Ask A Pornstar

You all are making me feel guilty about my pink fuzzy handcuffs!

I concur. That still doesn't dull my feelings about their desires.

It's definitely odd, to say the very least. There's a difference between fuzzy pink cuffs and slicing up tits, subby socks, so I wouldn't stress.

Oh, thank goodness! I'd thought I'd killed this thread.

I think I'm the only one capable of killing this thread and I don't wanna!

HIV+ pornstar who did both gay and straight porn speaks out:

The adult film performer who tested HIV-positive at a San Fernando Valley clinic this fall spoke out for the first time Tuesday, calling for mandatory condom use in porn productions, improved testing for sexually transmitted disease and follow-up care for fellow performers.

Derrick Burts, 24, said he tested HIV-positive in October at the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation in Sherman Oaks after working in both gay and straight porn films for a few months. He had previously been identified only as Patient Zeta.

Producers of straight porn regularly check performers’ test results using a database maintained by the clinic, known as AIM, to clear actors for work.

Burts, who performed in straight films as "Cameron Reid" and gay films as "Derek Chambers," said he was tested at the clinic Oct. 8, then received a panicked call from clinic staff the following afternoon, summoning him to the office.

When he got there, he said, clinic staff told him that he had tested HIV-positive. They wanted to perform a follow-up test and begin notifying performers he had worked with since his last negative test result Sept. 3. Those performers, he was told, would be placed on a quarantine list while they, too, were tested.

Burts said he gave clinic staff the names of about a dozen performers he had worked with in California and Florida in both gay and straight productions. The list included his girlfriend, who also works in the industry as a performer. He watched as clinic staff began scanning a performer database, notifying those he had named and placing them on a quarantine list.

The clinic has since said that none of the performers on its quarantine list tested positive. Burts confirmed that his girlfriend tested negative.

He said that when he returned to the clinic Oct. 23 to review the second test results, clinic staff told him that they had traced his HIV infection to someone he had performed a scene with whom they described to him as a "known positive."

Although straight porn performers must show negative HIV test results before filming, the gay porn industry does not have the same restrictions, although condom use is typically required.

Burts said he asked who the performer was and clinic staff told him they could not reveal the performer’s name or gender due to patient confidentiality.

Clinic officials could not immediately be reached for comment Tuesday night. An attorney for the clinic was traveling outside the United States, according to an e-mail received from him earlier in the day.

Burts says he may have contracted the disease during a gay porn shoot in Florida. He said the performers used condoms during intercourse but not during oral sex.

Contrary to Burts’ account of what he was told, clinic officials released a statement last month saying "Patient Zeta acquired the virus through private, personal activity."

"That’s completely false," Burts said Tuesday. "There is no possible way. The only person I had sex with in my personal life was my girlfriend."

Before he left the clinic Oct. 23, Burts said clinic staff put him in touch with a doctor affiliated with the clinic and promised to arrange for his follow-up care.

Burts said no one followed up, and he felt neglected.

"AIM promised they would help me set up a doctor and get treatment," he said. "They did none of that."

Burts said AIM staff had warned him not to contact the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, whose officials have been among the clinic’s chief critics. In frustration, Burts said he went to an AIDS Healthcare Foundation center in Los Angeles on Nov. 24 and saw a doctor, never identifying himself as Patient Zeta.

Pleased with the care he received at the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, Burts contacted the group’s leaders last week, identified himself as Patient Zeta and said he wanted to speak out on their behalf and in favor of enforcing mandatory condom use in porn productions. Foundation officials have scheduled a news conference with Burts for 10 a.m. Wednesday.

"AIM likes to state that testing is enough. That’s completely false," he said, noting that in the months before he tested positive for HIV, he had also contracted chlamydia, gonorrhea and herpes.

"It’s very dangerous," he said of adult film work. "It should be required that you wear a condom on the set."

Burts, who grew up in Whittier and Hemet, graduated from Hemet High School and a hotel management school in Florida and worked as a hotel manager and cruise ship magician before becoming a porn performer for the money. He said he earned $200 to $800 for filming a straight scene and $1,000 to $2,000 for a gay scene.

Looking back, he said he wishes he had known more about the risks of contracting sexually transmitted diseases in the industry.

"Making $10,000 or $15,000 for porn isn’t worth your life," he said. "Performers need to be educated."

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 8th, 2010 at 9:38 p and is filed under 2010, breaking news, hiv, pickup. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Original LINK (NSFW)

CHECKMATE for Adult Industry Medical testing center (AIM):

From LA Times

Porn industry health clinic shut down by L.A. County health officials [Updated]
December 9, 2010 | 11:32 am
Los Angeles County Department of Public Health officials have shut down the San Fernando Valley-based health clinic that serves the porn industry.

[Updated at 11:42 a.m.: An earlier version of this post incorrectly said the clinic was based in San Fernando. It is in Sherman Oaks.]

“We’ve told the clinic they have to notify people of test results that have already been taken and make appropriate referrals. But they cannot provide new services,” said Dr. Jonathan Fielding, the county’s public health director.

Fielding said county public health staff went to the clinic Thursday morning and issued a cease-and-desist order based upon state regulator’s denial of the clinic’s application for a community clinic license.

Adult Industry Medical healthcare’s general manager and lawyers did not return phone calls Thursday. AIM staff answering the phone Thursday morning said the clinic was still open.

Clinic officials were notified that their license application had been denied Tuesday. They applied June 7, state officials said, but Fielding said the application was “incomplete.”

“They hadn’t done all the things necessary to comply,” he said, but would not elaborate and referred questions to state public health officials, who did not immediately return phone calls or e-mail Thursday.

The nonprofit AIM clinic opened in 1998. Fielding said county public health officials did not become aware that they were operating without a license until April. In May, he said they sent clinic officials a letter advising them that as a nonprofit, they could not operate under an affiliated physician’s license and needed to apply instead for a clinic license.

Fielding said former patients at the clinic are welcome to seek care at county clinics.
“We have on our website a number of places where people can go for testing,” he said. “All the places that we’re involved with are certainly places where people can feel safe -- the privacy and confidentiality are maintained.”

Porn producers had relied on the clinic to maintain a database of performers’ test results that they could check prior to filming. It was unclear what would become of that system.

“I don’t know the answer to that -- you’ll have to ask them. Our feeling has been that that is not sufficient to fully protect the performers,” Fielding said. “They need to use condoms so that these workers will not be put in a position where they are exposed to potentially life-threatening diseases.”

To be clear, the only reason I care about the crossing over of gay male performers into straight porn is that the default presumption is: all gay male performers are HIV positive, or at minimum, are constantly exposed to HIV due to the high infection rate on the gay side of the porn industry, and therefore, they are not required to test for HIV. My opinion has nothing to do with sexual preference. It's an issue of common sense, which is in short supply in the adult film industry.

