I’ve been a little quiet lately, in part because I was too busy enjoying the sun and sea (and a few deliciously kinky play partners) down in Miami … but there’s definitely been a lot going on! For those of you who missed out on the Orleans Experience – Miami Edition, I hope to be visiting there more frequently. If you send me an email with MIAMI (or your preferred city)  in the subject line, and include your primary sessions interests and a reference or two, I’ll send you a note when I’m planning my next trip there.

Here’s my news for now…

First of all, I’m very pleased to announce that Salon d’Orleans is hosting San Francisco’s legendary Mistress Morgana through the end of May. Mistress Morgana made an indelible impression on me when I first met her during the 2004 NYC Fetish Marathon and I still find her just as compelling, charismatic, and gorgeously dominant to this day. She specializes in domestic play, especially punishment and regression, but she is equally skilled at intense bondage (her custom made wooden bondage table in her personal studio, Maison de la Maitresse, was the inspiration for Salon d’Orleans’ first bondage bed/cage). Morgana and I are also offering special double domme sessions for the duration of her visit. Consider a sound scolding, soaping, and spanking from Mommy Morgana before she sends you to MTO’s leather bound corner or punishment cage. Or perhaps you’ll be the happy bottom in a brutal spanking contest. Morgana loves extreme fetishists, too, so this is your chance to experience heavy bondage while having your deepest fetishes fed. We love playing together, so if you have an idea for your ultimate experience, let us know and we will make it happen.

Also visiting Salon d’Orleans this month from May 17-22 is Los Angeles’ Inga Larsson, the … I’m trying not to call her “stunning” or “gorgeous” because every one does and as true as it is, to start there does this talented domme (did I mention she was trained by Simone Justice AND Isabella Sinclaire and has also been studying bondage with me?) a disservice. But, go ahead, be taken in by her beauty…and end up having an extraordinary BDSM experience with one of my favorite up-and-coming dommes. I’m offering special rates for anyone looking to submit to bondage practice with Inga and myself (we’re focusing on single point suspension, mummification, sensory deprivation, and predicament bondage). Or see Inga solo for swooning worship, slave training, role play, corporal, and all kinds of edge play.

Here, I should mention that if you are an established, professional domme and plan on visiting New York, I do selectively accept rental requests with references. Salon d’Orleans is a smoke-free, private, single use space in a mixed-use building in Midtown Manhattan, a few blocks south of the Empire State Building. It is ideally suited for extended/overnight sessions and scenes involving bondage, corporal/discipline, medical (sounds, electrics, sharps), SM, and fetish worship.  Your sessions will be private, discreet, and uninterrupted. Please contact me via email for more details.

My friend Natasha Gornik is a talented fetish photographer. She’s photographed many of NYC’s prodomme set, including Mistress Alex, the Violent Fems (Mistress Veronica, Mistress Wynter, et al), Mistress Mona, Mme Sade and others. You’re probably familiar with her work already without even knowing it. We’ve been planning on doing a shoot together for months but between her travel schedule and mine, and most recently, my ill-timed Vespa spill, we’ve yet to make it happen. But we will. And it will be hot. Whether or not I show it to you is a whole ‘nother question.

Anyway, Natasha has a new photo project she’s calling “Portrait of a Fetish,” and she’s looking for subjects to photograph. She says, “Either portraits of people somehow clothed in their fetish (rope, whip, feathers, needles, lingerie,..) or I am going to select some interesting, kinky people to pose in a fetish that I choose. So very stylized, very simplistic. It’s about the indulgence that fetish gives us. Nudity is possible and it would be good if they were open to it. I may do some hardcore  (i.e. sex) images too, but its not first and foremost on my mind.” So if you are interested in being a model for this series — either yourself, or with your partner, or even with me — please contact Natasha or send me an email directly to discuss your idea.

Lastly, I’ve quietly started giving private instruction to prodommes who are looking to advance their skills. Classes are small (1-4 women), last approximately three hours, and include demonstration as well as hands-on learning. Class topics are determined by the participant(s). If you are a prodomme or know one who might be interested in learning from me, please send me an email with CLASS REQUEST in the subject line. Include your professional name and website, areas you’d like to explore (e.g. leather bondage, rope bondage, choreographing extended/discreet public scenes, medical play, creating connections, scene negotiation, etc.), as well as  your experience level, preferred days/times (e.g. “June 19-20″ or “any Saturday afternoon”) and if you have a demo body available for your class. Tuition varies, depending on the class.

