2007 In Review

I have a real love-hate relationship with the new year. On one hand, it’s nice to take stock, appreciate the last year and look forward to the next – but on the other, I just hate the prevalence of lists and fake awards and all that crap. That said, I’m giving in to the pressure and doing a big ole wrap-up, Dacia style.

Um, so, I did a lot this year. I guess that’s an understatement. Most of my time was dominated by promoting my book and my movie, but I did other perpetually busy girl type stuff too.

I spent 16 hours over four months getting a half-sleeve tattoo done by the very lovely Joy Rumore (check out her blog and her shop – you can see the final result on ModBlog, in a post hilariously titled (to me, anyway) Famous People’s Tattoos.

I traveled to a lot of different places: Las Vegas, Amsterdam, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chapel Hill, San Francisco, Los Angeles (twice), Maine, Washington DC, and Berlin.

In March, I threw a big-ass party in collaboration with my dear pal Bella Vendetta for my porno directorial debut, The Bi Apple – my Flickr set from the party is here, and the Fleshbot write-up is here. The film quickly became a best-seller for Adam & Eve, got some nice reviews, and it’s screened publicly in Amsterdam, New York, and Berlin. Eros Zine put it on their Best Of 2007 list and it won the “Hottest Bi Sex Scene” award at the Good For Her Feminist Porn Awards in Toronto. Curiously, Adam and Eve has decided that they don’t want to do a sequel, so I’m weighing my other options as far as how to fund more movies and whether or not I want to work with a big porn studio.

In May, I finished my Master’s degree in American Studies at Columbia University. I graduated the day after I got to hold my first book in my hands.

Oh yeah, that thing. I turned in my manuscript for Naked on the Internet on January 1st, and it hit stores on June 1, while I was presenting on it in Amsterdam at C*lick Me. When i came back to New York, I did a bunch of events and then hit the road, taking it to all the cities I listed above, which was totally awesome but totally exhausting. The book got lots of play both online and off, and it got good solid reviews across the board.

I also curated the second annual Sex Worker Visions art show for $pread, this time at Arena Studios, where I’ve started curating bimonthly art shows in November, beginning with a show called “Modified Eros,” which is up through January 18th.

Here’s a wrap-up of my best posts here on Waking Vixen:
Sex worker, other and More thoughts on sex worker/other
The State of Alt according to Vegas
Serious Hunk of Man, and the Shades of Gray – includes a pic of me at 19, with short green hair and a leather jacket
How to be an ally to sex workers
Authenticity
Sex workers, class divides and fun with empowerment and degradation
As it turns out, the Internet isn’t the answer to everything
Book vs. blog: where to stick all the juicy details
How the media is more exploitative than the sex industry
Creepy dudes
The internet is not a virtual streetcorner
Anniversaries: The Museum of Sex
Seeing straight ahead: the porn industry’s sexuality blinders

And for the visually inclined, a few of my favorite pics from 2007:

A performance at the Bi Apple release party, taken from behind the stage

Hot balls – doing some arts and crafts at the One Nation Under Dildo sex workers party

Outdoor Dr Sketchy’s in Western MA

Me, Molly Crabapple and Bella Vendetta, drunk and blurry – this is one of my faves, I laugh every time I look at it

Eliyanna guarding her cheesesteak, in Philly on my book tour

Me in the library at the Museum of Urology

the night before I left NY for two weeks in CA

Violet Blue and a cupcake

me in Freddy & Eddy’s bathroom

Zak and Mandy in LA

a shot from a foot fetish set I shot of Bella Vendetta

Annalee Newitz tallying up our dinner bill on her calculator watch

me and my sweetie in Berlin

Juicy giving her crotch shot the thumbs