Marked improvement

It's a spankless task being me. Up late, our morning fun date turned out to be unilaterally cancelled; SO is working away and was more interested today in getting onto the motorway than playing with me.
It meant that I didn't get the attitude adjustment that I was utterly sure was coming my way. Not good given that my SQ is at max at the moment.
So, I'm stuck in pouty, brattiness mode now knowing that's what I'm like, knowing what would smooth it out - and unlikely to get the antidote any time soon.
Anyway, enough of my moaning. I'm thinking about marks. Why is it that I don't get marks? SO is a reluctant disciplinarian, but over time has overcome soft-heartedness to some degree and can occasionally lay the brush on with gusto.
But a few hours later there's not often much sign that I've been punished. It's disappointing, by the time me and a mirror get together it's 'move along folks, nothing to see'.
l look at pictures like these here at Reflections on Red and can't understand how they can be so thoroughly marked, while I escape with a bot that's completely blemish free. They must be utterly fearless - or very naughty. 
Then I remembered a great post I read from the insightful Secret Spanko some time back that said that for spankees a marks selfie is like one of those pix that mountaineers take when they get to a summit. It's a record of experience - and personal achievement.
I reckon he's right, but personally I don't want the selfie - I just want the marks! And if I get them I'll be the spankee exception to his rule that we all post our spanky selfies (it has to be said that my bot hasn't been in shape for public exposure any time during this century, sadly...)

Twelve ways of Christmas

Are you feeling the Christmas spirit yet? It seems in short supply around here, but I did just catch myself humming 'Jingle Bells' while I was clearing away breakfast things in the kitchen.
The problem about working on your own from home is that you miss out completely on the whole Xmas run-up thing. No party, no secret Santa, no Christmas cards from people who dislike you - but can't afford to make it too obvious.
I think maybe I should print this 12 Days out and put it on my office wall. Perhaps I should see if I could persuade SO to get involved in a re-enactment.
Not sure where it's from originally (I just saw it here while doing a little random tumblr-ing), but I do like it. The style of penpersonship seems familiar, but I can't place it.
Isn't "rulers rul'ring" clever? But I'm not sure of the pay-off: "And a switch from a hickory tree..." Does it need an extra beat to scan, or do you just stretch hickory to fit?

Literary pursuits

Expect to hear a lot about the wordy Welsh wizard Dylan Thomas next year because it's the centenary of his birth and it's going to be all over the media. That's my prediction, anyway.

Dylan and Caitlin

In the last few weeks I've been working on commission from a magazine that has involved going to see the home of Dylan and Caitlin Thomas at Laugharne in Carmarthenshire. And it has resulted in a couple of discoveries that I won't share with the magazine's readers - but thought you might like..
In case you don't know it the 1940s radio play has become a classic of Welsh writing in English. It's at its best on the version voiced beautifully by Richard Burton and was also a film with Elizabeth Taylor and Burton.
Have a look at the trailer here. The topless girl in the pink pants is at Fishguard Old Town, Pembrokeshire, and I think she's the lovely Angharad Rees (who went on to star in the BBC's Poldark series).
 Anyway, startles.The first is a line or two from 'Under Milk Wood' that I can really relate to. It comes in a section that describes the sleeping townspeople's dreams; this is it:

SECOND VOICE: Willy Nilly, postman, asleep up street, walks fourteen miles to deliver the post as he does every day of the night, and rat-a-tats hard and sharp on Mrs Willy Nilly. 

MRS WILLY NILLY: Don't spank me, please, teacher,

SECOND VOICE: whimpers his wife at his side, but every night of her married life she has been late for school.

Every night... such commitment. Then when I was reading up about Laugharne I spotted this article. It's in section two about the corporation.
I'd heard about the tradition of beating the bounds before - it happens in lots of other British villages. But I particularly like the detail that the owner of the bottom that gets beaten at Laugharne is 'usually a young lady'.
There was a whole spanko world out there back then, but you're usually only aware of it through the odd nudge or wink. 

