Naked at BlogHer

There wasn't a whole lot of sunshine or sandy beaches waiting for me when I stepped off the plane and onto San Francisco's soil.

What was waiting for me was even better.

Boobs. Holy lawd, a whole sea of boobs. I'm not referring to the conference either. That's a post for another day.

Nope this post is how I flew to another country to strip down naked and pretend not to ogle women's breasts. Except I gave up pretending and just started openly enjoying. It was all I could do not to ask to cup them.

As I sat there, with steam tickling my nose and dripping down in a river between my breasts, soaking in the naked joy before me, I wondered how the hell I managed to get here.

It's my damn Yankee friends. They can get me to do anything. Even strip publicly and flap the girls about.

What can I say? I'm Canadian. I'm easy.

I went to BlogHer with the intent of reuniting with my friends, making new ones and maybe even learning something along the way to help me become a better blogger, a better writer.

But it was hard to focus on sessions when I was surrounded by people I adored and I just wanted to suck in their presence. Their clothed presence.

So when Jess texted me and asked if I wanted to join her and Jen for a relaxing massage in the afternoon, I thought, what the heck. I was hung over and tired and a massage sounded great.

I should have known better.

Turns out there was no massage. Turns out the spa was more of a public bath house. A decrepit, condemned, old bath house. I turned and looked at my pals with a look of disbelief plastered on my face, but they seemed unconcerned.

Hmmm, maybe spas are different down here in Yankee land, I thought to myself as the woman who ran the joint gave us a cursory tour.

The smell of chlorine and mold permeated the air. I warily eyed the facility as the owner prattled on about the rules of the joint as she walked us through the main attraction, the hot tub.

I admit, I only half paid attention but when she said there was no clothes or bathing suits allowed, the hairs on my neck stood up. Still, my lady friends didn't seem troubled about this new development so I just kept quiet.

Standing in the wide open change room, the woman left the three of us to strip and I leaned in to my friends and said, "Did I hear her right? She said no clothes or swim suits allowed?"

They nodded yep, that's right.

"So we have to get naked?" I half screeched, half whispered.

Again, they nodded.

"Naked, naked? Like in front of one another?" At this point I was sweating and it wasn't from the steamy heat emanating from the hot tub just mere feet away.

My charming lady friends could do nothing but just howl with laughter from the look on my face. Oh, yuk it up ladies, I thought, laugh at your naive Canadian friend, but I don't do public nakedness unless I'm drinking. Which I wasn't. Yet.

I mean, I flew to San Francisco to try new things, but public bathing wasn't high on the list. Hell, I don't think it even made it to the bottom of the page.

"What did you think we were doing?" Jen laughed.

"Well, I don't know, I thought a massage where I would lay down on a table, stick my head in a hole, with a towel covering my ass and some swedish dude would come and rub the knots out of my back. No one said anything about naked hot tubbing!!!"

But I am no party pooper. In for a penny, in for a pound, I thought. (Or a whole lot of pounds as my friends would soon see.)

"I'll do it if you'll do it," I offered while praying fervently they would say no farcking way and we'd hot foot it out of that skeevy joint to hail a cab to the nearest bar.

"Oh what the heck," said Jess.

"Count me in," said Jen.

Shiiiiit. It was at that moment I knew I was sunk. I wasn't going to be the party pooper. I was getting naked. In public. In front of women I highly esteem and love. My husband would be so freaking proud. (And turned on.)





For posterity. So I can remember what they look like with clothes on.

I'll never be able to look them in the eyes again, I thought to myself as I wiggled out of my underwear. I took my sweet time stripping. My heart was beating so hard I thought it might pop out of my chest. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath and turned around.

Two pairs of boobs were staring back at me.

I admit, I momentarily forgot I was standing there naked with my boobs swinging by my ankles as I took in the glorious site of my naked friends.

"Um, Tanis," Jess said. "Eyes up here."

Oh right. Naked etiquette demands you ignore the beautiful bounty of boobs swinging before you and pretend like everything is normal.

Because it's normal to fly to another country, get hung over, find the dingiest spa in the city and strip in front of people you only know through words shared on a computer screen.

Totally normal.

As we climbed into the hot tub, the steam curling around our faces, we laughed and tried to relax. Just as I was starting to get past the whole "I'm sitting here naked with Jen and Jess and the world hasn't fallen off it's axis" feeling, I looked up to see the some woman's hairy bush not ten feet from where I stood.

A woman I didn't know. A woman who obviously believes in going au naturel.

I started giggling like I was a little boy peeping in the girls locker room for the first time.

