Hey everyone!

First off, thanks to each and every one of you for reading my blog, tweeting/direct messaging me, google talk-ing, hanging out with, or calling me. Prior to blogging, I became something of a hermit after a few really god-awful jobs and a bad car accident, thinking there really wasn’t much of a plus to hauling myself out of bed in the morning. Dorky as it’ll probably make me sound, twitter kinda put the proverbial spurs to me to get involved with other humans again.

I am a dreamer, always have been – I come up with ideas that I will expand upon at great length for a conversation or two, then set aside because “it’ll never work”. Sometimes, though, I think they’re useful or good enough to pursue and I make myself keep running with them…the Massive Manufacturer List was one of these! A great labor of love, it was a pain to get started but is now one of my favorite things to work on. Not too long ago, I had another idea that managed to hurdle the “it’ll never work” mantra and gain momentum in my brain. This led to a chat with a really cool Etsy momma I met on twitter, which led to several more, which produced a sketch, which produced a prototype, which then gave birth to “Oh my god, I think this is going to work!”

That idea produced the Chilldil, which you’ve likely seen me talking about frequently on twitter. A simple but kinda neat idea (IMHO), it is a special sleeve for sex toys, dildos, and the like that is filled with natural materials that can be microwaved or chilled in the freezer to transfer temperatures to your favorite sex toys. Great for headaches and neckaches when you’re not filling it with faux phalluses, the design is purposely discreet so you can leave it lying about or store it in the freezer full time if you want to.  We’re even making a special washable sleeve that slips into the chilldil so you can use it for refreshing the temperature mid-play.

But – I need help.

We (my maker and I) have got pretty much everything all set up – we know what we’re making, we know how we’re making it, how it’s being packaged, what materials we’re using, who’s doing the advertising (cough), and other sundry concerns involved in bringing a new product to market that usually result in panicked last-minute “omfg what NOW?” reactions. We lack capital, however.  I’ve found really nice packaging (a tube, you can see it in the video), but it needs to be ordered in batches of 100 tubes and I have literally no savings or income for this at the moment.

I, of all people, understand the not-having-money thing. I fully comprehend the financial situation the vast majority of us are in, and I’m not asking you to empty your pockets! What I AM asking you is to spread the word. If you have a few minutes to spare:

• Leave a supportive comment here
• Mention my project on your blog
• Follow @ThatToyChick and @Chilldils on Twitter
  
• RT or Tweet info about Chilldils
  
• (Especially) Leave a comment on YouTube
• (Especially) Leave a comment on the Kickstarter campaign.

The more popular the Chilldil looks, the exponentially greater chance I have at running a “it’ll never work” idea into a “holy shit, it DID work” reality, and beyond.

Thank you a million times over for reading. I am very interested in giving back to the sexblogger community once Chilldils gets off the ground, as they’re pretty much the reason it’s happening in the first place.

-TTC

The entirety of what is posted below is courtesy of the fabulous Between My Sheets (Check out 33! – That’s my lucky number, too! Woohoo!!):

It’s here. Finally. I promised it earlier, I know. Life got in the way (I’ll talk about it in my next post). That, and I had well over 150 unique nominations this year, counting all the comments and the nominations I received via email. Last year, I didn’t get nearly as many, and a good number of the nominations were my own.

I first compiled this list last year as a way to recognize the people who are courageous enough to put their lives or fantasies or opinions (or all three and more) out there to entertain and inspire the rest of us. I also hoped that this would bring new readers to every blogger on the list, and I had hoped that it would be an icebreaker way for bloggers to get to know one another. It was a smashing success, so I decided to make it an annal event.

This year, I had a number of other sex bloggers and readers help me with the judging. Special thanks to:

• Lilly (from This Could be Dangerous)
• Nadia West (from Diary of a Kinky Librarian)
• SSS and ♀ (from Sweat Shop Sissy)
• Mischief (from The Sexual Buzz)
• Vixen (from Secrets of a Blue-Eyed Vixen and Tits for Troops)
• Amber (from Scarlet’s Letter)
• Miss KissThis (from Miss KissThis)
• DeDe the Deviant Dyke (from Deviant Dyke)
• Monica
• Sara
• Sarah
• Sera (from Letters from a Seraglio)
• Sexy @ Forty (from Sexy @ Forty)

If you helped me and I missed your name or linked your incorrectly, PLEASE email me so I can fix it. For example else, you can say “thanks for the list” by visiting all of these websites and getting to know these wonderful men and women.