This is the second time (that we know of. AIM, the testing center, has hidden infections) that HIV has gone from the gay talent pool to the straight side. This year.

Hey Tyler,

This has been a fascinating thread. I know we've talked a bit in the workshop, but I just wanted to say that you're doing a great job. I really enjoy your stories, and I'm sure you'll break through in no time.

I'm a workshop moderator here, and have a book out (Transubstantiate), 30 or so stories online and in print (including Shivers VI with Stephen King and Peter Straub out this month), won a few contests, etc. But four years ago I had NOTHING, so keep at it. Whatever I can do to help, just let me know.

You have a real talent for seeing the emotion and character behind the sex. Best of luck, and keep us posted.

Peace,
Richard

That was very kind to say. Thank you, Richard.

The big five won't touch my ms, although they have no problem publishing ghost-written, sugar-coated books by my peers. After so many near misses with indie publishing houses for the same excuse (love it, but we're too scared how we will look if we publish it) it's almost worthy of a laugh. It's like they're reading the same script or something.

There are perhaps three indie publishers left on my query list, then, I don't know...European publishers? I'm trying Process Media. They published Permanent Midnight, the Jerry Stahl memoir. I'm still swinging, though.

Keep pushing. Sounds like you know what you're doing. You're selling this as a memoir, right? Non-fiction? I don't know if you have any interest in my press, Otherworld Publications, they're small, and I don't know if they'd do it, but I can certainly ask. I'll ask around a bit too, see if any of my lit friends know of a press that might be up for it. Did you try Manic D or Soft Skull? Two-Dollar Radio? (these are all indie/small presses).

Found these guys are Duotrope: Cleis Press

I assume you already looked at all of the publishers of books by Jenna and Tera, etc., etc.? (It Books, Gotham)

Thanks for the referral offer, dude. Very generous of you. I was going to send a proposal to them for the January reading period, so a good word would be nice on the query letter.

The work is creative non-fiction. The only reason I threaded a narrative through the stories to make it a "novel" was because everybody in publishing kept telling me it would be easier to sell a novel. They say, "Nobody will take a memoir from a male pornstar seriously." Riiight. As opposed to literary fiction authored by a male pornstar? Two months ago, I reverted it back to the non-fiction stories, and the novel is a dead project. The way it's laid out, the chapters (stories) are loosely connected and can be read in any order, or all the way through like say...Last Exit To Brooklyn, or Trainspotting. (Like my ms, both of those books consist of chapters that have been published individually in various lit mags as short stories.)

Changing up what I used to build my readership to please the publishing machine, who won't accept me anyway, is stupid. It's the end user that matters. Ask Coca Cola how the New Coke is doing. It's readers for whom I create the product for, not publishing execs. Fuck chasing expectations. Fuck seeking approval. Fuck needing permission from anybody else to be a writer. If I fail, it will be on my terms.

I researched all the pub houses you listed and submitted to those I felt, based on their backlist, would be the most receptive. I don't give a damn about an advance or anything like that. I want the place that will give the book the best chance of long term success. And do so without fucking with (watering down) my prose. As much as I want this process to be over so I can focus on what's important--writing--I'm being patient.

Cool. Aside from what I've read here, have I read any of the official manuscript/collection? I'd be happy to put in a good word for you at OWP. You have my email, drop me whatever you think I should see.

I posted up a request at my FB page, and got a few responses. Nothing that seems worthwhile yet: "Penthouse" or "Oh sure, Richard YOUR FRIEND the adult film star." HA. But one person did suggest getting an agent. I can't remember if you're going that route as well, but thought you were. Any luck with that? I'm seeking representation right now, have a request for Disintegration, have to polish it up first, and about 6 agents and 6 houses that passed on Transubstantiate but wanted to see the next one. Obviously an agent would be awesome for you. QueryTracker.net is a great place to look.

Keep at it.

Peace,
Richard

Yeah, I did the whole agent query thing. Used both Query Tracker and Agent Query. A few agents requested my full ms, which I sent. Most ignored me. It was clear that none of them wanted to stick their necks out to sell my work to their editorial contacts. I learned to never accept a "no" from a person who was never in the position to give you a "yes," so after enough of those I circumvented the agent nonsense and went to the publishers directly.

That's where the near misses came from. One editor, who has been very supportive and a great ally, admitted that my proposal was the scariest thing ever pitched in an acquisitions meeting. Shit, man, it's just words.

I'll email you the proposal tomorrow. Thanks.

Oneironaut At Wrest

The van loops lazy figure eights in the parking lot, tossing me side-to-side in its backseat, while the Swap and Spit Girls spit and swap my cock. My mind re-lives this morning’s fight with Amanda. The van flies into a curve too fast and teeth scrape my shaft, ripping me back into the Now, and I remember to moan the way a you’re expected to when a redhead and blonde are throwing a rainbow party in your lap. I’m not convincing.

The director says, “Cut.”

Thank Christ. Me, shooting smut in the backseat of a speeding van with two white girls–-bald cunts, panties around their ankles--is a game of “Pin the Felony on the Negro” waiting to happen.

While the girls wipe their mouths and re-apply their lip gloss, Dana, the director, explains the rest of the scene will conclude in her compound.

Today’s scene is a reverse pickup. For the part we just filmed, I’m an Armani-clad executive out for a stroll when some girlies in a van skid to a stop next to me and fling open the door. Instead of baiting with a puppy, it’s hiked-up skirts and glistening pussies. I drop my briefcase, dive in, and the car screeches off.

Tracy, the redhead, sops up the puddle of da-glo drool in my lap with a paper towel while the blonde, whose name I forgot, tucks me back into my suit pants, but I stop her before a zipper mishap occurs.

Perfume, Amanda's, coats the inside of my nose...probably from this morning. When I’m together, I call her. It rings and rings. No answer. I regret this morning...What I’d give for another chance to do it all over again...

________

I sit on the sofa. Dana sets up the lights and goes off somewhere. I hear Tracy and the blonde in the bathroom freshening their makeup, and then their pussies with douche. Right now is when I wash up and take a pre-scene piss, but I decide to wait until the girls are done. While I’m alone I call Amanda’s cell again...busy signal. I close my eyes...and the toilet flushes but I don’t hear clicking heels, so they’re not done…

...highschool bathroom...where I lost my virginity...Moonlight Sonata echoes off the tile..

I push open a stall. She is there.

