'Mr Sex': Oh Shitting Hell, Not That Time Of Year Again

Oh God No. It's nearly Valentines Day. Thankfully, being single, I can take full advantage of the generous offer above, and drink myself into a guilt-free stupor a week tomorrow (or have a romantic evening with a lady friend in a bus shelter somewhere). But what about my unfortunate brethren who are still recovering from post-Xmas bank account meltdown who have left it too late to book restaurants, hotels, flower deliveries and all that nonsense?

Please, lady readers of Todger Talk - advise us on how to do Valentines Day properly without chucking money up the wall on stuff you neither want, need or can see through...

Dave: Women can be so tactless

I’d like to revisit the age-old classic theme of frienditis.

It seems an unfortunate yet simple state of affairs - and it’s easy to put it down to her plainly not fancying you. To her you lack that spark so often associated with the mystery of a stranger. Then inevitably she gets to know the stranger a little and forms a new friendship thus ready to cast her eye over to the next mystery man. Doesn’t that sound scarily reminiscent of the clichéd roving-eyed male – a brush we’ve been tarnished by ever so unfairly?

I was having a drink with a female friend of mine last night. This woman is magnificent. The aristocratic chime of her voice, her wonderfully positive outlook, her beautiful uplifting smile, and fuck me, what a figure. As per bloody usual, she reveals to me the string of disastrous dates she’d recently embarked upon.

The psychotically besotted guy who texts her eight times a day after one date. The charmless man utterly devoid of charisma and even the most basic conversational skills. The older man, possessive, money-oriented and extraordinarily boorish. The list went on like a particularly sexually-biased episode of Sex And The City (er, apparently). None of the potential suitors held a glimmer of sexual intrigue for her.

What struck me, having heard her distinct dismissal of any attraction be it in terms of physicality, sexuality or personality – two of them she admitted to not even liking, was when she confessed to have slept with all of them. Again, she recounted the disappointment of all the encounters (including an erectile disfunction scenario), as if it came as a shock.

Naturally, once the entertaining tales of failed dates had come to a close, the only thing I could focus on was the fact that people my striking companion neither fancied nor liked were getting to screw her.

And here was I. Chopped Liver. Forever fantasising about the curves of her body pressing tentatively against me. Here was I, offering an interested ear, making her laugh, sharing snippets of intimate information. Ultimately doomed to receive a ‘sweet’ kiss on the cheek at the evening’s end, and to go back to my bed to indulge in brutal self-abandon.

The question is do I mention my desires? Not necessarily in graphic detail. And risk receiving the response already clearly laid out on the table. Or may I be pleasantly surprised? Well, in my experience, any surprise is a rare bird in this all too often predictable world.

'Mr Sex': It's So Funny How We Don't Talk Anymore

So, I’m standing outside a pub in the summer, chuffing fags and getting satisfyingly mashed with two of my best female friends. And there’s a lot to talk about. Both of them have just split up with blokes, one of whom is a good mate of mine. The other is someone I got to know quite well while he was going out with my mate, but I had him pegged as a window-licking twat right from the off - but the point is, I know them both quite well.

And we start to play a game that I’ve just made up on the spot. I ask them questions about their just-finished relationships, and whoever gives the worst answer gets a point. I call it Whose Ex Was A Bigger Bell-End? I’ll need to work on that title before I pitch it to Channel Five, but for now, it’ll do.

After the tentative introductory questions, I decide to go for broke and see how much I can get out of them. What’s the shittiest present he ever bought you? What are the mankiest pants he owns? What does his come face look like? Not only do they answer all my questions, they suggest new ones. Before too long, I learn the following;

• One of them had the charming Saturday morning habit of eating three bacon and egg sandwiches in bed, before attempting to frig his girlfriend off
• One of them would routinely look at himself in the mirror whilst receiving a blow job and pout at himself
• One of them had an oral sex technique comparable to ‘a bulldog with Bell’s Palsy
• One of them regularly sent phone images to his paramour of his erection and bumhole
• One of them regularly pleaded with his girlfriend to set up a threesome with her work colleague (who she hated
• One of them would keep a piss-bucket at the side of the bed, because he couldn’t be bothered to use the toilet downstairs.

