Protester holding "consenting adult" sign.

I want to lend my support to BlondSlave and CruelSensei and the entire DFP community.    There latest fight with the Montclair Zoning board does seem to look like basic discrimination.

I live nearby the store and drive by frequently.  I have been a semi-regular store customer for years (really some of my best and most favorite items I own are from there).   I started shopping there shortly after they purchased DFP from the original owners and moved it to Bloomfield Ave.

My first visit to the store was the first time I have ever had a sales person offer to physically strike me!  She asked me to turn around and then proceeded to throw her whole body arm strength into a nice beautiful arc of black leather until it expertly landed into a pleasant thud against my back.

That flogger is now hanging in my closet.

I even attended one of the first parties they threw in the basement.   It was a smaller space then, and overall the party was actually kind of cramped and overcrowded (I know they have since almost tripled the party space since then) but the people were all genuine and mostly sincere.    I never went to another party there, but mostly that was for two simple reasons:  My Ex and my Schedule.    I had originally purchased memberships with my Ex, and out of respect for her, I didn’t really want to attend in her absence.   She attended another party or two after our breakup, and she even invited a few of her friends to go along also.    I didn’t want to complicate the situation but accidental showing up myself one night.

But more recently I just have a hard time getting a free Saturday that aligned with their party schedule.    And when I do get a free Saturday night, I tend to focus my time with Delilah and for a number of good reasons we have been less “out” in the scene lately.   More focused on each other. (Yay).

So overall I’m not REALLY aware of all the facts of the situation.  I only know what I have read online (at fetlife and NJ.COM etc).

But I kind of wonder if DFP really played their cards correctly with the town.   A public demonstration for BDSM rights is fine, but if it was meant to sway the zoning board I worry that it might have backfired.

Delilah is all ruffled when reading the comments on both new articles (NJ.COM and Baristanet).   Sometimes I admire that wonderful youthful sense of justice she has at times.   While the internet allows people like US to keep our anonymity it also protects idiots and their own rants.    Half the time I think people say stupid crap because they like the attention it gets.  But many of the comments reveal the real level of stupidity that most of the readers have about the kink community.

I wonder how wise it was to turn this into a public fight.   It’s not that I don’t support everybody’s right to protest – I’ve given my hard $$ to organizations like NSCF.   I think that this is eventually a fight that is worth fighting, and it’s a fight that eventually we will win.

I think the problem is that if you are trying to convince Montclair that your basement parties are “private” and have no visible or negative impact on the community, having a public protest with people in full fetish wear, in broad daylight, doesn’t really help convince people.   It plays right into the opposition’s argument that this is “deviant” behavior and should not be allowed anywhere inside their beloved little suburban hamlet.

I think the other problem is that the Zoning Board is made up of politicians.   I’m not sure if they are elected or appointed, but they are beholden to their community at large.   By turning this into a public issue, you just increase the number of terrified mothers calling up the city council and ranting “what about the children!”.   Any zoning board members who might have secretly approved of the place, are now gonna worry of the scrutiny they may receive by approving.

It seems like DFP clearly made a decision early on – they KNEW they wanted to build a dungeon.  I think they even chose the new location originally with full plans on expanding into the basement.   But by failing to get “pre-approval” from the town before they proceeded, they opened themselves up to this sort of legal challenge.     Zoning laws are notoriously difficult to defeat, and Montclair has used them to prevent things like drive-thru fast-food places and other businesses they don’t like.    Whether you classify the basement as a “sex-club” or “entertainment venue” or “social gathering” it won’t matter if the town has basically has classified you as a retail store.   They won’t argue about whether you can do that in Montclair, they will simply declare you can’t do it at that address – in that basement!

It’s true that the DFP store has been in Montclair for 30 years, but most of that was as a very small boutique shop tucked away in the Upper Montclair Mews.  Cute.  Small – and I don’t think it even faced the street itself.  But no venues for parties (that I know of – I myself never went in!).

I understand why DFP may not have wanted to get permission from the town first.   Because in all likelihood, on first view, most towns would immediately reject the idea any way they could.   But at least then they could have considered other locations before risking their hard time and money building a playspace there.

In the end I with DFP every success in challenging the zoning ruling.   But I think the real lesson learned here is to follow what OTHER successful kink enterprises do – contact community members EARLY!