I feel like there’s a lot more I meant to share with you … but that’ll be for another blog post. Right now, I gotta eat!

There are some that might say one of my signatures is using my body to intensify the scene, though it’s a characteristic of my play that I’m more aware of when there’s someone else in the room that I have to make space for, such as when I’m co-Topping.  Recently I was invited to join a colleague and her play partner for a sensory deprivation bondage scene. As we bandied him about, I couldn’t help but be aware how much closer I played than she. I’d straddle the man’s chest as I stuffed his mouth with a gag. When my fingers tired of pinching his nipples, I’d lean in close for a bite with my teeth, or  to exhale warm breath on his bits of exposed skin. While I held his bent knee, pushing him further, I bussed his thigh with an encouraging kiss. Later, when he was seated with his legs extended on the floor, I extended my own bare legs over his, pinning them down.

For all the sensuality of such physical, hands-on play, there are definitely times that I use my penchant for getting close to inflict more pain than pleasure. I’ve left bite marks pretty much anywhere. (I remember back during the Luxuria days when Mei-Loong, my fellow apprentice, and I were obsessed with cock biting! Sounds a lot sexier than it felt. Trust me.) When I’m feeling devious, I’ll use strands of my hair to tickle someone in immobilizing bondage, skating the hairs across sensitive parts like noses and eyes in particular. I’ve clipped my fingernails and scraped toe crud, and spat, snorted, and evacuated all manner of effluvia into a forced open mouth (and asshole, come to think of it). I’ve bare bottom hand spanked with such force, I not only left lasting marks on his bottom, I bruised my own hand, too! Once at a party, I dragged a man up a staircase by inserting my fingers in his nostrils and just toting him like a six-pack. Somewhere out there is a photograph of him kneeling by my side, his head resting on my hip as blood trickles out of his nose.

Obviously, any sub would love to spend a day in the Pound, but what does that do for you? I think too much of me would fixate on “Is she getting bored?” to really enjoy it for myself.

The idea of extended bondage and, based on my limited experience with actual extended bondage play — e.g. held captive in The Pound or fixed/suspended in a body bag with little to no interaction or active “play” with me — is so exciting and compelling and so the opposite of boring! For one, I’m paying way more attention to you when I’m not actually touching/interacting with you. It’s so much more psychological! “Is he ok? Is he sleeping? Bored?” “I want to touch him! I can’t! I have to ignore him!” “How long do I leave him there? Ok. He’s begging to be let out? Do I? Now? How about now? Not yet?!”

So that’s my brain. But what you see (assuming you’re not hooded) is me doing my email or drinking tea or tidying the dungeon and acting like you’re the LAST thing on my mind.

I don’t know how to convey how much “Is she getting bored” is not a thing you should worry about with me for even a second. If I could have a man in my Pound for 4+ hours, “bored” is the last thing I’d be.

I imagine some subs are always asking for more….longer sessions,tighter,more cruel bondage,more intense CP or electoplay etc etc. Is this an issue for you?How do you manage expectations and avoid scenes where a sub “bites off more than he can chew”?

I dunno. I feel like I can read most of my play partners well enough that they trust me to know how much they can take, how far to push them. One of the great advantages of the Orleans Experience is that the scene can last pretty much as long as we’re both standing, so a play partner that thinks he’s ready for “longer sessions” can easily get them. Occasionally a man will tell me that I haven’t been pushing him hard enough or that he wants “more.” Sometimes the challenge for me then is not to come at him like I’ve got a point to prove but just turn up the intensity enough that we can both enjoy the new territory…and even stay a while.

If anything, the “heavier play” requests come mostly from people who’ve never actually played with me. They’ve got this fantasy in their head — probably from watching some of the ridiculous Clips4Sale vids — that they’re gonna be super sub and just tortured to within an inch of their lives. But that’s just not the way it works in real life. How I manage that is by talking to them straight about fantasy vs reality, asking them enough questions about their experience so they can start to understand for themselves what level they’re ready for.

