Via Facebook

FROM: Paul Theobald, London, England

SUBJECT: No Subject

MESSAGE: really cracking looking lady!!!! be lucky!

I’ll note that when this email was sent, my user picture on Facebook was the following:

FROM: Bevin Branlandingham, Jersey City, NJ

SUBJECT: Re: No Subject

MESSAGE: Dear Mr. Theobald:

Or may I call you Paul? I am unsure how to navigate the social proprieties within the social networking spheres on the internet. Do you know, Paul? Please let me know if using your first name upon our first conversation is offensive.

I received your message and am unsure of your intent. What does “cracking” mean in this context? You see, I understand “cracking” in the sense of the verb. Perhaps when one is “cracking” their knuckles or “cracking” their gum as my mom used to say. I daresay I do not wish to be compared to knuckles, as they are sort of an unsightly body part as far as body parts go. Maybe gum, though, especially if it was that new “5″ gum by Wrigley’s. Do you have “5″ in the UK? I like the names of the flavors, “Flare” is my favorite.

I looked up “cracking” in the urban dictionary, wondering if it perhaps was a slang term I’m not familiar with.

The first entry certainly can’t be right.

“A term used by a low quality or mental radio DJ to describe items or fill space.

As used in a sentence: That was a cracking track from Peter Andre and there’s more where that came from on our cracking show. So stay tuned!”

As the second entry also doesn’t make sense in this context either.

“Removing copyright protection from copyrighted software. Commonly used to obtain software without paying for it. Cracking is not by inserting a false or used serial number, but to insert other documents and files into the actual program to make it seem like it was registered by a paying customer, when it actually wasn’t.

As used in a sentence: My friend downloaded Microsoft Word, and is cracking it right now.”

However, the third entry might be right, since it indicates your use of “cracking” might be a compliment.

“Something sensational, excellent or cool.
Part of ‘what’s cracking’.
As used in a sentence: That was a cracking pool shot!”

Since I am prone to seeking out and absorbing compliments, I will assume you meant that I am sensational, excellent or cool. And thank you for the accolade!

Congratulations on your engagement! If your fiance needs any chocolate brown and light blue polka dot organza bags for favors, I’ve got a bunch leftover from my defunct wedding.

Best of luck unto you as well!

Sincerely,

Bevin

FROM: Paul Theobald, London, England

SUBJECT: Re: Re: No Subject

MESSAGE: Wow!!! what a reply!!! and sorry !!yes cracking does mean!! how shall i put it!!! stunning!!!!!!!!! really super looking lady!!! and surprised no guy has snapped her up yet? Take care Paul xx

Then I changed my userpic as follows for a bit. This is my first published Paparazzi shot, taken by NY Magazine at the Catherine Opie opening at the Guggenheim. My friend Muse managed to buy digital images from the photographer. She’s such a good supporter of the arts.

FROM: Paul Theobald, London, England

SUBJECT: No Subject

MESSAGE:

wow!!! u really are a stunner!!!! and stunner in good looking!!!! and no not all us guys look at boobs!!!!! some look at the girls face!!!! nice eyes and lovely smile!!!! be lucky!

FROM: Bevin Branlandingham, Jersey City, NJ

SUBJECT: Re: No Subject

MESSAGE: Dear Paul:

Thank you for the next round of compliments! I do appreciate that you find I have more assets than just my killer rack, though I will admit that as a lesbian, having a nice cleavage to look at really helps during the lonely times.

I have recently changed my user photo again so that you can see my lovely smile, since both of the previous pictures were really more of a smirk.

I have been thinking a lot about your question, wondering why a guy hasn’t snapped me up yet. It’s not necessarily that I am keeping myself off the market or anything, I do go on my fair share of dates. But having been through 5 years of functional monogamy with 2 back to back relationships and the bonus of a pathological liar scoundrel rebound, I’m a little skittish to jump into just anything.

I recently published a podcast about the Lesbian Footwarming Syndrome. This is the tendency of women to say “You’re a lesbian, I’m a lesbian, let’s keep each others’ feet warm.” With no further considerations for happiness, sustainability or compatibility. I delve in a little deeper to this in the episode, beyond just lesbianism. Especially when you add being fat, kinky, transgendered, dis/abled, a person of color or a myriad of additional identities, sometimes people fall into a scarcity mentality with dating.

The scarcity mentality is believing that there isn’t enough to go around. The fear that maybe there really isn’t someone out there that can love you for all you are AND be compatible with you. It manifests by settling for someone that isn’t right just to have someone or staying in a relationship that isn’t working anymore because the alternative of staying alone is terrifying. This is something sold to us with the dominant paradigm of couplehood in this society.

