Need something fun to read (or listen to) over the holidays? I get it, baby…here are my 5 favorite blog posts, newsletter articles, songs, and fan stories of the year!

On this blog:

There are a lot of messages out there that seem to suggest that only traditionally attractive people are worthy of sex (a standard that often ends up leading to fat, racist, trans and ableism in its enforcement). It’s no wonder so many of us are nervous about being seen naked… [but] Imperfection is part of what makes sex feel so exciting, so raw, so human.

While I personally don’t find anything particularly attractive about, say, growing armpit hair, telling toilet humor jokes constantly, or lifting weights in the gym until sweat drips down my back, I still think it’s pretty fucked up that men can have no problem with it. Do all these things without batting an eye, but if a woman does this, she is viewed by many segments of society as a failure of femininity. Get lost! Let women be human! Let women get rough!

Like my recent trip to Portland, I decided to theme my entire Berlin wardrobe around a cohesive color scheme; this time, it was green, emerald blue, and yellow. In these photos you can see me holding a yellow reporter’s notebook from the German brand Leuchtturm1917, which I bought specifically to take notes on this trip (nerdy!), as well as a limited edition teal and yellow The Lamy Safari Pen…

I follow a lot of Twitch gamer boys and they are no Insufferable misogynistic bastards… I found it enjoyable to watch them play Echoes for the first time. No one ever said it was weird to play a girl. Instead, some of them smiled, controllers clicking, and exclaimed, “How cool is it that you get to play as Zelda in this game!” Having played Echoes myself, I will It’s considered a feminist allegory—and not just because you play as Zelda.

I want a “love core” [pink and red] Night King. I love these colors, but maybe more importantly for this post, I have a lot of clothes in these colors! I started putting the outfit together in my head before my new Night King arrived on my doorstep – and when it arrived, it was so stunning that I was even more excited to style it. Are you ready to see the dildo-inspired combos I came up with?

For my newsletter (you can access the entire past archive for just $5 a month!):

This is one of the reasons I find sex so enduringly fascinating. Just like a quantum particle, it can look completely different depending on how you observe it and who is observing it… If you’re talking to a friend, it’s relatively easy to tell whether you’re both enjoying the conversation – especially since sometimes one of you A guy might just say something like, “I always love talking to you!” Why is gender any different?

These days, “nice guys” – feminist, socially conscious guys – are more hesitant to “make the first move” in any romantic or sexual context… So now, if you’re a guy dating Women, just like me (and others), if you want the man you date to be a “good guy,” you have to be willing to take more initiative in sex and dating, even if it feels uncomfortable.

…Sometimes I just keep adjusting the way I sit, the way my hair falls, and the expression on my face because some voice in the back of my head tells me, “Your job now is to look good” so maybe someone will connect you. If you weren’t beautiful, who knows what great opportunities you might miss? “Hey, that’s the thing, isn’t it? FOMO. I love romance, I love love so much that the thought of missing out on an otherwise great opportunity makes me miserable.

For one thing, just because something “evolves” doesn’t mean it’s good. Creatures less evolved than us would not be able to cope with climate change, nuclear war, or genocide, whereas we are capable of these things. Apes don’t hoard AK-47s. Amoeba knows nothing about fascism. Our advanced evolution is what brings us to the brink of self-destruction. “Highly evolved” is not a selling point.

…if we want to have the best sex possible—that is, the most mutually stimulating, pleasurable, satisfying, and connecting sex possible—we need to actively counteract the sexual anxieties that cause our partners and ourselves power. We must strive to create a comfortable environment. I mean that on every possible level.

song:

We’ve had an arrangement all these years: / Keep it light and you won’t cry / But lately, our arrangement has definitely been changing / I don’t understand; that wasn’t the plan! / I’d probably yell “Fire!” when there’s no smoke / Why would I try to fix us when we’re not bankrupt?

Solastalgia: I missed you before you left/I knew the blow was coming, so why not start grieving? /That’s why seeing you again while you’re still around makes me cry/Solastalgia: I miss you while you’re still here

Some would say it’s a coward’s way / If I want something, I have to make it / But I can’t yet, can’t risk it / Because you’re a person worth thinking about, a hopeful place to be

Please don’t be too hard on you / Love yourself as much as I do, and / Care about you as much as I care about you / If you think you want to die / Call me because I / Can’t live without you

Party night, I’m already in shock/Should have stayed home with a whiskey and a book/Because I’m an introvert, introvert at parties/When you wonder where I went/Check the kitchen, hallway, patio and John/Because I’m an introvert and an introvert at parties

Fan fiction:

Roman sneaks into his hotel room for the night, kicking off his shoes and wondering why the fuck he drank so much champagne. Waystar’s top brass was celebrating a victory – the media merger Logan approved was Ken’s kid, not Roman’s, so naturally, Roman had to throw down a few fizzy drinks to deal with the good daddy in his belly question. The way his father looked at Ken made Roman want to drink bleach, but the caterer at the party only offered crystal.

To say that Roman was masturbating over the memory of having sex with Gerry would be an understatement… It would be more accurate to say that Roman had thought about nothing since that night. Others When he masturbates. No hentai beauties with giant jugs, no shapely female teachers wielding wooden canes, no panting blonde porn stars with bleached assholes. Just Gerry, the back of the city tram, and the hotel. He still remembers it vividly, though that might just be because he’s replayed it enough times to clog his shower.

Mark doesn’t know much about the technical side of the severance process, but one thing he does know – as it appears in Milczyk’s PowerPoint on keyboard shortcuts – is that it takes up your memory, but not you Basic human knowledge, your “implicit memory.” That’s why they can still talk, breathe and pee. That’s why Mark wonders what the sound of rain sounds like. That’s why Mark knew what a “date” was, even though he’d never been on one before and was pretty sure they were expressly forbidden. He wouldn’t check the manual to confirm this, mostly because he’d rather date Hailey.

Henry doesn’t think all-night jam sessions sound like torture, but he’s a theater kid through and through, and beer commercials notwithstanding… [He] He himself remembers the sleepless nights—sets that lasted until three in the morning, long lines at the 24-hour restaurant, cast parties that lasted from curtain call one night to the matinee the next day. Sleep-deprived actors are a crazy bunch… His Blanche and Ophelia are both the kind of girls who would never give him the time of day outside their little theater bubble – but when they’re overwhelmed by all the partying and Feeling it all while performing and exhausted, he would be the warm body next to them, grinning goofily, ready to open his mouth… “How can I get a ticket?” he asked Casey now, as he Just fucking human.

His body had not stiffened since his father’s death, despite the nighttime stiffness. Yeah, that’s a whole healing process, right there. He really appreciated HIPAA the day he shared this little gem. This doesn’t feel like a surprise; His boner limped around for years, kept alive only by medical intervention (and the occasional phone call with a sadistic blonde vixen before everything went haywire). It makes sense that when his father died, his tough guy self died with him. As far as Roman knows, this may be the old man’s last wish. “Curse my sick son with a flawed Johnson so that he will never be happy.” Oh man, that’s so Freudian. Makes him want to stab himself to death with the horns of the DSM-5.

did you Do you have a favorite thing that I wrote about this year, darlings? (Self-indulgence issue alert!!) Happy Holidays to you and your loved ones!