Gawker
The Museum of Sex seems to exist solely for 18-year-old tourists from Minnesota to come in and giggle wildly at the adult diapers and dildos on display. Because really, would you pay $14.50 plus tax to see stuff that's probably in your bedroom? But last night, duty called, and so Nikola and I headed over to the museum for the party for Sin in the Second City, a new book about a brothel in turn-of-the-20th-century Chicago. (And guess what? The book is actually really, really good. Even Joseph Epstein thought so!) What we found was that there's nothing publishing types like more than a party at a sex museum, because people who work in publishing are all secretly sexual deviants. Kidding! Well, sort of kidding.
The author of Sin in the Second City is a feisty Philly girl named Karen Abbott, who used to work at the same alt-weekly in Philadelphia that I did, and so I immediately felt the kind of kinship with her that you feel when you meet someone who was, like, at the same POW camp as you were, even though your time there didn't overlap? Like, we totally had the same jailer! Karen lives in Atlanta now with her husband, a very nice man named Chuck Kahler, and is tan and really kind of hot, which her editor said was helpful in promoting the book. (Well, duh!) Karen is also the type of person who seems to say whatever is on her mind, propriety be damned, which is another thing I liked about her. For example, when her editor and the host of the party, Water for Elephants author Sara Gruen (Sara and Karen met years ago in an online writing group, which must have been some writing group!), were giving toasts, Karen said a few words, including about how great her editor, Julia Cheiffetz, is, because Julie was more than an editor, she was also a friend and, it seems, a sort of remote therapist, and would advise Karen to sleep, go to yoga, and take a Xanax when she felt stressed out, which sounds like a smart combination.
Also, Karen said that if she had known that Random House editor Will Murphy was going to be there, she would have made it a cash bar. Ha! The truth of this statement was borne out as the party slowly wound down to its inexorable end. You know that point? It happens at every party, and it's when things start to get weird. Like, all of a sudden, off in the corner, Will Murphy is sucking face with a very tall, very skinny publicist from Wiley in a way that causes one person to remark, "That is the most un-sexy making out I've ever seen." Other people are imploring the bartender to pour them one last drink. And through it all, the hors d'oeuvres—spring rolls, fried dumplings, some goat cheese and endive thing—never stopped coming.
Comments
Liza, put yer damn shirt on.
Where's Miss New Jersey?
@InfoEd: Ha!
"We're all so excited backstage. Me, and David, and Joey, and Pappy..."
Please lay off on two things: NSFW images before the jump and reaching for "Minnesota" when you want to pick on the rustics. There are 49 states packed to the borders with non New Yorkers. Show a little imagination! I say August should be Missouri Month!
Jesus. This looks like someones mother's idea of New York.
@crotchety: i am someone who has belatedly yet good-naturedly come to accept 'Canadian' as shorthand for 'unsophisticated yokel'. perhaps you should know they don't mean you personally?
@josh speed: You're Canadian also? Can we do some sort of roll call?
@lululemming: yes ma'am; we're everywhere. what sort of roll call would you like: double double?
Just use Wisconsin. Those folks won't be offended--they haven't figured out how to use the internet yet. Uh, zing?
And it should be clear by this point that I'm from Wisconsin. And bitter. And not very funny! And over-sharing. It's a midwestern thing.
@crotchety: Personally, I'm partial to Indiana as a slur.
Also: Book publishing people are the biggest sexual deviants on the planet this side of fundamentalist Christians. I feel dirty just recalling the stuff I know.
Caption: When facelifts go horribly wrong. That bloodcurdling photo was on my screen when my boss walked by. He wasn't offended by the concept of nudity, only nudity on that particular woman
@InfoEd:
Hah! I was thinking the same thing almost:
Boy, did Liza's breats hold up incredibly well, or is that just new surgery?
How about Putnam County? Staten Island? Murray Hill?
Wow, y'all nailed the Museum of Sex dead-on! I pass by that place everyday on my way home and the only people I ever see congregating outside are giggling milk-fed farmers daughters in daisy dukes, neon flip flops and baby blue t-shirts that say "NYPD" on them. I guess they go there and get sublime when their parents let them off the leash for some "free time" in the "Big Apple". BARF!
@crotchety: word. i mean, christ, we had our own museum of questionable medical devices, including many sex-related ones, before the owners closed the place and moved some of the devices to the science museum.
I have somewhat awkwardly run into coworkers at openings (uh hey? what are you doing here? in front of the power drill dildo.. uh hem...)(I had legit/non-fetish reasons for being there!)The best is when the fetishists come to the parties in all their patent leather glory and revel in their bonded weirdness like cats in a bag of catnip. It's their few opportunities to shine and they eat it up...
@maevemealone: "...in front of the power drill dildo.. uh hem...)(I had legit/non-fetish reasons for being there!)" Can we look forward to a sex toys feature in an upcoming Consumer Reports?
@GirlCat: I'm awaiting a power upgrade on my outlets as several major appliances have blown out in the last few weeks. Stay tuned!
So basically a sex shop with liquor and without products for sale?
All I heard in my head, as opposed to say, the other things, was these infamous lyrics...
Black hole sun
Wont you come
And wash away the rain
Black hole sun
Wont you come
Wont you come
Are those what she allegedly used to allegedly slap around David Gest?
Doree, of which Philly alt-weekly are you an alum? PW or CP? My inquiring Philly mind wonders if we know some of the same people...
Tasseled pasties are never a good look b/c they only take the eyes and perceived nipple placements DOWNWARD.
Also, why is it that the most uninhibited people are usually the ones who could use it?
Oh, ho, for a second a thought someone had stumbled on to my photos from our Cabaret costume party where one of our copyeditors really took it to the next level, but thank God. I live another day.
don't forget the armpit of america - NJ!!!
@arirang: I'm sure there are some truly attractive, uninhibited people out there, but we never see them because they're always indoors, doing things in rooms too dark for Gawker's flash to illuminate.
when women stick their tongues out in pictures like this woman the right is doing, they think it makes them look kind of fun and wacky, but it's just stupid. when she's feeling pretty britney does it too, and I always want to tell her to stop. actually i always want to tell her to JUST STOP in general.
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