by Laurelin

I have always felt a little indifferent about Valentine’s Day. It seems cliché to hate it, stupid to love it, and all in all, just another day of the week. I don’t think I have ever had a spectacular Valentine’s Day even when I was in a relationship. In college, my boyfriend at the time told me we were supposed to go to dinner and then he wound up not being able to afford it. I was crushed. But I remember one other day, in the middle of the summer when he left a single red rose under my windshield wipers, and he hid so when I looked around the parking lot I didn’t see him until when I turned around, he was right there kissing me. It was one of the most romantic moments of my life, and it was also just another day.

A few Valentine’s days ago my boyfriend at the time and I went to a romantic dinner at a candlelit historic restaurant in Boston’s Beacon Hill district. The tables were so close together and we were both so tall that we looked like bulls in a china shop trying to be classy and quiet amidst normal sized couples. We wound up eating so much food and dessert that we couldn’t even make room for drinks afterwards, and we were both massively uncomfortable for the rest of the evening. Sexy.

I feel like Valentine’s Day is just one of those days that winds up making people feel bad, so I usually just do what I always do on every other day: hit the bars. If anyone is out at a bar in Boston on Valentine’s Day chances are they’re single. The odds of running into a guy lying about having a girlfriend on Valentine’s Day are slim to none, so I look forward every year to some guilt free bar scene action.

One year ago today I was with four single friends. One guy had just been dumped (they got back together), one had just been snubbed my by best friend and was nursing a bruised ego (he is now happily in a relationship), and then there was me and my friend Lindsay, two girls who can’t seem to be tamed. We were drinking twenty three ounce Harpoon UFO drafts and knocking back shots of Jameson when I glanced up and happened to meet eyes with a guy standing across the bar. I leaned into my friend Jay not-so-stealthily, “he’s CUTE!” I whispered, quickly looking away, my cheeks burning.

Not two seconds later I had a shot of Patron placed in front of me, and the bartender gestured towards that guy across the bar. “It’s on him,” the bartender said. I looked up and the guy was holding a shot as well, and I knew that there was no turning back now, I had to rip this shot and act like tequila didn’t make me throw up in my mouth. Turning down salt and lime, I got the shot down the hatch and stood up to go say thanks. I flashed my best smile and held out my hand, and I met Dan.

I remember leaving the bar that night with a smile stuck to my face. Who goes to a bar and meets a guy on Valentine’s Day? It was perfect, so sappy, so lame, and oh my god, why couldn’t I stop smiling? That night was the start of something that wound up being silly, tumultuous, fun and pretty important. Dan has become a staple in my life, someone I call when I need advice, need a drinking partner, need a pep talk on getting over an ex. We just got back from an 11 day cruise with a few other friends, and I couldn’t have asked for a better partner in crime with whom to spend that time in paradise with. Looking back one year later I can’t help but still have a smile stuck on my face.

It’s funny, how life works out. I always thought that Valentine’s Day was just another day, and it is — but you never know when life is going to hand you someone special — and as always, extra points when that someone special is holding a shot of tequila with your name on it.

[..]

By Daniel Robert Epstein

I don’t know a ton about strippers but if I was able to pick and choose them at will, Diablo Cody would definitely be the one for me. Cody is an intelligent, sexy and beautiful writer who went on a hilarious experiment a few years ago. A somewhat nice girl growing, Cody moved from Chicago to Minneapolis to be with a guy she met over the internet. After working some crappy jobs and being bored Cody decided to enter the world of sex work. Over the course of a year she was a stripper, a phone sex worker and a peep show girl. Now she’s chronicled all that in her new book, Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper. The book has also led her to write the screenplay, Juno, for a major Hollywood director.

Read our exclusive interview with Diablo Cody on SuicideGirls.com.

by SG’s Contributors & Team Agony

Valentine’s Day isn’t a bed of roses for everyone – especially those who are single. Here, the SG Blog’s brain trust share their strategies for surviving the Hallmark Day devoted to lovers.

