I’m too old for concerts, unless they’re billed as ‘intimate evenings’ and I get an assigned seat number and am actually expected to sit and listen to music. It kind of makes me sad actually, to come to this realization after many years of being a concert whore, but the truth is that at 30, it’s just not as much fun to stand for hours, listen to music, scream as if you’re actually being heard (something I did not do because of the possibility of polyps on my vocal chords) and attempt to get a glance of the musician from hundreds of feet away from the stage.

There was a bad energy last night at the Electric Factory. Way bad. Lots of security men, in all shapes, sizes and colors, pushing their way through the crowd anytime they saw a puff of smoke elevate itself. They kicked one boy out next to me for smoking weed, and as they were pushing him to the way back of the venue, I heard the distinct sound of a metal bat *an instrument used to smoke marijuana, hit the cold, hard floor. He didn’t want them to catch him with paraphinalia, but if I heard the metal from a few the feet away, the security guy with with the flashlight shoved in the potheads face most definitely heard the metal drop too.

There’s more I’d say, but A. wants to leave so that we’re not late for “the wedding.” It’s a college friends wedding and well..I’ll leave it at that for now.

Back to New York I go..But I do love Philly…This morning I passed Betsy Ross’ grave (she was married three times - which kinds of make her a little loose, or no?) and one of the guys she married was her dead husband’s best friend (and her husband was barely dead)…

I also passed where Ben Franklin is buried and saw his grave. All in a day in Philly, all in a day…

I am leaving town in less than two hours to go watch - and listen to - the man who I once wished would sire my children. Now he’s married (for the second time), and he’s got too many kids of his own, and I’m happy in my relationship. In other words, I don’t need him anymore - and not in a bitter sort of way. Besides, I’m no Laura Dern, I didn’t have a mad crazy relationship with Billy Bob, and I’m not tall and blonde and really, really thin..

Still, I am getting on a bus, and heading out of town to go hear Ben Harper tonight. In Philadelphia, where I’ll meet up with one of my closest friends and where I’ll get to pine over my lost love (if only he knew what he could have had). But then again, if Ben and I had actually been given the opportunity to fall in love, I probably wouldn’t be writing this blog, as he wouldn’t want me blabbering about our personal life and our life on the road. And, I’d be taking care of the children and being a stage wife, and probably doing less to further my career as a sex educator. And I wouldn’t be in New York enough to be President of Feminists for Free Expression. And I probably wouldn’t be designing my website, which yes, is really happening…and I definitely wouldn’t have met my lover boy, and over time, that might have made me sad…

but who knows..I might have been really, really happy, and it might have felt good to have millions of women pining over my man, although, on second thought, I’ve had to deal with a few women having crushes on my boyfriend and I don’t handle it well at all. I don’t like it one bit. SO maybe this whole thing, this Ben Harper dream, it’s just better that way.

Still, I get to hear him sing and strum tonight. I am one lucky girl.

There are so many places to go today. Walking here this morning, yes on the dawn of one of the hottest days of summer, I had one of those “only in New York” moments. First I walked over the East River and I was offered the best breeze on this side of Manhattan Island, okay, I don’t know that for sure, but it was the best breeze I felt all day, and then I walked through some major motion picture filming at Schiller’s on the Lower East Side, and then I passed a large group of ‘movers’ - men lugging heavy furniture out of some expensive apartment in the East Village. And then I passed NYU where things are mellow in the summer, although there are always students around. And then it was up towards the heart of midtown where suits and ties are as common as well, the corporate people wearing them.

I’ve been told I to look corporate today. Must be the flourescent lights.

My friend Andy wrote this really heartfelt piece about bisexuality for Nerve.com. I recommend reading it, and then if you still have time, read this. It’s a great piece on how men are really turned on by porn (in response to that NY Times piece, “Gay, Straight or Lying?”.)

Speaking of reading, In this month’s Contemporary Sexuality, a magazine put out by AASECT (American Association of Sex Educators, Counselors and Therapists) there’s an interesting article that defines a term for me, a term that many others may have heard about, but to mean it sounds sort of new. It’s called Peer Marriage.

“Couples who are not highly conflictual, who describe their relationship as very satisfying, and who consider one another best friends,” have peer marriages. According to Dr. Pepper Schwartz, these are “marriages of equal companions, a collaboration of love and labor in order to produce profound intimacy and mutual respect.”

This is what we all want on some level, no? So, there, now it’s nicely labelled and laid out, just the way we Americans like our lives. While there is a hint of sarcasm in my thoughts, it’s really quite true and perfect. At least, it’s the kind of relationship I want. I’m going to change the term to “peer unions” but still, it works. It really works.

