ClueChick: real clues from a real chick

Today's winning email approach:

"ok if your real holla at me ifnot its buillshit"

What, exactly, is a buill?

At any rate, I love a guy who can inspire me to holla, but this, sadly, is not he.

Posted by ClueChick at 6:29 PM in actual responses | Permalink | Comments (3)

I have some bad news for you all. Are you sitting down? It turns out, shockingly, that people are horrified to learn that you can buy sex on CL. (Thanks to one of my attentive readers for bringing this editorial to my inbox.)

I wonder if people will ever get over being shocked that huge portions of our population are willing to pay for sex, and that, given a market, we, being good capitalists, will provide the commensurate product. You want to stop prostitution? Make it just as easy for everyone to get all the sex they want for free. I'm sure that little initiative won't get the same funding that abstinence only education is getting, but it might actually do some good.

Not that our current administration seems to want initiatives that are actually effective. Er, sorry, that's enough with the politics. Moving on...

There's been a bit of confusion in the past as to my stance on prostitution and paying for sex. In general, if everyone's fully informed and consenting, I'm in favor of it. I've yet to be tempted to trade my sexual favors for money, but I'm sure if someone came to me with enough money, I'd be willing to give it a swing. (So to speak.) What continues to bother me is when people try to turn the casual encounters section into the erotic services section. You want to pay for it? Great, find someone who wants money! But I'm looking for fun, not business, so you can leave your money in your pocket when you're propositioning me, please.

I might let you buy me a drink, though.

But back to that editorial. Maybe we should write Mr. Jamieson and let him know that CL, unlike any number of right-wing ideologues, knows how to draw reasonable boundaries, and that Craig, and the good folks at CL, aren't, in fact, responsible for policing their users' behavior. Something tells me, though, that he won't think much of my opinion, slut that I am.

Posted by ClueChick at 5:32 PM in other sites | Permalink | Comments (4)

In response to sapiophile's well thought-out post on picking up hot fat chicks, DJ commented, "Hi ClueChick. Why not post a pic on here so we can see how beautiful you really are?"

I don't post a pic for several reasons:

First, I like to be anonymous. I don't need my parents surfing their way here and finding a big picture of me attached to a long story about how I fucked that hot guy I met on the internet. Furthermore, I don't need my future employers doing a web search on me and finding the same. And that's not even getting into the messy can of worms I'd prefer to avoid with people who know me in real life thinking that just because I write a blog about casual sex means that I'd love to fuck them casually and whenever they like. A funny little secret about me is that I'm actually quite picky and (don't tell anyone) kinda shy.

Second, I already get lots of offers from my readers to let them take me out for drinks or the like. I didn't set up this blog as a way to meet people, and I think a picture would confuse things.

And third, people could look at my picture and do one of two things: Either they'll see how gorgeous I am and decide they have to get in my pants, thereby ignoring my advice. Or they'll see how totally not gorgeous I am (hey, everyone's taste is different, right?) and decide that all my advice is sour grapes and thus not worth listening to.

My point in writing this blog is not to set myself up as some fabulous sex symbol, but just to be the voice of everywoman, or at least every-woman-who's-enjoying-casual-sex, and toss out some of my observations and advice in hopes of a) helping clueful men get laid and b) helping women who like casual sex have better options among the men.

As I've suggested in the past, if it would help you to picture what I look like, you should feel free to think of some woman you think is extraordinarily hot and imagine her writing this blog. Just for kicks, of course. Alternately, you can think of me as a fairly average woman: hotter than some, less hot than others, but who happens to write reasonably well, which is why you keep coming back to read my blog, right?

Posted by ClueChick at 8:34 AM in Administrativa , Q&A | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm back! Thank you all for being so patient with my extended vacation. I had a super-fantastic couple of weeks, complete with some possibly life-changing experiences, a whole slew of incredibly hot people, and a couple of firsts. I hope you all had a great two weeks as well, and that your stories will keep rolling into my inbox; I'm quite enjoying reading them!

Today I'm going to talk about feedback in casual encounters. When one is in a relationship, it's clear when you need to give feedback to your partner, right? Or more clear, at least. But sometimes, in a casual situation, I might desire to give feedback but fear that doing so will start to push things away from casual and toward serious and committed. After all, I think to myself, if we're going to have a processy conversation, that looks a lot more like relationship than it does like casual.