It’s my responsibility as the Top/Domme to control the scene so that my play partner is genuinely challenged but not allowed to fail. Say the fella in the previous question tells me he wants to spend “all day” in The Pound. Maybe I’ll suggest six hours with option to extend. Maybe I’ll suggest four hours, but I’ll have him in additional bondage/rigging in the cage that will make those four hours feel a lot longer. Maybe I’ll keep him in The Pound for five hours and then move him to the sleeping cage/bondage bed/sleepsack for another three hours. The key for me is paying close enough attention to him during the scene so I have a sense of what he can do (which is likely different from what he’s saying he can/not do at any given point) and staying flexible enough so that we can take the scene wherever it needs to go.

I’m guessing most of your clients are married men. How does that inform your personal view on men and relationships? Do you find it hard to trust men? Are you capable of giving and receiving love completely? 

My only judgement when it comes to married men and play/sessioning is that sometimes I don’t think the men give their spouses enough credit as far as what their wives desire or what they might be open to as far as kink. I believe every marriage has room for some kink — perhaps it’s not the kind of heavy bondage, degradation, or skill-driven play typical of professional sessions — but with patience, communication, cooperation/accommodation, and an open heart, any couple can incorporate some kind of kink into their sex life.

As for my personal view: I think men are awesome. I am a philandrist through and through. While I do not embrace the “poly” lifestyle *at all,* I also don’t get too gripped up about monogamy/fidelity. If you’re asking if I can “trust men” because I know that some men see sex workers or are non-monogamous? *eye roll* First of all, “men” is not “my partner.” Any relationship I’m in, I make sure to talk honestly and in detail with my partner about ourand desires so that we can come to a realistic agreement that we can both live with happily and contentedly. In some of my relationships, there’s been an expectation of and mutual desire for fidelity, in others we’ve taken a more accommodating “live your life” approach (basically, don’t seek it out but if an exceptional opportunity arises, you do have a choice). Second of all, if there’s something that my partner desires that for whatever reason I am uninterested, unwilling, or incapable of fulfilling/servicing, I have no problem with him outsourcing that to a professional, be it a sushi chef, a stylist, or a sex worker.

The presumption that sex workers are somehow damaged or not “capable of giving/receiving love completely” just irks me. There are emotionally fucked up people everywhere, no matter what their profession. I love. I am loved. And I try to make sure that those whom I give love are worthy of that gift and are able to give back as richly.

Since you brought the subject up (Or the times I’ve felt scared of or intimidated by or lustful about a play partner.) That sounds like an interesting subject to start off with .Have you had one or 2 Lustful Sessions as far as the moment or what scared you about a play partner in session ?

One or two? More like dozens! Lustful sessions happen a lot for me. But my lust isn’t the “hubba hubba” kind. While really good looking people are always just delightful to look at, what really turns me on is more of a mental or energetic connection along with really good play. As an example of that energetic connection, I’ve noticed that lustful feeling happens often with men who play in their personal lives with an intimate partner. I think it’s because BDSM isn’t compartmentalized for them…and I feel that and respond to it.  More generally,  I just feel my play partner’s  joy and passion for what we’re doing and it just kinda transmogrifies into something erotic and maybe even a little primal.

Fortunately, my practice is centered only on the kinds of play that I personally enjoy, so every scene has the potential to get me excited. There is something about sensory deprivation and/or intense immobilization plus a hard, jutting cock that … whew. Is it hot in here?

A few months ago, a play partner came to visit and in short order, I had him in a punishing, all rope tie on the floor. Watching him writhe and try and try and try to escape turned me on so much that at some point I leaned in close to his ear just so I could confess to him how much I wanted to drag him by his chest harness, untie his hands and feet and lock him down spread-eagled to the four posts of my suspension frame. Then I’d hood and gag him so he can’t see or smell or scream. And I’d put some kind of sheath on his cock (like this?) maybe lubed with desensitizing cream so he really couldn’t feel anything. And then I’d straddle his body and use it until I was done.

Needless to say, he loved the idea. I did, too. And the next time he visited, I invited a friend to join us and to do all those things with him. Minus the desensitizing sheath.