At the end of the day, even with the help of all the other judges, there were still ties or moments when I just felt like a certain blogger was being judged too harshly. This is still my list, still my opinion. So if you have beef, take it up with me, not with any of the other judges.

And now, without further ado, the Top 100 Sex Bloggers of 2009:

1. Coquitten (website)
2. Alexa (website)
3. AAG (website)
4. Bad, Bad Girl (website)
5. TBK (website)
6. Mistress Matisse (website)
7. Miss Mia (website)
8. Thursday’s Child (website)
9. Roger (website)
10. Sinclair (website)
11. Sylvanus…
12. and Mina (website)
13. Natt Nightly (website)
14. Jake (website)
15. Lyn (website)
16. Adriana Ravenlust (website)
17. Sexy Sadie (website)
18. Shay (website)
19. Lilly (website)
20. Nadia (website)
21. Joan Price (website)
22. Madison (website)
23. Anal Amy (website)
24. Z (website)
25. Essin Em (website)
26. Easily Aroused (website)
27. Blacksilk (website)
28. Sleeping Dreamer (website)
29. Melen…
30. and rayne…
31. and Master KKT…
32. and cinnamon (website)
33. That Toy Chick (website) < I’m on the list! *wiggle* -TTC
    
34. Red (website)
35. Tom Allen (website)
36. Vix (website)
37. Coy Pink (website)
38. Lady Pandorah (website)
39. BackseatBoohoo (website)
40. Epiphora (website)
41. Aurore (website)
42. Miss KissThis (website)
43. Storm (website)
44. Ron Jazz (website)
45. Josie Jacobs (website)
46. Distracted (website)
47. Deviant Dyke (website)
48. Joanna Cake (website)
49. Sapphire Jay (website)
50. Sarah (website)
51. Kimberly (website)
52. Duchess (website)
53. Figleaf (website)
54. The Caged Songbird (website)
55. Kaya (website)
56. Ms. Justine (website)
57. Luka (website)
58. Ang (website)
59. Perverted Negress (website)
60. Harlot (website)
61. Vixen (website)
62. Anakan…
63. and Padme (website)
64. Wilhemina (website)
65. Axe (website)
66. Amber (website)
67. Lucy Vonne (website)
68. Rogue (website)
69. SSS (website)
70. Kyle (website)
71. Amorous Rocker (website)
72. Sera (website)
73. Lolita Wolf (website)
74. Elle (website)
75. Scarlet St Syr (website)
76. Charlotte Thorpe (website)
77. An Unassuming Girl (website)
78. Maymay (website)
79. True Pleasure (website)
80. Bad Influence Girl (website)
81. Diva (website)
82. Raven Quince (website)
83. Autumn (website)
84. Vanilla Impaired (website)
85. Wil (website)
86. Robin (website)
87. Panthera Pardus (website)
88. Ell (website)
89. Miss Communication…
90. and Captain Pants…
91. and A.E. (website)
92. Roxy (website)
93. Secretly Naughty (website)
94. Abby Williams (website)
95. Subheart (website)
96. Sequoia Redd (website)
97. Innocent Loveboy (website)
98. Liljgrrl…
99. and Nawa*G (website)

YOU! As always that last person on the list is you. Please, please, please leave a comment below promoting your own blog (or the blog of someone you love). Links are welcome, as long as they lead us to a sex-related blog, not a retail website or porn aggregation site.

I ran into @erosandisis on twitter a few months ago. Once I picked my jaw up off the floor and stopped drooling, I maniacally clicked through every page of their online catalog, each more delightfully decadent than the last. While I lurve my “home” silicone companies, serious credit has to be give to people who manage to work in ridiculously lush, almost architectually detailed sculptural flairs that make their dildos half art and half sex toy.

The next time the idea of Canada summons up images of plaid flannels, round bacon, and mounties (Mm..well, okay. Keep the mounties, on second thought.) steer your eyes to these babies:

These lovlies are the raffle prizes thoughtfully donated by Eros & Isis for the New York Sex Blogger Calendar Party! The silver dildo to the left is “Victor / Victoria“, the fancy feline stimulator in the middle goes by “Little Leolo“, and the gold beauty on the right is a “Mr. Mister” (all are available for purchase from Eros & Isis by clicking their respective names).

