BijouBlog

When I was twelve (maybe thirteen) I inadvertently discovered the joys of jacking off. I think I woke up in the middle of a wet dream, turned myself on to my belly, and finished myself off. My brother then began to complain about hearing my bed frame squeaking (we shared a room, and thank goodness at that time my dad has taken down the bunk beds). Since then, I don't think I have missed a day, though I have changed my position to the most popular one. In fact, the day I wake up without a morning woody, I know the Angel of Death is just around the corner, and I won't change my name to deceive him (old Jewish bubby's tale). 

One interesting book in the Bijou archives called The Gay Book of Lists by Leigh Rutledge enumerates some jack off positions in some detail, also helpfully guiding the potential wanker offer to their specific advantages and disadvantages: 

“Lying on Back” is the most popular (illustrated by Tom Cruise in the movie Risky Business); advantages include a good angle for thrusting actions with the hips; the sheets don't get messy; easy reach for either tit. Disadvantages include it can be a bad angle for pictures (well, with these new-fangled cameras on phones, perhaps not) and it can become monotonous when done day after day (Maybe one could do it while lying on one's back in the bathtub; I tried it once, but I became so relaxed because I was lying in water not much happened; maybe I should have done it in a dry tub, but that would have been uncomfortable.) 

“Standing Up” is also popular, especially for those who cruise public bathrooms and want to show off (I would add especially if one is a grower). An advantage especially for those who are narcissistic: one can look at oneself in the mirror. It is also easy to do anywhere. Disadvantages include tired knees and legs, cum-splotched footwear, and it can be difficult to keep a dildo in the ass. 

“Legs Thrown Over Head” is a position where a guy lies on his back and throws his legs back over his head so that the head of his dick is aimed right at his mouth. This position is often used in BDSM scenes as a way for the master to force his slave to eat his own cum. Advantages include an intense orgasm; one can satisfy a hunger for cum; and one can watch oneself jack off. Disadvantages include a sprained neck and back (yikes!) and eyes filled with cum. 

“On The Belly, Rubbing Dick Against Sheets, Pillows, Etc.” is quite fun and sensual, especially if one is in a lazy mood, and it also works while one is being fucked up the ass. Disadvantages include messy sheets and also, as I mentioned in the first paragraph, don't do this if one's bed squeaks a lot and one's roommate is in the room supposedly sleeping (unless he wants to join in).

"Sitting on Toilet” is excellent if one can't find any other way to be alone and clean-up is quite easy. In fact, Portnoy, among others, helped make this position famous, and it became almost iconic in the movie The Right Stuff. More recently, based on craiglist missed connection postings, this seems to be going in men's room stalls everywhere, so perhaps for many it's not a distasteful location to pull the pud. 


Check out bijouworld.com as we carry titles that revel in the hottest guys pounding off their manmeat. 

One can also stream movies at bijougayporn.com and watch other guys jerkin' the gherkin to stimulate your own pole dancing. 

Now, by turned on, I mean something more wholistic than sexual, but I think you know, if you grew up in the seventies and stayed home on Saturday night to watch CBS' awesome line-up, to whom I am referring. 

Mary Tyler Moore, whom I remember especially in her television incarnation as the character Mary Richards, that midwestern, Presbyterian, single, associate producer of WJM News in Minneapolis, passed away on Wednesday, January 25, 2017. I join the multitudes of mourners (I feel like I lost a best friend), but I also rejoice that she will always be an iconic presence in the lives of so many people. 

Yes, the character Moore created is a true feminist icon, but I think there's so many other facets not just to the character, but the show as a whole. The situation comedy, I argue, was just as much about people as about issues of equal pay, gender roles, sexual freedom, journalistic freedom, and even, in one episode, anti-Semitism. 

And these were people we all to hang with, to laugh with, and in the case of the admittedly boorish Ted Baxter, to laugh at, but recognizing that beneath his bluster, as his wife on the show Georgette said, “Someone has to love him.” 
 