“I did it for Jonny.” It’s a line from the best Julie Brown song ever. Yes, Julie Brown did have a best song ever. It’s called Homecoming Queen’s Got a Gun and it’s about a homecoming queen who goes batty, possibly because she’s crazy, but possibly because she’s suffering from a bad case of PMS. Anyway she shoots up the cheerleading squad and some other members of her class before she dies herself. But on her deathbed, also known as “the gym floor” she tells her best friend that she “did it for Jonny.” Only no one knows who Jonny is…

“Who’s Jonny, she said and smiled in that special way..” The theme song from Short Circuit. Yes, I have bizarre Jonny knowledge. Always have, perhaps always will…

Turn..Turn..Turn..

At dinner last night the girl at the table next to me stopped to comment on my glittery eyes, which have quietly become one accessory I don’t like to leave home without. But when she said it, she was sitting across from me on one of those long booths at a small Cuban cafe, and after saying she liked me eyes, she went on to say what might have been the nicest comment from a stranger that I’ve ever received.

“No, really, it fits you perfectly. It’s not that the glitter is perfect on everyone, but yeah, it works on you. It definitely works - like it’s a part of you.”

Maybe I’m glittering in more ways than one right now. I do believe that when you are true to yourself and embrace things with a positive attitude, you vibrate and glow at a different level. I hope that’s what she’s seeing because that’s how I’m feeling. Not just about myself, but about the people I love most in my world. And I think they’re vibrating differently too. And no, it’s not peace, love and hippy crap, although there’s nothing wrong with a little peace and love, but it’s how I really feel. When I concentrate on how positive things are, everything changes and everyone notices. If you aren’t trying it, you should. Trust me. It works.

Oh, and drink lots of water.

I finally booked an appointment with an Otolaryngologist, or in a less big word, the doctor often referred to as an ENT (ear, nose and throat specialist). I am not a cigarette smoker, and my whole life I’ve had this husky voice, and I’ve never thought about doing much about it. But a couple of weeks ago I was at a happy hour and had a conversation with a speech therapist about my low gravelly growl and she expressed concern about the growth of polyps on my throat, or I guess more precisely on my vocal chords. She’s not the first person to ever talk to me about these polyps (right now I’m picturing the ads that were made for colon polyps, the ones with the red polyp man who talks to men about getting their prostate checked out for cancer and bad things like that - yeah the guy in the picture above) …my 7th grade music teacher mentioned that I would grow up to have polyps and so did the first man who gave me a full time job in radio. I’ll curse them both if it comes true, since maybe they put a hex on me, and now, now I have polyps!!!!

The truth is, if I talk too long or too loud I lose my voice. That’s not a good sign when you’re working in an industry where you talk a lot. So next week I’ve made an appointment, and I’m seriously hoping that there are no polyps on this trusty throat of mine. After all, I do need my voice for my job…and I do like having that deep, husky, phone sex operator voice that drives the men wild…okay, that’s a selfish reason, but it’s true nonetheless…

Well, my concern and the answers I seek will have to wait til next week when I visit the polyp doctor, or more precisely the ENT, or Otolaryngologist, or whatever.

Until then I’ll worry about other things, things that have nothing to do with throats and polyps.

In less than ten minutes I must write this blog and post it. That’s when the coffeeshop that I’m sitting in will close, and therefore I will lose the right to access their free wireless Internet. Oh, sometimes life can be so cruel (yes - sense the sarcasm, sense it, sense it).

It’s been a long weekend, full of not all that many “exciting” events, although, to me, the person involved in the participation of said events, it was much more exciting, than to a person who would just here them in list form on some strange(r) persons blog.

1. enjoy love
2. socialize with friends
3. attend grandfather’s unveiling

Not all that much traveling, although today involved a trip to Laurelton, the town where my mother grew up, and until today I wasn’t sure where Laurelton was (It’s in Queens).

I got very upset over a $13.50 roundtrip ticket to the town my parents call home, and instead of not caring so much about something I didn’t have, that would be the ticket, I had a couple of Lucy like tantrums instead. See, the conductor forgot to give me my ticket and I was to sleepy to remember to look at the other two tickets he handed to me, and it was really my fault just as it was his “bad service follow-thru” (okay, I’m still a little bit cranky, but not really), and I was just frustrated.

We all have our moments, and eventually mine came to an end, no really, it did. And today I miss my grandfather, even if we didn’t talk about him all that much on a day that the family got together to memorialize him in some way.

Because life ends too, just like my time at the coffeeshop, eventually we all close down.

The writer (that’s me) and The Porn Star (that’s Sean Michaels)

I took a hard core ABS class at the gym today, after not really going to a gym at all for a year, and now I’m afraid my legs won’t work tomorrow. I could barely make it up the steps and out of the gym today. No pain no gain.

In other news, the trip..the trip to LA, what a success! What a great time! What a bizarro world! WOW!!! I feel like I met 100′s of people in 48 hours. There are so many sex toys and sex aids and sex products on the market these days, it’s incredible. So many people have personal reasons for being or creating in this industry. and I find a lot of the stories inspiration and motivating. I really do love what I do.