For TesFEST (and other similar kink events that I know), usually the organizers contacted the local police long before they even booked the hotel.  And they also made sure that the Hotel venue owners were well aware of what sort of activities were gonna happen, before they invite all the kinksters in.   Not every town or hotel will be supportive, but asking for permission first avoids problems like this later!

When kink.com bought the San Francisco Armory, there was a lot of commotion in the local community about their beloved landmark being transformed into one of the largest porn studio lots in the world.  Ableit that was San Francisco (and Montclair is pretty far from SF),  kink.com has made a LOT of efforts to demonstrate to the neighborhood that they would be good neighbors.   When people came to protest at local city meetings, they showed up to hear their fears and complaints.    They invited people in for tours.   Of course that site was already “pre-zoned” correctly for them, so they didn’t have to argue that they had any “right” to film porn.  They already did according to the existing Zoning laws.

But Zoning Laws CAN prevent you from doing things that are completely legal.   Zoning Laws can’t prevent legal BDSM parties from existing, but they CAN tell people where they can do it.  That might not seem fair, but unfortunately that legal fight was lost years ago.

I would also recommend that if the Zoning Board denies them approval – they should at least demand for the Zoning  Board to tell them where in Montclair such a place like this would be permitted.    Because if the Zoning Board can fail to find a single spot in all of the town that would permit a legal and private gathering of adults, then it bolsters any legal case you have later on against the Board.    But it also forces them to classify your activity into the existing Zoning classifications, and that opens up the opportunity for DFP (or some other organization) to move the dungeon into a “pre” approved spot (much how kink.com avoided Zoning issues with the Armory).

What I would recommend is stop arguing that this is about civil rights.   Because that’s just gonna confirm in all the small-minded idiots heads that you really are just a freaky fucked up minority who wants to encourage unspeakable acts!   I’m not saying that it ISN’T about civil rights, but I doubt that is really gonna change be a successful argument in a Zoning dispute.

What you REALLY need to argue, is that places like DFP are an asset to the community.  That they are good neighbor and IMPROVE the quality of life in Montclair.   I would encourage them to invite the freaked-out people  in for coffee and donuts.   Invite the members of the zoning board in.   Give people a real idea of what the kink community is all about.

And while it’s true that often people want to dress up in leather and dog collars, but doing it in public at City Hall is probably not going to help you win the war.

You can’t really win this war until you can kill the misinformation – these aren’t deviants bent on wrecking the town.   These are EXISTING COMMUNITY members- doctors, lawyers, moms and dads – who are just getting together to express themselves.     It’s exactly what decent liberal towns like Montclair should be encouraging.

EDIT:

I ranted in a few other places: http://www.montclairtimes.com/NC/0/2623.html (as “mark”)

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/montclair_shuts_down_fetish_sh.html#4687369

This Week’s Picks
Another Night With My Beer Buddy
“She nodded, her eyes closing with pleasure, his arm working.”

Blowjob in Red
“My voice descended into lust.”

Her dirty talk got me off. twice.
“Why does that turn me on so goddamn much?”

Sugasm Editor
Sex Work And Honesty: The Correct Answer

Editor’s Choice
Stockinged Feet

More Sugasm
Join the Sugasm

See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.

(Sugasm participants should re-post all the links above within a week. The following links may be excluded as long as you include all the above links.)

Thoughts on Sex and Relationships
Is Sex Positivity Bad for Feminism?
The Mark

NSFW Pics, Videos and Audio
Deviantly Different -HNT
Katrina Darrell Bikini Pictures from American Idol

Sex and Politics
It’s All Over Now Baby Blue…

Erotic Writing and Experiences
Ah, those heels
The Classless in Stripperville
Domination Fantasy
Fucking Ratios, Part 1
Fun With Rose
Kiss Me
Lisa’s torments 2 & 3
Naughty Photoshoot!
A Perfect Welcome
The Reunion
Shivers
Wet. Confession #258
Wet Spot #1 (Crescent Moons)
Wild Dream

Sex Advice
Nookie Tip
Solo Lady Love – Women and Masturbation
Steps Towards Enjoying Sex

BDSM & Fetish
Carnal Conversations
Cop Performs Subdrop Aftercare
Dream Whore
Explaining Cell Popping
A Pain-Drenched Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss
Poetic license

Sex News, Reviews, and Interviews
The Hitachi Magic Wand – How it saved (or literally started up) my sex life
Pasties: Tassel Twirling 101
Race Play Interview, Part I
Radio Interview Tonight!

