HAPPY HOLIDAYS

Trans-Siberian Orchestra -- Wizards in Winter

Beautiful Operatic Duet Between Two Men

The famous duet from The Pearl Fishers "Au fond du temple saint" is considered to be a love song between two men.

npr music: The Pearl Fishers by Bizet was written in 1863.  Today we don't hear it all that often, and its reputation is based mainly on the beautiful tenor-baritone duet in the first act. That number has become a concert showpiece, and it was even performed at Bizet's own funeral service.

The Pearl Fishers is in three acts, all set on the island then called Ceylon, now the nation of Sri Lanka, off the coast of India. ACT ONE opens in a village of pearl divers, or pearl fishers. The fishermen elect Zurga as their tribal chief, promising him their loyalty. A hunter named Nadir shows up. He's been gone for several years and asks the men if they'll take him back.

Then comes the famous, "Au fond du temple saint" — "Deep in the holy temple." Zurga and Nadir are old friends, and they remember their last time together. They had visited the great temple, and both men fell in love with a beautiful woman who was leading a ceremony. Knowing this woman might come between them, they renounced her and pledged their eternal friendship.

CRUISING . . . Worst Case Scenario

How has cruising gotten you into trouble?  Ever been accosted by security or police?  Ever had your name printed in the newspaper?  Tell your story in the comments below.

Ever accidentally been locked up?

As I recall, it was Wednesday afternoon, the beginning of the Thanksgiving recess at the local university, where I did a lot of cruising in various tea rooms.  Perhaps nothing is finer than the glory holes at a university, not to mention the students themselves.  The particular building that I was using that day for my exploits had rather strange architecture.  Imagine a large cube with a tunnel going through it at ground level as a main artery through campus.  On one side of the tunnel walkway was the main entrance to the building which was mostly glass allowing you to see into the atrium and lobby.  On the other side of the walkway was a glass door that led into an elevator lobby for access to the upper floors.  This small lobby also contained men's and women's bathrooms.

The men's room had about four urinals, four stalls, and a very long row of mirrored sinks which stretched down the length of the room.  Needless to say, this particular tea room was very cruisy.  Frequently, I ducked in for blow jobs using the glory holes between the stalls.

I had forgotton that this was the beginning of the holiday period as I ducked into the tea room.  A few guys came in for a short while, but there was just no action! 

And then it became VERY quiet -- no one at all came in! 

So, I gave up, pulled up my pants and left the tea room, only to find out that the outer glass door was LOCKED!  And I was TRAPPED INSIDE!  There was no emergency handle to push to get out. (I could not help but wonder what would happen in the case of a fire.)  I looked across the tunnel and discovered that all the lights in the atrium and lobby on the other side had been turned off.  Obviously, the building was now locked and closed.  What was I to do?

There was a pay phone in the little lobby on my side, but what would I say if I called security?  Oh, I was just in the men's room waiting for some gay sex?  I don't think so.  So, I took the elevator up to the third floor, crossed over the tunnel in the interior of the building, and descended on a different elevator into the large atrium on the other side.  I wandered around until I found an emergency exit door which was a faux wood panel, only a few feet away from my wife's desk, who was a university employee!  Of course, she was not there, because she too had left early for the holiday.

I pushed on the wood panel expecting to activate the alarm system, and hoped I could disappear into the surrounding shubbery before any security arrived.  Much to my surprise, the panel door swung open on its hinges detached from the emergency alarm mechanism, allowing me to depart with no alarm!  Gently, I pushed the door back into place, and hurried home.  All the next week, I waited for my wife to tell me a story about how security had been breached in the building, but she never said anything.  TRUE STORY.

Coronal Papillae

What are those tiny little white bumps around the edge of my dick's head, you ask.   They are known as coronal papillae.

Ignore the black arrow as it is pointing to the frenulum. 
Look instead at the little white bumps under the edge of the glans.

Those of us who were never circumcised discover them during our teens, and they often occur into our twenties.  Lots of friction such as masturbation sometimes causes them to become tender and painful.  However, they are normal and are nothing to worry about.

They tend to go away by the late twenties as in this example:

In my experience, circumcised guys usually do not have coronal papillae.  Because the glans is constantly exposed to underwear, etc., it tends to dry out and the little white bumps just don't seem to form.  If you are circumcised and have these pearly white bumps, then please let me and others know in the comments below.