1. Two words. Ben & Jerry’s. – Sash Suicide

2. Chocolate, booze and drugs. – SnakePlissken

3. Make yourself a fuck-ton of cookies, and eat ’em all. (Or send me some!) – Lyxzen Suicide

4. Make heart shaped pancakes. Tearing them in half and eating them is delicious, barbaric, and therapeutic. Cover them with strawberry syrup so they look bloody. – Laurelin SG

5. Send yourself flowers or treat yourself to something nice. – Rambo Suicide

6. Do something nice for yourself, and remember that Valentine’s Day means we’re halfway through the last full month of winter. Fuck winter and all of its frosty bullshit! – Perdita Suicide

7. Call in lovesick from work, and indulge in a little erotica. – Atlea Suicide

8. Buy a sex toy and get down with yourself 😉 – Rambo Suicide

9. Stock up on whiskey and batteries. – Sassie Suicide

10. Strip clubs and liquor works for me. I hear there’s a strip club in Iowa where you can bring your own beer. I’m very excited about this. – Justin Beckner

11. Put on your favorite lingerie because it makes YOU feel sexy, treat yourself to a heart-shaped box of quality chocolates, and watch something that reminds you that being single/alone on Valentine’s Day is better than being married to an axe murderer – The Shining, for example. – Clio Suicide

12. Do not watch rom-coms. I repeat it: don’t watch rom-coms. You don’t want to do it. All those movies have happy endings, and a happy ending now can lead to never ending tears or immense anger. Don’t do it. – Dalila Suicide

13. Grab some popcorn and watch horror movies where the cute couples come to a sticky end (ie. The Devil’s Rejects). – Aadie Suicide

14. Take an overnight trip somewhere and treat yourself well, and pretend Valentine’s Day isn’t happening. – RIn Suicide

15. Hide under a rock. – Nicole Powers

16. Move back and forth across the international dateline to avoid it. – Zach Roberts

17. Take over the world, and declare an end to Valentine’s Day. – Elea Suicide

18. Try to get abducted by aliens. Maybe the dating scene is better on Mars. – Aadie Suicide

19. Move to Ethiopia – they’ve never heard of it there (source). Of course they’ve probably never heard of Jersey Shore either, so it’s a mixed bag. – Zach Roberts

20. Whatever you do, don’t move to Japan because they have two Valentine’s Days there! On February 14, girls give boys chocolate, and on March 14, boys who’ve received chocolate from girls have to give some back. – Brad Warner

21. Go out dancing at a club that plays house music. Holidays don’t exist for those maniacs. – Laurelin SG

22. Avoid social networks. Everyone has in their contact list someone who is madly in love and will post some cheesy glittery Valentine pic together with an annoying “I WUV UUUU” message. Ok, Linkedin is a exception. You’re allowed to go there. – Dalila Suicide

23. Troll the happy couples. Go out for a romantic dinner by yourself. Every time you hear a couple near by getting intensely mushy, rudely interrupt them. Start with simple things like: “Can I use your salt?” Then raise the stakes. – A.J. Focht

24. Throw a Valentine’s Day Massacre party. Dress up as your favorite mobster, police officer, or flapper, fill your bathtub (and Tommy water gun) with gin and put on some movies that feature it like The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre and Some Like It Hot. – Bob Suicide

25. Make a date with your single friends. Have everyone bring photos of their ex lovers. Have a nice BBQ and burn them! – Dorsal Suicide

26. Invite one (or ten!) of your other single buddies over for an XBox showdown, game night shenanigans (I recommend Catchphrase, Apples to Apples, or the Seinfeld version of Clue), or, if you’re artsy-fartsy like me, host a craft night! – Lyxzen Suicide

27. Host a spin the bottle party. – Rin Suicide

28. Invite the hottest single friends you know…and have an anti-Valentine orgy. Way cheaper than springing for flowers, chocolate, and dinner and everyone gets off (please practice safe sex). And the photos of the night for sure won’t bore your friends. – Steve Altman

29. Get a job at Hallmark and fuck with every V-Day card, substituting “love” for “douche” thus causing breakups and general emotional upset world wide. Misery loves Hallmark. – Darrah de jour

30. Carry a sharpie with you at all times and doodle a broken line on hearts everywhere you go. – Atlea Suicide

31. Pop Valentine’s Day balloons. – Rambo Suicide

32. Play Call Of Duty: Black Ops all day and shoot virtual people until you feel better. – Elea Suicide

33. Read the work of great philosophers, Arthur Schopenhauer for example. And no, it’s not boring. Schopenhauer believed that love and sexual impulse merely serves the will of life in its effort to perpetuate itself. Meaning we’re being tricked by nature with love. But we’re over that. Falling in love is so 1760. Embrace nihilism instead of a lover. – Dalila Suicide

34. Just think of it this way: every couple out there that is spending a crap load of money on flowers, dinner, and chocolates will end up having the same sex they had the night before for free. At least you’re saving $150 by not celebrating Valentine’s Day. – Damon Martin