It was a fun night.

As for fear, there’ve been a few times when I’ve been scared during a scene. Only once can I recall feeling threatened by my play partner (this was back at Luxuria. He was drunk/high and was threatening and belligerent when he was told to leave). Every other time, I was scaring myself. There’ve been a handful of occasions when I’ve found myself on the edge of reckless play. One or two times it was negative energy: I was playing from a place of anger and retribution. The other times it was just getting so carried away, so inspired in the scene that I gleefully wanted to fly over the edge and take him with me.

***********

Have you ever been in a scene with someone you’ve really enjoyed playing with for a while, and they’ve surprised you with a new talent or twist? Do tell! (This is actually a question from Mistress Alex’s post on Max Fisch.)

I was telling this story the other day about one of my very first sessions. I was in New Orleans, sessioning in a local dungeon. My client that day wasn’t very specific about what he wanted, other than that he wanted to be dominated. So I was just running through the basics: pinch the nipples, spank the bottom, stretch the balls, finger the butt hole, flog the back. He took everything, but I could tell I wasn’t really connecting with anything. And then I told him to kiss my feet.

Holy cow.

His reaction to that was like all the lights coming back on after a power outage. Such ardor! Enthusiasm! One would think “foot worship” would be an activity someone would readily admit interest in but he’d not said a peep. So, yeah. That was so surprising. And it was infectious. It was great ending the scene on such a high note.

As for long-term clients surprising me with a talent … nothing comes immediately to mind. Sometimes I suppose I’ve underestimated how much a play partner can take and am pleasantly surprised when he asks me for more. Because my practice is so focused on bondage and corporal (as opposed to, say, humiliation or sissy training) I don’t do a lot of, I’ll call it “stunt play” where the guy has to DO things, whether it’s dance around or suck dildos or put his foot behind his head. (Well, that last one … maybe.)

More often than not, I’m the active one and he’s the vessel so, if anything, it’s more about our play evolving. Perhaps when he started with me, he was indifferent to electrical play but now loves it. Or a hard limit was erased. Or, maybe, I’ve surprised him.

So I went in search of kink. Brain-jarring kink.

And (re)discovered Domina Stern.

There was a time when Mira Stern posted on Max Fisch. I kinda stalked her there. She was so, SO smart and talked about BDSM in really extraordinary ways that I wasn’t reading anywhere else. When she announced she was going to be visiting New York, I sent her an email, asking her for coffee or, perhaps, a double session with me. She said yes.

It’s not that I agree with everything she says. But I love that she’s thinking about BDSM critically. What we do. Why we do it (and not because your mother loved you too hard or our fathers didn’t love us quite enough). She thinks about consent and permission. What “tribute” can also mean.  She talks about truth in advertising, ripoff art, and  bondage. She makes me think about humiliation in a way that makes me wish I could do it, if only so I could experience it the way she does. She THINKS. And I love it.

All this thinking may mean that my post on lust will get postponed. But at least you’ve got plenty of links to read now…

• Just reviewed your last seven blog entries. Time for some wanking material, please and thank you.
• Do you ever have to delete or remove comments to your blog? If so, why?

Occasionally, I get snarky bits of uselessness — usually via email — like that first “question” (which arrived via Formspring) and I’ll either ignore or delete it, depending on where it is. As for deleting or removing comments from my blog, it’s happened very rarely. Assuming it’s a valid comment — i.e. it’s a direct response to the post, it’s civil in tone and reasonably grammatical — I don’t know why I’d delete or unapprove it. I don’t mind being disagreed with and I welcome constructive criticism.

One time that did not happen was a couple of years ago when a misguided dude was posting hateful and/or aggressive comments on my blog in hopes of getting my attention. He said he wanted to session with me, though I can’t see why on Earth he’d think that was the right way to respond to my initial rejection if he expected my answer to change. This is a weird phenomenon among certain … well, I can’t call them “clients” because I don’t think anyone ever sessions with them. Among my colleagues and from what I see on Twitter, there are a lot of guys who seem to think that if they call us names or say terrible things that we’re gonna agree to play with them.

