Jack’s Answers

1. I’ve had three orgasms in about fifteen minutes. I have no doubt that some women have done this, but I bet not a lot of guys have. I experienced this on Sunday night, though it was by no means the first time. I know that I’m not as young as I used to be, but some night when we don’t have to worry about getting up early or being interrupted by a crying baby, I’d like to see if I can keep the pace for a full hour, i.e. twelve orgasms in sixty minutes. I bet I could, especially if Jill was the one coaxing them out of me, though I’m curious as to changes in volume over the course of the hour.

2. I once had an open warrant for my arrest for about sixteen months without knowing about it. I’m not a career criminal or anything; this occurred when I was younger and shall we say much less judicious about the sort of folks with whom I associated. I’d participated in a certain indiscretion and explained my involvement to the police upon request but due to a miscommunication I thought they’d gotten what they needed from me. Turns out they hadn’t, and when I found out that I was wanted – holy crap, wanted? Doesn’t that make me sound like a badass outlaw or something? – I immediately cleared the matter up. The scariest thing about it was that, the entire time that this warrant was out, had I been pulled over for a traffic violation they would have run my driver’s license and immediately arrested me.

3. I kissed the Blarney Stone.

4. After experiencing extreme disillusionment sitting in a cubicle, I started my own business almost a decade ago. Today the fact that I am strictly management means that I can afford to spend my days raising my daughter, though the fact that I remember what it was like before I was management means that I never fail to let my employees know that they are appreciated.

5. I once rode a mule down the Grand Canyon. In my early twenties I would road trip to Lake Havasu for Spring Break, and one year a friend and I decided to take a mule ride. Though a fun once-in-a-lifetime experience, once we were on our mules it was clear that neither of us had any idea how steep the trail would be. Or, for that matter, just how long the ride was going to be. It was interminably long, the weather was hotter than we were prepared for, and by the time we got to the end of the ride (we only went as far as Plateau Point), we really wished a helicopter would swoop down from the sky, extend a rope ladder, and carry us the hell out of there, mules be damned. When it was over, and we were both chugging beers on a party boat back at the lake, we acknowledged that we were glad we did it.

1. I’ve never crank called anyone. While I understand that, in the ’80s when I came of age, this sort of thing was for some a mischievous childhood rite of passage, much like toilet-papering or egging someone’s house, I never partook in this annoying but probably harmless activity. I’m guessing that my reluctance to do this stems from the fact that, during my childhood, my family was the subject of frequent crank calls, and I guess that while I was willing to do things of which my parents would not approve, annoying random strangers was not one of them. Additionally, I was always convinced that the first number I crank-called would have a trace attached for the purpose of locating a kidnapped child, and that I would be hauled off to juvie without benefit of trial. Here I must acknowledge that crank calling has almost certainly diminished in frequency over the last fifteen to twenty years as Caller I.D. has gone from being a novelty to a universal concept. But I include this have-not with the understanding that I am comparing myself with the rest of my generation, and not the current crop of young people for whom Star-69 is probably meaningless.

2. I’ve never smoked a cigarette. Both of my parents smoked when I was a kid, and I always found it gross. While on many occasions during my formative years I gave in to peer pressure, did things that I knew I shouldn’t, and otherwise demonstrated questionable judgment and decision-making skills, I knew that smoking after years of giving my parents shit for it would make me a hyporcite, and I always resisted the temptation. Because, you know, an activity that stinks up your body and your clothes, wrinkles your skin, and leads to a variety of terminal illnesses is seriously tempting.

3. I haven’t seen more than one or two episodes of Lost, a series that about 75% of my friends not only watched, but also took for granted that I watched as well. Between 2004 and 2010 the number of times I had to deflect requests to discuss the latest episode by explaining that I don’t watch it (usually including the specific phrase, “No, I didn’t watch The X-Files either”) probably amounted to a hundred or more. It’s an easy assumption to make; it was a very popular show that appealed specifically to my demographic: Geeks in their late twenties/early thirties. But apparently so ridiculous was the notion that I didn’t count myself amongst the Lostaways that I had to explain it to the same person several times during the series’ run.

4. I never played high school sports. To this day, I have no idea why this is.

5. I have not owned or regularly used an Apple product in seven years. I’ve owned a couple Apple computers, including a Macintosh Powerbook laptop in 1993 and a Macintosh Performa desktop in 1994. Of these, the only one that met my expectations for functionality was the Powerbook. When the Performa crashed, I made the switch to PC and although I understand that the Apple brand is much more popular today than it was then, I haven’t looked back. A couple years after the iPod was introduced, I wanted an easy way of listening to my impressive digital music collection on the go, so I bought one. Like the Performa, it didn’t live up to my expectations; it couldn’t hold a battery charge long enough to transfer my music, and took more than a day or two to fully re-charge. I assume based on the iPod’s market share compared to other digital music players that most people who own one enjoy it, but I’ve jumped ship to a competing brand.

Some sort of specimen in a jar that my high school biology teacher kept displayed on a shelf in the back of his classroom. No one had a clue as to what it was, though the general consensus amongst much of the class was that it was the penis of some kind of animal. In retrospect I doubt that this is in fact what the specimen was, though I’m at a loss to offer an alternate guess. It seemed like some manner of medical curiosity that one might see at a carnival sideshow in the days of yore.