Take that

What happened next? I reckon the Woman in Black cornered her adversary, threw down the riding switch and then wrestled her over her knee. Under a barrage of spanks guilt was admitted - and only then were a dozen good stripes with the switch applied.
Maybe not, but I do like the way spanking art lubricates the imagination. I came across this one at The Spanking Art Blog and it caught my eye.

I've done some searching for pages about Sarah Bernhardt and there's plenty to read. She does sound like a bit of a brat, but I can't find any mention of Marie Solombe - wonder what the real story was?

Good old days?

This gives my age away, but anyway... A long time ago little me arrived in London from the country and discovered all sorts of strange things. 
Certainly, the strangest - and most wonderful - was that I wasn't alone. It seemed that other people were getting a sexual frisson from corporal punishment, giving and/or receiving. Or a bit of both.
I have to say that it made me feel a lot less uncomfortable about some of the thoughts that crossed my mind. I decided that getting all hot and bothered about getting my bottom all hot and bothered made no sense and I vowed to stop giving myself a hard time about it.
How old was I when this revelatory moment happened? Well, I was somewhere between 22 and 23, would you believe. 
But I'm taking you back to a pre-internet age. Today, a young person with even a hint of spanko spirit can Google and discover all there is to know about TTWD, but in 1989 the red-bottomed facts of life were far harder to discover.
What my hometown didn't have were the sort of newspaper shops that sold porn magazines. In London, the top shelf in my ordinary street's newsagent was full of naughty mags and in among them were copies of Janus, Roue, and the like.

I didn't do more than look out of the corner of my eye at that self (which I couldn't have reached even if I'd been brave enough to try). But it was pretty clear from the slightly ambiguous cover images that some of the magazines there were about spanking. 
Janus covers were the ones that really caught my eye. I'm sure that the guy who owned the shop noticed my blushes when I was taking a peep at Janus (or a furtive look at a copy of Blushes) and had me sussed.
Dana Kane touched on the idea of a spanko good old days recently and questioned when that might have been - pre-interent, or post-internet. Personally, I say it's defintiely now. It was only after the internet that the content of that top shelf became available to me because I never had the confidence to buy one of those magazines.
The other London discovery that took me by surprise was that all of the city's phone boxes were full of cards selling sexual services - and it was pretty clear from the pictures that red bottoms were a significant part of the exchange. Ever the social historian, Richard Windsor had the good sense to collect some and save at least a few for posterity.
The phone people would turn up and rip down the cards and almost straight away someone would arrive and new cards would go up to replace them. As a cub reporter I had to use public phones just about every day and found those cards very distracting.

'New' Benson

What a treat, an undiscovered Benson. Or undiscovered for me anyway,  because you may have seen it before - I hadn't.
And that's a bit of a surprise as I'm a bit of a Benson obsessive.  I really thought I'd seen everything there was to see of his work that's published on the Net.

So, it's nice to have come across it on a new-to-me photoblog. Though I have to say that, unfortunately, it's not going to make it onto my personal Roger Benson all-time Top 10 for a couple of reasons.
Firstly,  there's the fact that her hands are tied. For me bondage and spanking don't mix,  the spankee should accept her (or his) need for punishment. I need to be there by my own choice, however reluctantly.
And then there's the teddy. By the looks of things something pretty unpleasant is about to happen with that switch and I don't think that's something a Teddy should have to see.
Anymore than teddy bears should have to be on stage with a twerking Miley Cyrus. It's a messy old world and I think we have a duty to see that Teddy bears don't get to know that.