"What? What?" Jen and Jess wanted to know.

"Oh my GAWD, you guys. We're not alone!!! There are other naked women here!" I giggled as beads of sweat ran down my freely hanging boobs.

"What are you worried about?" Jen asked. "You've got glorious boobs." Spoken as she eyed my sparkling boobs.

"Ya. Your tits are unbelievable." Jess agreed.

That's right people. Apparently, I have the best boobs of Blogher. Only fitting since I may have been the biggest boob there.

It wasn't long before a steady stream of naked women were paraded before me. I never realized how different we all look. I saw melons, oranges, flap jacks, beaver tails, and dimpled watermelons.

I was in freaking boob heaven. The problem with naked boob ogling at a spa with your girl friends who are decidedly much more mature that you are, is you can't hide your giggle fits when ever you see a good pair.

"We should just give you a score card and let you rate them when you see them," Jen joked.

Oh, what I would have given for just that privilege. Of course, then I would have had a small army of naked women chasing me down the street with their breasts flapping in the wind as they tried to wrap their hands around my neck and choke the life out of my boob-gazing ways.

Eventually, the heat from the hot tub became too heavy and we decided to go and sun ourselves on the isolated sun deck. It was for the best since it was about that time two other women decided to join us in the hot tub and I could no longer freely remark about the size and quality of nature's bounty.

Wrapping towels that have seen more action than I care to imagine around our bodies, we made our way up the rickety steps of the sun deck. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why this place was being condemned. You had to be careful not to get a sliver up your arse or hoo-ha when you sat down on the wooden bench.

The thee of us fell quiet, enjoying each other's company, long past the surprise and awkwardness that inevitably happens when you unrobe and bathe in a community hot tub with virtual strangers. We whispered and shared secrets and we formed a bond as the sun beat down on our exposed bodies.

(Note to self: Next time you decide to sunbathe naked please remember to put sunscreen on your nipples. Enough said.)

All was going well until a woman decided to stretch out on the sundeck by our feet and sun herself. What does one do if a woman's naked arse is almost touching your toes?

If you are Jess and Jen, you ignore it and pretend it happens daily. If you are a redneck from the wilds of Canada with a seemingly low i.q. you stare at the dimples on her ass and wonder if that's what your butt would look like splayed out on a wooden deck for all to see.

I'm pretty sure my arse wouldn't look like that.

I bend over backwards (literally) to make sure my ass hair isn't climbing up my butt crack and the lobes of my arse are silky smooth. This woman obviously didn't share the same concerns as me.

As Jess pointed out, we were surrounded by some wom-yn. Granola crunching, nature-loving- women-who-are-at-one-with-their-body-and-all-it-encompasses. Every hairy inch of it.

I developed a nervous twitch and in a fit of giggles I knocked over my now empty water glass. It rolled off the bench and towards the woman who lay at our feet.

Shit.

I looked at Jess and Jen and they grinned. I was going to have to retrieve the cup. The cup that was all but touching a nude woman I didn't know but would surely recognize if I saw her nekkid in a line up.

Bending over, I reached for the cup. My nose was inches away from the hairy crack of this strange woman's arse. It was one of those moments you never predict seeing yourself in life. But there I was, with my nose up someone's ass.

Thankfully, the woman just ignored the redneck groping about her, trying to reach the cup that would roll further away every time I laid my fingertips on it.

Grasping the cup, I shot up right and vowed to make an appointment with my own waxer when I got home, and I grinned at Jess and Jen.

"This gives a whole new meaning to that naked blogging session, now doesn't it?"

Eventually, time stopped standing still and we knew we needed to abandon our nakedness and return to the conference, clothed.





I love me some naked wommins. Especially these ones.

Looking around the dungy spa bath house I tried not imagine just how many naked arses had touched where we sat. I'm not thinking cleanliness was next to godliness in this establishment, I thought to myself as I pulled on my clothing.

Still, we were relaxed and refreshed as the three of us walked out of the twilight-zone and back to the pressing reality of blogging, sessions and life.

We walked quietly, our hearts full with joy at the unexpected intimacy we found that afternoon in the most unexpected of places.

"I think we are all going to walk away from this moment a little different than who we were before we walked in," Jen said smiling.

"Well, of course, we are," I agreed. "Now that we all just shared something really special."

I paused.

"Community herpes and all. Funny. It wasn't the souvenir I was looking to take home with me," I half-joked. "Gives blogher swag a whole new meaning."

Good thing Canada has public health care. I have a feeling I may need it.