The blonde girl who took my virginity…The gossip about her is, she only does things with black boys, but I don’t know why and nobody will explain it to me...She lifts her skirt and spreads her lips and pees on the floor...The stream splashes off the tile...Hot spraylets of salty piss pellet my lips. Steam rises from the floor, filling the bathroom.

Moans...

...I open my eyes to a stiff dick and the extreme urge to pee, so I run to Dana’s bathroom. Dream-like smoke fades from my consciousness as I laser-pee a hole through the back of the toilet. I’m rock hard, so this takes some gymnastics.

When I return to the set the girls are rubbing their pussies.

Dana says, “Action.”

________

...and I feel my bones sink into a sofa after the blonde gets up from riding me cowgirl, and my eyes follow Blondie’s ass as she walks away toward the edge of visibility.

Fading...

Fading, as Tracy lowers herself onto my god rod and drapes her arms around my neck.

Giggles...

Tracy’s mouth shapes the words, I’m next, then blossoms into a smile. Hands from behind me pull my shoulders down…It’s Blondie. She straddles my face...

Blondie sits...

Darkness.

________

It’s after the scene and Tracy and I sit on a bed. I rub her shoulders. She turns and kisses me.

Would things be any easier with a girl who’s also in the business?...I mean, seriously, could you handle it if Amanda went off to suck some mope’s cock?...Coming home with dick on her breath every day to pay the bills?...And kissing me?...That flake of dried come on her ass that she missed in the shower?...Shit, how much better would your life look if you weren’t in the business?

Tracey bends over. I insert in her pussy.

What would your life look like if you never met Amanda?...There wouldn’t be one...She saved you too many times to count...Jesus, what you doing? You’re such a piece of shit. Your entire life is a failure and your not smart enough to break the cycle...not man enough...put your .45 in your mouth and be done with it...Amanda’s life would look better, that’s for sure...But don’t do it at home...can’t let her find you…But...if you just disappear she’ll think you left her and that would only hurt her further...It’s never too late to be a better man, Eric...

Tracy comes. I roll off her, get dressed, and drive home.

________

Amanda should be back from work already but the house is dark and the only sound is the ticking of the kitchen clock. Still smell her perfume, though. I grab a bottled water from the fridge and sit on the bed and kick off my shoes. I strip down, lie back, and listen to time, the betrayer of lives, tick away from the kitchen...

...and I’m standing before a desk with a Newton’s cradle...those steel balls in constant conflict with one another, crashing time.

click-click-click–

Behind the desk hangs a mirror in a gilded frame. On the right side of the desk, a window with vertical blinds runs the length of the wall. The only light radiates through the blinds from the setting sun outside, which casts deep shadows, like long fingers reaching across the room.

A painting, also in a gilded frame, hangs on the wall to the left of the desk. It shows a man wearing medieval battle armor, mounted on a rearing horse with flaring nostrils. Skulls at its feet. Plumes of smoke swirl around in a crimson sky. A plaque on the frame’s bottom says, Gilles de Rais.

click-click-click–

Deep-pile carpet covers the floor that gives the sensation of sinking, slowing time with each step as I walk toward the desk.

A laptop on the desk. I walk around it to see its screen. There’s a video camera embedded into the laptop screen’s lip. The screen itself displays a document file. A contract. Scrolling down as I read, I learn the contract is an exclusive performing deal...Along with the performance contract is an agreement to have my body parts, specifically my genitals, cast and molded into sex toys...

My pulse quickens as I scroll down the compensation section.

click-click-click–

I read, my mouth dries and I have to re-read it to be sure the numbers right. The cardboard I stuffed into my shoes as inserts to cover the holes in the soles are long since worn through, so I can fondle the soft carpet with my toes. I read my compensation again...and again. My eyes sting and I’m on the edge of losing it, maybe even dancing, until I remember the camera in my face. I wipe my face and type my name on the space designated “signature” and click the “send” button.

The contract on the screen dissolves into a real-time image of me from the video camera’s point of view. The shadows cascading across my face from the window gives the appearance of bars. The combined effect of the seeing myself simultaneously in the screen in front of me, as well as reflected in the mirror behind me, renders the effect of two opposing mirrors angled in such a way that both the front and back of my head are reflected into an infinity of diminishing returns. I swallow.

click-click-click–

Amanda’s perfume bottle sits on the desk. There’s a sensation…that whoever is on the other side of the video feed is no longer watching me...It’s as though their presence is in the room...with me.

Amanda’s voice calls me from somewhere...I stand. My feet trod in hushed footfalls across the carpet, and the world is shaking...

“...Papi, wake up.”

My bed. The kitchen clock ticks. Amanda, dressed for work, stands over me. Her hand waves something in front of my face.

She says, “Whose red hair is this?”

I take it from her. Tracey’s.

“I dunno...”

“How can you not know?”

I take my time sitting up and I rub my eyes to buy time.

“Jesus,” I say, “It’s from work. One of the girls from--” I look out the window. Sunlight. “--yesterday?”

“Why are you yelling, Eric? Don’t yell at me. Never yell at me. People only yell when their guilty of something.”

“I’m not yelling, damnit. I’m just sick of these silly questions the first thing when I wake up, fucking up my mood for the day. You know damn well I go to work and--”

“How many times do I have to tell you to shower those putas off of you before you get into our bed? You smell like pussy, and you bring those...those bitches into my bed–”

“I’m sorry, okay. Christ, I sat down...and I must have fallen asleep, or...”

Amanda moves the water bottle and sits on the bed beside me. She says, “When are you going to marry me?…Are you ever going to marry me?”

“I uh...I can’t…not while I still do porn...”

The silence. It’s a third person in the bedroom.

She says, “We can’t go on like this forever, Eric.”

She’s right. This isn’t fair to her…she deserves a lot better than me.

I say, “I know…”

“I trust you.”

...hands that look like mine knead a woman’s flesh. It’s not Amanda’s...

“...yeah.”

“Well?”

“…Amanda--”

“Asshole!”

She cries. Heels click down the hall. Keys jingle. The front door slams. A car starts.

But I’m not really alone...her perfume lingers.

And that clock ticks.

I sit in bed wishing for a do-over, but I don’t know if that would do any good. I’ve been repeating the same mistakes, three girlfriends running. And I’m not any more clever today than I was yesterday...

I get dressed in my wardrobe for this morning’s scene, a suit, and I drive to the Valley.

________

I check my cellphone. It’s time, so I walk along the sidewalk. I can still hear Amanda crying in my ears, which makes me tear up, and when I wipe my nose I smell her perfume on my hand...I’m losing my girl and I’m working twice as hard for half the money I made the year before...Diminishing returns all around…Keep adding to that “Fuck You Fund” and move the fuck on...Screw that, you can turn around right now. Your car is right behind you. Get in it. Go–-

A van skids to a stop next to me. The door swings open and a blonde and a redhead, skirts hiked-up, show me their pussies.