I had a great conversation with Sean Michaels, an adult actor whose penis has been molded into a number of sex toys, my favorite one being a “life like” Sean Michaels dong that can actually ejaculate. He told me that he put that on the market because there was nothing like that out there. We had a really nice conversation, and when I asked him why he started doing adult, his response was “anger.” Anger at racism in the industry. Interesting if nothing else.

My favorite sex toy creator at the show was Tony L. His uber creative line of sex toys is at Big Teaze Toys. I never knew how to sell the I “rub” my Duckie when I was working at Babeland, but after Tony L.’s demo (on my arms and back) I’m a believer. His newest toy is the “Flower Power” and it’s not only a vibrator, but it’s also a cockring, and it’s so damn pretty.

There was so much more. I met a triad (2 women and 1 man) and they have a CD of live orgasms set to techno music. Plus, Catherine and Brian at SoundsPublishing have a great line of audio erotica that they’ve been working so damn hard on.

And there was even more..I learned not to drink to much with business partners, because when you lift your top to show them your tattoos, they will take pictures and post them for the whole Expo to see. Valuable lesson that will hopefully NOT be repeated. It was only my back and my bra strap anyway.

So much to do. So much going on. Buy my friend Regina Lynn’s book - Sexual Revolution 2.0. The book is really goo and I’ve got a quote on the front cover and this excites me!!!Tomorrow I’m talking with Heeb magazine for an article about sex. Then I’m filming some talking head stuff with Sex TV. And this is just the beginning.

So now it’s time to breathe.

I’ve been in another world these past two and a half days, a sort of fog land that has covered my brain the way the smog covers the sky here in LA. I just realized I’ve had free wireless Internet access this whole time and haven’t been using it. I even decided to take a ‘vacation week’ at Steppin’ Out because I didn’t think I could send in my piece.

It doesn’t matter, I’ve learned a lot at the Pasadena Convention Center, where I’ve spent the greater part of two days. But if I had to summarize my findings in one sentence it would be that there are a lot of people making sex toys in this world - some of these people (and toys) are stranger than others.

I have so many good stories, but not now.

For all my kvetching, I liked being out of the humidity and moist dampness that is a New York summer. I must also admit that I’ve had a lot of fun in LA these past two days. Lots of business, but in this industry business also equals lots of pleasure.

My flight is early tomorrow morning. Too early for me to be up this late typing about nothing just so I can egotistically stroke my blog hard on.

But then again, I am in LA and I was here for sex.

I’m about to get on a plane to LA again, only it’s raining in New York. My flight is already delayed by 30 minutes, and I’ve pushed the car back 15. So I blog.

But I have nothing to say.

Except that I’m in no mood to fly.

I tried some green powder in my water yesterday and it put a zing in my step. It’s some all green shite that you order online, and it’s got wheatgrass and like a million other grasses and stems and berries and stuff, and it’s blended into this powder that’s supposed to only taste bad if your body is really out of whack. I was sort of afraid to sample the elixir, as I was sure that, as of yesterday, my body was on it’s way out..or at least on it’s way to repair by going into major shutdown mode, but alas, the green water tasted like a yummy tea. So, I’m feeling like the sun is shining and the sky is bright and life is good, even if I might have nodes on my throat.

I bought some homeless couple a slice of pizza on my way to grab a drink with some friends last night. They were mumbling, “would you buy us a slice of pizza?” and people kept passing by as if they didn’t exist. I walked right by them as well, but I decided that there was a pizza place just steps from where they were begging, and if I could afford to tip the bartender a dollar just for pouring me a drink, then I could afford to feed some hungry people. I only bought them one slice, so I wasn’t all that generous, but after my last bad pizza with a homeless person negative experience (the pregnant homeless lady that took the warm pizza slice I bought her and put it under her armpit and kept on begging for change), I didn’t want to take a chance and feel disillusioned all over again. So I bought the slice, brought it to them, and continued walking. Of course I stopped at the next corner to make sure they were enjoying their pizza, and that I was enjoying my piece of mind and I remembered my take on the homeless from when I was just a child, uncertain of why anybody had to be homeless.

I used to want to feed them all, and thought that if they knew about the Nathan’s by my house, or the Roy Rogers free fixin’ bar, they wouldn’t have to go without food. They could just walk into any of the aforementioned food joints, and fix themselves some pickles and kraut and perhaps a little mustard and ketchup. But at least they could eat…for free…and until they got kicked out. I used to want to help them all, to bring money into the city and to distribute the contents of my piggy bank to all the men and women sleeping on steps or sidewalks or whatever…but now I think that most of these people should get jobs. Even if they’re sucky jobs, they should still get them nonetheless.

Still, I’ll help out when I can.