Smash, bang, wallop

Whack! The noise was so unexpected that I nearly jumped out of my skin, but a quick glance in the direction that it had come from suggested that the damage was minimal.
The road had been narrow and I'd been intimidated by a man in a van coming the other way, but impact was definitely my fault. But it look like I'd got away with it - the passenger door mirror was upside down, not off.
A few miles down the road I stopped and went round to straighten the mirror out and was horrified to discover that the plastic housing was gone, shattered to smithereens. Bad, but what made it worse is that this was my first solo outing in our lovely new (to us) VW Camper.
SO had waved me away the day before with the words "now don't bring my van back crunched..." I have to say I felt terrible and spent the rest of the journey home trying to work out how and when to break the news.

What happens next? In the wonderful world of spanko imagination I'd be driving home to a woodshed whipping that I'd never forget, wouldn't I? Of course, that didn't happen.
It turned out that SO was very understanding - accidents do happen. But I have had to pay. As it happens the day I messed up that mirror was the last day of the long school holidays and the next morning was the first time in more than a month that the house was kid-free.
By mutual agreement yours truly was heading for a long overdue attitude adjustment that I just couldn't wait to collect. Lots of little black marks had been noted over the weeks and the time had come to straighten things out.
When I heard the school bus heading off down the hill I went back to bed to talk things over. I feel awful about the van, I said, and SO said I should.
I feel like a deserve a REAL punishment. "Yes, you do." Something that I won't forget... And that's what I got.
I never understand how DD couples untangle TTWD from the stick and carrot stuff. In our house I pay my dues to society by NOT being spanked. SO got breakfast in bed and I've resolved to drive much more carefully in the future.

Perfect hairbrush

Certainly not the perfect picture I know,  but I was in a bit of a hurry. Anyway, away on a work trip, SO emails to say I have a gift coming my way. There's some hints and some guessing and, to cut a long story short, I work out that it's a hairbrush.
A nice wooden hairbrush, just what I've been looking for. Perhaps even something from a little antique shop, I thought,  and my imagination began to run away with me. Maybe this will be THE one...
So you can imagine how ticked off I was when my gift turned out to be "just a little joke". That is, both little and a joke - a hairbrush no longer than my index finger.
Now you know how important hairbrushes are to us,  you understand their centrality in the spanko-iconography.  The estimable Pandora Blake touched on the subject recently on her blog,  saying: "Wooden hairbrushes are a huge part of my kink, and I fantasise about them all the time, quite possibly because they are so evil and difficult to take in reality. Being my own worst sadist, this is more than enough reason for me write myself lots of wooden hairbrush spankings."
Exactly, and after all these years SO still doesn't get that. Is that depressing, or what?

Crash, bang...

...wallop. Is it just me, or is noise a vital part of the spanking experience? Quiet corporal punishment is like orchestral performance without the percussion section.
If you've spent time on this blog you'll know that volume is an issue in our house. SO is so terrified about being unmasked as a semi-willing participant in TTWD that a sound spanking for me often lacks sound.
So, yesterday we were blessed with one of those surprise no-kids days. Our girls decided to go shopping together, which is unusual. It's been a while since the opportunity has come along and I've been very bratty, so the normally reluctant SO was nearly itching to get switching.
And today's marks on my bot are testament to the fact that I got what I had coming. That whippy, green stick used was especially punishing when it found the tops of my legs, so no short shorts for a day or two.