I drop my briefcase and I get in.

The door slams shut behind me.

End.

Lucid dreams & Möbius strips...

I want a book deal for Tyler for Christmas.

working on it

^5!

I can throw in a second wave of recommendation if need be.

I want my two front teeth.

Fixed for you, mate.

Dusk to Dawn

My cellphone’s glow illuminates my steps through the dark hall, and my free hand drags along the stucco wall whose Braille crumbles under my fingers. The light dies, a flick the volume button re-ignites the torch. Industrial debris crunches underfoot. My fingers lose contact with the wall when it terminates at an intersection, and I’m a kid in a crowd reaching for his mom’s hand that’s no longer there. I grope the wall out of the darkness once again, and follow its new direction down another hallway.

Ahead, voices echo, then a ice blue glow of another lithium-powered torch blazes. It bounces toward me. When our lights get to within conversation distance of each other, we stop. The voices say something to me in Japanese.

My light cuts out, then theirs. Black. We flick our buttons.

With a scrap of Japanese remembered from a long forgotten girl, I say, “Watashiwa Tyler. Genki desu-ka.”

Their expressions twist into Jack o’ lantern smiles, and they escort me through the corridors. They open a door for me, gesture me inside, then disappear down the hall.

My eyes adjust to a cinderblock walled room with a greasy lightbulb swinging from the ceiling.

A stale mildew scent. Windows, to high to see out of, with glass either broken or missing. The last shafts of daylight filter through, exciting the dust on a current of warm air. Couple of folding chairs. On one chair, a pizza box with heels and coagulating cheese. On the other chair sits a kid mangling the remains of a slice. He tosses the crust on the floor where it skips into a corner, and introduces himself as the translator. I fill out the forms, then he takes the paperwork and leaves.

I sit and wait.

________

After a contortion act I find a sleeping position in a metal chair. I’ve slept on worse. As I close my eyes my phone chirps an incoming text message. My brother...He’s accepted into medical school…his first choice. A glimpse of life shaped by different decisions. We began at the same start line...similar IQs and other raw materials. He took his ore and forged himself a scalpel. I made a straight razor.

The reality is, either can kill you. My last day working in a investment banking firm, Frank Garrison, a stock trader who’s been in the market since Nixon took us off the gold standard, went down to his car, came back with a baseball bat, and played t-ball with my skull as I laughed and cackled my last vestige of sanity away. Rewind five minutes earlier: he complained that he couldn’t read my handwriting on a trade ticket so I told him to ass-fuck his mother. Old people can be so pissy. When they pulled Frank off of me, I tossed my wallet and keys on my desk and walked around Beverly Hills with the clothes on my back: an Ermenegildo Zegna suit and a paper Burger King Crown. I spent that night sleeping in La Cienega Park...and the next night, and the next, and...

I text a congratulatory reply to my brother...no signal.

________

Through the windows, night replaced light. During winter in the high desert the temperature plummets with the sun, and I dressed for daytime. Wind whistles through the gap-toothed glass and the lightbulb sways. The hairs on my arms stand up so I pull my arms into my thrift shop t-shirt.

________

My breath plumes from my mouth and evaporates. No clock. I check my cellphone. It’s now tomorrow. I search this storage room. Racks of boxes filled with doorknobs…a jar of nails, screws and washers…a box of showerheads…nothing to seal up the windows.

I start some Silat djurus (think katas or forms) to keep warm until that evolves into all-out shadowboxing, which I regret because I’m sweating and when it evaporates it will steal my bodyheat.

A yawn pushes past my lips so I sit again, propping my feet on the second chair. The wind whistles a lullaby…

The door scrapes open and the translator tells me it’s time. I follow him into the bowels of the building.

________

A white dot of light beckons from end of the hallway. When we get to the end, the hall opens up to a vast, sprawling warehouse space. In the center, an island of light blazing in the sea of black. The set. It’s dressed to look like a hi-tech clean room or something you’d expect to see in Area 51. All that’s missing are engineers in clean suits reverse engineering a crashed spaceship, and a dissected alien on a gurney. The mildew scent of the storage room has been replaced with the tart citrus of industrial cleanser, which tears my eyes a bit. The all Japanese crew scurries about, scrubbing the set and working their chores. All of them in beanies and hoodies.

Am I going to be dressed in an alien costume? Japanese are big on tentacle porn. A tattoo-sleeved man, wearing surf shorts and a wife beater, jogs up to me. The translator introduces him as the director. We shake hands and exchange deep bows. By the time I rise from my bow the director is bouncing around the set from prop to prop like a sub atomic particle on meth, spiting out Japanese sentences Kalashnikov style while the translator struggles to keep up. Schroedinger’s Jap wants me to play a patient. Someone hands me a hospital gown, which I change into. I’m commando style with my bare ass open in the back. The translator tells me to hop up on a stainless steel gurney. It’s polished to a mirror finish. No paper. I think, thank God I’m not wet or my buttocks would stick to the metal. I curse to myself as I lie back. I’ll warm up when we get into the sex.

My co-star, a girl who’d get carded for ordering apple cider, enters wearing a candy striper’s uniform. The director yells, Action!, tears a rift in space-time, and steps through it. Sayonara.

Nurse recites her exposition in Japanese then switches to English phrases she must have practiced all day to get right. We talk (sort of) about the horrors of war (what war would have a black guy in a Japanese hospital?).
She helps me to sit up, unties my gown, and rubs my chest with frozen steaks she passes for hands.

Then, she asks, “Are you ready for, giggle, sponge bath?”

Her words hit me jagged and crisp like a bucket of chipped ice flung in my face.

I fight the urge to say, Go fuck yourself! Last time I said that to a co-worker, I dodged hickory wood.

“Hai. Domo-arigato,” I say.
________

Over and over, she squeezes the sponge over my body. Over and over, sheets of ice water crash onto my skin–the water cascades off my body and onto the metal, taking with it a piece of my spirit like a Bering Sea wave eroding an Aleutian shoreline. When the shivering comes, it comes with violence.

Fuck this. Enough! I rip the sponge away her, rub her hands between mine, then and place one on my crotch. She gasps and squeals words I don’t understand. Could be genuine exasperation, could be her playing coy for the scene. The fuck if I care.

I rummage under her skirt and grab a fistful of muff. Her eyes are punctuated by dime-sized pupils. I smash my mouth onto hers. When we separate, she pants, spraying a mist of breath in the crisp air.

It’s on.

Men of various job descriptions orbit the gurney, filming, lighting, and snapping stills. I fall onto my back as naughty little AZN girl wrestles the hentai cock.