Crafted by the lovely ladies of Eros & Isis in North America, these are (VERY plushy-soft) food grade platinum silicone that is dishwasher safe, can be boiled to sterilize, and all the other myriad pros the dedicated silicone conisseur is already a fan of. How do they get that unique “antiqued metal” finish on their toys, you ask? I was curious too, so I asked -  They embed natural mineral pigments. That means the only thing touching your skin is pure, safe, silicone…nothing is painted on, sprayed on, or otherwise unwholesomely applied. These beauties are safe, body-friendly and intended to be enjoyed without worry…and what more can a girl (or guy) ask for, really?

I was also delighted to discover removable vibrating bullets in a special cavity in the base of each toy. Strong vibes, they sit inset into  the base for comfortable strap-on play which is a really nice touch. They’re also waterproof for bath and shower exploration, but should be removed if you’re dishwashing the toy.

What’s that, you say? You want more pictures? Goodness, fussy bunch, aren’t we? Well here, then:

See you at the party, you sexy beasts you. Rawr.

-TTC

I imagine hearing a case like this takes the monotony out of hearing a bajillion boring-but-important-ones.

Backstory: I had heard talk, back in my days as a buyer, of a little glass company making legal noise about how the popular “juicer” design seen in glass dildos was their thing. Whether this is the same company, I can’t say…much of what I initially heard was through several grapevines and came without a name attached, but it caught my attention. I’m all about keeping original ideas in the hands of the people who made them…infringement sucks and makes it impossible to be a confident and lucrative artisan…something that’s difficult enough as it is. But THEN I heard about a little glass company (one that I hadn’t heard of previously, which means they are likely exceedingly tiny or don’t market well) that was trying to say that glass toys – all glass sex toys – were their intellectual property.

Those who know me can tell you, I am inherently suspicious of the larger toy makers, as several of my artisan friends have seen their designs unabashedly copied. BUT – in this case Topco’s not-inconsiderable size and legal strength ensured not only their own glass dildo making future, but that of smaller companies as well. While I doubt I’ll ever lose my caution re: sex toy corporations, Topco’s actions seem to have benefited the community at large – this ruling will ensure Know Mind Enterprises can’t pull the same move on a company that wouldn’t be able to defend itself so successfully.

To summarize, I am all for ensuring that artisans have a right to copyright designs, as well as certain obviously unique concepts. If Know Mind were indeed the folks behind the “juicer” suit, I’d be inclined to dig up more backstory on that before weighing in with my opinion. Materials, however, seem a bit far-fetched. I mean, heck – they’re finding stone dildos now on archeological digs – does that mean that Stockroom can be retroactively sued for historical infringement? Lawsuits like this undermine the very real fight to ensure one’s designs stay exclusive, and that’s something that just isn’t worth a settlement.

-TTC

Edit, 8pm:   In a strange twist, I stumbled across an interesting story (marveling geekily still at the power of twitter to get info and allies so quickly) about an incredible artists who makes truly beautiful fire bowls by re-using discarded propane tanks. This man, and his creations, are under duress because a car salesman suddenly decided he was going to quit his job, steal John T. Unger’s designs, and get them made on the cheap out of NON recycled materials. The “best” part? John had previous copyrights on all the designs, which this THIEF is trying to get turned over – so he can continue making his cheap-o knockoffs.

Well, you say, surely that can’t hold water. And you’d be right. Except because the THIEF acted against John first when he filed to try and get the copyright overturned.  His plan of attack is to delay getting everything into court (which would get promptly turned over out of sheer ridiculousness) so that he can outspend John and win by default – a sad fact that would transpire because he made the first move.

This is why I am pro-copyrighting for designs over materials. Even John says in his press release that there would have been plenty of room in the market for BOTH artists, even using the same medium, if his designs hadn’t been ripped off.