But a while ago we came across a very interesting method to “cure” subdropness (or at least minimize its effects).   We found it online somewhere (FetLife?) and tried it out.

The cure is … Pain.

The idea is a bit counter-intuitive, but basically what you do is repeat a new scene – albeit usually a smaller “lighter” scene.   I’ll usually just do a hard spanking, with a some nipple pinching.   For just a few minutes.

I think the LOGIC behind it has to do with brain chemistry.   The explanation for sub-drop has to do with the massive amount of endorphins and other chemical releases that occur during a hard and long scene.    Endorphins, hormones, adrenaline – lots of brain chemicals pumping at full strength.   It’s really WHY we all do what we do.

The next day, your “brain” is a bit empty.  Not TOTALLY empty, but a bit.   It usually needs some time to rebuild and restore those chemicals.   The more often you play, the faster your brain replenishes what’s missing, but sub-drop is pretty much a given.   I think that a lot of those chemicals require a FEW nights of sleep to totally restore balance.

But lately we have been trying out doing a small morning scene, the morning after a heavy one.  And it SEEMS to help.   It’s not a cure, but performing a second “mini” scene seems to encourage the brain to squeeze out a few more chemicals that are hiding somewhere – and they tend to due the trick to keep away the soul-crushing depression.

I usually try to make the “mini” scene HARD enough to get her heart pumping – I look for the normal visual queues that she is definitely alert – eyes, breathing, etc.  I always feel a bit guilty,  since normally when I do it, she has just woken up and is groggy and depressed and tired.   And is often NOT turned on.   Which normally would seem like a terribly selfish time to be whacking her ass (especially when her ass might already have bruises!).  But sometimes our jobs as a Dom is to make our subs do what they need to do.

And it seems to work.

Today however, we skipped the mini scene.   We both woke up too late.   And tired.  And cranky.

Normally I drop Delilah off at the train, and then go to my kids house and get them to school.   And this morning I was running a few minutes late.  No mini-scene.  (I was late AND neglectful!).

When we where in the car, my son called and wanted to know where I was.  This turned out to be a VERY bad time to answer the call, since I was also driving past a cop.   And talking on a cell phone without a hand-free kit is illegal here.

What followed was a rather stressful half hour parked on the side of the road with a cop.  He wanted to see both of our drivers licenses, and seemed suspicious I had something illegal in my car.

He asks, “Do you have anything dangerous in the car”?

My mind flashes on various toys or other things that have been in my car from time to time.   “I don’t think so”.  (Bad answer – for future reference, the correct answer is “no”).

He ran my license and found out I had a old unpaid ticket in the next town over (a ticket for a failure to get my car inspected! – That car took 5 inspections and over $3k to get it to pass! ) and said I couldn’t drive until I paid the ticket.

Later he says “Why did you give me such a weird answer if I asked if you had anything illegal”.    And said – “You didn’t say illegal – you said dangerous!” .   I apparently need a lesson in how to talk to police officers.

So he made Delilah drive my minivan away.  And she HATES my minivan and has always refused to drive it.

I had to talk Delilah through how to turn on my turn signal and pull away.   She had missed her original train and we drove to the NEXT town over to drop her off for the train, so I could start driving again.(which was also the town where I had the ticket!).  The whole affair was an adrenaline rush of it’s own.   Both of us where stressed, and I felt a bit guilty for putting her in that position.

I got a my kids to school and went and paid the outstanding ticket.   I didn’t want to drive around with a “suspended” license.  That’s when I found out my license was fine.  The cop was wrong.  (I get to have one of my tickets dismissed – which is very emotionally satisfying).

About an hour later, Delilah messaged me from class and said that the whole cop affair seemed to help push her a bit out of sub-drop.  It appears ANY sort of adrenaline rush helps!

Although I think I’m gonna go back to just spanking her.  Much less stressful for me.

Moral of the story: So no more skipping morning care scenes!   (And – use my damn cellphone speaker phone!).

Then I got married way too young.  To somebody who also never spent much time in bars.  Actually to somebody who didn’t even drink.

It wasn’t until I was 10 years into my marriage and started doing a lot of business travel, that I found myself in bars.  In bars with an expense account (even nicer).    But I was also still married.

So finally, over a year ago, I found myself “emancipated” from my marriage, and .. omg.. dating!

One of the first woman I met (on CL of all places..) asked me right out.. “Do you pickup a lot of women in bars?”.   This kind of gave my head a full headspin…  she clearly thought I had the ability to pickup women in bars.   Is it possible?