My legs quiver...I place my hands on them to stay them...The director phases back into existence, makes the universal sign for blow-job-to-pop shot, then returns to his state of everywhere and nowhere at the same time...The girl obeys and attacks my tentacle...The crew seems transfixed by this little girl in mortal combat, hell-bent on sending the Kraken to the watery abyss from which it came…Fuck the crew, focus! Control your breathing...Breathe in...hold...exhale...Breathe in...hold...exhale…You’re in a sauna...with some girl sucking your cock…

It’sss nnnot working...Goddamnit, I’m ccconvulsing...No way the camera doesn’t sssee this...Okay, draw your limbs as close to your core as pppossible…biology is working against you. Lose wood, it’s gone for good...kkkeep the blood flowing where you need it...there’s a girl sucking your cock...sucking your cccock...sucking your cock...it’s Amanda...lips...tongue...sucking your cock...sucking on your motherfucking cock...

Pop shot.

I blink; the director is there.

His lips fly, then he bows.

The translator translates, “You’re a jungle beast!”

I say, “Yes, I know,” and return the bow.

Directorsan counts out a crisp stack of Benjamins into my trembling palm.

I say, “Oats Caress Ha-ma.” (Nice working with you).

I come down hard from the rush. I yawn.
________

Outside, wind slaps at my face. Stars everywhere. When I fire up the Mustang, I’m greeted with the sound of a lawnmower wheezing with asthma.

YOU FUCKING WHORE! START!

I pop the hood with my cell phone clinched in my teeth to illuminate…corroded ports on my battery. I scrape the smegma with my keys, and fire the V8 up. She roars to life.

Clicking through gears with my short-throw shifter, I assault the freeway. Outside the window the desert mountains surrender the fight as they no longer hold back the grey of dawn. Clouds, underlit pink. I yawn. My eyes want to close...and I don’t remember how to get home...The car knows the way.

Gotta stay awake...I lower the windows...Wind blasts through, whipping up a vortex in the cockpit. Normally, this the part where I contemplate what all this shit means. Not today. I crank the radio full blast as the rising sun warms my face...and sing.

“Every time I look in the mirror

All these lines on my face getting clearer

The past is gone

It went by, like dusk to dawn

Isn’t that the way

Everybody’s got their dues in life to pay...”

End.

@Brandon - sure, I'm just reading over his proposal and work now. From what I've read here it's be a wild book to have OWP put out. Should get some attention for sure.

It has a polarizing effect. No middle ground whatsoever.

Dear Jane Smith:

I’m seeking a representation for my collection of true stories based on my life as a major adult film star, complete at 62,000 words. Because your bio says you’re looking for authors who take risks and have something unique to say–authors whose work challenges perceptions–I believe we’re a good match.

The collection of stories follows the life of an ordinary man from his introduction into the world of pornography, to the contract with a porn studio which thrusts him into stardom, money, and a line of signature blow-up dolls made in his image. When a sex scandal erupts, involving the most famous athlete in the world and his mistresses, the narrator satirizes the situation, only to realize that the higher his own celebrity rises, the further his descent into madness.

The book endeavors to be a mirror held up to a society that places a premium on celebrity, gained without merit, over the plight of the evaporating middle class dream. An America where the average person knows who Snookie is but not Justice Sotomayor, the embodiment of said dream. It asks: what is the true metric for success in the Twenty-First-Century? This book about my decade long life as a porn star, fits into market shared by Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential, James Frey’s A Million Little Pieces, and Jerry Stahl’s Permanent Midnight. Though the work is non-fiction, readers often compare my narrative aesthetic to “transgressive” literary fiction similar to work by Dennis Cooper, Hubert Selby Jr., and Chuck Palahniuk.

I’ve established a platform by publishing excerpts of the book in several print and online literary journals and chap books including Sex and Murder, Thirst for Fire, Thieves Jargon, Ignavia Press, Ronin Press and Danse Macabre. My stories are the subject of discussion on Internet forums around the globe, including a 3,000 post thread. Fans of my writing include many celebrities who use social media to share my writing with their fanbase. I read at venues all over the country, and am an active member of Chuck Palahniuk’s online writing workshop. My (porn free) blog is TylerKnight.com. Writing is a not a career choice for me: it’s my life. I’m working on my next book.

Thank you for your time and consideration. I look forward to speaking with you.

Sincerely,
Tyler Knight

encl.: biography
synopsis
sample chapters

I’m about to send this letter and forty other personalized ones to literary agents in New York when a message pops up on my laptop from Twitter:

Joe Rogan: Hey bro, you want to do my podcast tomorrow? We can talk about your writing.

Me: Ha ha, this is funny. I was just proofreading my query letter to literary agents. I was gonna send them out now.

Joe Rogan: There are no accidents. Your writing is great. We have to get the word out, that’s all. Trust me dude, do my show. A lot of people listen to it.

Me: Fuckin’ a! Thanks for being a great friend. I appreciate it.

Joe Rogan: Stop it, dude. You’re super talented. Soon, everyone will see it. I’ll text you when I wake up tomorrow.

I send the query letter off to the agents, then go to bed.
________

The podcast lasts a couple of hours. We talk about a range of topics from the true nature of talent, sensory deprivation chambers, funny YouTubevideos, and debate the point (or lack of) meaning of life. Several times during the podcast, Joe hammers the point home to his listeners to check out my blog. We have a lot of good laughs. It’s the easy conversation between two friends.

When I get back home I check my bank account because that always brings me back to reality. Then I check my e-mail:

Dear Mr. Knight:

Thank you for submitting your letter to our agency. Although we found the subject compelling, we don’t think we can sell it to our publishing contacts. Unfortunately, we don’t think we would be the right agent for your project, but we wish you the best elsewhere!

Regards,
Agent

I open three form rejection emails just like this, with only slight variations on the wording, when I open:

Dear Mr. Knight:

Thank you for submitting your letter to our agency. We found the subject compelling, please send us your complete manuscript at your earliest convenience.

Regards,
Agent

I do a little Snoopy dance, then I send the materials. When I’m done celebrating I continue my four-month-long search on Craigslist for a job because my porn scene workload is down to a fraction of its past. High enough to live on, but low enough to skew the grief-per-dollar ratio not to be worth continuing much longer. And it will get worse.
________

The woman lingers in the door’s threshold. Bifocals hang from a chain around her neck. She’s engaged in conversation with someone inside the office.

“–and I know all the tax codes.” she says, “And–”

“Thank you, Mildred.”

“Oh, I see. Okay…so, I shall expect your call then, sir?”

“Probably not.”

Her lips move, stop, and move again to a series of stillborn thoughts.