The Post My MIL Will be Sorry She Read

**Warning: Graphic contents ahead. Read at your own risk. Heh. Welcome to my life.**

**Oh, and if you happen to be an adoption case worker or foster worker, or MY FATHER, please skip this post. Thanks.**

There was a time, long, long ago, when I believed in romance, true love and happily-ever-afters. Then I grew up, got married and squeezed out a three shrieking demons. My love affair with romance ended right about the time I had to keep elbowing my husband in the middle of the night to remind him it was his turn to rock the baby back to sleep.

He'd just pretend he was sleeping through the baby's shrilly cries while the walls rattled and the windows cracked and pretend to snore his way through my elbow jabs.

Somewhere in the middle of the marriage and life, romance fell to the back burner. Romance kinda faded to the background as we paid bills and struggled to stay afloat in the early years of marriage.

I mean, it's hard to remember the blazing passion we once shared when we were knee deep in squalling infants and mortgage payments.

I never gave much thought to married life before being married. At that point, I was ruled by lust and the need to constantly fornicate.

Oh, how times have changed.

Apparently, as my husband likes to point out, times have only changed for me. He still wants to fornicate as often as possible.

Perhaps it's because I'm still the sexy hottie I once was (minus the saggy tits and belly jiggle) or perhaps it's because he is poisoned by too damn much testosterone.

Whichever, he still wants to get it on. All the damned time. Even if I haven't shaved my legs or my um, nether regions and I resemble a small hairy yeti. Even if I haven't washed my face or combed my hair or had a shower in days. He still wants a little something something.

I admit, I don't understand it. We're getting older for chrissakes, our bodies aren't the temples to sex they once were. No matter how we try, we can't recapture the glory of the days we bumped uglies like rabid horny bunnies.

Don't get me wrong. It's not that I don't love him or find him attractive. But the sweet siren call of my soft pillow calls to me stronger than well, his passionate whispers of romance.

Hmm...eight hours of blissful uninterrupted sleep vs. hot and sweaty sex which invariably means exercise because a gal can't just lie there like a lump while her man goes at it like a dog on a guest's leg...sleep is gonna win hands down every time.

Boo doesn't see it this way and has made it his personal mission to rev up the romance in the boudoir. We can sleep when we're dead, he says. Use it before I lose it, he'll whisper as he bangs his Pickle against my leg.

Oh the romance. How can I resist?

In an effort to inspire me, Boo came home with a brown paper bag filled with goodies from the local sex shop. I should have known something was up when he wouldn't let the kids look inside the bag and shooed them outside while sporting a stupid look on his face.

I warily eyed the bag, knowing no good can come from that silly look he was mugging and asked him what was up.

"Me in a few minutes, once I show you what I got for us."

Oy. I mean, how can a gal resist such temptation?

With a furtive glance to make sure the kids were beating each other with sticks far away from the house, Boo dumped the contents of the bag into my lap and smiled like a little boy who had just picked a handful of posies for his mother.

(Because you know, sex toys are just as wholesome as fresh picked flowers.)

Not one, not two but three different vibrators, some edible underwear and a sex game.

He was thinking about all the naked fun we'd have together and I was thinking about all the energy I would have to expend that night while missing sleep.

Gotta love the romance of the long-time married.

"Well, what do you think?" he asked, beaming.

"I'm thinking I gotta take away your bank card and send a babysitter along with you every time you leave the house."







As I eyed the treats in my lap, Boo waggled his brows suggestively and offered to take me into the bedroom for a test drive. Charming.

"Why on earth do we need THREE vibrators? How many holes are you planning to stick things into?" I asked very worriedly. "Do even understand how much batteries cost these days?" I whined.

"I'm just trying to spice things up a little for us."

"Are you insinuating that I'm not spicy enough for you?" I screeched.

Boo looked befuddled, like he hadn't anticipated that reaction. Probably because he was too busy envisioning me in edible undies with a bunch of vibrators buzzing in the back ground. Or gawd knows where else.

"No, not at all," he stammered. "I just thought the change of pace would be fun."

"I can't keep up with the pace you set now! And you want to change it????" Cue the screechy wife.

"Don't be such a priss. It'll be fun. I promise," he leered.

"Fun." Snort. "And just what am I supposed to do with these?" I ask, while poking at the strawberry flavored underwear.

"Um, wear them." Again, with that stupid look on his face.

"Great. Cuz sex isn't messy enough. Now I'm gonna have jam smeared all over my new sheets." How is it that guys don't think about these things? Must be because they never have to sleep in the damn wet spot.