35. Don’t mope *too* much! Seriously, you’re not the only single lady or gent out there! – Lyxzen Suicide

36. Give your dog a bouquet of roses and a box of doggie-safe chocolates. – Darrah de jour

37. If you don’t have a dog, rescue one ¬ that way you’ll have someone to love and love you (and remember, unlike a lover, a four legged friend should always be for life!). – Nicole Powers

38. Go out somewhere you’ve never been before. Last year on Valentine’s Day I met a guy at a new bar who became of one my best friends. That is, after we finished all the tequila in the bar and made out in the street for a while. – Laurelin SG

39. I’m a huge believer in random acts of kindness. Do something for someone just ‘cause. As an added bonus, giving someone else the unexpected warm and fuzzies will make you feel that way too. – Nicole Powers

40. Remember those corny packs of Valentine cards you passed out in school? Or remember actually MAKING cards? Do that, only for your grown-up friends, parents, neighbors, mailman, etc. Who wouldn’t grin at the sight of a “I choo-choo choose you” card? It doesn’t have to be about mushy-gushy romantic junk, try just making people smile. And you know you like sealing envelopes with stickers anyways. – Lyxzen Suicide

Alternatively, you could always spend some quality time honing your dating, love, sex, and romance skills with a little help from SG’s awesome community so you can snag a partner by Steak & Blow Job Day – which is less pressure and way more fun than V-Day anyway!

XOX

Related Posts:
Love Don’t Cost A Thing: What Men Really Want On Valentine’s Day

by Blogbot

This Sunday SuicideGirls Radio will be celebrating love, sex, and sensuality with iconic adult film star, author, producer, and sex educator Nina Hartley. SG Radio host Nicole Powers (SG’s Managing Ed) will also be joined in studio by SG’s resident post-feminist sex and sensuality expert Darrah de jour and renowned relationship columnist Yashar Ali. Light a candle, open some bubbly, grab a box of your fave chocs, and listen in to our intimate in-studio foursome – judging by past shows, a little naughtiness is bound to ensue 😉

Tune in to the world’s leading naked radio show for two hours of totally awesome tunes and extreme conversation – and don’t let yo momma listen in!

Listen to SG Radio live Sunday night from 10 PM til Midnight on Indie1031.com

Got questions? Then dial our studio hotline digits this Sunday between 10 PM and midnight PST: 323-900-6012

And cyberstalk us on Facebook and Twitter.

[..]

by SG’s Team Agony feat. Rin

Let us answer life’s questions – because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.

Q: My best friend fucked my ex boyfriend the day we broke up. We weren’t really friends before he and I broke up, and a week later she tried to convince me to have a threesome with her and her boyfriend. When I told her I wasn’t interested she told me that she fucked my ex. Should I be alright with it since we weren’t really friends until the next week after he and I split? Should I be mad? Because I’m fucking furious and I’m not sure if I should be mad at her, but I know I should be at him because he lied to me and told me that he was still in love with me. What should I do? And I’m aware that this doesn’t have much to do with SG, I just don’t have any girlfriends that I can talk to about this and it’s tearing me up.

A: Your friend sounds like kind of a jerk! First off, she tries to ‘convince’ you to have a threesome (instead of just asking and then accepting your answer) and when you say no, she tells you about having sex with your ex. It seems like she did it to hurt you after you turned her down, and that is never cool. Although you said you don’t have many girlfriends, perhaps you should start looking for a best friend who has more respect for you than this current one seems to! It’s worth investing in friends who treat you like gold.

As for the dude, what a total dickbag. It’s emotionally manipulative for him to say ‘I love you’ when he fucked someone else the day you broke up! That kind of behavior is so destructive and because of it he doesn’t belong in your life in any capacity.

Your anger at both of them is completely legitimate. They acted in ways that were completely hurtful! My advice to you is to allow yourself to feel anger from the situation, but then to let it go and move on. If this was just a one-time douchey move for your best friend, then it’s worth discussing with her why her actions were so hurtful to you. Really examine your relationship with her, though: girlfriends are there to support and care for us when we need it, not to have sex with our exes and throw it at us later. It might indicate a long-term pattern of disrespect and that is absolutely not what friendship is about.

Rin

Got Problems? Let SuicideGirls’ team of Agony Aunts provide solutions. Email questions to: gotproblems@suicidegirls.com

by Laurelin

There are a lot of things I remember about certain people, and a lot of things I’m sure I forget. A lot of the things I remember I wish I didn’t, some things make me smile, things remind me that I’m human, that things change, people change. I remember tracing outlines, wanting my fingertips to remember every dimple, every muscle line, every tattoo. I remember smells, sounds, songs playing before I drift off to sleep, songs playing in clubs when our eyes meet across the dance floor and I can just breathe in a beat. But always with these memories, I remember that things change.