“That will be all,” the voice inside the office says. “Close the door behind you.”

The woman shuffles in a daze across the reception room, where she passes my chair. A run streaks down one leg of her hosiery and her shoe leather is scuffed. The woman stops, walks back to the office and knocks on the closed door.

“May I come in?” she asks.

She waits. Video cameras loom from the ceiling, peering down on her.

She says to the closed door, “I don’t know if you can hear me, but if you hire me I will work extra hours…off the clock…every day.”

No answer.

“You see,” she continues, “Jim…that’s my husband…we have custody of our grand children, but he…well, Jim passed away… And the bank sends these letters, so I’m afraid to open the mailbox anymore…”

She stands by the door, straining to hear a response. Silence.

Her shoulders slump, and she crosses the reception area once again to front door and to the waiting elevator. Its mouth opens and she steps inside. The doors snap shut, swallowing her whole, and speeds her down the gullet and into the bowels of the building.

At that moment, the office door opens a crack. A voice says, “Next.”
________

I enter and close the door behind me, sealing out the buzz of the sales floor. A man with an expensive looking haircut sits behind the desk, finishing a conversation with a businesswoman. There are two chairs in front of the desk, but I don’t sit. I stop my hands from fidgeting so I don’t crush the document I’m holding.

Porn has been waning for years. Porn people that were making ten or twenty thousand a month are getting evicted and their cars repossessed. Porn Valley is quiet. Unlike the music industry, the government won’t intervene to save the porn. Why should they? The Chinese saying goes, “When your enemy is destroying himself, get out of the way.”

The last time I got a call for a scene was for a five-mopes-on-one “girl” gang bang. Girl in quotation marks, because I Googled her before I returned the call. It was a square-jawed forty-something with a chunky clit-penis who made no pretence of womanhood anymore. Four of the five mopes were probably needed just to hold her down. With a schedule book filled with blank pages (my only contact with my agent nowadays is when they send invoices), and atrophied bank account to pay the next few month’s bills, I turned the scene down. Then scanned the Internet for employment–anything–in the worst economy and job market since the Great Depression. Even janitor gigs want five years of work experience. Verifiable, with references. After nine interviews with no job offers, I saw a posting for brokerage firm…

I scan the office for any clues I can use to establish common ground. Framed antique currency and gold certificates line the walls…Behind the desk, a photo of men screaming at each other in the Chicago Board of Trade trading pit…No diplomas or degrees or indication of his alma matter…No pics of a wife or kids…A keyboard and a bank of monitors…and tray labeled “resumes” with a stack three inches thick. A coffee mug rests on top of the stack, staining the top document with a brown ring.

The conversation between the man and the girl ends with a command from the man, which the girl nods to before she disappears through a side door. The man turns to me. With his slicked-back hair, he reminds me of a snake. He rears up in his chair, a cobra poised to leap across the desk and sink his venomous fangs into my face, and offers me his hand. We shake hands and I sit.

He says, “Do you have something for me?”

“Sure.”

I hand him the single greatest work of fiction known to man: my resume.

He skims the resume, then says, “So you were a stockbroker…but that was a long time ago. I want relevant work experience that’s more recent, and for the last eight years you worked for…” He glances at the document. “…Continuum, Inc. Films?”

“Correct,” I say.

He waits for me to continue. When I don’t, he says, “Care to elaborate on your duties?”

I stand in the eye of the orgy. An Asian girl vortex of flesh swirls around me, and I’m buffeted with the scent of assholes and cunt and sloppy fuck sounds as skin slaps on skin.

Through the tempest, I spot Aveena Lee. I tackle her.

Giggles.

“Switch!”

“Sure,” I say. “Human resources.”

He says, “If I were to call them right now, what would they tell me about your performance?”

“I’m a consistent worker.”

Snakehead flicks his tongue across his lips as though snatching my scent particles from the air. He regards me for a moment, tosses my resume on his desk, and folds his arms across his chest. I mirror him, folding my arms across my chest.

He says, “Give me a reason to hire you over the people that came in before you, and the people I’ll interview the rest of the week.”

He leans back in his chair. I lean back in my chair.

“When I was a broker,” I say, “I raised millions of dollars in assets under my control. I’m a closer, and that’s a skill set never goes away and is always in demand.”

That’s actually all true. Next, I do what salesmen call the take away. It takes balls, because there’s always a chance your bluff will be called: “Three other firms put offers on the table for me. I’m making my decision today.”

Snakehead says, “You’re full of shit.” He chuckles. “Jesus…the take away? Really?” He hands my resume back to me and stands. “You start training Monday.”
________

Amanda and I are in bed. She is asleep, but I at the ceiling, thinking, because I can’t shut my mind off. I check my e-mail:

-Hey TK,

I saw Rogan’s podcast the last month when you were a guest. When I heard his guest was a pornstar, and that you were a writer, I must confess I had a lot of preconceived notions. Boy was I wrong! Not only could I not stop reading your blog, I forwarded some of the stories to several other people. Thanks for sharing!

-Christopher

I write a response to Christopher, then open the next three identical e-mails:

Dear Mr. Knight:

Thank you for submitting your letter to our agency. Although we found the subject compelling, We don’t think we can sell it to our publishing contacts. Unfortunately, we don’t think we would be the right agent for your project, but we wish you the best elsewhere!

Regards,
Agent

Delete. Delete. Delete. Next e-mail:

Hi Tyler-

i just wanted to say that i love watching u in those movies and maybe we can hook up and practice sometime together? i sent u a picture so u kno i’m not ugly or anything. txt me anytime! (310) 555-1212.

Hugs,
-Lucinda

I open the attachment. A young, golden skinned girl is taking a picture of herself with an iPhone in the bathroom mirror. She’s arching her back in a way that makes both her chest and her ass pop out at the same time.

The next picture is a vagina of the same girl. Her cunt is shaved down into a landing strip. There is a film of pussy cream drawing a slick line between her lips.

In the past I would have fucked every piece of ass that sent me an email like this.

I look back at Amanda. She’s snoring. Mouth curled up in a smile.
I’ve made some fucked up decisions in the past.

I save the girl’s picture in a designated folder for all the other girls who sent me stuff like this, delete the e-mail, then log off the Internet.

Then I open the folder of jerk-off fodder, and spitting the difference between fucking up and doing the right thing, I spit in my hand, and rub one out. I clean up when I’m done, and go about my nightly routine of setting out my clothes for the next day of work in the office.
________

It doesn’t take long to settle into a routine. Aside from the other black guy in the office who cornered me at the coffee machine one day with a “You look familiar…Do you go to my church?”, everything is swell. Although it feels good to earn a check from an honest day’s work, I stare at the clock until it’s time to leave every day, and Friday never comes fast enough.

