Miscellaneous stuff...

When we left off I was heading out to a rope lab. I won't write extensively about it because I'm guessing most of you aren't interested in the load bearing weight of hemp vs. jute vs. nylon. It was an hour and a half of information like that. It was helpful because the presenter had a set of samples - 20 different kinds of rope of different weights, materials, and manufacturers. So it it was good to be able to handle different kinds of rope and get an idea of what I might want to buy if I get more into it. I don't know why, but I had assumed hemp and jute would be scratchy - like twine or something. And maybe they are initially, but you either buy the rope processed and conditioned, or do that yourself (which sounded extremely tedious, but if it reduces the cost from say, $400 for a rope to to $150, I guess I can see why people do it).

The only other notable thing was that it felt like there was a little bit of a strange dynamic. They had folding chairs set up in rows, I arrived a few minutes early and took a seat in the front row. More people trickled in and eventually there was about 25 people, most of them half my age (which I expected). We did introductions and I said I was an "aspiring" top. Well, during the session the presenter was making mega eye contact with me. It felt like I was getting a personal presentation. I haven't quite figured out if it was -
"Here's a newbie, let's make her feel welcome"
"Here's a community elder, I must pay respect" - or -
"Here's somebody fresh who I haven't bored to death already with all of my arcane rope knowledge". 😂

And then in the middle of the presentation one of the other "experts" looked directly at me and said "Since you're new - when he's talking about a "bite" that's the place exactly halfway down a length of rope where you double it back on itself". That's actually the one rope term I do know, haha! It seemed a bit condescending but since I was completely lost the last time I came, I can't really blame him.

Bottom line....nylon rope, which is what I bought, holds more weight and doesn't require processing and doesn't wear out as fast. So for a newbie it seems like the way to go. Experienced people seem to prefer the natural fibers because they're less slippery and hold a knot better.

Last night I went to a swanky music nightclub, the Dakota, with my girlfriend J. We were there to see the Cactus Blossoms. We lucked out buying tickets - they have a few big four person half-circle booths, very comfy, and they sell tickets to them in two blocks of two. J. bought two of the seats in a booth and apparently no one wanted the awkwardness of sharing a booth with strangers, so the other two seats went unsold and we had the booth to ourselves.

It was a very mellow show. The guys explained that they were coming off of a summer and fall of touring where they needed to do "high energy" material so they were taking advantage of this small club environment to slow things down a bit. (Not to mention an audience of well to do stodgy older people hahah! No, they didn't really say it but I thought it). About an hour into it, I was getting a little tired of the lovelorn songs and was ready for a little more energy. They did close out with one of my faves, Change your ways or die

This video is about six years old but the guys (they're brothers) are as good looking as ever.

Today was another edition of the daytime kinksters party. Nothing very exciting to report, although I and two of my women friends got to initiate a young newbie. We traded off topping him and went fairly easy on him (I did, anyway). It was a good party - lots of action and a good variety of scenes including a couple of fire scenes. I spoke to the guy who had done one of them as he was leaving the party and said I'd be interested in having that done to me at the next party. So I'll report on that in March if it happens.