It was when one of my lady-friends said, matter-of-factly, “Actually, I feel sorry for him, because his inability to get a proper erection means he’ll probably have a heart attack in his late 30s”, when I thought; hang on a minute. I know these women. They’re not mad, or hysterical, or malicious people. They’re just normal. Like every other woman I know. Including all of my exes. So what the fuck would they be saying about me?

Suffice to say, that first experience of women talking about what they got up to with men was an eye, skull and even chest-opener. I've never heard a man break down a sexual relationship in such detail before, and haven't since.

Now, I try to keep away from the ‘women do this, while men do that’ school of thought as much as possible. But if there’s one instance – the instance – where you can say without doubt that the two genders differ, it’s when we talk about sex and relationships with each other. The good news is that most right-thinking men don’t discuss sex like the cast of On The Buses anymore. The bad news is that we pretty much don’t talk about it at all. Here are a few examples…

After a one-night stand

Chap: Met this girl the other night.
Bloke: Leg-over?
Chap: (raises eyebrow)
Bloke: Nice one. Aren’t Liverpool shit at the moment?
Chap: Yeah. (half-hour conversation about Rafa Benitez)

At the start of a relationship

Chap: You know that girl I met the other night?
Bloke: Yeah.
Chap: I saw her again last night. And I’m seeing her again on Friday.
Bloke: (after at least ten minutes of thinking “Well, that’s him pissing off for six months, then”) Burnout Paradise looks mint, doesn’t it?

At the height of the relationship

Chap: She’s lovely, Bloke. She’s really lovely. You know what I mean? She’s one of those girls who you see, and you think “Aw, you’re really lovely” and then you get to know them and then you think “You know what? You’re really, really lovely”. She’s just…lovely.
Bloke: Yeah.
Chap: Lovely.
Bloke: I’m going to ring for a taxi, now.

When the relationship starts to go wrong

Chap: Blah blah blah…football…work…computers…how many nipples a giraffe has…anything but relationship…

When the relationship is over

Chap: (Pause. For three months. Before it all rushes out, usually in a pub car park, in a torrent of tears and snot)

Personally, I’m no different. I’ll talk about sex and relationships on here until the cows come home, but in public to my mates? I’ll just squeeze everything into a suppressed ball of angst and resentment, thanks. It was an entire month before I told any of my mates about the first serious relationship I ever had, and it wasn’t until six months after I got cheated on before I could even begin to tell them about that. And that kind of behaviour is not uncommon amongst my male friends at all. We’ve been conditioned to keep our cards close to our chest, deal with relationships on our own, and not bore our mates with it. I’ve even been to some of mate’s weddings, seen them up there brushing a tear away, and I’m thinking; “Shitting hell fire…he actually really loves her”

So when Sam talks about this sinister cabal of womanhood, he’s basically pointing out that the difference between female and male relationship interaction and discussion is currently not dissimilar to comparing the Internet with a frayed bit of string attached to a tin can. A lot of men don't seem to talk about new relationships (for fear of jinxing them), we don't talk about relationships we're in (for fear of being boring, or having the piss ripped out of us), and we don't talk about relationships that are dying on their arse or already dead (for fear of admitting that somehow we fucked up).

I'm not advocating that we all sit around banging drums and crying with our shirts off, but surely there's a better way to go about things. And, while I totally agree with a lot of comments on the forums that all the bullshitty barriers between women and men need to be broken down as soon as possible for the benefit of all, there needs to be some serious demolition work on the barriers that men have put up between themselves.

Sam: You WIN, you lose

Imagine an international organisation that has branches in every country in the world, that spies on every single person, every single day, that makes secret judgements that could affect you for the rest of your life. Sounds like a paranoid nightmare right?

Well according to one agent, after being plied with considerable quantities of champagne, this organisation exists. And it puts the CIA, MI5 and KGB to shame. It’s called WIN and 52% of the population are its agents.