The phrase in the show's theme song, “Love is All Around You,” became in the show not a sentimental cliché, but a dynamic emerging out of relationships where the characters, following the lead of Mary Richards, accepted each other's human foibles with grace and subtle humor but also knew when and where to assert their own self-respect and human worth. 

As I mentioned above in the case of Ted, even characters like Phyllis and Sue Ann Nivens which could have become caricatures of narcissism and nymphomania, were not, because they were ultimately viewed from the perspective of Mary, and the brilliant actresses who played them understood the show's unique dynamic. 

So many moments on this show exemplify what I am trying to say. One episode that stands out include the first episode where Sue Ann appears, “The Lars Affair.” This predatory “other woman” whose public persona is the Happy Homemaker has an affair with the unseen husband of Phyllis. What makes this episode so interesting is that it's clear Phyllis is the wronged woman, but both Mary and even Rhoda (Phyllis' enemy), actually find an interesting, humorous insight into the situation: Phyllis, who is always trying some newfangled, ephemeral scheme (even encouraging Ted to run for public office at one point), seems to be, because of her quirkiness, more the “other woman,” while Sue Ann with her mom, apple pie, frilly apron persona, looks more like the cliché of the wronged wife. 
 

At one crisis point in the episode, Phyllis tries to emulate Sue Ann by baking an apple pie (with disastrously funny results), bemoans her husband's clothes are cleaner after his nights with Sue Ann. We see Phyllis' combination of narcissism and vulnerability here, and also, the show's emphasis on a community of friends that transcend conventional views of family to whom she can turn in a time of personal crisis. 

Phyllis gets her revenge (a brilliant move using food), but only after Mary intervenes. Mary, always tactful, tried to stay out of it, but she finally took action, telling Sue Ann that Ted knows about the affair, and thus everyone knows, and that an extramarital affair would not exactly be the best image for the Happy Homemaker. Mary does this on the spur of the moment, and her intentions are not vicious (she does not spread the rumor), but she knows that it is time to hopefully do something to preserve everyone's self respect. 

I could go on even more, emphasizing what so many others have done the evolution in Mary's relationship with Mr. Grant (I just knew on the next to last episode when they dated that they would never finish that kiss without laughing), and the show's brilliant use of belly laugh humor in the Chuckles the Clown episode to wrestle with the usually unfunny death and mortality. Ah, that scene at the funeral. Young lady … askes the minister. Young lady … Mary looks back. And then her most perfect Mary Richards (so consistent to the character when she was torn between not making a scene or saying her mind) flustered, plaintive moan. 
 

I mentioned earlier the unique sense of community that the show revealed, in the interactions of Mary with her her neighbors who were also her friends and with her coworkers who were also her friends. I always envied that dynamic, especially later in life when, like many other LGBTQ persons, I had to create my own family, when, like Mary, I moved to the big city to be on my own and hoped to find love all around me. 
 

Yes, Mary Tyler Moore and her character of Mary Richards, you made it after all with an amazing combination of strength and sweetness (and intuitively knowing when to use either one or both), and you gave hope to so many that they could do the same. 

I guess maybe the whole adult bed issues ties into marriage. You know, the marriage bed, and dowry chests often contained linens and other items to furnish the bed. And this bed would be for the couple only, a major rite of passage, as for many centuries siblings and unmarried family members routinely slept together in the same bed. Why? Most people were poor. Privacy was lacking. Bedding was expensive. 

Of course, in the United States, most young adults live with each other, cohabit before marriage. In fact, I even remember when I was living in the dorms, the sign when a guy and a girl (two guys was of course taboo at that time) began to cohabit was the double bed. Sometimes two beds pushed together, and usually in the guy's room. Apparently the guy's dorm was a more acceptable place for sex than the girl's dorm. The few times guys even visited the girl dorms was for let me eat with or even fix dinner for you in my room. Sexist, oh yes! 

I've often wondered if a certain type of bed makes better sex. I mean, some bed sex fantasies involve frills and canopies and flowers but also rough sex. Really rough. I think of those bodice-ripper historical romance novels, where the guy who ends up being Prince Charming, but not after some often an often mind-boggling I love him, I hate him, I love her, I hate her, and the result of this confusion is a heroine deflowered before the wedding, sometimes on the same bed where she ends up after the marriage. 