The switch was chosen with noise-reduction in mind. It's so hot here at the moment that everyone has their windows open and that convinced SO that someone would hear us (even though our window was tightly shut).
Now to moan about the detail of what was a very satisfying afternoon encounter would appear to be ungrateful, I know. The sort of gracelessness that calls for a bit of old-fashioned correction, in fact.
But hey, SO doesn't come here so who cares. That switch stung like a dozen hornets, but it wasn't as all-round satisfying from a spanko pov as something really noisy would have been - a nice percussive paddle, hairbrush or rubber-soled sandal.
The blog Learning DD is a good source on the practicalities of everyday spanko life and has things to say about implements and noise here. Clint at Learning DD says "As a general rule, the less surface area of the buttocks the implement impacts, the quieter the spanking will be."
Btw, reading the post's comments I was green with envy with one from Jack's Jill who said: "We’re lucky that the kids have moved and my HoH can use whatever pleases him without worrying about children in the house or others hearing. This gives him a great sense of freedom and me too. He can discipline me anywhere he pleases in the house and with what ever implement he wants." Sounds heavenly.
Anyway, for me the surface area thing is the seat of the issue (if you'll pardon the pun). I have lots of butt surface area and I want lots of it to get attention with each and every spank.
And the noise that the implement makes, and that I make as it does its work, is very much part of the exercise too. The thwick, thwick, thwick of a switch, a can, a Loopy Johnny or a tilt wand (?) isn't nearly as satisfying as the gunshot whack of slipper or paddle.
Personally, I'd prefer it if we look out the paddle and then threw open the windows and let the neighbourhood hear what a truly punishing spanking sounds like. But I think SO would die on the spot, so I suppose I'll just have to be happy with the quiet life.
   

Brand new?

Or brand spanking new? You get so used to a phrase that you don't question it, but then today I did. My first search engine question was to ask is it only us Brits that say it?
But it certainly seems to have currency beyond the UK otherwise why would this South African marketing company have decided that it's brand would benefit from being a little bit spanky?
But what's it all about? I heard someone say the phrase today and when I gave it some thought the best explanation I could come up with was that it had something to do with the old tradition of the midwife slapping a newborn baby to get it to breathe.
But a bit of Googling suggests that that's way off the mark.This definition makes a connection between the s-word, strutting Scandinavians and horses.
While here there's a link made between the sort of branding that cowboys do to cows. Off topic, personally, I don't really understand the whole fiction niche that sees big, rough cowboy heroes spanking the living daylights out of bratty girls in gingham; maybe you have to be American to get it.

But anyway, so far 'brand new' makes some sort of sense. But why the spanking? Apparently it's about our favourite word having two meanings. 
Yes, there's the noun and verb one that involves the reddening of naughty bottoms, but there's more. Meaning number two is adj. 'exceptionally large or fine'.
Interesting. It turns out then that we've forgotten what it means, but we still like to use it. Personally, I think that just may be about the fact that all adult human beings have at least a little bit of spanko hidden deep inside and just like to have an excuse to say the word. 
And then there's all the people like you and me who don't hide TTWD too deeply and just love any opportunity to say 'spanking' in vanilla situations. Anyway, from now on I intend to make full use of both of my favourite word's two definitions.
I'm planning to let SO know that from today I want my spankings to be spanking - that is 'exceptionally large or fine'. Or preferably, exceptionally large and fine...   
 

Learning point

You really do learn something everyday, don't you? And today's step towards enlightenment provides a scientific explanation for why a good hairbrush punches above its weight in the disciplinary sphere.
Physics was a real problem for me at school. Or put it another way, I was a real problem for my physics teacher (sorry Mr Hindmarch).
But since I discovered The Big Bang Theory I have been trying to understand what makes the universe tick, so today's insight was especially pleasurable. I stumbled across it while wasting a little work time in Tumblr-land at a blog called Who's Sorry Now, where Spanked2Tears appears to be mostly concerned with the interface between male bottoms and hairbrushes (in female hands) - but I guess the physics is much the same.
A blog visitor asks: "Why a hairbrush, does it have anything to do with it just being available? Doesn't look like its going to hurt actually."
And Spanked2Tears answers: "My personal take on it, is that the bristles act as delayed mass. In other words they continue to decelerate after the wood has stopped."