I feel like I have already lived a lifetime of change when it comes to my friend Ben. I remember the first time I ever saw him, a fleeting moment of eye contact in a filthy frat house and I thought, “who is THAT…” and he was gone, and it didn’t matter because whoever he was, this was my boyfriend’s frat house. Ben and I wouldn’t talk much that summer, but I always remembered him.

Fast-forward to a year later, long after my boyfriend and I had broken up, and I was turning 21. It was a Tuesday night, and as the lights flashed for last call at my first bar my best friend Lisa ran up to me. I was drunker than I’d ever been before, and she was smiling as she gestured towards the door.

“I found him,” she said, “for your birthday. I found him, that guy from the frat house.” And there he was, she had found him somehow, and that was the beginning. It was a fairy tale in a sense, a sorority girl in a pink lettered sweatshirt and a smirking sarcastic guy with tattoos, something that didn’t make such sense but would be all and none of the sense I knew from then on.

It seems so far off now, but all those year ago I did love him, or I thought I did. We dated, we were inseparable, we would hit a rough patch and take a break. We would fight, like really fight; screaming and crying, nights where I would just want to die if he wouldn’t speak to me again. I did things that I haven’t done since and will never do again, things I can’t even say out loud let alone type. I am the most ambitious person I know, but I remember I wrote him a letter, saying that I could lay with him forever and be happy with everything I never did. Time stood still and moved like liquid at the same time. It wasn’t right, perfect to no one else but me. Then one day, he was gone.

When I say gone, I mean gone. Years together and then just gone, disappeared, fallen off the planet. It was one year almost to the day until I heard from him again. I can’t say what happened in that year; but finally, after indescribable hurt, I was eventually healing. Everything that’s happened to me since that moment has seemed like nothing I can’t conquer, every break up since then has been tough, but almost laughable. It was the longest year of my life, and then one day, it was over. 12 months later I looked down at the glow of my flip phone and recognized his number. I should have known better than to answer it I’m sure, but the apology on the other end of the phone was really a long time coming.

Add a few more years, a lot of bad choices (meeting his father for the first time while I was drunk at work at a strip club in a naughty nurse uniform), and a few good choices (endless concerts, dancing all night, swimming at the beach by moonlight, traveling to Ireland together) and we somehow found ourselves over the worst, over the on and off dating and finally, just plain friends. I don’t know when I stopped loving him, but somewhere along the line I finally found ME, and I realized that while I had always thought there was no me without him, that wasn’t the case at all.

Ten years later he would have the perfect description of what happened to us between now and then: “You moved to Boston, you found this life, this strong personality and you stopped being that small town girl from Rhode Island, that girl who just wanted someone to love her.” Our strong personalities clash, and one afternoon a few weeks ago I made a call, and he must have recognized my number. Ten years later, after yet another year of not speaking, I’m finally looking at him from across my bar. We’re both smirking with tattoos now, and I see our life together in a blur of colors, sounds, hurt feelings, songs and traced outlines. We order a round of shots and I rest my head on his shoulder, finally with my best friend again after all this time.

“How do you guys know each other?” my friend asks, pulling up a bar stool. Ben and I look at each other.

“It’s a long story,” I say, smiling.

[..]

This past Sunday (January 30), SG radio presenters Nicole Powers (SG’s Managing Ed), Lacey Conner (all round rockstar and recovering VH1 reality TV star), and Darrah de jour (SG’s Red, White & Femme post-feminist sex and sensuality columnist) were joined in studio by actress turned lifestyle guru Mariel Hemingway and her partner, stuntman and fitness expert Bobby Williams. Together they have developed a holistic regimen, which they call The Willing Way.

The pair spent a full two hours in the SG Radio studio explaining their all-encompassing mind, body, and soul philosophy. Going from yin to yang, we discussed the importance of getting enough sunlight in your life (Mariel and Bobby like to watch the sun rise and set each day, though they avoid the burning midday rays), and how to keep darkness at bay. With her life having been touched by several suicides, Mariel spoke about how she battled her own depressive tendencies, and how she has empowered herself to find a sense of wellbeing.

This being SG Radio, there was also plenty of laughter, and lots of conversation on our favorite subject – sex. Thus, the first hour of our show was devoted to talk of orgasms – and the importance of having a healthy diet of them, in order to achieve a truly balanced life.

Tune in to SuicideGirlsRadio.Indie1031.com/ this Thursday, February 2, at 2 AM PST to hear a rebroadcast of the show.

For more information follow Mariel and Bobby / The Willing Way on Twitter.