Monk, we have not yet heard anything from you about Shibaricon. Are you going?

So I’m guessing by now since I have not said much on the topic that you have probably already drawn your own conclusions, but here is the “official” word. After giving the matter a great deal of thought, many conversations with those I trust the most and lots of consideration I have chosen to not vend at the event. I know, the biggest bondage rope maker in the world not attending the largest rope conference in the world, what gives? Politics, you ask? Bad blood, perhaps?

Nope, nothing so juicy I fear. In the end it came down to simple economics really.

The workload coming in via online sales have reached a point where diverting stock, labor, travel expenses and shutting down the shop for over a week just does not make economic sense at this time. Simply put, I have more orders than I know what to do with and going to a show, even a huge one, would in the end cost me more money that I would make by staying home and filling existing orders.

While I am very disappointed that I won’t get to see many of my good friends and customers at Shibaricon this year, but it would be unfair to the hundreds of customers who have placed orders, paid their hard earned money and are waiting patiently of their rope. I am trusting that those of you going to the event will understand that this is nothing personal, I adore you all and want you to have a great time.

Of course there is a silver lining to this, no death march for yours truly. Sure there is a ton of work to do, but it is more of a “Moderately Overwhelmed, Damn We Best Get Back To Work” march and not the “Bone Crushing, I Have Not Slept In A Week And There Is No End In Sight” march.

If you listen close you can hear a collective sigh of relief from my partners

So there you have it, the official work from the man himself. Sorry I could not give you better gossip fodder, but in the end it came down to the old saying “A bird in hand is worth two in the bush” and right now we have a lot of birds in our hands.

Regarding Shibaricon 2008

I am long overdue in addressing this matter. As most you already know, I and my company, TwistedMonk.com, have been proud event sponsors of the Shibaricon rope bondage conference for the past two years. A lot has changed in those two years, as the event has grown, changed ownership, and moved host hotels. Through that time, it has been an honor to donate my financial, promotional, administrative and moral support to the event as it has evolved and grown.

We get approached by so many worthy organizations and events for sponsorship. It would be simply impossible to sponsor them all. Rather we work hard to pick and choose worthwhile events and organizations to lend out aid to. This can some days feel like a daunting task, so many worthwhile causes, and only a limited set of resources at your disposal.

Of all the lessons learned from the environmental movement of the past 20 years, “Think Globally, Act Locally” sits high on my decision-making process. The Seattle Center for Sex Positive Culture (formerly known as “The Wetspot”) has faithfully served the Seattle and greater North West’s sex positive community for over a decade. This is where I took my first rope class, where I sold my first piece of rope at one of their holiday vendor fairs, and where I have hung art in several of the Seattle Erotic Art Festival shows. The TwistedMonk.com you know and love would not be here if it were not for this organization and the tireless efforts of its volunteer staff.

This year it is my plan to donate funds, in my customer’s name, to this organization. Thus, I am not sponsoring Shibaricon this year. It is my hope that by stepping down as sponsor, I can give another young entrepreneur the opportunity to go from selling to their community to becoming a sponsor of it.

I am sure this will come a great shock to some; I assure you that this decision has weighed heavily on me for several months. While Shibaricon is an excellent event and a great way to spend a 4 day weekend, the greater needs of our local community are just too pressing to not inspire one to action.

So what about those who won free passes at last year’s event?
As part of last year’s sponsorship agreement, several free passes to this year’s event were to be given away as prizes. Fear not, I have every confidence that the event organizers will honor still honor the agreement and will see to it personally that you get into the event free of charge as promised.

Does this mean you will not be hosting the Annual Rope Rodeo?
At the time of this writing, neither I nor my organization has been invited by the Shibaricon planning committee to make a repeat performance.

Does this mean Twisted Monk will not be selling rope at the conference?
To be honest, I really don’t know. As much as I love getting to interact in-person with my customers, show sales now make up such a small percentage of our overall revenue that I am hesitant to commit resources to many of them. While Shibaricon is a good event, it is also a long one. Requiring me to divert stock months in advance, transport, house and feed a multi person staff and shut down my shop for nearly 2 weeks, forcing good customers to wait.

I am waffling here on this one, dear readers, the constant cycle of preshow death march, show frenzy and post show crash has taken its toll on me. The goal of any business to build a stable enough customer base such that you don’t have to do this cycle over and over again. As a company, TwistedMonk.com is at that point. With a global client base in the tens of thousands and more new customers coming in every day, I’m loath to want to subject my crew and my family to this kind of punishment.

The jury is still out on this one gang, I assure you that when I make my final decision you, my loyal reader, will hear it first.

Let me close this on this happy note, I am so proud of all the memories and people I have encountered as part of this event. Some of my dearest friends and leather family were first found here. Shibaricon is an excellent event and I encourage those who are considering going to not take my lack of involvement as a slight against the event or its planners.