On the other hand, sometimes a little conversation goes a long way to making things go more smoothly, or more hotly, or what have you. So, from time to time, I will go against my native avoidance of big, process-heavy conversations (I don't even like them in relationships, though I'm less likely to work hard to avoid them in that context) and bring up a topic for discussion on the theory that it'll make things better.

"Lover," I might say, "as you know, I hugely enjoy fucking you, and I especially like that thing you do with your tongue. But it would really help me to relax when I'm with you if you wouldn't bring cookies to bed with you. The crumbs drive me crazy."

Okay, it's true, that's not necessarily a big, dramatic Relationship Conversation, but in the context of casual encounters, I sometimes feel like any feedback is pushing up against an unspoken rule of "This is working as long as no one has to change anything for it to keep working." That's fine in a one night stand, but if you have an ongoing casual thing, it might well be worth your while to bring this sort of thing up, especially if it'll help make things hotter or more fun for you. To be casual, after all, isn't the same as not to have opinions. Luckily for me!

Posted by ClueChick at 10:28 AM in misc tips | Permalink | Comments (0)

There are multitudinous formats in which to have casual sex.

There's the ever-popular one night stand. You meet, you fuck, you kiss goodbye. Maybe you know each other's names and maybe you don't. Maybe you even know the right names. Or maybe not. This can be hot, but it's always superficial.

There's the newly-popular friends with benefits,. This is a fluidly casual sexual arrangement in the context of a non-casual (or not necessarily casual) ongoing friendship or relationship. This is one of my favorite arrangements, because it allows for the development of a connection and trust that can bring the sexual connection into more interesting territory.

There's the whenever-we're-in-town fuckbuddy, where you don't hang out together, but when your schedules overlap, you hook up.

There's the nooner fuckbuddy, or the ego-boost fuckbuddy, or the... well, the list goes on, needless to say.

And there are plenty of other ways to have casual sex, whether the whole relationship is casual or just the sex. Some people can enjoy any of these sorts of sex, and other folks only like one style or another. But I always feel funny talking about casual sex as one monolithic concept, because the truth is, it comes in as many forms as the people who enjoy it.

Posted by ClueChick at 9:59 AM in ground rules | Permalink | Comments (1)

I recently had a conversation with someone who said that she doesn't believe in love anymore, and that's why she's moved on to casual sex.

This made me sad. For me, casual sex and committed love are not contrary, not mutually exclusive, not somehow in competition in my life. In fact, part of the reason that I can be so comfortable with casual sex as a part of my life is that I see it as being more or less unrelated to love. (Although there can be love involved with casual sex. That's another post, though.)

I strongly believe in love, whatever it means to say I believe in something that's demonstrably present. Love is a powerful force, whether it be platonic or romantic.

For some people, casual sex may well be exclusive to a love-type scenario, but it's not a necessity. Some people have casual sex outside of an existing committed relationship (some with "permission", some without), some only have casual sex when they're single. But love and sex don't run along the same axis. There are areas of overlap, certainly, but they don't go hand-in-hand.

Posted by ClueChick at 7:46 PM in ground rules | Permalink | Comments (3)

Cluechick is out of town for a bit so I promised I throw in a couple bits of "worth what you paid for it" advice in her absence.

Today's topic is: fat chicks. I'm one. Or, if you prefer, a BBW. Thick. Juicy. Zaftig. Plump. Curvy. Round. Voluptuous. Pick your euphemism, I'm a big sexy gal.

Now I'll admit upfront that I have no idea if my experience is typical for other hot, horny, casual-sex-loving BBWs, so this all might be a total waste of bits. But here are a few thoughts on the topic.

