Monday, March 08, 2010

Whip Smart

I generally try and tune into Fresh Air with Terry Gross on NPR if I’m in my car in the late afternoon. I got in the habit after I started picking Peanut up from school on Wednesdays and Thursdays. The show comes on at 3:00 PM and school lets out about 3:10 PM. We listen in on the way home.

Today, I was thankful that Peanut wasn’t with me. Terry’s guest was Melissa Febo, who has just written a memoir of her four years as a professional dominatrix at a club called The Dungeon in Manhattan. The book is called Whip Smart.

To be fair, WAMU advised listeners that today’s show contained “adult subject matter” and that it “may not be appropriate for all listeners.”

I imagine some regular listeners may have missed that message though and maybe were a bit surprised at finding this type of discussion going on the radio in the after school hours. Volumes are suddenly lowered, channels quickly changed…, “so how was your day honey?” …and so on.

The host and guest weren’t holding much back either. At one point Melissa talks about an interview where she was asked if she had a favorite place to shop for her “accessories”.

“Home Depot,” she quipped.

I just about drove off the road.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I heard that interview as well. Fascinating!

Anonymous said...

WB... This isn't the first time that such conversations have come to our area. It was only a few years ago (FEB 05) that the Turf Valley hotel hosted a Swingers conference and "exhibition" that took over the entire hotel.

The sponsor (Dark Odyssey) boasted that the main event, including fantasy and dungeon stations, was planned for the 20,000sf ballroom.

The most curious aspect of County Executive Robey's response was that he didn't do anything, even though his administration was in the middle of spending more than $300,000 in a failed attempt to close a nearby Route 40 adult store.

Anonymous said...

Wow! Never heard about that party. Just read the Sun article on line. Guess they took the hotel ball room to new level.

Anonymous said...

Wow! Never heard about that party. Just read the Sun article on line. Guess they took the hotel ball room to new level.

Downtown said...

Yeah. It was all over the TV news and the five newspapers we used to have - Sun, Post, Examiner, Flier, View.

I can't help but wonder if this falls under the convention revenue that the HC Econ Dev Auth uses in their models to support GPAs and rezoning.

Anonymous said...

Did you see that the Route 1 adult store stacked their shelves with non porn so they could beat the county zoning reg? Same tactic as the Route 40 store.

And the zoning still allows Turf Valley to host swingers in their neighborhood hotel.

What can you say when there's a bunch of clowns running the show?

Anonymous said...

Yes, the juxtaposition of Howard County's position on adult book stores and the convention held at Turf Valley is ironic.

The two "events" seem mutually exclusive, and a fence-sitting, money-wasting exercise at best.

Full disclosure, I'm not a fan of adult bookstores myself, but....

Is anyone going to get into Freedom of Speech issues here, though?

Freemarket, where are ye?

Anonymous said...

This isn't about free speech. It's all about campaign contributions to the faux puritans. Turf Valley gives and the book stores don't.