Remember how I joked that me exposing myself had become a Shibaricon tradition? You thought I was kidding, right?

So here is a shot of me after being the "Celebrity Stunt Cock" for the liquid latex demo. Yes, that would a not work safe photo BTW. Oh and yes that is gold with gold glitter. The glitter was an added touch courtesy of the latex creator, Scott. Who, just after my dearest wife Tambo giggling stepped away to admire her freshly painted handy work, dropped to his knees in front of me and "blew" me with a handful of gold glitter. (I'm staying with him in a few weeks when we trek east for the Summer Flea. He should be worried.)

So make your goldfinger/ goldenrod/ man with the golden gun jokes now, thank you.

I suppose I should be slightly embarrassed by shots like these. They would certainly not encourage the image of the "Bad Ass Top". To the contrary, I say if you cant laugh at yourself, why bother leaving the house? Of course this shot makes me cringe just a wee bit. But just a tiny bit.

Broken PT2

Critical hardware failure is not a pretty thing, experienced players do everything in their power to plan for such things. However a brand new piece of equipment breaking on the very first night of play? Well that just sucked out loud. Now I would like to take credit as an experienced top and skillfully getting my bottom down and free from the failed frame before anything bad happened, but it was Ayem who calmly stated to me, after said crack, “Um, that’s not good. Shall I come down now?”

Thankfully, we were using a minimal amount of rope, so he was free and clear in a matter of seconds.
Upon inspection of the frame, it was obvious that we had in fact broken the main support struts and damaged it beyond repair. I may have lasted another 10 minutes, 20 tops, but for certain this unit was down for the remainder of the convention. Way to go Monk, the event sponsor kills a hard point on the first night.
Despondent, Ayem looked at me with a large pouting lip and hung dog expression. “Great, I broke the new toy, now I won’t get to play anymore.”
“Fuck that, I aint done with you!”
Tossing him to the ground and firmly tying him into a small, laughing ball. I set about to find something suitable to use to continue the scene. All the suspension frames were in use and I was not about to go and see if I could break another one. Then, inspiration hit. Strewn on the floor of the play space were a number of small tie down mats. These are basically large padded seats with tie points bolted into the sides; they would make an excellent tool.

I was not planning on tying him to said bondage furniture; no I was planning on hitting him with it.

The foam padded seat made an excellent impact toy as I wielded it above my head and brought it down on his ass. A satisfying “whump” sound really. Followed of course by howls of laughter. That sick monkey was enjoying this way too much. Time to show him exactly what tea bagging was.

Rolling our victim up into a sitting position, I grab the back of his head and straddle up close. “See buddy, its like this” I say with a much malice as I can muster between giggles, “Tea bagging is when you take your junk and rub them on someone’s head, like so…” pulling his shaved dome closer, I make exaggerated thrusting motions with my hips and rub the crotch of my jeans into his forehead.

“But why is it called tea bagging if you are just rubbing your jeans against me?” He asks in his goading way.

Let me pause for just a moment, over the course of the last 3 years, it has become a sort of tradition that I end up naked in public. Well not naked really, just my junk. Yep, for whatever reason it is just not a Shibaricon with out Monk pulling out his genitals and doing something silly with them. I blame my buddy Scott for this, but that is another story.

Shrug, what can I do? He had me there. Un buttoning the front of my pants, I pull out my boy bits and comically slap them against the top of his head. Laughter erupts from over my shoulder. Seems that folks were watching things unfold and the sudden flash of skin caught them, shall we say off guard? No, lets not. The truth of the matter was that there was a line of girls watching two hot, sweaty boys wrestle around and now they were laughing their asses off as I comically used my good friend’s shaved head to scratch a non existent itch on my balls.

You would think that getting tied up in hot pink rope and having a dude rest his junk on your head would be enough for somebody, but no. This just made the crazy fucker laugh louder.

It took me doing (post pants re-zipping mind you) one-handed push-ups, fist resting squarely in the meat of his pectoral muscle, for him to finally tap out. Of course I made the mistake of gloating after we were done, proud in the fact that I had made Ayem, a notoriously energetic soul, exhausted. “Oh yeah, I broke the energizer bunny” I think was what I said… and what happens, like the terminator, he somehow reassembles his bruised self and bounces back up and smiles that silly grin of his at me.

Un freaking believable.

Later that night he would take part in a group suspension and single tailing at the hands of my lover, Matisse.

Stick a fork in it and call it done.
The Shibaricon 2007 Death March is officially over! We just need to pile stock into bags, print a couple of signs and catch an airplane to Chicago.

Huge, huge thanks to everyone who pitched in with food, caffeine, extra hours, 16yr old whiskey, all around patience with us as we crunched this one out. The Abbey crew, Nerdy, DoubleL, and minion, you guys are all rockstars in my book.

Thanks

Now with any luck, all the stock will make it in one piece, the display gear we have yet to pick up will be waiting for us, and the local authorities won't kick our perverted asses out of the place.