I was a bit puzzled at this point. Delayed mass? If only Mr Hindmarch had held my attention (or been more persuasive in demanding it). But S2T goes on to add: "Extending the duration of the impact. If you have ever seen a shot hammer it’s the same theory. The hollow head of the hammer contains small, loose lead balls. They land a moment after the head of the hammer does and cause the blow to generate far more energy than a regular hammer of the same weight..."
So, it's as simple as that - bristles extend duration of impact. I feel I now need to buy two identical hairbrushes, take the bristles off one and then get SO involved in some citizen science. 
How would it work? A dozen with one brush on one butt cheek and a dozen on the other with the other brush, then rate redness?
Spanked2Tears does end on a point that's more about psychology than physics, saying: "I think that the allure of the hairbrush is that it is such a common domestic item." And all that delaying of mass aside, that for me is what makes a good old-fashioned hairbrush THE number one implement for TTWD.
It's an object that is so fearfully stingy, but at the same time is so sweetly innocent. It can sit around the house, or the handbag, and mean nothing to the majority, but everything to those of us in the know.

Wartime romance

What did (or do) your parents get up to when they were in the first flush of romance? For most of us I think it's something that we'd rather not give too much thought to, isn't it?
Reading your parents' love letters must be quite an experience, especially when they were written in wartime. Putting them on the web for everyone to see is really, really brave.
Let me back track a little. Last night I was using a page from Thursday's copy of The Times when I was doing some painting. Reading as I worked I came across a thorough startle. 
The heading said 'Ripping wartime romance with a happy ending', but a quote was picked out in bold and it was that which caught my eye. It said: "Darling one, it's just as well you aren't here as you would probably have to spank me hard — but what a heavenly spanking!"
It was a story about a daughter who had put all her mum and dad's wartime letters on a site called With Love from Graz. He was a soldier, she was a nurse and they served in different places, so there were regular letters from one to the other. 
The story is here, but The Times has a paywall. But it turns out that it started out closer to home to me in the South Wales Echo, which you can read for free - it's here.
The daughter says the letters "can be a bit like reading Shades of Grey..." Which made me think about how I'd feel if it were my parents - and about what my kids would discover about me if they ever stumbled on some of the stuff I've written.
I do like the site, but looking around I can't see much more in the way of grey shades. You can read about the "heavenly spanking" in a letter dated May 12, 1946.
I'm not sure why Katie thought she deserved the hard spanking. Possibly it was just because she was beging a bit negative and letting her stiff upper lip sag a little.  

Measured behaviour

My little crush of the moment is cold, steely and scarily strong. He's also rather exacting and seems intent on keeping me on the straight and narrow...
OK, I'm overdoing things here but I'm at that stage in a relationship where you're all over-excited and gushy. Finding such a great new-to-me corruptible - our little metal ruler - is quite something. I was out the other day buying some art supplies for youngest daughter when I came across it in amongst the paints and crayons  and the light bulb in my head pinged on.
When I'm judged to be in need of some attitude adjustment SO says 'got fetch me something' and I'm expected to select the implement that will be used on my bot. So, yesterday when we reached that stage I trotted off to find... the ruler.

In the past I've played with wooden rulers (for school scenarios) and been distinctly underwhelmed. Too light - no umph whatsoever.
Metal is quite a different sensation - and I'm hooked on it. I know lots of people prefer the extreme end of TTWD, but I'm pretty middle-of-the-road and don't like anything too heavy.
And the ruler is just right, lots of sting and heat, but not the deep muscle pain that SO's usual weapon of choice (the clothes brush) imparts. It left me feeling so exquisitely hot back there that I thought I'd melt.
I'm now struggling to suppress the urge to brat too much because I'm itching for seconds. I'm also thinking that I need to visit the DIY store; would they perhaps stock a bigger, meaner steel ruler mark 2?

This thing...

How come I didn't know? All the time I've happily squandered on spanko blogs over the years and I've managed to miss TTWD. Thanks to smuccatelli (comment on the last post) for bringing it to my attention.
I googled for it and couldn't understand how I'd not come across it before. This Thing We Do. It's a great label, much better as a name for our shared 'thing' than the one I've used for years - spanko.
I like how it feels like secret code, something that can go unnoticed to the vanilla majority. It's inclsuive - not the thing I do, but that we do.
And  I also like how it seems to capture some of the puzzlement that goes with the lifestyle, on my part anyway. This thing is a mystery to me - why do I love it, why is it as necessary to me as food and drink? I don't know, but it is the thing I do, and that we do. 
Not sure why I've picked this old picture to go together with this thought. I've always loved it, there's a resignation in the stance of the spankee while the look on the spanker's face has an icy intensity. Altogether it seems to encapsulate all power of TTWD.