In the end, I think I’m still a pretty shy guy.   My best relationships so far, all started online.   All started with email and IM and lots of opportunity to be literate and whitty (which is easier when you can edit your response).   But walking up to somebody dead cold, that I haven’t met, is still incredibly intimitading.

And to be honest, I’m really not interested in picking up women in bars.  Fetish clubs and parties – yes!  Bars… eh.  Maybe not.  But I figure the same skills are needed.   Single women in bars get flooded with attention.   What does a guy need to do to get noticed?

So, being the nerd that I am, I decided to do what any self respecting educated guy does… research!

So a few weeks ago, after doing some googling, I found this site. And after reading a WHOLE bunch of “testimonials” I forked over $20 and downloaded his “ebooks”.    Although I figured with all the HEAVY SELLING of his book, maybe the author might actually have some skill in selling himself at the same time.  I mean if you can sell yourself in bar, you might be able to sell yourself online.

I’m halfway into the “Double Your Dating” book, which is downloaded as a password protected PDF file.  It is… actually poorly written.   It has some interesting insights, but mostly reads like somebody just rambling on.  Not organized.   After a while it kind felt like I was actually reading the “how to be big jerk” secret journal.

I mean he says “Be Confident” and “Be Dominant”.    Blah, is that it all it took?  But you can’t walk up to a girl and say “I know how to use restraints”.

Oh well.   Maybe I’ll just keep myself focused on using the internet to lure college students into compromising situations.  Or at least one in particular.

This Week’s Picks
The Balance of Power
“A wave of lust coursed through her body at his words”

Betrayal
“What’s this? Evidence of pleasure?”

Secret signals
“I will adore him for it”

Sugasm Editor
Not An Overnight

Editor’s Choice
The Ghost of Abuse

More Sugasm
Join the Sugasm

See also: Fleshbot’s Sex Blog Roundup each Tuesday and Friday.

(Sugasm participants should re-post all the links above within a week. The following links may be excluded as long as you include all the above links.)

Thoughts on Sex and Relationships
The Ass
I forgot
Let the Catfighting Begin
Question #5
My Heart is my Strongest Muscle
No Woman
Owning Slut. Confession #239
Want

Sex Advice
Improving Male Orgasm

NSFW Pics, Videos & Audio
Betty in white stockings
The Blue
Delicate Curves -HNT

Sex News, Reviews, and Interviews
20 Questions with Jiz Lee
Blowjob FAIL – the Blowguard
Hysteria and the Hitachi Magic Wand
Industrial Pleasures – the Hitachi Wand
Interview with Daniel Bergner, author of “The Other Side of Desire”
LELO Liv (And Hot Hunk Hugh Jackman Pix)
Sex Toy Review: Go Ringo Cock Ring

Erotic Writing and Experiences
Blindfolded, in a dark forest
Crowded Elevator
How I Became One Groupie’s Real-Life Guitar Hero
Instant Messaging Fun! #1
Oxygen
The Scent Of A Woman
She almost killed me
Sick Day, Part 2
A Sweet and Dirty Love Fuck Story or The Librarian and the Writer
Video Nasty
Watching Girls III, Strike a Pose
What we did on Valentine’s Day

BDSM & Fetish
Diary of a Futa (part 6)
Dream (100 words)
An Enigmatic Angel Returns
On display – Moroccan fantasy 2
Passion
So where’s the missus?
To be or not to be
A weekend with Miss Susan – My version

Tomorrow evening we will be driving up to San Francisco for the SF Citadel party.    I went last year, and really liked both the people and the play space.

And then Sunday we will be enjoying the Fair, and then slumming back to the East Coast on the redeye.

So we will both post some blogs about our adventures.

Yay!

Well, yes I do.. it’s the HANDS!  The human hands behind the dolls.  They kind of freak me out.

Of course when they hold Barbie by the back of her head and turn her head around, I can’t HELP but think it’s a little BDSM-y…  I know.  I’m a freak.

Is this new?  Did Barbie commercials always have a hand?  Or did somebody decide that there HAD to be hands in the commercials so consumers knew they weren’t buying tiny little spirited robots?

Click here to view the embedded video.

(This is a cross-post this from Delilah’s site.) Not gonna make a habit of cross-posting, but I like this one and want to take credit for it!).

Last night we finally found time to get Delilah over my knee and deliver on our promise to the Friends of Jefferson fundraiser.