Atraw Ceramics is a sexy little company that tingled my toychick senses a ways back, and whom I happily ran into at Exxxotica. A prime example of the sort of “little guy” I made my Massive Manufacturer List precisely for, the owner John sculpts these beauties in his very own workshop in upstate NY. We’ve chatted on the phone a few times, and he’s explained how they are made (lots of pottery-speak – suffice it to say it’s difficult), and why they are safe (vitrification and many smooth layers of body-safe glaze fired on). When he adds flair like sculpted-in veins and presses in breathtaking grapevine leaf  impressions – plucked from his own backyard, no less – you get a toy that doesn’t get much sexier or “green”!

I took some snapshots at his table in Exxxotica, which was woefully glanced over by one-track-minded fanboys eager to creep out their porn idols via awkward conversation and boob-staring. I, pulling a fangirl move of my own, picked up nearly everything on the table, turning it over in my hands in awe. THIS was ceramic? This smooth, lustrous, amazingly slick surface? I realized mid-conversation with the bemused owner and his wife that I was…erm…stroking the massive sleek-surfaced black cock in my hands without realizing it.  You would have too. Stop judging. Pbbbbth.

After chatting with John a few times, I mentioned the Sex Blogger Calendar Party. He wanted to help support the cause, so I’m very (very!) happy to say that there’s a FREAKIN GORGEOUS butt plug that will be gracing the raffle table, courtesy of Atraw Ceramics. This black beauty measures 5 1/4″ high and 5″ in circumference, weighing in at an sturdy 7.5 oz. It can be enjoyed with any lube, and has a non-porous surface that is diswasher safe (top rack, no soap, you silicone lovers know the drill!) What’s that? You want pictures? Well, sure!

So, consider this just another “incentive” to drop in on the New York Sex Bloggers Calendar Launch Party, held on November 6th 2009. You could potentially be able to put this in your butt! Woooo!

Also, there are ridiculously amazing gift bags and other raffle prizes – and admission is FREE!!

-TTC

I love writing, I love sex, I love microfiction, and I love free shit.

So when I saw this? Yeah. Totally all about that.

My entry into the 250-word-or-less “How Did The Condom End Up On The Bus” challenge:

“Fleet Week”

Fleet week, a welcome holiday for men (and women too);
When sailors came into the city, and sexiness ensued
Our latex-hawking heroine was tasked with combating STDs
By passing condoms all around, and asking “pretty please?”

The end of day arrived, and dejected and non-plussed
She sat her scruptious rear-end on a northward facing bus
Her condoms in a bag beside, ungiven – all rejected!
She winced and sighed, fretting over all those unprotected

The bus filled up quite suddenly with hot men in uniform
So polite and handsome, surely THEY won’t dish out scorn!
She takes a different tack, her blouse unbuttoned slightly
They stood at attention up and down, pants all fitting tightly!

One thing led to another, and another yet again
Between the third and fourth stops, she’d made a couple friends
By the tenth the driver began to get turned on
By the twelth and thirteenth, her bag was halfway gone!

When the bag was empty, she came back up for air
And gathered up stray latex, and patted down her hair
Smiled wickedly as she slid her belt back round her waist
And gave them samples of the condoms, and told them to play safe!

Were it not for one last oversight, a tip-off to that ride
We’d have a fleet at happy rest, and a woman satisfied!
But alas, a rider one day after, just barely out of bed
Notes an errant tube with seaman’s semen…just above his head.

-TTC

A quick, funny, and easy question:

If you could load a King Dong (GIGANTIC 14″ long purple dildo – seen here) into a box and ship it off to an anonymous sex-phobic, homo-phobic, or otherwise party-pooping person or group, who would it be?

Leave your nominations in the comments below

(inspired by @Lscribben ’s investigative WTF reporting on Libindo)

So, I found out the hard way that all those cool edgy shots that photographers get of half-nekkid women in abandoned places? Yeah, they aren’t always as abandoned as you’d think. Also, I am surprised at the areas where one could theoretically whip out a pair of boobs if they are pleasant enough to look at, and be excused for doing so.

Dutifully clutching a t-shirt with less square footage than a tissue and about as thick as one, a pair of flip flops, and a tube dress so tiny that could double as a pool cue sleeve, I trudged through various exotic locales with my potential new boss.

The shoot timeline went thusly:

• A visit to a “dancewear” store, wherein I learned that one could theoretically charge $60 for a 4 inch square of spangly fabric if you sew some straps on it.