 

Big bang

Oh, the squirming embarassment of it all... A friend who works away was back in town for the weekend, bringing her DVD box set of 'The Big Bang Theory' with her. 
At her suggestion the two of us sat down last night for a DVDathon with a bottle of rosé and a box of choccies. All's going well until we got to the episode called 'The Fish Guts Displacement'.
You probably know the one I mean. It hasn't gone unnoticed. If not, it's the one where Sheldon is very unhappy with Amy and decides she must be punished in some way.
The key bit goes:
 

Amy: Are you saying you want to spank me?
Sheldon: I don't want to. But, it looks like you have left me no choice.
Amy: That's true. I've been a very bad girl

The spanking gets going - see it happen here - and the smile on her face as action cuts away elsewhere tells you all you need to know about Amy's attitude to it all. I tried to make my laugh sound as normal as possible, but I'm pretty sure that the atmosphere in the room as we watched that scene was charged with something or other (Sheldon would probably know an equation to describe what was going on...).
I was certainly uncomfortable with the moment. And, I think, probably I blushed a shade of pink that matched our wine, but then felt really stupid that in a post-50 Shades world I'm still so jumpy about what makes me tick.
Is it just me? Everybody else in the spanko universe seems so relaxed about their sexuality these days, but I'm stuck firmly in my closet and would be horrified if the door were ever to open enough to let in any light.

Sitting pretty

We spanko's take a great deal of interest in the well-being of our bottoms, don't we? Or should that be the unwell-being? But what about the impact of CP on your back?
No, not 'impact' - I'm not expressing myself very well here. The affect on your back, I mean. Since sometime last autumn I've been troubled with lots of spinal pain, mostly in the top bit around the shoulders.
I've been seeing a lovely osteopath who has mostly sorted out the problem and spent time changing my habits to prevent it getting so bad again. Kim says my bad neck and back are as much to do with my day-to-day life as the accident I had last year.
All the time I was spending in front of computers was the main culprit, she says, and things have changed there. I do less keyboarding and use voice-recognition a lot now too.
I've also been trying to think about bad posture and improve how I sit. This picture isn't exactly how I was sitting (and I nearly always wear clothes too), but it's an exaggeration of what I was doing wrong - butt out, head forward.
There is though, one issue I haven't discussed with Kim. It's my enthusiasm for the diaper position. I have to say, I love it but I think it too may have been adding to my difficulties.
So, diaper is on strict ration in our house these days. I'm quite happy to 'suffer' a pain in the ass, but hate the pain in my neck.

Too tempting...

As you know if you've ever spent time on this blog, I love all things 19th Century. I grew into my spanko kink in the days before the internet and it was vintage erotica that opened the door to self-discovery.
All those gloomy Gothic country houses with their stern guardians and strict, no-nonsense governesses... And, of course, lots of forbidden sexual activity.
You rarely come across 21st Century imagery that gets anywhere near capturing the laced-in passion of it all. I love the work of artists from the time like Lewis Bald, but when photographers and videographers have a go at creating a 19th Century scenario it's usually a disaster. So, I was thrilled to see that Dreams of Spanking have ventured again into Victorian/Edwardian country - because they do it so well.

I'm so busy at the moment with real world writing that I try very hard to be good and to keep away from reading spanko-world blogs - I can waste whole days blog-hopping. But I have to share my enthusiasm for 'The Edwardian Governess'.
I really do LOVE the costumes - they are so convincing. For me, there is something so incredibly sexy about a reddened bot peeping out from virgin-white old-style bloomers.
Actually, I think of them as drawers rather than bloomers. Not sure what the difference is, but my pair were 'lost in action' recently and I really could do with finding replacements.
And doesn't Pandora make a scarily strict governess. She has such a presence on the screen.

