(UPDATE, March 8: Er, no new entry today, I think, because I can't think of anything interesting to talk about for 2,000 words; I thought I'd spend the day trying to get caught up on email instead. Sorry!)

(CAUTION: Today's entry discusses the author's sex life in graphic terms. Those uncomfortable with reading such things [including, as always, the author's mother] would be wise to skip today's entry entirely.)

Okay, so last week I made a small, mostly jokey complaint here about this new home broadband connection of mine, and all the chat accounts I now have running here; namely, that so far none of my readers had gotten drunk and beeped me in the middle of the night yet, inviting me to participate in cybersex with them, which is something I'm curious about these days because I've never actually done such a thing as cybersex. (Oh, and a clarification to the several people who wrote in this weekend about this - yes, I know I've exchanged dirty emails with some of you before! I'm talking specifically about text-based real-time dirty talk via chat client; that's what I've never tried.)

And man, I've said it before and I'll say it again, that my readers are always coming through for me in a crunch; I heard from a lovely young woman in California, in fact, who very graciously offered to have a cybersex session with me, which we indeed ended up having on Sunday night, after I had gotten home all fucked up from my birthday party (but more on that later). And what's more, I actually found the experience much more satisfying than I was expecting, and definitely a lot dirtier than I thought such a thing could be; but then again, that might be because of some new things she and I added to it all, that maybe you don't normally see when it comes to most traditional 'cyber' sessions. Anyway, it's gotten my brain ticking recently about all this; and in typical form, I thought I'd go ahead and share these thoughts with you as well.

So what exactly did we add to our cyber experience that was new? Well, two main things, mostly...

1) First of all, I decided that I didn't want to do a real-time text-based fantasy back and forth, like is so typical with these situations; that is, when you and your partner act as if you're actually having sex that moment, and writing things back and forth that reflect that. ("Now I'm kissing your nipples." "Now I'm grasping your cock." Stuff like that; you see what I'm saying.) To tell you the truth, this is the main thing that's held me back all these years from actually trying cyber, because I just find such a thing so ridiculous, and not a turn-on at all. "Now I'm sucking your dick, Jason." No you're not - you're sitting in front of a computer 2,000 miles away from me! I'm looking at my dick right now, and there are no lips on it!

I mean, we definitely discussed fantasies on Sunday, definitely told dirty stories back and forth, and explained in detail what we would do to each other if we happened to be in the same room that moment. But my point is that the actual wording was different than what you typically see with cyber; say, for example, "I had this really kinky fantasy about you the other day, and I'm now going to tell you all the details," versus "I have a kinky fantasy about you, and now let's pretend that we're actually acting it out, even though you and I both clearly understand that we're not." Semantics, I know, but semantics are important in this kind of environment; it's the difference, for example, between me getting an erection and merely laughing out loud at the ridiculousness of it all.

And then 2), the much more important one, we also decided to take a series of photographs of ourselves earlier, in various poses and states of arousal that we expected to be in later that night while actually chatting. And then while both of us actually were chatting, we could then simply drag and drop these photos right into the chat conversation itself, and have it be a contextual part of the dirtiness, i.e. "Here's what I'm doing this exact moment, as you're telling your dirty story to me."

And boy, talk about the saving grace of cybersex for me! I'm the first to admit it, that I'm a very typical male when it comes to subjects like these - that my brain really does work much more effectively through sensuous data than cognitive. That's why, for example, it's difficult for me to even imagine my online corresponders as actual real human beings, until I've literally met them in the physical world; because that's the way my particular brain works, that it has a difficult time even accepting something as real unless it can interact with it through the physical senses (seeing, hearing, touching, tasting and smelling). And you know, it's also hard to deny that written erotica just barely gets me turned on at all, and that's only when the story itself is some freaky dark little prurient thing, like the kind of stuff Poppy Z. Brite writes. (Actually, maybe that's a bad thing to admit, that Poppy Z. Brite's work turns me on; I can just imagine what you fellow Brite fans must be thinking of me at this point.) Anyway, my point is that 99 percent of the time, written words just don't get me aroused, in any shape or form, no matter what words those are and what order they've been put in.

This is a real stumbling block for cyber, of course, because that's the main point of cyber; to exchange words, stories and other cognitive data, in an attempt to get both yourself and your partner off. So I have to admit, it was extremely cool to add the photos to it all, because this taps right into what about this stuff does get me off - blurry amateur photos of naked geeks masturbating, that is, and I'm not about to apologize for that either. And so this created what I thought was this rather nice little environment for the two of us: where we were able to have this rambling, unfocused conversation about sex for something like four hours, one that would sometimes veer into really kinky territory, then suddenly not be sexual at all, as a random comment would get us talking about something else, and that would eventually lead us organically back to the kinky stuff again. And then punctuated every 20 minutes or so, of course, by a new photo from this hot little nerdy woman I've never met, but who nonetheless is doing some awfully nasty things in the photos themselves, as well as telling me all about it in the text part of the conversation.

