Monday, August 19, 2002

Have you ever been to a sex store? I don't mean a brothel (what kind of guy do you think I am?). I mean a store that sells erotic stuff. Condoms, toys, latex, rubber, leather, silicon, and other similarly based products. Stuff I shouldn't be writing about since my oh-so-Catholic mother might well be reading this. The same mother who once said asked me at the start of a new relationship "Are you having sex with her yet? I don't care if you are, I just don't want you having kinky sex." I'm not sure what disturbed me more. My mom asking about my sex life, or just what my mother thought was kinky.

Regardless. The first time for me in a sex shop was quite a few years ago when after a night of drinking in Scottsdale a girlfriend recommended we go to Zorba's. I thought this was an afterhours club. Turned out it was an adult book/toy store. I walked in the door of this dark and dirty looking shop with two women at 2AM on a Saturday night. Helluva look I got from the three seedy looking guys shopping at that hour. Well, sex shops have changed a lot since then. Condom Revolution by my house is bright, tasteful, visited almost entirely by couples, and appears more like a boutique than a house of porn. I remember visiting a similar shop in Arizona for a friend's bachelor party and having the pretty young clerk explain all the benefits of their various lubes like I was asking about the features on a new stereo. And you thought the Penzoil was technologically advanced. Hah! That didn't have to coat your genitals. Pleasure Chest in Hollywood is damn near the size of a Wall Mart and is a veritable shrine to all things kinky, sexy, slippery, studded, risque, or ribbed - for her pleasure of course. And by the way, "ribbed for her pleasure"? Have you ever actually looked at the ribs? You need a microscope to see those things. I have never met woman number one who found pleasure in the ribs. How about engorged for her pleasure? Or sensitive for her pleasure? Or debonair, masculine and charming and willing to cuddle after sex for her pleasure? And if you do have to rely on the condom, how about one called "speed bumped for her pleasure"? I digress. I walked into Pleasure Chest with an ex sweetie a few years ago on a Sunday morning and found about 30 people shopping. On a Sunday! Always a surprise to see the accountant looking guy fondling a new cat-o-nine or the frumpy looking woman in a sun dress buying a double ended dildo. I hear that the Hustler Store in Hollywood is THE place to be. They even have souvenir T-Shirts. "My boyfriend went to the Hustler Shop and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt and case of the clap."

So I paid another visit to a sex shop the other day. No, Mom this is not my usual weekend MO, and I am not into anything kinky. Well, not too kinky. Other than the one trip to buy some gag gifts for a bachelor party, I had never bought anything other than condoms from a sex shop so I never had a need to check prices. Well, as I was walking through the store I randomly started checking the prices of stuff. Just curiosity Mom, I'm not shopping for an orgy. Did you have any idea how much money they are making in the sex industry? Any single piece of leather gear used for S&M is regularly in $100+ range. Some of those more exotic looking vibrators? Hundred bucks. No shit. $100 - for a penis shaped tube of plastic with a couple of C cells. There is a HUGE profit margin built into that pocket rocket. The margin is as out of proportion to reality as the dimensions of the toy! I swear I need to stop selling super computers. The real money is in dildos. Only a few people in the world need a $1,000,000 piece of hardware. But apparently thousands of people need a $100 vibrator. Man, those sales are turning into some really good vibrations for somebody.
Jim Parisi