I’m surfing the Net when I should be working, careful of staying away from any not safe for work sites, and answering questions about porn on non-porn threads I post on at several message board forums, when I get a few text messages from my friends asking me if I’m okay because of the new HIV scare in porn. What HIV scare?

Another male talent, who crosses over and goes back and forth from gay porn to straight, has exposed the straight porn talent pool with HIV again (this happened last year) and the testing center will not release the names of the exposed (again), furthering the confusion.

Out of all the porn studios, only five decide that, gee, it may be a good idea to stop shooting until there is a sense of who may have infected or exposed whom. For the rest of the studios, it’s business as usual. They keep shooting.
________

A few nights later I have drinks with Tucker Max at a bar on Sunset Boulevard, right across the street from where he is to have a book signing. Tucker believed in my writing from the beginning, and has been a steadfast advocate. We talk a few hours about what I want to accomplish with my writing, and I tell him about my response from literary agents. All of them rejections.

Tucker says, “Fuck the agents. Why do you need other people within the publishing machine to validate your writing?”

For those that don’t know, Tucker was rejected by every agent in the world. Yes, the world. All of them. He self published, and his book went on to sell millions of copies, and has been on the New York Times best sellers list ever since.

After drinks we cross the street to his signing, which is packed. The surprise is, most of his fans are women. When they meet Tucker they smile, gush, and flirt. Some hang around after he signs an item, as though they want some me time with him right then and there.

When the event is over we say our goodbyes and I go home to submit my manuscript for the 163rd time.
________

Dear Mr. Knight:

Thank you for submitting your letter to our agency. Although we found the subject compelling, We don’t think we can sell it to our publishing contacts. Unfortunately, we don’t think we would be the right agent for your project, but we wish you the best elsewhere!

Regards,
Agent

Delete. I get dressed and go to work.
________

The end of the day. After ten hours of collecting “fuck you, take me off your list,” and “Bob is dead” while cold calling, it’s time for the sales manager’s propaganda meeting.

Everyone on the floor prairie dogs it from their cubicles to give him their attention. He paces back and forth in front of the flat screen TV as he speaks. The TV, on mute, is tuned to CNBC, where Jim Cramer is wrapped in foil like the Tin Man, arms waving in silence as he goes about his schtick touting Alcoa Aluminum.

The sales manager drones on about the importance of enthusiasm when the program on the CNBC changes to an investigative program about the state of the porn industry, probably in trying to ride the ratings wave due to the newest HIV event. Of course, nobody is paying attention to the manager.

Several edited clips play out in silence. A girl dressed as Little Red Riding Hood prances across the screen. Fuck! That’s one of my scenes…the one I won an award for ass fucking Little Red when I was dressed as the Big Bad Wolf…This can’t be fucking happening to me…My asshole clenches as the girl skips through the foggy woods with her basket swinging, and I recognize my character’s cue is right now, and my face feels hot. Red bangs and bangs on the cottage door…but the program cuts to the news anchor a nanosecond before my pornographic wolf man was to appear on screen. I laugh aloud. People turn and stare.
________

I’m about to open my e-mail when I notice my cellphone flashing with messages that I missed from the night before. It’s my mother. My uncle, her brother has passed away. He was born with physical disabilities that prevented him from caring for himself, so my grandmother sacrificed her dreams to take care of him day and night for sixty years. Mom tells me Nana is in a lot of pain, too, and she doesn’t have a lot of time left, either. I call.

“Hey grandma, it’s Eric.”

“Who?”

“Eric.”

Silence.

I say, “Um…hello?”

“Hello?”

“Yeah, Nana, this is–”

“Will you stop calling?” she says, “I paid the bill last week!”

“–Eric…”

“Eric!”

“Yes,” I say, “Eric.”

She laughs. I smile.

Nana says, “Oh silly, Eric doesn’t live here. He moved out to Hollywood twenty years ago!”

“No, this is Eric–”

“Who?”

I whisper the rest of the sentence into the phone “–your first grandson…”

Silence. Then, I hear soft weeping. My Grandmother says, “I’m sorry, but my son has passed away…My baby is dead…”

Click.

The line is dead, but I keep the cellphone pressed to my ear. After a while, I don’t know how long, I set the cell on my desk. I walk to my bed and sit. I try to cry. But I can’t, because I don’t know how. Rather than forcing it, I lay back and try sketch memories in my mind of good days growing up in Philly with a younger grandmother. Then, the last conversation I had with either my grandmother or my uncle. But they don’t come, either.
________

I move through the next few days on autopilot when Amanda gets me out of the house for a Halloween street festival that’s a block from our street.

It’s a Saturday night. The Ferris wheel spins. Laughter, screams, burnt popcorn and lights fill the warm night air. Every little girl is a princess. I watch Amanda, the woman who has stood by me for years when I did everything possible to drive her away, but refused to give up on me, play with some kids. There’s hope and dreams in her eyes, just like the children’s, because she never let life grind her spark down. How does she do it? Without her, I’d have thanked my sponsors and swallowed Ajax a long time ago. Often times, the only thing that has kept me from doing just that most times was the pain it would cause her.

Amanda meets a few of her girlfriends from the barrio, and they chat in Spanish. Amanda holds my hand. The girls gossip about who knows what, and I look at the other idiots tethered to their women’s hands. These men just smile and say nothing as the girls complain about what losers their men are, and I feel as welcome as a roach at the bottom of your milk glass, so I kiss Amanda on the cheek, cut the line, and head for home. As I jostle my way through the crowd, a few college kids dressed as a hotdog, ketchup, and mustard bottles run up to me.

Mustard says, “Hey, aren’t you Tyler Knight?”

“Not anymore.”