In contrast, the man-eating, predatory Sue Ann Nivens on the Mary Tyler Moore Show ended up doing the deflowering on her indescribable bed. We see this bed in one episode, where the WJM-TV gang congregate to comfort her when she realizes her sister will be staying in Minneapolis to host a rival cooking show. Erosville, USA. Cupids, flowers, pink satin. It vibrates. And when the climax occurs (and in Sue Ann's world, her climax is the goal), the florid theme from Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet sounds forth. 
 

I'm not entirely sure how LGBTQ persons fit into this dynamic, because for ages they were banned from participating in traditional heterosexual rites of passage. In the days of the closet, when lovers had to present themselves as “roommates,” I'm sure a double bed would more than raise eyebrows. But then, those were the days when heterosexual icons Lucy and Ricky had to sleep in separate twin beds after the first season of I Love Lucy as a double bed was too risque. 

I just bought some bed risers for my futon frame. I sleep on a futon, which used to be on the floor, then on a low wooden frame, then on a black metal sling frame (still low). Now the sleeping structure resembles a bed, at least the height. Have I grown up? Maybe, but the best sex I've had occurred on the floor of a van. 
 

 

 

 

I've noticed lately there's almost a cult on youtube of people filming antisocial behavior on public transportation. The range of antisocial behavior is wide, but of course obvious brawls accompanied by foul language are almost sure to go viral, or at least get multitudinous views. 

Not surprising, this trend, in a world where senior citizen middle school bus monitors are brutally scapegoated (the Karen Klein incident) or where a girl is brutally attacked by her peers (not in public, but the video was disseminated on the Internet), and her attackers are even thrilled when they end up on the news after they get arrested (see the Lifetime movie, Girl Fight, based of course on a true story). Overall, these incidents (and many others) point to a disturbing pathology of voyeurism and narcissism. 
 

I do wonder how many fights occurred on buses in the 1950s. But then, one couldn't just immediately whip out a phone and film them for posterity. 

One takes the bus only when one is too poor to own a car, or disabled, or old, or very young, or non-white. And one only takes it when one's car breaks down. And it's almost like if you own a car, even in densely populated areas where you don't really need one, you've made it. And the high-end developments going up almost always contain garages. 

And in Chicago, certain bus lines are stigmatized in the stigmatized CTA system and those who take it. The number 36, Broadway, carries a reputation for being the bus “weirdos” take. Yet that bus goes through an area of Chicago, Uptown, an area especially hard hit by the lack of governmental funding for certain programs released mentally disturbed people onto the streets from shelters and other facilities. 

I'm not certain which other routes carry this stigma, and I don't want to overgeneralize that buses in underserved areas carry passengers who are necessarily more dangerous or “weird.” Well, there was the woman on one bus on the South Side who claimed to be a bike; see this photo. 
 

Anyway, I've been taking the CTA for a long time (for multiple reasons, and I fit some of the stereotypes of those who take it), and I've seen much, but an incident that occurred on the number 81, Lawrence bus, (which travels through one of the most ethnically diverse areas in Chicago) stood out. 
 

I was waiting for it with my friend from out of town. We had just returned from the casino. We saw a frowsy older woman (maybe sixtyish) with very short hair and very thick round coke-bottle glasses practically leap in front of the bus as it pulled into the terminal; yes, she leaped right in front of the yellow line. The sign tells you to not cross that yellow line. The bus driver, a heavyset African-American woman, yelled at her, harshly, claiming that she had almost hit her as the bus pulled in because she crossed the line. I got the sense this woman takes this bus regularly and always disobeys the sign, and may have been almost hit previous times as the bus pulled in. I heard her respond snarkily to the bus driver, “I have to be the first on the bus.” Uh, OK ... 