Outside of deliberately mean crap like that, there’s only one comment I’ve ever removed, as far as I can recall. But I did approve it initially and let it stay up for a bit. This was last year when I made my birthday post. A frequent reader and nonclient  decided to comment anonymously to tell me he found my post distastefully entitled, “gold-diggerish,” and very “out of character.” I addressed his issues privately over email.  Ultimately, I felt his accusations were patronizing, presumptuous, and in no way reflected my intentions when I wrote the post. Rather than let his comment stand and taint what was otherwise a very beautiful, affirming, positive, and memorable time, I removed it.

It’s actually kinda surprising (knock wood) that I don’t get more trolls on my blog. I don’t even get many trollish emails for that matter. Sometimes I attribute that to just not leaving a lot of purchase for the wankers and otherwise malintentioned.  I’m not terribly provocative or fetishizable or easily provoked. Plus I try to keep things positive. Like attracts like, or something like that.

She undid his buttons, opening his shirt, while I adjusted the volume on the stereo. Ali Farka Toure’s “Ai Du” (from the 2002 movie “Unfaithful”) floated through the room.

“Now you undress her.” His hands fumbled a little with her clothes, which I anticipated. But since she’d already told me that she had nothing on under her tank top and skirt, I figured it’d be okay.

“I’ve been reading ’50 Shades of Grey,’” she’d texted when she requested the visit. “Uhm…very, very energetically charged today. ;)”

They faced each other, naked. His arms circled around her waist and hers around his neck. I shook loose a length of hemp and bound his wrists together at the small of her back, threading the two lines  into the crack of her ass, between the lips of her sex, then through his legs, pulling the lines tightly so that they pressed against his balls and perineum. Then I bound her wrists with the same rope, wrapping the remainder around their bodies, pressing them even closer together.

Then I pressed myself against their seam and began warming her bottom with my left hand and his with my right. It was getting hot. Grabbing my 6ft Australian single tail, I got down on my knees and started swinging so that the whip would wrap around her body but the tail would sting against his ass. Wrap. Sting. Wrap. Sting. Around and around. He was kissing her neck. She was trembling. She’d never been whipped before.

When I untied them, I maintained the tension on the line as I dragged it back through her legs so that she felt the friction on her clit. I could feel her wet on the rope.

My skin erupted in goosebumps when I realized what I was going to do next.

She was ordered into the Pound. He was stretched over it, face down, his wrists cuffed in leather and locked to the frame, his legs spread its width by a spreader bar. Butterfly clamps dangled from his nipples, tethered to a small vibrator she held.

“Pleasure yourself or pleasure him as you like,” I told her. “Whatever you do, I’m going to beat him.”

A buffalo flogger. A bound cluster of resin canes. A 1 ½ in. wide wooden paddle. Whenever I’d strike particularly hard, he’d whoosh, “Thank you, Mistress.” When I’d change implements, I’d hear him say, “I’m taking this for her” (meaning the woman in the cage). He was rock hard, even though she kept the vibrator to herself the whole time.

Finally, I ordered them both to the bondage bed. She on bottom, legs spread and cuffed at the ankles to the sides. He sat on top of her, knees bent, bound from ankle to thigh, straddling her. The goosebumps rose again when I placed the punishing scolds bridle on his head with the instructions: “This does not come off you until she gets off” and handed him the Hitatchi Magic Wand.  The spiked plate pressed on to his tongue as he pressed the vibrator against her pussy. I put my lips to her ear and started whispering very, very dirty things.

I meant every word.

You practice seems to be evolving quite a bit – more leather, ‘trixy kind of themes, shorter sessions, etc. This feels like a departure from your past. What’s driving the change?

It seems that with your updated site you’re bringing some significant changes – more photos of you (thank you), a more dommey spin to things, and shorter sessions. Why the shift in image and approach to the game?

These two questions came in about a month apart, though I suspect they may have been submitted by the same person. If not, someone has a (slow) twin.

The shorter sessions option was just because I want more corporal clients. I was talking with Mistress Wynter last summer about corporal sessions and she was raving about all the guys who’d come see her for just an hour of straight up corporal. A few masochists who’ve contacted me in the past have balked at the two hour minimum so I decided to offer a one hour, corporal only scene and see what the response was like. So far? Crickets. Which is really, really disappointing. What does a domme hafta do to find a man to whip in this town?!?