What is WIN? The Women’s International Network. The agent obligingly provided me with some examples after I suggested that it was OK not to pay for everything on a first date.

Example 1. Guy takes girl on date. Guys doesn’t pay for whole bill, WIN is informed. Guy is blacklisted by all her friends in her entire group. Apparently if he is not going to pay for dinner, how is he going to manage when she wants kids?

Example 2. Girl meets new guy, it’s starting to get serious, but he’s not in her immediate social network. Word goes out on WIN, someone knows someone and soon she has a report on his entire relationship and financial history.

Let’s not even go into what she told me about men and affairs.

Facebook is a key tool for WIN, as it allows quick international communication for its agents. And actually, a recently study found that in our modern connected world, there are now actually only four degrees of separation between us and every other person on the planet. So put the word out on Facebook about pretty much anyone, and you are easily guaranteed an answer back.

Now as a man, not only does this make me slightly paranoid, but it strikes me as deeply unfair. In comparison to WINs massive resources, men are stumbling around in the dark. If a women treats him like rubbish, a man probably won’t even mention it to his mates in the pub. Even it he did he probably wouldn’t suggest his mates steer clear of her. And the idea of actually knowing her relationship and financial history by the second date is beyond comprehension for most men, we are lucky if we know that after the first year of living with her!

WIN is like an international relationship credit agency, watching your every relationship transaction, with no appeal on its decisions. An FOI request to find what’s on file and make corrections won’t work on WIN. It’s Big Sister, on steroids.

In comparison, MIN, the Man’s International Network, effectively has one agent, who never talks to anyone.

So next time a woman is making seemingly innocent interested inquiries about your relationships, or your job, just remember that she just might be compiling a dossier for judgement by a secret WIN panel.

Men, be careful. WIN is watching.

Something for the weekend, Sir? (2.2.08)

Todger Talk is stopping in for the weekend, playing domino-toppling with its collection of Electric Blue Betamaxes. Here's a few links to keep you going until Monday...

Letters from Working Girls, and it's companion blog Letters from Johns

A short film, in case you needed reminding that the Internet is rammed with Grot

We will never get bored of Super Snake exposing skanky love-rats on KISS-FM

And it's not too early to get your Valentines sorted out, single readers

'Mr Sex': Another lovely Porn letter

Time once again to don the washing-up glove and delve into my jiffy bag of letters sent to wank mags - and, as I'm sure you'll agree, this one is a of a particularly piquant vintage.

One of the most popular types of porn mag letter - ranking way up there with 'Look at this photo of my cock, isn't it nice?' and 'I've never seen such a shower of baggy-fannied dogs in all my life, give me my money back now' - is the letter begging us to send out free grot. Every week, we would get letters from soldiers in Kosovo, poverty-stricken students, and assorted cheeky fuckers wanting us to mail out bundles of wank mags, as if I was Jimmy fucking Saville or summat. And every week, they would be lobbed in a binwardly direction.

This one, however, was different. Maybe it was the location. Maybe it was the floridly heartfelt prose. But whatever it was, it found a special place in my heart. And maybe it'll find a place in yours , too...

Dear Sir/Madam,

I am much grateful to have this day pleasurable in writing to you this letter. I am a man of thirty eight year of old and a married man with two kids. Please the real purpose of writing to you this letter is that, We the Ghanaians, are so much ignorant of how to conduct sex.

I mean, Ghanaians don’t know exactly how to play the foreplay or how to play romance before playing the sex. And also we don’t know exactly the skills and styles of sex. And in fact as I said earlier on my wife is ignorant of all these things, though I normally take her to sexy films, She was convinced that these films are alarms and that they are toys that are Computerised.

In fact, whenever I tried to make love to her and then demand styles, she becomes annoyed and sometimes refuses to offer. Because of that, how to make love becomes a problem. But you can agreed with me that, it is love making or sex that can hold our married life.

Please in the absence of these, our married life is becoming ruined. And I am much disturbed. I was seriously looking for a hot sexy magazine to show or give to her which will enable her know, that the styles of sex is real and playing sex in adorable styles is not an alarm.

