How Much Sex Is Too Much Sex? – OZY

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE

Because when you find out there’s such a thing as too much of a good thing, it might be too late.

Riddle Me This: Gas Station Dick Pills?

EUGENE, SIR: If gas station dick pills are dangerous, why are they still being sold? I’m thinking it’s because they sell, and if they sell it’s because they work, ergo, the warnings are just another scam, like when they wouldn’t admit that steroids were good for building muscle. Why keep us away from medicine that might help? Am I right that Big Pharma wants us to go broke buying Viagra? — Name withheld by request

Dear Mother Trucker: If gas station mini-marts are the new medical standard against which we make health decisions, I’m going to prescribe you two microwave burritos, a bag of Doritos and an unspecified “orange drink.” This might be known as the breakfast of champions if there were any champions who ate like that. But they don’t for a simple reason: No one who cares about their body puts much of anything in it from gas station mini-marts.

If what you’re trying to get comfortable with is the idea that mini-marts wouldn’t sell stuff that kills you, you should probably rethink this. Remember a few years ago when pet food was accidentally killing pets? Or all the food recalls in the past 18 months alone? The watchful eye monitoring what’s commercially available to ingest is never as much watchful as we might like.

And yet they’ve been selling “real spurious Spanish fly” for years, the name itself a remarkable legal limbo act to avoid litigation.

But to answer your question, my guess is that these drugs exist and are profitable on what we should call “the margins.” They’re not expensive enough and don’t cause enough damage in micro to warrant those who consume them being annoyed to drag the manufacturers to court. Also, if they work even a little, most users are not likely to be unhappy. The product packaging has increasingly added small print that advises users to consult their physician before consuming said product. That’s called CYA, or covering your ass.

My advice: If your health insurance won’t pay for Viagra, generic solutions can be purchased — legally — online. They are a much better bet than something called Stree Overlord that’s wedged between penis enlargement pills and pole-dancer-shaped air fresheners.

Why I Swing

EUGENE, SIR: The shutdown has given us lots of time to think. My husband and I, in better times, swing, and despite wider social efforts to paint us as sexually degenerate, I thank my lucky stars that my husband is man enough to realize that a full range of sexual expression for me involves my needing a penis to be a certain size and stay that way for a certain period of time. I hesitate to say “a long time” because it is what it is and if I generally need 62 minutes to orgasm that’s what it is. Instead of expecting one penis to last that long, I work much better with more than one. So one that lasts for 62 minutes or five that last for 12 minutes each is how we got here. Yes, I am an engineer, but that has nothing to do with my thinking clearly about this. I’m telling you this since in a previous column you used the word “outré” to describe swinging and it’s not. — Trish B.

Dear TB: I’m glad you’ve done the math on this. Some might say that your deep analysis is a version of the lady protesting too much, but, to play devil’s advocate, would there be anything wrong with just saying that you like having sex with five men at once or sequentially? I guess you might then say that if not for people like me using words like “outré,” you would be able to. While I don’t remember which column you refer to, I’m game: So, between consenting adults, is it possible that nothing could be outré?

We may not know what outré is, but we know it when we see it. In 1999, Annabel Chong had sex with 250 men in what was billed as the world’s largest gang-bang. Chong did it as performance art and referenced the Roman empress Messalina, who shared her appetites. Chong’s performance was outré and indeed that was part of its appeal to some. So there is an outré standard and somewhere between Chong and most of us it exists.

But the word was never used in the pejorative sense. Nothing that is human should be strange to us. Not often done, yes. But bizarre? Not really. Final note: Chong, now 48, works as a web developer in California. I imagine the jobs to be fairly similar.

The Limits of Doggy Style

EUGENE, SIR: Doggy style doesn’t usually work for me, unless I lie flat. Even when my lover’s legs are outside of mine, the problem is that arching his back for any amount of time is painful for him. When I lie flat, I get good friction in the front, but it’s gone when I rise up. Suggestions? — Where’s Gumby?

Dear Dammit: You could find a man with a longer penis or one who is more flexible. There the simplest solution, though, is to work a pillow or a balance ball so that you get the frontal pressure and your doesn’t have to try to either pull off Downward-Facing Dog or grow a larger penis. Give it a try and keep me posted.