- Sex is hottest with a partner whom I find sexy and who also finds me sizzling hot. If you think I'm hot, that is a big point in your favor.
- On the flip side, if my body is not to your taste, that's fine, but then don't waste my time. Seriously, you would think this should go without saying, but there are horny guys who really prefer thin women, but they aren't getting any, so they'll settle for anyone with holes in all the right places, so they cast a wide net. When I detect one of these, he's a goner: my dance card is too full to let people to fill a slot who aren't really into me.
- To set yourself aside from one of those losers, let me know you like my body. If you are responding to a personal ad, you've seen my picture. If you are responding on CL-CE, I've described myself. Saying something specific about your attraction to my body ("I love your picture, especially the awesome curve of your hips. I love a curvy woman") lets me know that 1) you aren't a "holes in the right places" loser, and 2) you have absorbed the fact that I'm fat so there won't be any awkward surprises when and if we meet.
- BUT...there's a danger on the other extreme, too. There are BBW-fetishists who don't so much love women-who-are-fat as they love FAT-that-happens-to-be-attached-to-a-woman. I don't know how other large women feel about the fat fetishists but it is not my cup of tea. As much as I want you to enjoy my body, I want to be a person, first, NOT an archetype, a charicature or a walking flesh-mound. A few well placed compliments are good; going on and on at length about how much you LOVE my body and you want to touch it and lick it and feel my weight on you and grab my fat in your hands and squeeze, not so much -- I'm going to start thinking you don't care what's between my ears, as long as there's plenty on my bones. My fat is just what's under my skin, and not specifically an erogenous zone. If you are one of those guys who (I am SO not making this up) want to fuck my fat...? Move on.
- Don't make the dreaded mistake of assuming that "fat" is an insult. I'm fat, I know it, and I think I'm damn attractive. I don't need to apologize and I don't need you to either. I can't tell you how many conversations I have that go like this: "blah blah blah as a fat chick blah blah..." "Oh, you aren't fat, you've gorgeous?" "Um, dude, I'm fat. You didn't notice? I'm ALSO gorgeous." "You're just curvy. Today's standard of beauty is so artificially thin, you are just where you should be." "Yes, I'm fine with where I am, but where I am is one hundred pounds over the insurance tables, so let's not play word games, okay?"
- One hint that I'm a pity fuck and you are going to be watching my big ass waving at you from a distance. Or, depending on how I'm feeling that day, nursing a broken jaw.

99% of picking up a big girl is just like picking up a skinny one. The other 1%? Well, I think my main squeeze is just perfect that way: he doesn't lust after a specific body type but instead looks to all types of women to find the rare one who can be a treat for his eyes, his body and his mind. And then he lets her (well, me, anyway) know exactly how hot she is on all fronts.

Posted by sapiophile at 8:38 AM in misc tips | Permalink | Comments (6)

In thinking about Mother's Day, I got to thinking about my own socially progressive lifestyle and what my parents would think about it. I'm lucky that I can talk to my parents about pretty much anything in my life. I don't always, because, after all, they don't need to know how many hash marks I have on my bedframe, but I could, and I appreciate that.

No matter what crazy lifestyle choices I've made, my folks have been accepting and supportive. I'm bringing home two boys for the holidays? No problem. I'm bringing them to dinner at the commune where I spent lots of time? No sweat. I'm introducing them to my girlfriend and her husband? Whatever floats my boat. If I'm happy, they're happy.

But it's more than that. Because they've always desired my happiness, they've encouraged me to explore the paths to achieve that happiness. They may not know what paths I'm taking, but I'm lucky to have them in my corner.

Not everyone is so lucky, of course, but we all come to our lives both burdened and equipped with tools from our families. I hope that your approach to relationships -- casual and otherwise -- are enabled by things you learned from your parents, either things to do, or, perhaps, the ever-popular things not to do.

This is a good time, too, for those of you who have kids to think about how to raise them with a healthy relationship to sex. Are you sending mixed messages through your behavior and your actions? Do you make sex seem dirty or forbidden? How can you help your children come to be sexual beings in a healthy way? They will, you can be sure, be having sex sooner or later. And if you don't help them know how to do it safely and without harm, either emotional or physical, you can't count on our mixed-up culture doing it for you.

Posted by ClueChick at 9:28 AM in politics | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay, I lied. I did have time to write a few posts before I skipped town.

Today, it's Mother's Day. This would be an excellent time to appreciate the sexy moms in your life. It's also a good time to think hard about the contradictions that moms in our society face. We're all familiar with the madonna/whore conundrum that women in our society face, and it's magnified when you bring motherhood into the picture. There seems to be an idea that once a woman enters the realm of motherhood, her sexuality gets put under wraps, or, at least, pushed aside for the time being, in order for her to subsume herself into the role of mother.

This is what gives the MILF concept its spark. That forbidden fruit carries with it a titillating thrill. By turning the mother (that symbol of pure and ideal womanhood) into the objectified whore, we can brush up against the electric zing of playing with stereotypes and taboos.

Today, I challenge you all to think of the sexy moms you know as sexy in their own right, not because your appreciation of them makes you feel enlightened or progressive or somehow subversive, but because they're hot, and gorgeous and make you wet hard just thinking about them.