Yes, she was, and she sat down and pulled out what looked like some kind of Christian fundamentalist tract from one of her multiple bags (yes, a cliché, but watch for multiple bags, and I don't mean newly minted bags from a recent shopping trips to Macy's or Bloomingdales). My friend (we were sitting a couple of seat pairs behind her) saw she had made many notes on one of the pages. The theme of the tract was the usual societal decay apocalyptic doom end of the world scenario, and my friend later told me he was able to even decipher one of her notes on a section of the tract: It's the television, the source of evil. 

I must claim, though, based on what I said about these viral videos, she may not be that far off track, but I imagined her sitting in her tiny apartment wearing a tin foil hat monitoring the Satanic messages coming in from a test pattern. 

But then, and this is where her behavior became really bizarre and offensive, a young Hispanic woman got on with a baby in a stroller. The woman with the baby pulled down the disabled seats right in front of the weird woman so she could get the stroller out of everyone's way. The weird woman proceeded to hold her nose. She then retrieved from one of her multiple bags a small, sample-size container of Lysol and spray it around her. 
 

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. My mouth remained open. Shock. 

Weird woman exited at Pulaski and Lawrence, not exactly a high-class area. In fact, it looked rather overcrowded and depressed. Gentrification had not arrived. Many people were thus waiting for buses. 

And no, I did not film this incident. I'm not sure what conclusions I can draw, but I get the sense, other than that the woman was obviously disturbed, that perhaps she was one of the people who lived around Pulaski and Lawrence in the sixties or even the fifties when the area was white, and I think, predominately Jewish. And she was still living there. But the world changed around her. She couldn't embrace the change as positive and took refuge in a reality that could be safe only by through segregation and scapegoating. 

And this disturbing dynamic is still occurring as youtubers film and view videos that show “the other” as someone or, more accurately, something, to be mocked and dehumanized by not only physical strangers, but by millions, even billions of impersonal, invisible voyeurs. 

Bijou Video’s social media is literally out of this world, and a major social media blitz by our esteemed videographer Miriam Webster actually increased sales and customers. I credit the brilliant Miriam with this development, and we are actually going to feature a different movie on Twitter and Facebook every Monday. Call it Movie Monday, and Monday rather than Blue Monday might actually end up being for our customers and social media followers Sex Monday. 

I do wonder though, as I’ve also noticed on Twitter even more retweets of our posts than usual, if what is really going on is an escape into sex. Yes, escaping into it, but what is it an escape from? The obvious answer: the profoundly shocking upset to America that occurred on November 8.
 

Yes, so shocking, to the point where I actually called my mother (we don’t communicate frequently). There’s that line from the movie Mildred Pierce, “everyone has a mother,” and in my case, I felt like my mother was all I had. We wept together for about half an hour. 
 

Now, I wasn’t necessarily escaping into my mother, but the election, especially for those in what are now liberal enclaves (I hate having to use that word, but it is true), triggered a descent into the most fundamental core, so deep, like the tohu-va-vohu of Genesis 1 (the primordial, undifferentiated waters, like the amniotic waters of the womb) of our personal and social psyches. And in that dark place everything gets mixed up together, what is taboo and what is pure, what is violent and what is peaceful, what is evil and what is good. It’s the place where we decide whether to cross or maintain boundaries, build walls or make bridges in the world. 
 

Sex is crossing a boundary, physically, mentally, spiritually. I wonder if this crisis just made people unconsciously desire to do so, to cross that boundary, to voluntarily experience the petit mort of orgasm, especially in a situation where they felt utterly helpless and powerless. And the orgasms perhaps were even more intense, more powerful, given the raw emotions surging through the person. There’s an intimate connection between sex and violence, and perhaps the external climate violence we are all experiencing viscerally connected with our sex drives, like an electrical charge so strong it could blow a fuse. 
 

I know in my case my horniness has literally skyrocketed, and I experienced some of the best kinky sex play the weekend after the election to the point where my playmate and I even decided to commemorate the day in the future. Yes, we were escaping from the election and into sex, but I think we were also in our own way taking back the night because in, around, and above those dark, primal waters is a living, breathing spirit.