone who claims to be Santa Claus and/or the Easter Bunny.

I can't get all that worked up over something that only happens in (low-grade, amateur pornographic) fiction. I do, however, acknowledge that it is unwise and impolite to try to disabuse people of a closely held belief, so the next time one of your friends who still checks under the bed for monsters tells you that shit happens, just smile politely and change the subject.