Sex in San Diego: Rocking Rabbit Christmas, Part I

by Anais Child

By the time I get around to Christmas presents for My Beloved, our bank account is always in the negative and I have run out of creative ideas. Over the many years we have been together, Christmas isn’t a big deal when it comes to exchanging gifts. But this particular year, I wanted to do something … special. I wanted to do something … different.

The most different thing I could do was to enter the downtown Hustler. I had walked past it daily since it opened, but had never been inside. Once inside, it was apparent that I did not reflect the “demographic” of the customers nor the sales staff. Well into my 50s, I also possessed the blinkless quality of someone who has seen a whole lot and is shocked by little.

The first floor had sexy apparel and funny sexy gifts that you probably would not buy for your office holiday exchange. The mother lode of untapped pleasures and mysterious must-haves was upstairs.

Upstairs I was greeted by a vivacious, attractive woman who worked there, about thirty years younger than me. We obviously shared that same blinkless quality of a real professional woman who has heard everything, was shocked by little and was there to provide customer satisfaction. We smiled at each other.

I frankly wasn’t sure what to say for openers, and ultimately settled upon the question of whether there were any special holiday products, maybe an extra special Christmassy lubricant. I was personally escorted to a boatload of lubricants and then I was on my way to butt plugs.

“Are there any Casper the Ghost Butt Plugs? “ I enquired.

I have no idea why I said that. Truly, it was the first thing that entered my mind. We laughed, and I said that I would really like to find something that would engender such wild feelings of passion and deep satisfaction that my partner and I would both ultimately dissolve into conjoined spots on the sheets—the torrid Christmas fini of a life well lived!

My personal shopper seemed to get the gist of my florid peroration and led me to a wall o’ wonders, each item sealed in plastic and made in China. And yes, I wondered what a possibly 12-year-old Chinese kid or a prisoner thought about us while he or she assembled said items.

It was difficult for me to figure out where you would put some of these items and even how you would put them there. But above all, they seemed so plastic, so lifeless. Passion and deep satisfaction? I couldn’t quite see it, but I muscled on.

“Ah,” she said,” here’s a really popular item—the Rocking Rabbit.”

The RockingRabbit consisted of an odd shaped plastic thingy with “ears” (!) and two little plastic boxes—his and hers, for maximum sensual stimulation, whatever that meant.

I grabbed the package.

And then I inquired whether there was something special I could present to my partner to use for sexual satisfaction during those times when I was not there. I was immediately taken to another sealed package, and happily it was not blow up Betty. She pointed to a plastic wrinkly penis sheath—extra-large—that looked like a condom standing at attention.

By then I had to get back to work and took some lube, a butt plug, the Rocking Rabbit, and the penis sheath alternative to our all-natural, olive oil soap to the checkout counter on the floor.

Batteries Not Included

A drop-dead, gorgeous, six-foot tall young guy smiled at me from behind the counter—as if he had been waiting for me! Such mortal youth and beauty! He commended me for my penis sheath, better-than-soap purchase. He confided that it was the hands-down, below-the-belt, fave choice of our men shipping out to Iraq and Afghanistan. I felt positively patriotic as I stood in solidarity with our men overseas.

But then he said this item and the Rocking Rabbit required batteries. And that because there were no returns, I would need to purchase the batteries and he would make sure the items worked—in the abstract sense of “worked” of course.

So there I stood while he inserted the batteries and hit the on switches on Little Bunny Foo-Foo and Better-than-Soap. I was still clueless as to what they did, but it was confirmed that each of them”worked.” I felt awkward, but it wasn’t as if I were going to run into someone I knew. Or if I did, they were there too. And what was the problem anyway?

Actually, I am a very private person at heart … and there is some part of me that reacts as a good catholic girl, which is to say that all thoughts carnal can engender equal measures of guilt and desire.

And besides, do I really want someone to think “Rocking Rabbit” or “butt plug” the next time they see me?

But I left in anonymity, and as a recovering catholic I paid a hefty $160 for plastic stuff manufactured in China that would purportedly fulfill the desires of a sybarite. The bag that contained these objects of desire was as small as a Tiffany purchase—but emblazoned with the word “Hustler.”

Stay tuned for the next installment of Rocking Rabbit Christmas, Part II: The Big Day Comes.

Sex in San Diego, a column appearing every Friday here at The OB Rag, explores topics related to sex in America’s Finest City. To encourage openness while still respecting privacy, most authors will use pseudonyms.