I'm going to respectfully disagree with Babeland enthusiasts, and dissertate at length on a topic near and dear to my heart: masturbation.
When I lost my virginity, I realized somewhere between enduring the agony of my own weight on his teenaged triton and being handed a Kleenex and my Paul Frank panties some six minutes later, that for whatever reason, curiosity had never picked up where sex ed left off. I knew, vaguely, what sex looked like, but of the actual mechanics I was woefully ignorant. I'd sort of assumed that the point of entry was, well, the *point*, and that all subsequent points - pregnancy, orgasm, true love - occur at this magical juncture.
I was, needless to say, in store for a grave disappointment. D., to his credit, was meticulous about safe sex. The same, however, could not be said of his prowess in the physical or emotional realms, and I was pretty much left high and dry -literally- on both counts both that afternoon and for nine months of ensuing angst.
Enter feisty best friend, and one, wild weekend in L.A. I returned with many souvenirs; among them, fatefully, my first vibrator: a demure, sparkly-blue-silicone G-spot starter collected, with giggles, from a low-brow Westwood smut-shop. With The Blue Baloo, as I affectionately dubbed it, I not only experienced the then-unknown, cryptic O for the first time, but the even more liberating pleasure of orgasms at my command.
From that point forward, I was free! - free from the shackles of neatherparts-cottonmouth, premature ejaculation, straight-up fugliness. After the Blue Baloo sputtered out during my sophomore year of college, I made an annual gift to myself of a new vibrator, never spending more than $15.
This year, I returned to New York after some time living in a bigger, badder metropolis in Asia. I'd evolved in mentality from a scrappy New Yorker living on instant noodles and in converted apartments, to a more materialistic urbanite. I wanted my vibrator to reflect this new taste for beautiful, expensive things. So I shunned the old WeVil smut holes I'd patronized in seasons past, and went to Babeland.
Babeland is a high-brow rendering of low-brow subject matter, tastefully displaying the best-in-show sex toys (prices range from ~$18 - $200 for vibrators), and employing real connoisseurs of the field. After two trips and much deliberation, I walked out with the fairly basic, $25 Jenna Kitty Velvet Caress.
As a pretty experienced consumer (if I do say so myself), the cost of a vibrator should be most directly tied to three specs:
1.The noise level. In the art of self-pleasure, discretion is key. I once owned a "massager" from the Sharper Image that sounded like a power drill. I'd feel too self conscious to use it during high-traffic hours in my shared apartment without turning on the tube. If you've ever tried masturbating to Arrested Development, you understand. In this, the Velvet Caress (and most of the other lower-end numbers I played with at Babeland) fails to measure up.
2.Battery efficiency. My favorite vibrator to date, California Exotic's smallish wonder, the Tsunami, brings this to a new level. Not only has it never, ever crapped out mid-motion, but I actually felt socially conscious using it. The button-dictated intensity levels on most of Babeland's fancy vibrators make them less customizable for use, and somewhat (I've found) less battery-efficient.
3.The actual quality of the orgasm. The idea that I'd been having ~$13 orgasms my whole life when there exist, claims Babeland, $180 orgasms, seems specious. I'm not sure I'll ever drop really big bucks for a vibrator, given that the cheaper ones procured in crasser WeVil establishments were really fantastic.
The bottom line is that I'm a lot less fond of my grown-up classy vibrator. It, like most other grown-up, classy things, was more expensive, and underwhelming in terms of specs compared to materials beloved in younger years. read more