Hair trigger

I don't think I'm alone in spending quite a lot of time thinking about why I'm a spanko, or more broadly why spankos are spankos. Is it in our nature - a bit of genetic pre-disposition - or have we been made by early-life experiences?
Just now I was thinking about how things were when I was 10 or 11 and my Mum and older sister were, or so it seemed, constantly at war with one another. For some reason it occurred to me that over-hearing them may have been my 'trigger'.
As far as I know Mum never actually spanked Big Sis, but she often threatened to. I'd be in my room listening to them arguing and I'd hear stuff like: "I've a good mind to take your knickers down and give you a good hiding!"
Big Sis would say something like: "Go on then, I'd like to see you try..." And that would be that, Mum would come slamming out of the room and everybody would be in a bad mood for the rest of the day.

The other thing about these exchanges was that there was usually a fair bit of Mum talking about what would have happened to her in similar circumstances. "Do you know what my Mum would have done to me if I'd said that to her?" she'd ask, before answering the question herself: "She'd have taken a belt to me, that's what!"
That didn't seem to add up because my Gran was such a small, gentle woman that I could never imagine her as a belt-wielding disciplinarian. Anyway, from the time when my sister was about 15 to when she left home at the age of 19 there was lots of talk about CP in our house; it didn't happen, but it was on the agenda.
That was all going on when I was between the ages of 9 and 13, an impressionable time. Another thing, I can remember was that when Big Sis did move out I was really pleased at the change it brought to the house.
There were no arguments and everybody (Mum, Daddy and I) got on much better. Also, after feeling overlooked for such a long time I was suddenly the centre of attention.
My point is that just when my brain was being wired for sexuality our house was buzzing with parent-child confrontation and lots of talk about CP. And, I think I was jealous of the attention Big Sis was getting from Mum, even though it was negative attention.
Anyway, this post has begun to read like I'm on the therapist's couch. Sorry, but it does make me wonder.

  

Horsing around

One of my 2013 resolutions is to do more riding. I was talking with SO about it this morning and we're going to make it part of our get fit regime.

Then I logged on here and found that search terms over the last day include  'equestrian porn jodhpurs' and 'ladies in jodhpurs and spanking'. Which reminds me that my interest in all things equine is not entirely unconnected to SQ. 
As it happens I went to the saddlery yesterday to buy a turnout rug (a coat for a horse) for one of our ponies and was looking at jods. Time was when you could only get black, blue or stone colour, but now the choice is wonderful and some of the colours and designs are crazy.
I particularly like the design that has a seat and inner thigh panel that's a different colour. But for me there's a couple of problems in the brighter, breezier designs; firstly, I think they're a bit young for me - I worry that I'd be mutton dressed as lamb, and there's also the skill issue.
Bright pink or blue jods catch the eye, but if your riding is a bit rubbish - as mine is - then that's not a great thing. You'd rather blend in a bit more.
Anyway, the way jods (of any colour) cling to your bottom is a wonderful and erotic thing. It's something that I think the fabulous Pandora Blake seems to understand as her work often features horsey gear.
I love it all and for a spanko it immediately puts you in 'that' frame of mind. Add in riding whips, lots of leather and the saddle-soreness that comes with a long ride and the riding-spanko connection is a heady thing. Perhaps I could find a pair of pale pink jods with a vivid scarlet seat as a celebration of the sport's spanko heart.

Apres-fess

Après-fess (French: after spanking) refers to going out, having drinks, dancing, and generally socialising after spanking. It is popular in the Alps, where spankees often stop at bars after their last chastisement of the day while still wearing spanking-related costumes (school or maid uniform etc). The concept is similar to the 19th hole in golf.