• Writhing around in the back seat of her more-expensive-than-every-car-I’ve-ever-owned-collectively ride in the parking lot of her photog’s apartment complex.

• A jaunt to a state park nearby (wherein the not-so-friendly park rangers made an appearance the moment her boob was out and shooed us away).

• A half-abandoned industrial park with random swarms of mosquitoes, tetanus-inducing rusty girders, and a particularly lecherous guy snapping cam phone pics, stopping his clicking and continual commentary only long enough to answer his wife’s call about his whereabouts with a bald faced lie.

• The beach by my old house, where we scandalized some seagulls and a fisherman so disinterested he should probably have been checked for a pulse.

My potential new boss is hot. Like, really hot. Not my tastes, so she doesn’t show up on my sexual radar, but nonetheless a hotness that just about anyone could nod appreciatively over. This bodes well for her dancing income intake, which indirectly translates to my intake if I hit the road with her. It still looks, however, that I’m going to have to search for additional work to tide me over between the monthly or twice-monthly travel jaunts.

I find all the weird jobs, I swear. Ah well, it’ll be fodder for a novel later, right?

-TTC

Where have I been? Well, for one, I got to hit up Exxxotica NY and met, among others, Mr. Marcus (really f-ing hot in person), Sasha Grey (also hot, but also incredibly well spoken and an absolute delight to talk with), and rubbed proverbial con-shoulders with the likes of Tera Patrick, Jesse Jane, and Mr. Ron Jeremy himself for the now-umpteenth time. Joanna Angel and the rest of the Burning Angel crew were there as well, and I always love stopping by the booth…Joanna and her girls don’t get the glazed-over con look where they’re looking through you as they sign stuff, they actually take the time to talk to you. Mr Marcus was also guilty of this, but he was considerate enough to explain that it was because the booth behind me was showing a particularly engrossing blowjob video on a wide screen.  I, too, got caught in it for a moment.

A side note here, porn stars – the weirdo balloon-lip thing? No. Knock it off. Stop injecting crap into your lips. For reals. Also – judging by the ridiculous heels I saw all weekend, a chiropractor booking a booth at the next show could consider his marketing dollar very well spent indeed.

There was considerable eye candy, not the least of which were nubile young women flanking the inside entrance dancing on elevated poles, scattered throughout the cons “locked up” in cages like some kind of geekbait (I half-expected to see a target on the floor, or a hovering box held aloft by a stick), and my personal favorite, randomly strewn about the convention floor on fully made up aerobeds, gyrating and wiggling around slow mo on a pile of money. It looked like spontaneous rap videos were breaking into filming everywhere, as if T-Adjective was suddenly going to pop up and start autotuning about how hard life is for a gangspimtajuggalo.

Meeting the Pink Cross

I was especially perplexed by the presence of “Pink Cross” – who littered their table with innocent-enough seeming literature about STDs, testing, and sat stylishly behind a giant “We <3 Porn Stars” banner. I crept closer, genuinely curious, and paused like an alerted gazelle when I noticed that 3/4 of the booth people were openly sporting crosses around their necks. Cue an hour long conversation about their mission, their reasoning, and tons of other stuff between a surprisingly grounded young woman and yours truly. While it was not specifically mentioned to me that they are anti-porn (even after I attempted asking several ways), the sentiment resounded as if I stuck my head in a ringing churchbell. Upon closer examination, the literature on the table was folded in with glossy postcards done in dark, angry-dark color schemes, with a little dark-circled-eyed girl clutching a stuffed animal in the center and another girl on the side without a mouth (think interrogated Neo in the matrix) on the left, asking the frighteningly-fonted query “what if it was YOUR daughter?”

Further marketing material branded the company as one that helps “addicts find healing, and porn stars find hope”, adding that according to their research from presumably reputable sources, 75%-90% of porn performers are prostituted women, and further claiming 66% of porn performers have Herpes, a non-curable disease.

On Herpes: When put to my industry friends on twitter for their take, one mentioned that around 80% of the public – porn and “civilian” alike, has some form of herpes. The way this particular “fact” was worded leaves a lot open to creative interpretation on the part of pink cross, and I think it’s more than a little misleading.