Mustard and Hotdog laugh at this, and Ketchup shoves a camera in a passer by’s hand and the pedestrian takes my picture with the comfort food and the condiments. I scribble some lines on a piece of paper that I pass for my autograph (I never really learned how to sign as “Tyler Knight”) and the kids leave.
________

When I finally open my e-mail it’s full. Fan mail. Hate male. Rejection letters. A couple from small publishers who requested my full manuscript but both houses say they have to pass.
________

It’s Wednesday morning. I’m standing in front of the elevator with my Starbucks in hand. I’m three minutes late, one elevator isn’t working, one is going up, and the one that’s going down is paused at the tenth floor. I know when I get to the office there will be a confrontation with Snake Face. After the pre-market meeting, of course, which if your tardy, you sit outside and wait until it’s over. In his opinion, “You should be bursting at the fucking seams to get here an hour early!” The elevator dings and the door slides open and people don’t wait for the passengers to exit before they pile in. I think about my laptop and the story about a Japanese porn set I need to rewrite. Then I remember my grandmother. The elevator door shuts. I turn around and leave the building. Then, I eat the sandwich out of the brown bag that Amanda made for me as I walk down the street. I use my tie to wipe my mouth.
________

It’s 2011. Although I’ll turn 40 this year, I don’t need a calendar to tell me my life is half over and my body is winding down its operations. The white hairs growing out of my ear do that just fine. This is the point when most people think of their legacy. Certainly not those lucite awards people give me for fucking. My friend, the late David Aaron Clark, tossed all of his AVN awards in the garbage…The AVN awards show was last weekend…Even though I’m always nominated for shit, I never go. Bragging about winning porn awards is like showing mommy what you did in the toilet…Hell, David wasn’t much older than me when he died…There’s been a lot of tension between Amanda and me since I quit my job…money is drying up…I gotta make my stand, here…Keep writing…Win or lose, I have to make my fucking stand.
________

There’s an email with “Your book” in the subject line…It’s from a literary agent in New York…My first choice. In this economy, he sold a book about a cat for 1.25 million. He’d be your first choice, too.

Hi Tyler – Robert forwarded me your manuscript. Would be interested in talking with you.

George

I send off a reply:

Hi George,

Thank you very much for taking the time to read my ms. I’m in Robert’s debt for believing in my book enough to put it in front of you. Looking forward to speaking with you.

Regards,
Tyler

I turn on E and watch the talking heads speculate who’s going to win big at the Golden Globes and who’s fucking whom, and by the time the first weight loss commercial tells me I’m not good enough, I’m reminded why I don’t watch TV. I cut it off and go back to my laptop. Another email:

You’re a great writer, but I think with some polish from a pro this could be a remarkable memoir. I told Robert it could be a porn A Million Little Pieces with work. If you’re open to discussing, let’s talk.

-George

Well, it’s about damn time.

End.

I was just thinking the other day: Where the fuck's Tyler fucking Knight?

Sorry I've been absent as of late. I got this crazy idea to pick up a paint brush, and oil painting has had me in its thrall ever since. I'm doomed--16 hours a day never went so fast, not even with writing. I don't believe I'm particularly good, but then again, I can't say I care.

Still making porn, though not nearly as much. Just enough to not starve to death. I think I did maybe 20 scenes over the entire last year, as opposed to 30 a month in my prime. Which is funny, because two different porn organisations just nominated me for their 2010 Performer of the Year awards. Total bullshit.

Ah, well, stick around, man. You're a good face to see around here. And it's good to see your book getting there. Can't wait to buy it, and see some of the stories I've read, and worked on with you, and seen flourish into Bukowski-honest tales of humanity and inhumanity.

Good shit, man. Glad to have you back.

I was thinking about you, too. I'm sorry to hear that your non-pron job didn't work out. This economy is rough. I hope your book comes out soon and sells well enough that you only have to do what you want to survive for the rest of your life.

TK - Good to see you. Don't forget about us, alright?

Keep at the writing & keep sending it out. Someone's gotta pick it up eventually, right???

I was also wondering what happened to you. I look forward to reading it every time you post. I can't wait to read your book.

Thanks for the support, guys. Much appreciated. I doubt there's any chance of my lit agent selling the book for enough money to live on for a year let alone forever, but money was never the point. It's to break the inertia on a long-term career doing something that matters, gives me satisfaction, and that others may enjoy.

Even if I never wrote a damn thing, at least now I know well enough that I can't go back to the cubicle farm. Ha ha, I think I was in love with the romantic notion of rotating my shirt and tie combinations every morning and happy hour martinis. Perhaps my brief return to that life was to remind me that sociopathic directors, diseased vaginae, bouncing checks, sleazy production managers, drugged-out scene partners, and spewing rectums are not all that bad. Wait...yes they are, but still...

Hey Tyler, you should post some of your paintings. I know I'm curious to see them, I'm sure some others would be too.

Yeah, the cubicle farm / corporate banking is just another form of whoring yourself out to the highest bidder, only with less integrity and more pretending. I am sorry your escape didn't work out as planned, but from what you have written about your past, you have changed pretty dramatically from the person you used to be. You'll find your balance and be able to earn a living from it eventually.

Tyler Knight>

I was curious if you've ever read David Foster Wallace's essay "Big Red Son" (which can be found in the book Consider the Lobster). The topic of the essay is the 1998 AVN Awards. This being one of my favorite essays by him, I was wondering what an insider's opinion on the piece may be?

What's still on your sex bucket list? Do you think about having children? What stds do you already have (just kidding- please don't tell me)? how big is it (I don't watch a lot of porn)? Have you ever yawned while fucking on camera? Also, diet/exercise routine?

do pornstars form crushes with people they work with in scenes are they're rejections and are they brutal ?

Read the thread.

Use punctuation.

Learn the difference between they're and there.

Never wander into Uncle Touchy's basement past midnight.

I never touched a paintbrush in my life before January. It could take years for me to produce anything worthwhile, if I ever do. Hell, Matisse said he was lucky go paint one work in twenty worth keeping, and that was a master. Because I started very late in life(like writing), I'm painting a canvas of each style that interests me, and when a particular style grabs me I'll explore it further and deeper. Not counting the one I abandoned, there are four 36"x48" canvases ranging from realism, neo-expressionism, and abstract surrealism.

I used to think abstract art was a sham and reading this didn't help (The artist was a toddler)--until I tried it. I never would have guessed, but my self-portrait in realism was far easier for me than abstraction. But abstraction fascinates me. So many techniques to play with...push/pull...turpentine burn...

I've not read it, but a friend who has said it was rife with hyperbole and inaccuracies.

1) If I were to list things in order of importance in my life, sex would not crack the top 20.

2) No.

3) AIDS.

3) ℓP (a Planck length).

4) I yawn more than I fuck.

5) I don't have one.

... Easy for you to say, that's like Warren Buffett saying money isn't of great importance to him.

Also: Are you happy for Bree and Charlie?

I'm not claiming to speak for Tyler, but I mean... I used to have a job as a dishwasher. The very last thing I ever wanted to do in my personal life is wash a dish. I understand. I would do it, because you know... you need to wash dishes from time to time, but it certainly wasn't on my priority list.

Also: Are you happy for Bree and Charlie?

Why would he give a shit?

1) That answered nothing... but I'll act like you said "I've already conquered the world with my penis".

2) Me neither.

3) Sorry I joked.

4) Good Lord!

5) How about sneezing?

6) I hate you.

Have a wonderful day.

Don't. I'm very fat now. I just don't care.

this article just came out.. instantly thought of you and this thread.