Oddest: When I was probably nine or ten years old, I used to flail my right arm out to my side as I walked. This wasn’t some sort of nervous tic; this was a voluntary behavior. I’m not actually sure why I did this, but I remember it occurring with regularity for probably the better part of a year until I realized that to most people I probably looked like an idiot, not unlike John Cleese in that Monty Python “Ministry of Funny Walks” sketch, but less funny.

Kinkiest: I don’t know how I can answer this. I’ve done relatively kinky things, but I don’t know that anything I’ve ever done is much kinkier than anything else, certainly not enough to be singled out as the kinkiest. I could list some of the kinkier things I’ve done, but I’m sure most have been mentioned and/or described elsewhere in this blog. Hell, how about Porn and Pizza? I’ll go with that.

Craziest: I once smuggled something across the Mexican border into the U.S. Nothing too outrageous, just more alcohol than an individual is allowed to carry. Again, this was in my younger and more reckless days (pre-9/11), when repercussions were the sort of thing you worried about after the fact, if you worried about them at all. If I was caught, I don’t know that I would have been arrested – I might have – but I’m sure I would have been fined at the least. At any rate, it didn’t matter because they accepted my “nothing to declare” with a wave-through, and my friends and I spent the next couple days wasted.

Jill’s Answers

1. I drank melting ice atop Mendenhall Glacier, a twelve-mile-long block of ice located near Juneau, Alaska. It was the freshest water I have ever tasted, and I’d like to return someday before the glacier is gone, if only so I can taste it again.

2. When I was in my twenties I had sex on a play structure at a local park. It was after dark, the park was pretty much deserted, and there was probably very little chance of being seen by someone passing by, but if the police had noticed us and decided to come see what we, two adults, were doing atop a play structure, we might have been in trouble. Fortunately, we didn’t get caught and the risk we were taking made this an experience I will never forget. This isn’t the only time that I have ever had sex in public, but it is probably the only time that I had sex in an area intended primarily for children, unless you count the time that I did it at a Toys ‘R’ Us.

3. I saw Sha Na Na in concert. It depresses me to think that most of the people who read this probably have no idea what Sha Na Na is.

4. I have visited Disneyland at least once a year for more than two decades.

5. For fifty-two consecutive weeks in 2010, Jack and I submitted photos to The Other Half-Nekkid Thursday. This is more my thing than Jack’s, since the pictures were of me and not him. It was exciting to bare my body and my soul, and the positive, sometimes very enthusiastic comments people left make me proud to visit the site and look at myself.

1. I’ve always wanted to go to New York, but I never have. I’ve traveled the world extensively, especially throughout Europe, but the one place I want to go more than any other is New York. A few years ago Jack went to the East Coast to follow AC/DC on tour, and because of my work schedule I couldn’t join him. Plus it was a guy’s trip and I wasn’t invited anyway. While I envied him for all the fun he was having, I wished I could have flown out to meet him at least while he was in New York. Now we are parents, and traveling is more difficult. But it’s on my bucket list.

2. I’ve never broken a bone. Maybe this is less common today, when kids are encouraged to stay inside and watch TV or play video games, but when I was a kid I was very active, constantly getting into the sort of scrapes that children were expected to. Today I am a teacher, and if a student comes into class with the amount of cuts and bruises that I had all the time, I am supposed to discretely ask the child how he or she got them.

3. I’ve never lived in more than one state. Despite my travels, I have always been a California girl, and I’m not sure that this will ever change, nor that I would want it to. Despite the fact that the cost of living here is astronomical, California is my home.

4. I’ve been working since age sixteen and have probably held twenty-five different jobs. While I’ve left jobs for a variety of reasons, it was always my choice to do so. I have never been fired.

5. I’ve never enjoyed sushi. I’ve eaten it on many different occasions, usually when invited out with friends or a mixed group of people, and I’ve just never liked it. I know it’s not the sushi, as I’ve eaten it at higher-end restaurants and bars, not just crappy low-class places where the staff don’t use quality ingredients or wash their hands. Literally every time I’ve eaten sushi I’ve been sick afterwards.

In the area where Jack and I currently live, which includes the city where I grew up, there is a woman who wanders the streets wearing only a T-shirt that barely reaches her ass, and a pair of hospital booties. Now, I know that this probably sounds incredibly sexy to many of you, especially given the fact that this is literally all she wears (no panties), but it’s unfortunately not as hot as you may be thinking. She’s been a familiar sight for probably ten years or more, and the fact that she lives on the street has obviously taken its toll on her. I assume that she’s been picked up for indecent exposure (as well as for psychiatric evaluation), but for whatever reason when she is released she immediately goes back to wearing her usual outfit.

Oddest: This is going to sound like a cop-out, but I can’t think of anything odd. I wish I had something to share, especially after reading Jack’s weird childhood quirk. But I wouldn’t want to share anything that weird. It sounds like someone had a touch of OCD.

Kinkiest: Masturbating for the viewing pleasure of our friends.

Craziest: The play structure incident described above, as well as the manual-masturbation-on-a-plane incident. As I get older, I still appreciate the thrill of inadvertent (or deliberate) exhibitionism, though now that I am a parent it seems much riskier.