Paul, I don’t know what it’s like in the UK, but in the States it is definitely considered ideal for people to find a forever monogamous partnership and it is really devaluing to those of us who are critically engaged in our relationship status. Some queer femmes don’t do the monogamy thing, some choose alternative family structures and some just haven’t met the right person yet. I don’t want to “settle” for anyone and I certainly want to be treated well.

I was engaged once, he ended things but after the break-up I’ve been privy to so many behaviors that made me extremely thankful I never had children with him and “Omigod you dodged a bullets” that I feel really secure that no one having “snatched me up yet” is cool. So I suppose I could partner with whoever might show interest, but I am really waiting for the killer combo of chemistry, personality, looks and timing that I am positive will come my way. Until then my Shih Tzu, Macy, is doing a great job keeping my feet warm.

Further to that, recently in the States there has been an onslaught of gay hating voter initiatives banning same sex marriage. At one of the protests I donned this sign, because even though I don’t intend to get married eleven times or however many times Liz Taylor did, I still think I deserve the right to do so. Maybe just once a decade; hopefully to the right person again and again.

So here’s hoping I’m lucky and you are lucky, too, Paul. Squeeze on your fiance tonight and tell her how happy you are to have found one another, love is rare and beautiful. I’ve just found a bunch of fake flowers and straw hats my mom was going to put together for my shower. If you’re planning a garden wedding I’d be happy to send them off to you!

Cheers!!

Sincerely,

Bevin

As this is my inaugural post on the Femme’s Guide to Absolutely Everything, I thought I would go with my favorite category: “How-To”. Big love to Scarlet for setting this up, a clearinghouse resource like this is integral to community building. One of the things I love best about Femme sisterhood is sharing resources. My mom was a second-wave lesbian feminist. The trappings of Femme were things I cobbled together mostly through the graciousness of my Femme friends, performing as a drag king (no kidding) and the magic of you tube.

The first “How-To” guide I present to you is entitled “How to Have a Gorgeous Beach Body” graciously modeled by my BFF and Consigliere, Zoe Femmetastica.

You may be saying to yourself “Bevin, I am so glad beach weather is over. I can’t possibly go to the beach. I am too fat/pale/gender non-conforming/[insert your insecurity here].” I am here to tell you that you, too, can totally go to the beach without worry!

The first step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is to decide to go to the beach. Summer is over, technically, but here at FemmeCast headquarters (New York City) we refuse to give up the ghost until it is absolutely too cold to bear a day on the beach. Thus, Zoe’s birthday weekend of September 14 was never considered too late for a beach day.

The second step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is deciding which beach to go to*. Our favorite beach within driving distance is the Cherry Grove section of Fire Island. Historically gay, the beach is beautiful, water cool and clean and the beach is populated with a hugely diverse array of homos, a smattering of lesbians and virtually every body type one can imagine. It is both kid and dog friendly, while not being overpopulated by either.

We like homo beaches because we are homos** and enjoy hanging out with our people. Also, gay men usually ignore lesbians and disinterest based on your gender presentation makes being out in your bathing suit a little bit easier. I am also a huge fan of surrounding yourself with diverse body types in all situations, because nothing is more normalizes fat bodies in bathing suits than actually seeing fat bodies in bathing suits.

The third step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is to assemble a Posse of Homos. I find all situations far more fun surrounded by amazing people, fat queers and allies. We sent out an evite and cobbled together a group of twenty people ready to celebrate both Zoe’s birth and Have Gorgeous Beach Bodies [TM] with us. We carpooled and hopped the ferry to Cherry Grove.

Zoe is smiling so big because she loves the beach and loves being surrounded by people who love her.

The fourth step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is to concoct a durable and appropriate cover up outfit to get you to and from the beach with style.

H & M polka dot dress–$14.99, stretchy size 14. Black leggings from pretty much anywhere. Black and white croc (seriously) wedges, $40.00.

The fifth step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is to make sure you have the proper levels of sun protection. Zoe is high maintenace, therefore her sun rituals involve a gallon ziplock bag full of various SPFs for each part of her body, depending on the amount of tattooedness and contiguous sun exposure.

Mine is simple–bring a huge umbrella and/or hat and Baby Sunblock in the highest SPF possible–minimium 50. My Irish Heritage has insisted that I burn immediately upon contact with the sun. Owning that fact and working to prevent burns has gone a long way to encourage my comfort with the beach.

It also helps to have gentleman butches on hand to apply sunscreen on parts of your body that are unreachable–these butches should be appropriately grateful for the honor of application. Femme sisters/admirers/lovers are also good for this.