Fortunately I came across your address and I am please pleading with you to send me at least one of your sexy magazine to boost our married life and our love live. Please for God’s sake, consider the breaking of our marriage and send me your magazine. Please consider it so that, we can boost our married life and satisfy our wondering libido in a grand style.

As I read this letter for the first time, I could feel my hand automatically reaching for a stack of Razzles. No, I couldn't comprehend how photos of some woman from Doncaster bending over a fridge without her knickers on could save anyone's marriage either, but who was I to deny anyone's right to satisfy their wondering libido in a grand style?

And then I checked the address; 'C/O Rev. Joyland, Holy Trinity Church, Hohoe, Ghana'. And I thought, no, better not.

Dave: Treat 'em Mean

Just as the ‘Tree of Knowledge’ pops up in the mythology of every practised religion, so does the ‘Treat ‘em Mean’ mantra from every successful pulling-merchant.

An old friend of mine, whose arrogance is unsurpassed even by the most heinous celebrity chef, regularly preaches this me. Usually over the phone as he’s sneaking out of his latest conquest’s apartment in the early hours of the morning after.

He’d say it’s not about charm, or even confidence (he’s one of those typically insecure arrogant guys. Arrogance and confidence are two very different things). He’d advise rudeness. Not as in hurling insults at the poor girl, commenting on her dreadful taste in shoes. For starters, that would just make you sound gay, wouldn’t it?

No, what he meant was to appear disinterested. He’d say to glance around the room while she’s talking to you. Never under any circumstances seem keen. In fact, goes as far as to convince yourself you don’t even like her before she’s spoken.

Now being the humanitarian I am, I always refused to believe women love being treated improperly. Still do, I suppose. Sort of. Perhaps it’s a blind faith in womankind? Or a fantastical hope for my own behalf? It’s just that I think all people should be treated with equal respect. As long as they recognise my rightful position as master of the human race.

Naturally I put it down to the specific type of dreadful girls he must be going for. The kind I wouldn’t share cyberspace with nevermind personal space. Alas, this proved not to be the case.

I’ve never approached a woman I fancied and whom I didn’t know. Apart from this one occasion. I just wanted to test the over-hyped theory. I expected either I’d do it wrong – not offensive or dismissive enough. Or I’d hit the bar perfectly and she’d be a charming young woman who now feels utterly offended and thinks I’m scum.

So I was in a pub, and this voluptuous brunette was flirting outrageously with these dopey students, getting free drinks out of them (student loans must be much larger than in my day) then giving each a very predictable brush off. This was enough to rile my senses and I must admit that using negativity as a source of ‘courage’ to approach her definitely worked. Otherwise I would never have spoken to her. Now I understand what women mean when they announce we should simply go up and talk. Quite literally that, it seems. There’s no need for humour, politeness, or, as my friend suggests, charm.

So I swan over, as if I’m looking for a fight, for christ’s sake. And lunge in with some accusation of her ‘playing’ the poor sods fawning over her. To this day I can’t recall my actual words, such was the self-disgust I felt. Priding myself on being a decent man, I’ve buried that part of the memory. What I do remember is that I was brutally offensive. There was absolutely no charm involved. No intrigue she could’ve possibly felt. Yet, she responded. A conversation was brewing. Either that or a potential fight.

Unfortunately, I had to keep reminding myself not to like her. And sustain my obnoxious manner. And the more this appeared to entice her, the more I truly began to lose any semblance of interest in her. And when she leaned in to kiss me I found myself rebuffing this attractive woman. So basically I’d finally talked my way into a stranger’s knickers and talked myself out of them before I’d even stretched the elastic. It transpires treating them mean simply makes me feel unclean.

Well, my friend’s advice definitely works, but it’s not for me. I’ll just have to continue my adopted method of hanging around suspiciously until the right girl takes pity on me and decides to engage me in conversation. And more importantly, finds my nervous stammering, as I marvel at the rarity of having been approached, particularly alluring.