Archive for the ‘Language and the body’ Category

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New frontiers in porn for gay men

February 22, 2026

(Once more into man-on-man sex described in street language; kind of silly, and actually rather sweet, but way too raunchy for kids or the sexually modest)

In my e-mail this morning (2/22), a gay porn sale ad from ASGmax: for Almost Real (part 1), In the Name of Science, featuring Nico Coopa and Ryder Owens, from the studio Next Door Films, released on 2/14/26. The video tells the tale of a “synthetic intimate robot” — not an AI creation, but a character played by an actual porn performer, which somewhat takes the edge off the kinkiness of getting a blow job from a robot or the unpleasant prospect of getting fucked by one. (The only machines I want up my ass are anal probes and dildoes that are entirely under my control — nothing with any sort of mind of its own.), The whole ad, in all its details, but with the dicks fuzzed out for WordPress modesty (I will, however, describe them):

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Posted in AI, Gay porn, Language and the body, Language of sex | Leave a Comment »

Catamite’s delight

February 21, 2026

(This posting is all about man-on-man anal sex, with photos, in the plainest of street language (F-bombs will fall like snow), so it is utterly out of bounds for kids and the sexually modest; entertaining in its own grossly raunchy way, but spectacularly NSFW)

I’l ease into things, starting with some background about the noun catamite, taking off with NOAD‘s entry:

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Posted in Gay porn, Language and the body, Language of sex | 2 Comments »

Calvin Tompkins

February 12, 2026

A note about a moving diary of unsparing self-reflection by the American writer Calvin Tomkins as he struggles through the year to the age of 100: in print in the New Yorker issue of 12/22/25: “Centenarian: A diary of a hundredth year”.

Tomkins (born 12/17/1925, graduated from Princeton in 1948; I am 9/6/1940 and Princeton 1962 — merely stumbling through towards the age of 86, but we swim similarly against the chill tides of decline and loss) has been a writer for the magazine since 1958. Casuals, interview pieces, and so on, but preeminently as the magazine’s art critic.

His piece is characteristically direct and spare, traversing a wrenching jagged route through his life, without drama or pleading. His story obviously speaks to my condition, but more generally serves as a model of how to deal with nasty, messy mortality with grace and humanity. And, if you can bear it, should be read along with Tatiana Schlossberg’s remarkable “A Battle with my Blood”, in print in the 12/8/25 issue of the New Yorker under the head “A Further Shore”, about her last days as a 34-year-old woman dying of leukemia.

 

 

Posted in Language and medicine, Language and the body | Leave a Comment »

Finishing my groom

December 21, 2025

(This posting devolves fairly fast into oral sex between men, so it is, alas, entirely unsuitable for kids and the sexually modest.)

Musical overture: the chorus and verse 2 of the 1960s song “Chapel of Love”:

[chorus]
Goin’ to the chapel
And we’re gonna get married
Goin’ to the chapel
And we’re gonna get married
Gee, I really love you
And we’re gonna get married
Goin’ to the chapel of love

[verse 2]
Bells will ring, the sun will shine,
I’ll be his and he’ll be mine
We’ll love until the end of time
And we’ll never be lonely anymore

Save this thought. In the original, written for a girl group, the narrator is a woman writing about her man. A later version was performed by a guy group; the narrator is a man writing about his woman. Finally, we get performances by Elton John singing to his husband David Furnish (they got a civil partnership in 2005, were married in 2014).

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Posted in Etymology, Homosexuality, Language and the body, Language of sex, Marriage, Music | Leave a Comment »

Ad-talk: your morning groom

December 19, 2025

Caught on tv this morning, one version of a Titanium Edge tv spot ad “Any Hair Anywhere”, released 7/31/25 (details on the iSpot site here); from this ad:


Titanium Edge, the “2-in-one nose and ear groomer that goes wherever razors can’t … to finish my groom” — with a noun groom, a nouning of the verb groom, to denote a regular routine of grooming, here specifically for men and in fact specifically for shaving; this nouning would appear to be a commercial invention by Titanium Edge’s ad agency

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Posted in Conversion, Innovations, Language and the body, Language of advertising, Nouning | Leave a Comment »

Z-Man and his cornucopia of words

December 7, 2025

Today’s Zippy strip shows us Bill Griffth’s superhero character Z-Man, the Pinhead Superman. Like Zippy, Z-Man is an onomatomane, luxuriating in a constant warm shower of remarkable words. Like Superman, Z-Man has magic eyes: Superman has X-ray vision, Z-Man can beam information though his eyes. If you have abiblia, or fear that you will contract it — if you’re abibliophobic — Z-Man ‘s gaze can send you all the words you need.