The sixth step to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is to enjoy the hell out of your time at the beach! The real secret to Having a Gorgeous Beach Body [TM] is having a great time. The first few times you step out in public in a bathing suit are anxiety ridden, but baby step your way to comfort! If you have to keep your cover-up on to feel secure, do it, but challenge yourself. Take your cover-up off for a few minutes and feel how good it is to sit in the sun (or under an umbrella), splash in the surf and live in your body. Even if you have to dissociate for awhile and purposefully forget that you are not in street clothes, try it out. People truly respond to the you that you radiate to the world, not your body. If you are radiating positive energy and having a good time, that is what people will notice.

Take a look at Zoe here–there’s no way this isn’t a gorgeous beach body.

During our seven years of friendship, Zoe’s passion for the beach has definitely rubbed off on me. I know that I have a Gorgeous Beach Body, in part, because of her.
Happy Birthday, Zoe!

Also, I have purposefully ignored the selection of a bathing suit since clearly Zoe’s body isn’t gorgeous because of the suit she’s wearing (or isn’t wearing). And, also, Fat Girl Bathing Suit Selection is another series of blog posts I’ll get up here closer to next year’s beach season.

Do you have a Gorgeous Beach Body story to tell? Email me! FemmeCast at Gmail dot Com

xoxo,

Bevin

*I understand not everyone lives geographically close to a beach, but this guide easily translates to the public recreational swimming establishment near you, as well as for any vacation opportunities you choose to create for yourself.
**Socially I use the term homo to refer to pretty much anyone on the queer spectrum, including Zoe who is a bisexual.

Hooray Hooray, for Cleavage of the Day!  And sometimes, shoes, too!

One comment I hear over and over is that I have very interesting friends, and indeed that is true.  Take, for example, my friend, Tess.  She’s to be blamed for distracting me every day with her Cleavage of the Day and today I had to interrupt both her work and mine to talk about her shoes!  Boobs and shoes.  I’m in bi-femme girl heaven!

My recent post about why I love being a sex writer prompted me to write a post here about why I love being a femme.

You see, as I see it, I can dip my toes in the stream and the creek - in the ocean and the seas.  As it’s been pointed out recently in our discussions here, being femme can mean so many things to so many people.  To me, it means I have more choice.

As I see it, as a femme I can get all dressed up, put on the little black Audrey Hepburn dress and put my hair up and wear gorgeous jewelry, cuban stockings, and heels and be stunningly gorgeous.  It means I can go to the make-up counter on a blergy day and get a make-over just because I want the pick me up.    I get the girly side, or as I like to call it the frosting side.  The perks of being a girl, as I see it.

Because also as a femme I can hang out in my cute little pajamas and tank top without makeup and still look just as femme and cute.

I can wear jeans and tennis shoes and a school soccer shirt and I’m a MILF.

But aside from the aesthetic flexibility to the social dress code from which I benefit as a femme, I have the added benefit of double dipping as a poly queer femme in the sex pool, if you’ll forgive the pun.

I feel like as a queer femme I have a lot of choices in terms of sexual partners.  I am attracted to men and women of all types and it seems that men and women of all types seem to enjoy the company of a slutty queer femme.   I enjoy a sexy man every bit as much as I enjoy a sexy woman, but for very different reasons.  I love sleeping on both sides of the bed of masculinity and femininity.  I love being the third in a threesome or the center of attention with two men.

I think I get the best of both worlds as a queer femme.  It’s something I identify with so strongly that I can’t imagine being any other way than the way I am.  To conceive of myself as a queer butch is as difficult to envision as it is for me to envision being a stay-at-home heterosexual (monoromantic) housewife.  Please don’t get your feathers ruffled, housewives and butches, I just mean for me I can’t even imagine it.  The thought of me packing just makes me giggle.  The idea of me being sexually active with just one man for the rest of my life makes me uneasy.  A queer femme I am.  Indeed.

ladies, gents, or none of the above:

i have to take a survey.  is anyone else anxious with anticipation for more word on the mr. man dildo or is it just this femme over here whose been up way past her bedtime several nights over the past few weeks considering the crazy joy it will bring?  ever since always aroused girl’s (aag) tantilizing review of mr. man a few months ago it’s, frankly, been hard to shake its image and potential out of my head. a silicone cock that claims to work with the naughty bits of anyone female-bodied allowing for a simulated blow job experience?! oh, *and* you can fuck with it too?? is this too good to be true or what?!

i’ll be perfectly honest. a love of giving blow jobs to cute butches and genderqueer boys of all sorts is what has me so damn excited. there are few things hotter to me than looking up at some handsome, queer butch, genderqueer, or transmasculine folk and locking eyes when your tongue and mouth are on their dicks, i do declare! i mean, blow jobs in the past have hardly been lackluster (can they really ever be?), but the potential for clit stimulation in the midst of hot and heavy cocksucking has me chomping at the bit. …oof! bad phrasing, maybe.