Happy Mother's Day to all y'all!

Posted by ClueChick at 7:11 PM in politics | Permalink | Comments (0)

People! I hate to break it to you, but I'm going on vacation. Skipping town. Getting out of Dodge! And this means that for the next two weeks, you won't hear from me. This is very sad, and I had hoped to write up some interim posts that I could set up to run automatically while I'm away, but, well, I'm lame, so no dice.

I have asked sapiophile to keep an eye on things, and she may even post once or twice while I'm gone. I will be back after Memorial Day, and with any luck, I'll have some great stories for you!

Your homework, while I'm gone, is this: email me with your confessions, your questions, your true stories and your desired adventures. Go out and have some adventures, and then tell me about them. This way, when I get back to my email, I'll have lots of juicy stuff to read.

Hey, it's only fair for me to get some from you all for a change, right?

Posted by ClueChick at 6:14 AM in Administrativa | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sapiophile asks, "Does exchanging keys and reserving a drawer in one another's domiciles always mean it isn't casual anymore?"

Yes.

I'm tempted to leave it at that, but that's not much of a post, now, is it?

Casual relationships can take any number of forms, some of them more regular than others. In fact, though none of my casual relationships have involved trading more than phone numbers and saliva, I can imagine an ongoing-but-casual thing that would result in trading keys. In fact, that could facilitate the playing out of all kinds of fantasies, but that's another post.

But the point at which you're making room for each others' stuff in your homes, it's no longer casual. Sorry.

Posted by ClueChick at 7:59 AM in Q&A | Permalink | Comments (1)

As you may have gathered, I'm pretty up-front about sex and sexuality. Especially after having done the casual sex thing for a while, I'm even more difficult to nonplus with regards to odd interests and tastes. As I mentioned in yesterday's response to wotw's question, his comment about liking to stick weird things in women made me think of a fellow who ran up against my forthrightness in an unfortunate way.

Let me set the stage:

It's midsummer, and the weather is hot and sticky. This causes me to spend a lot of time lounging around my house as close to naked as I can manage and not feel icky sitting on the furniture. And then, naturally, spending all that time in states of undress causes my mind to drift to sexual topics fairly constantly. So, I'm in this state when this fellow IMs me to strike up a conversation. He liked my profile on some dating site or other and in that profile, I'd said something about being open-minded.

This, naturally, led us to talking about fantasies, and as he got comfortable, he told me that he gets off on thinking about fucking women with weird objects: the weirder the better. Now, the way he's talking about this makes me think that he thinks this is really strange. I, on the other hand, happen to know that a) it's not at all unusual and b) I think it's hot. So I say as much to him, which leaves him completely flabbergasted and at a loss for words. He stuttered a little something and signed off.

A couple of days later, he was, of course, back, and we talked more about his fantasies, what was interesting to me, what wasn't, etc. Now, something that you all may or may not do, but I definitely do, is that I give people nicknames. I'm especially prone to doing this before someone is totally "real" to me. That is, early in getting to know someone, before she or he is fully fleshed out in my head, I create a nickname. This is often related to their work, or some interest they have, or some other characteristic. Some of the nicknames you might hear about down the line are: The Cop, Baseball Boy, The Brazilian. And, of course, you all know about Mr. The View.

At any rate, this fellow was, naturally, "Insertibles Guy". This was before I'd started this blog, but not before I'd begun entertaining the idea of writing a book or blog about my adventures, and I mentioned the idea to him. He thought it was a great idea, and he asked if I'd write about him. Of course! I told him, unless that would bother him? He said it would be fine, but only if I didn't use his name. Oh, no, I assured him, everyone would have nicknames, anyway.

And that's when I told him what his nickname was. Now, I have to say, I wasn't saying it to mock him for his interest. In fact, it was fun to be talking to someone who was just beginning to explore some of his stranger fantasies. However, I overlooked the fact that, as a newly minted explorer, he was not actually totally comfortable with his kinks, and he blanched when I told him. Via IM, he gave me one of those blushing emoticons (I didn't know, before that, that there was a smiley that blushes!) and signed off immediately.

Sadly, I didn't hear from him again. The lesson for me: Just because someone can talk about their secret desires doesn't mean he's ready to face them head-on. Which is too bad, because if he'd stuck around, odds are good that we could have knocked a few items off his "to do" list.