It wasn't just the photos that got me off, and it wasn't just the text, if you see my point; it was the combination of the two, done in an intriguing way, with a partner willing to play along, using technology that made it easy to do so, without it getting in the way of the main point of cyber, which of course is to beat off furiously while your partner says dirty fucking things to you. And I guess that's really the most important point I want to make about all this; that unlike these supposed audio and webcam capabilities that all these new chat clients apparently have, which I can attest absolutely do not work, any of them, when attempting to connect between a Mac and a Windows computer, my solution actually worked perfectly, and didn't get in the way at all of our masturbation and dirty talk, but rather enhanced it. (Which of course brings us to this question - of whether such a thing could be considered another example of the Web 2.0 or not. Cybersex mash-ups, anyone? Hey, Yahoo, want to buy the idea from me? I'll sell it to you for ten bucks and a blowjob! Oh, but the blowjob has to come from someone on the 360 team, so that I can have sex and lodge a customer complaint at the same time. "Suck it, bitch! Your API is inadequate for high-end user customization! Suck it!")

So anyway, all of this led to me having this really charged experience and very hard orgasm, almost as intense as actual physical sex, which of course has also gotten me thinking about it all. Was my orgasm that intense simply from the novelty of it? Because it was the first time I'd ever tried such a thing? Or is such a situation (non-narrative chat and photos, that is) something that really is that erotic to me? If I replicated the experience with other partners, would I enjoy myself as much as I did that first time? I mean, regular readers can see already where I'm going with this; they know that my sex life is a rather strange one, where instead of dating I merely have casual sex with strangers a couple of times a year, usually by advertising for one at a place like Craigslist. And as I've complained about many times here, it's becoming more and more difficult to actually find partners through a place like Craigslist anymore, as the service gets more and more popular and drives away the very people who made it popular in the first place. But boy, I'm willing to bet that it'd be a hell of a lot easier to find random women willing to cyber instead; and if such a thing could be proven to be consistently erotic for me, this might actually make for a nice semi-regular addition to my sex life, on those days that I'm feeling horny but don't want to go through all the bullshit of finding a physical partner.

So that's another thing that my brain's been contemplating recently - of whether I actually should try running an ad like this at Craigslist soon, just to see what might happen. And that of course brings another dozen questions on its own - like, just how exactly do I get all this across in a personal ad, the very specific thing about cyber that I tried, and that I would want to do again with any future partner? I mean, Jesus, it just took me a thousand words to describe it to you; how do I boil that all down into one short paragraph? And make it ultimately a positive invitation, instead of a laundry list of what I don't want? And still accomplish all the things a personal ad from a single male needs to accomplish anyway - to have a charming quality to it, to be funny, to be non-threatening, all things a personal ad from a guy must have before a woman will even think of responding to it? And another question - would any women actually be interested in such a thing? I mean, you tell me, ladies - what do you think of this idea? Would you be willing to meet your cyber partner halfway when it comes to all this? To have him deliver the text-based stuff that's getting you off, while you delivering the image-based stuff that's getting him off? If you had a chat partner who said, "I want to talk dirty, but I don't want to pretend that we're actually having sex that second," would you think, "Thank God, finally someone who thinks like me?" or "Well, that defeats the entire point of cyber?"

As always, your thoughts are greatly appreciated; and as always, your name is automatically withheld if I end up mentioning your comment here, unless you specifically say it's okay to disclose it. And needless to say, if some cute little nerdy girl out there just happens to want to help me continue my nefarious experiments, I would of course be more than happy to hear from you.

So, yes, it was my birthday this weekend! I turned 37, as a matter of fact, and in typical fashion just could not think of a single fun thing to do. So I dropped an email to all my friends on Friday morning; and sure enough, a couple of them really came through for me, which led to some really nice experiences all weekend long.

Two of the people I heard from, for example, were my old friends Franky Vivid and Michelle "Toots" L'Amour, co-founders of this incredible burlesque company here in Chicago called the Lavender Cabaret; and they made the same offer they did for my birthday two years ago, to let me and all my friends attend last Saturday's show for free. Well, all right! I always get so excited about seeing Franky and Michelle again, because they're such cool people but so busy, and I just never seem to get any time to hang out with them. So that was a lot of fun, needless to say, although only one of my friends ended up actually attending, my old buddy Erik who I originally know from my poetry days at Joyblue in the '90s. But hey, that's fine with me; that just means more half-naked ladies for Jason!

And then on Sunday, my actual birthday, my old childhood friend Tom decided to throw me a party, over at his place in River West; which, okay, was technically an Oscar party that he had already been planning, but simply doubled as a birthday party for me as well. And that would've been fine, except that my friends Kate and Anna then called me as well, and wanted to see if I could get together with them beforehand at my place, maybe 6:00 or so, so they could give me my present. And in typical form, the present was in fact drugs; which the three of us proceeded to do starting around 6:03, and not stopping until maybe 1 in the morning or so. Oh, and well, of course with a fridge full of booze at Tom's place as well.

Anyway, my point is that I got fucking wasted, which I don't do very often anymore, because I'm 37 now and my body simply can't handle such a thing very well. (How wasted? Well, every time Brokeback Mountain won an award, I would force everyone at the party to stand up and scream, "Damn gay cowboys!" in tandem. That wasted.) And then once I was wasted, of course, I jumped on my cellphone and did two new episodes of my podcast [randommedia], featuring me and my wasted friends acting all wasted for ten minutes. (You can right-click here and here to download them yourself; and then I'll be getting an actual episode entry with the files up later today.) Which, yes, I know, I don't sound very wasted at all in those; which was actually a recurring complaint from my friends in college too, that they could never tell when I was sober and when I was wasted, because I still sound the same in either case. But I was, believe me.

Okay, well, I'm running awfully late with today's entry, so I guess I better wrap it up here and actually get it posted. See you later, fuckos!