OK, I've pinched the Wiki definition of apres-ski and substituted one s-word for another, but still. I pleased to say that I got a humdinger of a spanking today and I feel GOOD.
So wouldn't it be nice to be able to share that with somebody? I know people can and do, but in my little world its not an option. I could hardly pop into the village pub, hop up on a bar stool and say: "Golly gosh, my bum's all hot and stingy tonight..."
The best option I have is to share my marvellous little secret with you, dear reader. Thank you.

Moment of guilt

Long-awaited, well-deserved. I'm sitting here at the desk in my office with that warm post-spanking glow in, and on, my seat. The perfect tonic.

Or should be. More than a month has passed by since this particular brat last got an attitude adjustment and, having been extensively adjusted, I should be on an after-the-event high, but I'm not.
That's because I'm feeling a bit guilty. What do I give back? Our little kink isn't SO's thing and I'm really, really grateful that my whims are indulged, but this morning was all about ME and that's not really right, is it?
Vanillas have rights too. Not just a brat, but a selfish brat too...
PS I've just been into our bedroom and there was Old Faithful at the corner of the bed. I just had to find a camera and record the moment. Old Faithful is a clothesbrush that I bought sometime around 1990 and that, to my knowledge, has never, ever been used to brush clothes!

Outdoor option

The long Christmas-New Year holiday is almost over. The Christmas tree has gone and the tinsel is back in the box in the loft - and I'm itching for some adult fun...
With the girls off school and uni we have been in fun lock-down since early December. For some reason SO is horrified by the idea that they might discover that parents do have sex; presumably they assume we did it twice for procreative purposes and then said that's the end of that.
I have been tempted to suggest some sort of shed-related encounter. We have one at the very end of the garden well away from the house (and the neighbours' houses for that matter).
But the whole woodshed discipline thing doesn't really work on this side of the Atlantic and, anyway, our shed isn't that sort of shed.
It's rather like the one in this picture. What on earth is he planning to do in there? There wouldn't even be room to swing a meaningful spank, would there?
No, our shed is dusty and damp, there are spiders and dead flies and it is about as un-erotic as it could be. No kids come Tuesday though, so the wait may be over soon...

Six - and two threes

I came across some nice old-fashioned boarding school stories the other day (by an author called Louise O. Weston) and once I'd read one collection, I wanted to go back to the Kindle store for more. But at the time I couldn't remember the author's name or the book title (and by then I'd deleted the collection that I'd read).
All I could remember was that the title included the phrase 'six of the best'. So I searched for that on my Kindle and was surprised at just how many books it threw back at me.

Boy, has this CP-related phrase gone mainstream. In fact, I wonder if the vanilla world knows what it's saying when it talks about that  'best'?
Presumably 'six of the best' doesn't have a life beyond the UK. Here, whenever a publication does some sort of product review the editor seems to think that the page has to carry six of whatever's been evaluated. Not five, not seven, sometimes a top 10 - but more often than not six of the best. Whether it's boots, waterproofs or cameras, they have to come in sixes.
Is this all an innocent use of half a dozen? We Brits like to cleave to the old ways, so we use our acres, miles and ounces when it would make more sense to go metric, but even so...
But you only have to run the phrase through Google to see how much sixing is going on out there. For example, when the ex-public schoolboys of Genesis got together for a reunion I reckon they chose 'Six of the Best' as the name of their temporary band for nostalgic reasons.
There's a lot less ambiguity when it comes to the band Lip Service. I reckon the cover of their album 'Six of the Best' speaks for itself, don't you?
Then there's the 80s girl group Clout. What did they call their second ablum? You've got it.
Innocent or not, I like it. I love the way iI can be flipping through a mag at the doctor's or a paper on the train and turn a page and... there's a reference to six and my mind is off to it's favorite fantasy boarding school for naughty girls and boys.
By the way,a six and two threes is a phrase my dear old Mum likes to use and has nothing at all to do with that other six (of the best). It's her shorthand for when something makes little difference one way or another.