PS:
I'm bringing my camera and hope to get some shots of the booth and such so you can see just how big a show we are throwing. I don't want to brag here, but damn this is huge.

Dumbfounded

The pre-shipment of stock just left the Abbey. This year we are sending five hundred pounds of stock ahead. This, this is staggering. The first year we went to this show, Griffin and I stuffed all our show stock into the trunk of a rental sedan, 200 pounds? Maybe 250? The next year we pre-shipped out 300?

This is JUST stock, not racks or bins or other show support stuff. All that gear we pick up in Chicago.

Here is a little math problem for you. Assuming that 100 pounds are books/dvds and that 100ft of rope weighs approximately 2.5 pounds. How many feet are currently en route to Chicago?

Now you wanna know the really mind blowing bit. I still need to make another mile of stock this weekend. Nerdy, Tambo and I will carry on another 300 pounds of stock with us when we fly out on Wednesday.

Welcome to hell week

I’m holding a coffee cup that is larger than my head. I don’t think the human body was designed to ingest this much caffeine in one sitting, enough to keep small tribes of indigenous Amazon peoples buzzing for days. Me? I’m sucking the fucker down like it was mother’s milk.

Welcome to the last big push.

I kissed my wife goodbye this morning, sent email to all those I loved and told them that if they wanted to see me, bring me lunch… and more coffee. I’ve got 10 days left to pull it all together, pack up the stock and deliver one hell of a show. No small feat, considering that 20% of my stock is not yet even in the damn country yet. This would send most folks into paroxysms of panic, me? I’m just drinking more coffee and hoping that my partners’ near legendary patience will hold out for this one last week.

As for those of you going to Shibaricon, oh man do we have a hell of a show in store for you. Here are just a few of the new things we have in store for you:

1) A new, never before seen exotic rope that is going to knock your socks off. (Thanks to everyone who helped me test run it this weekend.)
2) Our full color compliment (including the new Hot Pink).
3) New goodies from our friends in Tokyo.
4) A new book / DVD combo that you have never seen. (We will be showing all our DVDs at the booth so you can see them before you buy.)
5) Those amazing “ball end” ass hooks? Forget those cheap knock offs being sold elsewhere. We got the real deal, in three sizes no less. Small, Medium and OH SWEET JESUS!
6) New, ultra light, suspension rings. All the strength, half the weight.

Just to name a few.

Then there is the matter of all the free stuff and the bondage rodeo. I’ll talk more about that later this week, but couples who are going should think about participating. I’m looking for 4 couples who are comfortable with rope, but not experts, with rope should think about competing. We will be giving away over $1,000.00 in cash and prizes at the event.

My coffee cup is empty, the dye kettles are boiling and I need to get these new orders ready before Nerdy gets into the shop.

Time to turn up the Motorhead just a wee bit louder.

This just in from my video guru, the Folsom 2006 highlights video.


As with the rest of our videos, this too has been posted to the youtube channel. I have a few more up my sleeve that I'll be posting later. The response has been nothing short of astounding, I think I will be packing my miniDV cam around a lot this summer.

Yes, this is amazing, but watching it kinda freaked me out. See, it hit me this morning. We leave for Shibaricon in just over 3 weeks and there is still so much left to be done. Vendors who are late, colors not yet right, booths to design, what am I going to wear? ack the list goes on and on! I'm not going to panic, yet. However if I seem a bit edgy next time you see me, this would be the case. I know, in my more lucid moments, that we will be ok there will be enough stock and that we will sell all we bring. I just never want to do these things half way, come up short and not deliver a kick ass show.

Shibaricon Presale Begins 4/20/07! Pre-order your rope now, save 20% and enter to win 2 passes to Shibaricon 2008!

The time has come again, the annual gathering of rope fanatics that is Shibaricon is almost here. As usual, your friends (and proud event sponsors) TwistedMonk.Com will be there with lots and lots of rope! Now if you have been to the event in previous years you know, no matter how much rope we seem to bring we always run out of it! Don’t miss out on getting the rope you want for the event and save yourself a bundle.

Here is how it works: for 2 weeks, starting on Friday April 20, we will be accepting Shibaricon pre-orders. Call the Abbey at 206-938-7527 or email your shopping list to pre-orders@twistedmonk.com We will contact you with your discounted total and you are all set! Everyone who places a pre-order is automatically entered to win 2 full event passes to next year’s Shibaricon.

The Sticky Details:

Discount does not apply to Exotics, Clothing, DVD or book stock.

A 20% deposit is required at the time of order with the remainder due at delivery.

2 passes to Shibaricon 2008 will be given away via random drawing and announced at the event. Limit one entry per household.

Pre-sale begins at 9am on Friday 4/20/07 and ends at 6pm Friday 5/4/07

All preorders will be ready for pickup Friday 5/25/07 when the vendor space opens.