The saddest part is that I suspect the reason why serious masos don’t take me seriously as a corporal top is because I don’t have any bloody hamburger ass pictures on my site.  Ironically, I think that’s what makes me a really good corporal top: that I can give you a serious beating that you will feel, relish, and lament for days but I won’t leave any significant/”permanent” marks. Last summer, one of my play partners wrote an incredible review of my corporal skills on Max Fisch. 1200+ views later and still no maso clients. Then again, I suppose any half-decent domme out there can beat the shit outta someone, more or less, but the bondage artists are a fading breed in this town.

As for “more leather,” “more ‘trixy themes,” and “more dommey spin to things” … I dunno. When asking some of my play partners for feedback on my site, one of the common replies was, “The site needs to show what you DO” and “You need more pictures of you.” So when redesigning it, one of my priorities was to show more photos of my scenes and of me. I am not a visual person. I like words, not images. And, personally, I do not understand how a photo of me in a corset — which there’s about a 10% chance you’ll actually see in a session with me —  is more compelling or evocative or, ugh, business generating than a picture of someone in some heavy duty leather bondage. But this site isn’t for me. It’s for you. And y’all like pictures. Google Analytics confirms this. Highest traffic page on my blog? The MTO Gallery. Second highest? What Yes Looks Like Gallery. Next is the blog. Bless your predictable li’l hearts.

But, really, I haven’t changed. I’m just being a teensy more accommodating in my dotage. Fancy that. Or at least appreciate it.

When I started my apprenticeship at Luxuria, I didn’t even intend to be a prodomme for more than eight weeks. It was probably right around the eight week mark when Domina M commented that, with so much going on in my vanilla career,  she thought I’d be the first apprentice to quit until she realized, “you like to win.” She was quick to clarify that she didn’t mean I was out to best my fellow mistresses but, rather, that she could tell how important it was to me to do well at whatever I did.

She was right.

Unlike in vanilla-land, there’s no real or meaningful marker in this world for being “the best” — no bonus, no corner office, fancy title or promotion. “The best” is actually a pointlessly useless comparison and I’ve always rolled my eyes at the dommelettes who suggest otherwise. A prodomme can snuff a candle with her whip or rig a Texas handcuff in .02 seconds or pee for 132 seconds straight, but the only thing that truly matters is whether or not she connects with her client. It’s like golf. Fancy clubs, a beautiful swing, terrific handicap… but, in the end, you still gotta get the ball in the hole, y’know?

It’s that essential, I think, that’s been largely responsible for my longevity and continued interest in and desire for play. BDSM, for me, has always been about the journey, not the destination. I started prodomming because it seemed the most effective and efficient way to learn as much as I could about BDSM: a wide variety of play partners, the guidance of experienced mistresses, access to a ton of equipment I’d never have been able to afford (or be able to justify acquiring) on my own. Numbers have never been important to me; I want to genuinely look forward to and enjoy every scene I choose to do. To this day, I still love having the opportunity to live out all my kinky fantasies and to be challenged and inspired by an assortment of wonderful men who share my enthusiasms. In this way, we all win.

So, to celebrate the last eight years of my journey — and appreciate all of you who’ve contributed to it — I’m extending a very special offer. For the next eight days (Mar 4-11), anyone who has ever sessioned with me before may schedule an appointment at my original 2005 independent rates: $250/1hr, $440/2hrs or $620/3hrs. Overnights are $1800.

If we’ve never played together, you’re invited to play with me at 20% off my current (2012) Tribute. This 20% discount offer is good for everyone, new and  previous play partners, through March 19.

To request a session, please submit an email to: 
with “Anniversary Special” in the subject line. If we’ve sessioned before and you think I might not remember you, please provide some identifying details (email address you used to make the earlier appointment, where we sessioned, and/or what happened in the scene).

Thank you, all of you, for being part of this amazing and treasured adventure. I hope to see many of you over the next few weeks … and that our paths continue to intersect in the years to come. In the meantime, please feel free to use the comments to share your favorite MTO memories.