i’ve been so anxious for mr. man’s arrival at my local feminist sex toy shop - lucky for me it will be one of the first stores to stock mr. man - that i emailed the manufacturer, jollies, last week to get more deets about an ETA. i know, i know! i’m a woman possessed! after receiving my note (and the barrage of questions it contained), luze, the ceo of jollies, was kind enough to tell me that mr. man should be “out for production” what would now be later this week or early next week. retail value is estimated at being around $89, though there wasn’t an answer yet to my question of whether or not the first version of mr. man will be harness compatible.  aag’s blog post seemed to suggest that harness compatibility might be a feature only of a future model, while the the xbiz article posted above seems to say that the first version will be harness compatible. i’m obviously hoping for the latter.

i’ve brought mr. man up in conversation a few times lately with friends and while it has spawned interest and curiosity, it has also been surrounded by questions of logistics and whether or not mr. man will fit or take into account the different kinds and sizes of parts we all have in our knickers. so what do we think, y’all? does the mr. man sound too good to be true? does it sound like an absolute dream? do we think it’ll work? have the prayers of female-bodied folks and their blow-job-loving partners been answered?

someday soon, hopefully very soon, i will have the answer and be able to hand them off to you. in the meantime, i’m dying to know if i’m the only optimistic person out here tappin’ my foot for mr. man’s arrival in my hometown.

I’ve sat down to write this post three or four times over the past week or so. First I was going to write about all the many uses of top coat, but then I realized that had already been done other place. Then, I was going to write about how to give a home manicure, but that’s been done, too. And then I thought, why on earth would I think I have what it takes to write about nail polish. My fingernails and toenails have been in a state of absolute disarray since middle school. Even after top coat utterly changed my life, I still walk around with chipped nail polish. Not even chipped, it’s the remnants of what was once a decorated nail! The toenails hold up a lot better than the fingers - I can go two weeks without painting the little ones, I just repaint, or patch the big one every weekend.

In thinking about it, though, I actually think that I like the chipped nail polish look. Unless I’m going for glamour (in which case, I nix the polish altogether - polish is a casual thing for me, what about you?) I quite frequently paint them and then wait anxiously for them to start chipping. I like how it looks on other people, but on my own, I feel so fake when I’m painted. And I surely don’t like the idea of putting fingernails with formaldehyde and acrylic in mine or someone else’s vagina. doesn’t that seem like a generally bad idea? Actually I really think that’s one of the ways that you can use to figure out whether or not someone is a queer femme - if she is totally cute and feminine, but has short, well-manicured, yet unpainted fingernails. It’s just dead follicles anyway, what’s the big deal?

I’m sure you will all have plenty of comments about polished nails since it is a feminine accoutrement - yes I know some femmes do wear polish, it is but one of the many descriptors that can tip you off to a possible Sister. Have at it!

 

Ok, now, I know what you’re thinking.  What does Strawberry Soup have to do with Femmes (other than being sweet and delicious)?  Well, Strawberry Soup is tasty, easy to make in a hurry, nice and cooling on hot summer days, is slightly erotic, and oh, is fun to drizzle on your partner (or have drizzled on you).

So. That’s why I’m writing about it

First step, get naked.  You think I’m kidding; I’m not.  Get naked, and then put on an apron. Nothing BUT the apron (it’s cold, there is no cooking involved, you’ll be safe).  My particular apron is leopard print with black ruffles, of course.

Step two, get the ingredients.  This soup is SO simple!  4 ingredients (5 if you want a garnish):

*1/2 Quart Strawberries (hulled and quartered)

*1/2 Quart Strawberry Ice Cream

*1/4 Cup Whipping Cream (although I’ve used fat-free half and half, since I had it to make Grasshoppers, and it worked just fine)

1/2 Tabelspoon Lemon Juice

Sprinkle of mint/shredded coconut/dried strawberries for a garnish

Third step, make the soup;

Mix the first 4 ingredients together in a bowl.  Stir it up to blend them together. Now put them in a blender (you may need to do it in two separate rounds, depending on the size of your blender).  Blend (complicated, but someone has got to do it!).  

Fourth step; prepare the soup;

Pour the soup into two bowls — one for you, and one for your partner.  Garnish if you’d like. Add spoons.

Fifth step; eat the soup;

Cuddle in bed, on the couch, or on the back porch.  Eat most of the soup while chatting.  Then save a little at the bottom to place a dot on their nose, or drip down your cleavage.  CLEARLY, there needs to be a shared effort in the clean up.

Final step (optional), Sex0rs!

I think you know how to do this better than I can explain.  If not, well, we’ll just have to post a “how-to” on that. Or shoot me an email at EssinEm at gmail dot com, and I’ll do my best to explain. No promises though.

Makes enough soup for two hot and horny people. Feel free to double or triple the recipe for an orgy, play party, or if you’d like left overs.

-Essin’ Em