Boo was getting insulted now, because I wasn't offering to put my ankles behind my ears immediately. Apparently, I wasn't seeing the romance he had intended.

Call me crazy, but if he wanted to be romantic, he could have brought home flowers and a maid along with pizza and beer.

"You have got to be out of yer ever lovin' mind if you think I'm gonna eat those nasty undies off of you. It's bad enough I have to pick hairs out of my teeth, but now you expect me to get strawberry seeds stuck in my molars? And um, ew. Man juice mixed with jam. Yummy."

Exasperated, Boo tossed the edible undies back into the bag and rolled his eyes. "Forget about the damn undies then, woman. Sheesh. Where's your sense of adventure?"

Um, anywhere warm and tropical where I have half nekkid men serving me unlimited mojitos. Anywhere where I didn't have to um, exert myself.

Picking up one of the fancy vibrators, I looked at him and sighed. "Boo this thing looks like it will hurt! I mean, I know you mean well, but I really have no inclination to be rubbed raw and impaled by this plastic penis."

"I knew I should have bought that ball gag in the window," Boo mumbled.

"Pardon ME?" I'll show you what that ball gag is for, you twit, I thought to myself as I eyed the vicious vibrator and contemplated shoving where the sun don't shine.

"You know what, Tanis?" he huffed. "You are no damn fun."

"Fun??? How about we stick that in your hole first and take it for a test drive? Let's see how much fun it is when your arse is bleeding?" I pointed out. (Very pleasantly, too, I might add. Heh.)





Dear Boo. It's supposed to make me weep with PLEASURE. Not weep from having my insides torn aSSunder. Just so you know.

"Just forget about it," he snarked as he swept everything back into the paper bag. "I was just trying to liven things up in the bedroom."

Which to me, means things aren't lively. Which, in my woman's twisted brain, means I'm boring. To hell with that, I say. I'm bendy. I'm a damn Gumby! I all but do back flips for that man. How much livelier does a woman need to be?

"I may as well shove dynamite up my arse while hanging upside down from a trapeze while giving you head," I yelled while looking out the window to make sure the kids didn't overhear their parents arguing over sex.

"You didn't have any complaints about my bedroom bouncing the other night! Just so you know, there are a lot of men...and some woman...who wouldn't mind taking a turn with me under the sheets. You ought to count your blessings!" As I spoke I continued to get more and more shrilly.

"Dammit! I was just trying to be nice!" With that, Boo grabbed his bag of goodies and stormed off. I'm gonna guess this WASN'T how he envisioned how his evening would go.

"NICE would have been you bringing me home a box of fudgesicles!" I yelled after him.

Boo turned around, and said, "You're insane. Remind me why I married you?"

"Because insane girls are crazy. And crazy girls know how to f*ck like wild monkeys. Without jam drawers or rubber daggers shoved up their hoohaa's!""

"What ever. I'll just take this back to the store tomorrow." Boo sighed and I could see his shoulders droop just a fraction.

"Wait, wait. Bring that bag back here." Boo raised an eyebrow but brought the bag back to me.

Pulling out one of the less evil looking toys, I gave the bag back to him.

"There. Return those. I'll keep this," I murmured as I caressed my new love toy.

Boo stood there with his mouth open while trying to stifle a look of triumph.

"What??? I may be crazy but I'm not stupid." I smiled.

Anything to help him get in, get off and get out and get me back to sleep.

Heh.

The Art of Wooing

There was a time when I would see my husband and all I could think of was all the naughty things I would do to him, things that would make my momma blush and my father race out to buy me a chastity belt.

Ahh, those were the days. We were young, in love and fornicating like two bunnies in heat.

Now, when I lay eyes on my husband all I can think about is my 'honey do' list waiting for him on the fridge and wondering if he'll actually be able to cross off an item while he's at home.

It seems I am more interested with what my husband can do around the house while he's home than I am in fulfilling my official spousal duties to 'do' him.

Really, the man's life is hard. Or so he keeps reminding me every minute of the day.

It's not that our romance is dead and we are living a life devoid of passion and heat. It's more like, after eleven years of marriage, three kids and a mortgage later, my darling Boo has forgotten the fine art of wooing his lady and mistakenly expects me to mattress dance with him just because I'm legally obligated to.

Screw that.

Heh.

Like many mothers and wives out there, all I want is a little romance.







Would it really hurt him to tell me I look beautiful even if my muffin top is hanging over the edge of my mom jeans and I've forgotten to shave my underarms and the hair is peaking out while I chase after the kids wearing a sweaty stained tank top?