On “Prostituted Women“: When I throw “prostituted” into dictionary.com, the very first thing that comes up is “a woman who engages in sexual intercourse for money”. And yes, that is the textbook definition of a porn star. However, it is my firm belief that they purposely use a word that is steeped irreversibly in culture as something “dirty” in order to elicit negative emotional response from their reader. Yes, I’m a marketer, and yes, chastisizing them on this particular twist of semantics would be a bit like biting the hand that feeds me. However, I’m gonna put myself out there to take the hit on hypocrisy here, for the sake of my performer friends. It’s dirty pool, and it’s not kosher.

On both claims, and many other vaguely-worded ones: There is no asterisk. No citation. No study. Putting such claims on one’s front page without a very easily located citation is irresponsible. It’s either an act of laziness or purposeful fear-mongering, and they both stink if you ask me.

Working for people who do not routinely talk about dildos

I have very quickly found out that I dislike it intensely. A month hectic 9-hour days of stapling the equivilent of TPS reports for a exceedingly racist-against-caucasians family of Chinese importers is just about enough for the toychick. Moar sex toys, pls.

Happily, I just had the opportunity to interview with a really awesome playboy playmate, and will hopefully be her new assistant. If I land it, expect lots of posts from our travels around the US on her feature dancing bookings.

Contests. They are soon.

I have stuff to give away, so keep your eyes here for updates in the next week or two!

]]> http://thattoychick.wordpress.com/2009/10/02/recap-exxxotica-ny-and-working-a-real-job/feed/ 1 That Toy Chick http://thattoychick.wordpress.com/2009/09/13/weird-sex-toys-o-the-week-the-floating-world-edition/ http://thattoychick.wordpress.com/2009/09/13/weird-sex-toys-o-the-week-the-floating-world-edition/#comments Sun, 13 Sep 2009 04:21:02 +0000 That Toy Chick http://thattoychick.wordpress.com/?p=492 ]]>

One of my first days trying to re-locate back home saw me rushing headlong back into toychickiness,  in a familiar place playing trusty sidekick to Ms. Vera of For Your Nymphomation.  Along with the singularly lovely Ms. Wendy Blackheart (who – and you heard it here first – is a shameless cheeto fetishist) – I served as a super sexy, and still very tired, booth bunny.

While there was a bit of oddity, it was more of the fun, quirky variety that makes you go “Huh. Nice.” and kinda grin to yourself. I am by no means a painslut…hell, if I could get pillows reclassified as a flogging device, I would…I can still appreciate a nicely rendered tool. (Stop giggling. I know you’re giggling.)

My friend M. from Wolf Princess Designs debued a really neat cheeseburger gag – a rubber life size cheeseburger squeaky-toy (minus the squeak) mounted sideways on a vegan strap for semi-ironic and animal-friendly kinky fun. I regret that I have no picture of this delightful and original design, but the cell phone enforcement was hardcore…and not in the fun way!

Canes4Pain had  very cool “beach canes” -  particularly painful looking rattan sticks covered in sharp broken seashells from Sanibel beach in the proprietor’s native Flordia. In a thoughtful finishing touch, the handle is wrapped in rough nautical rope that can also be employed as the sadistic wielder sees fit. Covered in a special material that ensures all the shell bits stay put, the canes are proudly proclaimed to “easily cut skin”. Yeowch!

…and this last one, while it wasn’t at The Floating World, rounds out what I always try and make at least a trio of strange items. I’ve seen this idea in santa, in soldiers, in firefighters, and in policemen – and now proudly (?) continuing the tradition of wind up masturbation novelty toys, our very own commander in chief…

In a funny side note, I took some “artsy” shots of vintage arcade games on a trip to the shore awhile ago. There was an old brass “love meter”, the plaque of which is now my blog header. Basically, you would grip an egg-shaped handle with a trigger on the front of it as hard as you can to measure your “love strength”. While I’m sure this was a quaint and perfectly acceptable notion back in the 1920’s or so when the games first debuted…it only took one look at the handle to send the perverted mind of yours truly into fits of mental snickers:

P.S. – Okay, so I’m totally late to the party on this one, but if you haven’t heard, Tantus made a cool sparkly dildo called the Vamp that totally has nothing to do with Twilight. Nope. No Sir.

-TTC