Posted by ClueChick at 10:15 PM in cluechick encounters | Permalink | Comments (0)

In a comment on yesterday's post, wotw asked,

This problem comes up repeatedly. It's a first date. We hardly know each other. She asks: "So what do you do for fun?". The honest answer is: "Stick weird foreign objects up women, set people on fire, host (with invaluable help from invaluable friends) large get-togethers for sexually open people, etc."

I do usually get around to telling them about this stuff, usually on about, oh, the second or third date or so. But the first five minutes of the first date seems a little soon.

On the one hand, this stuff takes up a lot of my time, and crowds out a lot of other things I might do for fun---so if I don't mention this, I'm sort of at a loss for an answer. I end up saying someting really stupid like "Oh, you know, I like all kinds of stuff."

Or I say something like "I read a lot", which is moderately accurate (actually, "I buy a lot of books" is more accurate), at least as a matter of fact, but grossly inaccurate, I think, as far as conveying information about my funloving nature.

Help me, Cluechick! How do I answer this question?

This is a great question. There are lots of kinky people online, as we all know, but there are also lots of people who aren't kinky. And there's a time that it's reasonable to talk about your kinks and darker desires, but the first few minutes of conversation are rarely that time.

So, I recommend that you lie.

Okay, wait, no, sorry, I didn't mean that. But it doesn't hurt to have a few innocuous things that you can talk about in those first minutes before you get into some of the more, ah, extreme interests. While I'm a strong proponent of honesty in general, I'm also in favor of the occasional white lie to help people save face or to keep a new social situation flowing smoothly. This is probably one of those times.

Your approach of talking about books is a good one. Other fairly innocuous topics might be movies or current events (though that gets dangerously close to politics, which might also be best avoided), travel, or what have you. Now, innocuous topics will not, in fact, help immensely in conveying your fun-loving nature, as you put it, but they will help to break the ice, let you and your date get comfortable with each other, and come to feel comfortable enough that you can broach the topic of the last weird object you inserted in a woman. (That reminds me of a fellow I fondly called Insertibles Guy, but that's another story.)

Remember, in the first few minutes of talking to someone, you're not necessarily trying to convey every last tidbit of information about yourself, but rather, are just getting started on striking up a rapport.

There is, of course, another hand to this answer, however: If you would not be interested in dating/playing with/fucking this woman if she's not into the sorts of things that you're into, then you have very little to lose in scaring her away early. If she's into the sort of play that you are, she's probably not going to be nonplussed by your opening the conversation in that vein. I, for example, have been known to enjoy a variety of activities that might not be found on the regular menu, and I'm generally pleased when someone I'm flirting with lays out his interests early so we can see what overlap we have.

On the other other hand, you never know what she might be interested in trying after getting to know you and how fabulously attracted she is to you.

All of this is to say, then, that you have two basic options, both reasonable: Start on innocuous topics (which you will probably want to think about ahead of time), or dive right in. I recommend that you use your judgement on which to use based on the balance between how disappointed you will be if you don't get to stick weird objects in her because you've scared her away and how disappointed you will be if you get invested and then find out you won't get to stick weird objects in her.

Posted by ClueChick at 6:38 PM in Q&A | Permalink | Comments (0)

I try hard not to pull the, "Tell me about you!" card unless I'm really stumped. I know that when I'm put on the spot with no seeding topic helping to crystalize my thoughts, I can end up paralyzed. "About me??" I'll think in a panic. "What about me? How I look? What I read? Where I grew up? My shower routine? What??" Then, I will, as unobtrusively as possible, sidle away from the conversation in search of something less stressful, like directing traffic in downtown Baghdad. Therefore, I'm sympathetic to the guys who freeze up in the face of similarly open-ended queries from me.

I will point out, however, that I only go to the broad and open question section of my trusty getting-to-know-you handbook after more specific questions have been dodged:

Me: So, what do you do for fun?

Him: Oh, you know, I like all kinds of stuff.

Me: Like what?

Him: Whatever, you know! Just whatever sounds good at the time.

Me: [grr]

Or:

Me: Tell me a bit about what you're into!

Him: I like sex.

Me: Oh, yeah? What about it?

Him: Well, it's, uh... sex. And sex is hot, so I like it. Yeah!

Me: Mmhmm. So, what would you say your style is, or what sorts of things get you going?

Him: Hey, chicks, man, they're great. I really like sex with women.