Would he really die if he had to actually put his dirty dishes in the sink instead of leaving them by the computer or on the coffee table? Where does it say in the book of life that menfolk will turn to a pillar of salt if they have to wash a dish or wipe out a toilet bowl?

My husband doesn't get that when I ask him to bring me home something special after he's been away working, I'm not referring to a big ass duffel bag stuffed full with his skeevy underwear and smelly socks.

He just doesn't understand why I'm not racing to greet him wearing nothing but my birthday suit and a sexy smile when he comes home and drops that big bag of rancid clothing at my feet. Nothing says foreplay like sorting his whites from his darks while I'm butt naked.

Oh yeah. I'm getting hot just thinking about it.

Yes, my beautiful and darling husband has forgotten about all the times he'd try his hand at romance by bringing me flowers or whisking me away for a romantic picnic where he'd feed me grapes and rub my feet.

Now the only time I eat grapes are the times I'm tossing them at my children's mouths and seeing if they can catch them.

(Frac is definitely more skilled at this than his sister.)

To be fair, my husband isn't the only one who has turned his back on the fine art of romance. It's not like I bend over and give him head on a moments notice just to see him smile anymore.

As my husband thoughtfully pointed out recently, I can't even remember what baby gravy tastes like anymore.

Funny, I can't shake this nagging feeling telling me I'm not missing out on anything by not remembering. Except for seeing my husband's spontaneous smile. Which I now know I can illicit just by making farting noises with my armpit.

Hell, if I had known that ten years ago I could have saved myself hours of lock jaw and drooling all over my chin. Heh.

So we aren't the most romantic couple to walk the earth. I can live with that. Hell, I can not only live with that, but I will celebrate that. The fact that we can see each other naked after more than a decade of marriage and not double over with laughter or run screaming from the room, is a true testament of our love.

Three kids, some stretch marks and a few pounds between the two of us and let me just tell you, we are HAWT.

I think the real romance in our relationship is derived not by the smoke generated from between the sheets but our unrelenting willingness to forgive one another and still get naked and bump uglies with each other.

Proven just this past weekend when I got out of the shower and stood in my bathroom, naked and troweling on my makeup.

Boo had only arrived home hours earlier, in the dead of the night while I was sound asleep. My lovely husband was feeling a little annoyed that he'd been home for a grand total of ten hours and he still hadn't seen any marital action other than me nagging at him to pick up his socks.

As he pouted to me about this while I got ready in the bathroom, I ignored him. I don't know where my husband get's this mistaken delusion that I just live to jump up and down on the end of his man-stick at a moment's notice.

"You don't even care I'm home," he pouted as I applied my eyeliner.

"Of course I do," I stopped and put my eyeliner down and looked at him. "Who else would take the garbage to the dump and put the mower attachment on the lawn tractor? I'm THRILLED you are home." I smiled at him and then went back to putting on my makeup.

"Very funny, Tanis. But that isn't exactly what I meant." If his bottom lip stuck out any further I'd have mistaken him for my three year old nephew.

"You didn't even notice I got a haircut just for you."

I looked at him and noticed his new do. He did look kinda cute. Still, I wasn't going to make this easy for him.

"Oh please. You had to get a haircut for work. I cared so much that you are home that I showered for you."

"Ya. I'm sure your shower had nothing to do with the waft of green noxious gas emanating from you and was all about me coming home," Boo grinned.

"Ya, well, I shaved my legs for you!"

"Pfft!" He rolled his eyes. "I shaved my beard for you."

"I plucked my eyebrows for you!"

"Hey, I trimmed my toenails for you and nothing says romance like a guy using the toenail clippers."

Damn. He was right.

I was determined not to let him win this match of "Who loves who more." The competitive bitch inside me demanded a victory.

I looked him square in the eyes, stood up straight and pushed my boobs out as far as they could proudly go. Nothing like distracting a man from imminent victory with a little naked titties in his face, I thought.

"Oh yeah? Well, I plucked my nipple hairs just for you and if that doesn't say love, I don't know what does," I smugly lied.

Top that, Boo, I thought to myself.

Boo leaned over and I thought victory was mine. I thought he was going in for a kiss.

Turns out he was just going in for a closer inspection.

Ogling my boobs adorned with their shiny bling, he looked up at me and said, "Next time try harder. You missed a few hairs."

Then he sauntered out laughing.

I spent the next fifteen minutes performing a self breast exam and looking for any hairs.

It was marital foreplay at it's finest.

Well played Boo. And I was worried our romance was dead.