From axolotl to doo-hickey, Z-Man has a word for you

(As a Z-person, I am of course partial to a Z-Man superhero. He flies for me.)

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Posted in Language and the body, Language of medicine, Lexicography, Linguistics in the comics | 2 Comments »

Joey’s Surf Vacation

December 5, 2025

(hard-core man-on-man sex action, so totally not for kids or the sexually modest)

Yesterday, in my posting “Surfing like bunnies”:

In this morning’s crop of gay porn ads, in a TitanMen store mailer, the charmingly titled (and apparently single-entendre) Joey’s Surf Vacation, with a dvd cover featuring a porn actor new to me, the boyish twink Joey Mills (paired with a familiar muscle twink, Dean Young, in a scene I’ll write about in a later posting).

— with the cover of the 2024 dvd (released 9/24/24) from MEN.com, showing Joey Mills with a third actor from the video, Troy Daniels.

This is that later posting.

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Posted in Gay porn, Homosexuality, Language and the body, Language in advertising, Language of sex, Movies and tv | Leave a Comment »

Cartoon understanding: the advanced class

December 5, 2025

Today’s Wayno / Piraro Bizarro is an advanced exercise in cartoon understanding: a wordless strip (no speech, no caption) in which a tuxedoed performer takes a bow, next to a toy piano:


Ah, he seems to be a pianist, and the tiny piano, no more than a foot long, must be his instrument; at that point, you are baffled — unless you’re familiar with a classic walk-into-bar joke (if you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Wayno says there’s only 1 in this strip — see this Page)

In this variant of the classic joke, that piano is in fact 12 inches long, a 12-inch piano, so the performer is a 12-inch pianist. This is the status conferred on him by a genie when he wished for a 12-inch penis. Whoops.

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Posted in Jokes, Language and the body, Language of sex, Linguistics in the comics, Music, Understanding comics | 10 Comments »

Pressure Drops and Itchy Spots

November 17, 2025

Yesterday’s set-up (“Two afflictions”) for today’s more detailed report:

I have largely lost the last few days to afflictions

…. One of [them] comes with rapid descents into very low barometric pressures [pressure drops] (as has happened twice in the last three days, as sea storms sweep through coastal California). The other is a mystery ailment that has variously annoyed and plagued me for many years: intensely itchy spots over most of my body, but especially my limbs, sometimes maturing into actual pustules; I have taken to referring to this condition as the itchies. On the night of the 14th/15th, I had the worst attack of the itchies in my life

So today I bring you a report on the Days of Pressure Drops and the Itchies. You hope for days of milk and honey, cakes and ale, wine and roses, beer and skittles, but sometimes you get days of pressure drops and the itchies. Both of which hurt, both of which exhaust you.

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Posted in Language and medicine, Language and the body, My life, Weather | 1 Comment »

Two afflictions

November 16, 2025

I have largely lost the last few days to afflictions, poleaxed by pain of several varieties, immobilized by exhaustion, escaping into sleep, into music that delights me, and into familiar old tv dramas with moral lessons that satisfy my desire for order in the world.

One of the afflictions comes with rapid descents into very low barometric pressures (as has happened twice in the last three days, as sea storms sweep through coastal California). The other is a mystery ailment that has variously annoyed and plagued me for many years: intensely itchy spots over most of my body, but especially my limbs, sometimes maturing into actual pustules; I have taken to referring to this condition as the itchies. On the night of the 14th/15th, I had the worst attack of the itchies in my life, all over my body, too many to count, indescribably awful.

But … the barometric pressure rises to something tolerable, or even delightful, within a few hours. And the Assault of the Itchies tale has a delightful denouement. So I am worn out but happy. And in the midst of this, my vital signs have been splendid, in particular very low blood pressure and a stunningly good resting pulse rate.

Alas, the day has wound down — I am in good shape, and happy, but worn out —  so I will put off all the exciting details for tomorrow: Pressure Drop and the Itchies.

 

Posted in Language and medicine, Language and the body, My life | Leave a Comment »

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