Me: Okay... [backing away]

The early stages of getting to know someone are tough. And to pull it off, both parties have to be willing to share the work. Ideally, you'll take turns asking questions, and when it's your turn to answer a question, you've got to, oh, I don't know, answer the question, perhaps even with actual information.

I'm not asking what you like in bed just to kill time, after all. If you give me the right answer, as soon as we're done talking, I'll drag you to my bed and rip your clothes off (or let you rip off mine). But if your answer makes me want to claw your eyes out with frustration, you can be sure that the only one getting any in my bed that night will be me. And, of course, my trusty Hitachi, which never lets me down.

Posted by ClueChick at 11:48 PM in misc tips , snarky | Permalink | Comments (2)

I know, I know, the internet is a harsh mistress for you men out there. There are lots of men, and not so many women, and it seems like there's no real way to make yourself stand out in the world of internet meetings. You're absolutely right, and I'll be the last one to say that I can come up with some magic pill that will make your emails leap off the page every time you respond to a personal ad, much though I may wish I had that ability!

Nevertheless, I can tell you that there are things that don't help your cause. Lame or unremarkable emails are ubiquitous, and though I think it's a hoot to read them and see what absurd thing this guy has decided is the way to get me in the sack, they rarely, if ever, garner a response.

I've suggested in the past -- and I stand by this suggestion -- that you have a paragraph of generic email that you can send to anyone you respond to, but that you open and/or close with a couple of lines that show that you're responding to me. Unless a guy sounds incredibly awesome in his generic approach, I won't respond to an email that's obviously designed to be cut-and-pasted to all potentials.

I know it sucks for you guys, but the truth is, if you can't be bothered to put a little personalization into it, I figure that even if I do respond to you, our conversation will fizzle out before we meet, anyway, so why bother?

Posted by ClueChick at 6:15 PM in misc tips | Permalink | Comments (4)

The other day I posted wondering what questions you all might have, or topics you'd like to see me post on. I had a few responses, all interesting. Today, I'll address b4f's question:

How much casual sex do you think is actually going on out there? Is it a select few folks like us who choose to spend their nights pawing and sniffing each other or is the world essentially one giant pick-up bar with a few prudish naysayers on the sidelines?

The truth is, I don't have any good idea about this, because I spend almost all of my time safely ensconced in the cozy and, yes, sexually free environs of my home and neighborhood. Here, even those people who aren't engaging in casual sex either have in the past, or take a rather laissez faire attitude toward it, which makes it seem normal to me. I understand that in vast swaths of the country, and even in other social circles in my very city, this isn't the case.

So, although I may perceive that there are lots of people running out and having as much casual fun as their hearts may desire, I think the truth is that we're probably a rather select few.

Looking at Craig's List for a bit of insight here, there are many hundreds of posts each from people in my city alone. And they're all looking for casual sex. Now, sure, there's a lot of repetition, but you also have to assume that not everyone is looking there. And then, of course, there's the bar scene.

So, I think there's a lot of casual sex happening. Probably most of it is happening in younger crowds; I'm 30, and by this time, most people are settled or settling down. And probably most of it is happening as a filler, rather than as a life-oriented practice. But not all of it! I know there are plenty of people of all ages who enjoy casual encounters and have no desire to change that. I just don't have any idea how many there are!

I do, though, think that we are the few... the proud... the, um... well, I don't know what our title is, but we're out there!

Posted by ClueChick at 10:56 AM in Q&A | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, there are typos in your response to a personal ad. Big deal, right? I mean, we all do it from time to time (even I! Thanks to those of you who've pointed out my occasional typo!), and everyone can read what you meant to say, even if you munged a few letters...

Well, almost everyone. It turns out that the occasional absent-minded reading of a typo can cause great confusion. To wit:

Yesterday, I received an email approach saying, among other things, "I'd also like to try try some ana with you, how about youl?"

Now, it's probably obvious to everyone what "ana" means, in this context, right? Well, not me. Call me dense, or oblivious, or I-don't-know-what, but... I didn't draw the obvious conclusion. Instead, I thought, "Hm, I wonder what "ana" is? I know "tina" is amphetamine..."

Aside: I've never used recreational drugs, and I don't get a lot of exposure to them, so I'm used to not "getting" drug slang. This doesn't explain why my mind went there, but I do regularly get invitations to "go skiing" or smoke a joint as part of our get together, so maybe that's it.