We only got a very small number of direct pledges from our site, but a promise is a promise.

Anyways, Delilah also had to answer for a several infractions of our her own over the last few weeks. We are developing a new routine where she is gagged and I go over her daily slave tasks for each day since the last “review”. She explained the rules in a previous post. So while lying across my lap, I used my laptop to go over all the email logs. For each day, I made sure she sent me her required slave reports and her daily picture. Of course she had a very busy few weeks so I had found MANY missing required slave tasks. She gets particularly attention when I’m missing my daily photo.

She had cope with my bare hand for each one of those. The gag is especially fun because for some reason she still tries to argue with me over each infraction.

I find the arguing with me a little funny. If I had just grabbed her and started spanking her ass for NO REASON (cause I wanted to….) she never complains. Being spanked as an “object” gets her hot and wet. But if I’m spanking her for a reason – because of an infraction or a punishment, then for some reason she gets very frustrated if I’m doing it “unjustly”. She gets frustrated enough that she actually tries to talk through the gag. Which is simultaneously funny and a little hot. Especially since I can just add another strike for being defiant.

I saved the our “donated” lashes for the end. Overall we owed 6 hard lashes to our readers. For these I added the blindfold and switched to using the metal and rattan canes. She also received a few extra hard cane lashes for some stolen orgasms (masturbating without permission). So, in total she received about 8 or so very hard cane lashes. I think I always intentionally lose count, would rather just keep striking her until I think she’s done anyways.

She did ask for a small break in the middle of the caning, which she got. The pain was quite difficult and there were tears. I gave her the option to stop, but she wanted to finish her punishment, and did so quite beautifully.

I don’t consider myself “in the scene” or “in a lifestyle” even though by all public definitions I seem to be both.   For the longest time I have resisted any notion of using anything else but my real name.  Anything else seemed wrong.

Don’t even ask me to take on one of the more lofty titles:  Master MarkOfTheCane! Sir MarksAlot!  I can’t really walk around in public and have people call me “Master” while I keep a straight face.   When asked, I always gave people my name.    I don’t have two personas.  Just one.  And this one enjoys a healthy dose of domination and submission with his sex partners.   I’m not a superhero with a costume (actually there are few costumes hanging in the closet).  But the need for keeping secret identities seems to be par for the course.  Welcome to America.

Delilah calls me “Sir”.    She has already given me her gift of submission, so with it comes the term of respect.   That fits.  That works.   She likes saying it, and I like hearing it.

But unless you have decided to kneel in front me yourself, please.. just call me Mark.  Mr. Swell if you must.

I don’t keep my life a secret, but I don’t advertise it either.  My kids know that I “date”.  But like most sane parents, I don’t advertise the details of my sex life to my kids.   They REALLY don’t want to know.  (I’ve had my older kid cover his ears and leave the room, when I started to talk about sex.  And believe me, I wasn’t being overly explicit.)  If they ask, I’ll tell them (they will eventually ask, I’m sure).

So my coworkers don’t know.  Some know I have a “too young for me” girlfriend.  But I’m clearly in a midlife crisis anyways (they are probably right about that assessment), so walking around with a chick half your age is par of the course.

Most of my friends don’t know.   I told one friend/coworker.  She seems to have taken it in stride.  Although she’s been to the Folsom St. Fair also.   So I trusted that she wouldn’t find me the freakiest guy she’s ever met.

But nobody talks about sex.  Everybody HAS sex (well, at least most healthy adults do).  But it doesn’t matter how “vanilla” or “alternative” your sex life is.   Society says: “Go ahead and DO whatever you want, as long as it’s consensual and legal.  But please god, don’t TALK ABOUT it!”

So how do you talk about sex?  How do you talk about “socially unacceptable sex”?  How do I do this without affecting my job, stressing out my kids,  and generally been seen as a freak?

I’ll try this.  Stick on a new name.  Start a blog.  I’ll even change the name tag when I go to Folsom St. or TesFEST or whatever other “scene” event.   It’s been done before.  It will be done again.

And now maybe I get to talk about whatever the fuck I want.

As for collaredcoed.com, I’ll still be making frequent appearances.  But I consider that Delilah’s blog.  It’s meant to be her voice, her space.

Although I expect we may be doing a lot of “cross-posting” between the sites.

But it’s the future.  We ALL get our 15 million hits of fame.   I don’t need to steal hers.

Mostly I’m just gonna blog whatever-the-fuck I want.