At any rate, I Googled it, with no luck, and then asked some friends:

cluechick: What drug is "ana" slang for?
helpful: Not as in "pro-ana"?
cluechick: No, as in a drug
cluechick: I know it's slang for a drug, but I don't remember which one
helpful: Anabolic steroids?
also-helpful: That would have been my guess
also-helpful: You're sure it's a drug? I've heard it as slang for 'anorexia'
helpful: that's what I wondered but she said no :)
also-helpful: oh, i see
cluechick: yes, sure it's a drug
cutiepie: maybe epinephrine?
cutiepie: (I'm searching google for "ana drug", which is not very clear)
cluechick: yeah, I searched for "drug slang"
cluechick: but none of those lists include it
cluechick: so maybe it's new, or a typo, or I'm misunderstanding what, "Maybe you'd like to do a bit of ana" means
cluechick: maybe it's a sex act
helpful: anal.
also-helpful: anal
also-helpful: jinx!
helpful: if this is in casual-sex mail, that seems far the most likely reading :)
cluechick: oh. duh

Seriously! Duh.

But, after laughing at me, you all can take a lesson here: typos actually do matter. Usually, it's no big deal, but other times... well, you may be sending a message entirely different from what you mean.

Posted by ClueChick at 10:25 PM in actual responses , cluechick encounters | Permalink | Comments (0)

This response to one of my ads has me a bit flabbergasted:

WELL I THINK WECOULD BE AGOOD MATCH BECAUSE I LOVE SEX AND I TAKE CARE OF MY PARTNER I LOVE TO TRY NEW MOVE WITH A WILLING PARTNER.I HOPE YOU LIKE THE TOP BECAUSE I LOVE TO WATCH TITS BOUNCE I LIKE TIT FUCKING TOO I LIKE IT ALL. LET ME SHOW YOU.

I'm sorry to say that I'm not making this up. Seriously, how could I? This is one of those cases where truth is stranger than fiction, because if I made this sort of thing up, I would look at it and then laugh at myself and say, "Chick, what the hell are you thinking? No one would ever write something so ridiculously absurd! Go make up something that people will believe!"

Even if I try to lowercase it in my head, it's still ridiculous. Maybe there's some woman out there who loves this sort of thing, but I'm not she. Maybe my man here will, someday, find her. If so, good luck to both of them!

Posted by ClueChick at 6:31 PM in actual responses | Permalink | Comments (7)

Dear CC, Why does casual sex make me insecure? Signed, Hot But Insecure:

Dear Hot But Insecure:
First, casual sex IS less secure that committed sex. After all, sex in a r'ship has a structure and clear expectations and boundaries. When you're dating someone, there's a generally accepted path and unspoken rules that most people follow. Casual sex, on the other hand, is fluid and doesn't have much in the way of rules. So, while, when dating, you can reasonably expect your lover to maintain regular contact, be it a phone call the next morning or an email touching base midweek, in the casual sex setting, you can reasonably expect your lover to either call you in the morning or not, to let you know what he's doing later that week, or not, etc. That's unsettling, and it leaves the niggling gremlins of your imagination to go to work.

And what do those niggling gremlins focus on? The natural insecurities that everyone has, of course. In this case, they probably make you think things like, "He hasn't returned my email in 12 hours. That must mean he never wants to talk to me again! And the reason he never wants to talk to me again is that I'm unattractive and boring and I give horrible head! This means I'm a bad person, and I'll never find anyone to date, or even fuck, ever again!

Pay no attention to the gremlins in the corner. The insecurity is normal, and if it drives you to distraction, you may decide casual sex isn't for you. Or it may mean that in your casual engagements, you need to set up systems or understandings that clarify the process for you and help you avoid those insecurities. And, of course, doing what you can to allay your own fears is important. Remember, you're awesome. Make a totally immodest list of all the awesome things about you. Ask your friends to help. I don't know if that'll help with the insecurity, but it sounds like a fun project, doesn't it?

Best, CC

Posted by ClueChick at 11:19 PM in Q&A | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tonight, uninspired by anything particularly outstanding -- either good or bad -- happening in the last week, I'm completely stymied for a topic of discussion. Thus, I turn to you all. What would you like me to talk about in the next couple of weeks?

Of course, if you don't ask me anything, I'll just have to come up with more boring advice. You wouldn't want that, right?

Posted by ClueChick at 10:18 PM in questions for the audience | Permalink | Comments (3)