If you are a fan of Bel Ami's Eastern European uncut guys, you will notice the coronal papillae in abundance!

(Click on the above images in order to see the coronal papillae more clearly.)

Statistics -- I can't help but wonder . . .

Just looked at last month's statistics and I am somewhat surprised and puzzled.  Given Muslim's strict codes about sex and homosexuality, I note that Saudi Arabia has moved up into tenth place:

Saudis spent the most time per vist on the site and was the only country with a zero percent bounce rate!  First time visitors represented 76% indicating that 24% were returning visitors!

Welcome indeed to all you Saudi.  You are perhaps not as repressed as we have been led to believe.  Please comment below on why you like UncutPlus so much.

Thank you to all visitors, not just those in the top ten, because I value each of you as readers.

Ever "Play Doctor"?

Perhaps many children both before and during puberty are so curious that they "play doctor."  Sometimes, it starts off, "I'll show you mine if you show me yours!"  Maybe it occurs between siblings, or perhaps neighbor children.  There was a boy two or three years younger than me who lived two doors down, and down the block there was a ravine beside a creek in which vines had grown into a jungle.  It was the perfect hiding place and one day my friend pulled out his dick to pee, and he wanted to see mine.  So I pulled out my dick also, and he noticed that mine was different because it had foreskin on it.  So he wanted to touch it, and of course I let him.  He moved the foreskin up and down over my glans and it felt so good.  But that is as far as it went.

Another time my adopted brother and I were playing on the floor in our room about the time we entered puberty.  We compared our dicks and again he was circumcised, and he thought mine was funny looking and wanted to touch it.  We both started getting hard and enjoying the mutual excitement which progressed all the way to cumming.  We discussed what had just happened and couldn't understand the sticky mess that had come out of our dicks.

Did you have similar experiences "playing doctor"?  Were they with your own sex or the opposite sex?  Did you and your brothers have sex during those teen years?  Tell your stories in the comments below.

ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY

Today, August 15, marks the one year anniversary of UncutPlus!

It would not be a blog without its readers, so I am thankful for each and every one of you, especially those of you who so loyally follow along.  There are lots of kinds of blogs out there with different purposes and many of them attract a lot more readers than UncutPlus.  And that is just fine, because I am in a race with no one for the most of this or the most of that.  The blog is named UncutPlus for a reason.  It's first and foremost purpose has been to educate and encourage parents to leave their infant boys intact.  The Plus is added for additional content that from time to time, I think is educational and entertaining.  I hope that you have found it thus.

Even though it is not the most frequently viewed, it has still wildly surpassed any expectations that I had.  Here are just some of the first year statistics:

45,275 - Absolute unique visitors

57,182 - Visits

1,262,771 - Pageviews

79% - New visitors

21% - Loyal returning visitors

143 visitors who have logged in over 200 times.

769 visitors who have spent more than 30 minutes/visit.

50%  of visitors looked at more than 20 pageviews/visit.

656 visitors read the blog on their iPhone.

422 visitors read the blog on their iPod.

Visitors came from 155 countries/territories.

Visitors came from 4 cities in China.

Beijing visitor spent 15 minutes looking at 40 pages.

Shanghai visitor spent 24 minutes looking at 19 pages.

(Google Translator translates the blog into the visitor's native language.)

Top 10 countries:

1  - USA

2  - United Kingdom

3  - Germany

4  - Canada

5  - France

6  - Australia

7  - South Korea

8  - Spain

9  - Italy

10 - Brazil

Top USA states: California and New York

Top USA city:  New York City

Thank You, Readers!

Sacred & Profane

First of all, I would like to provide a shout-out to JoeBlow's new blog The Closet Professor.  Recently, he has been concentrating on classical mythology and how it applies to gay readers.  Check it out because I know that you will enjoy it as much as I do!

In his new blog, Joe references the Sacred and the Profane.  I would like to expound a little on that by providing you with a clip from Carl Orff's Carmina Burana:

And if you want the entire score instead of just an excerpt:

Carmina Burana (Orff)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Carmina Burana is a scenic cantata composed by Carl Orff in 1935 and 1936. It is based on 24 of the poems found in the medieval collection Carmina Burana. Its full Latin title is Carmina Burana: Cantiones profanæ cantoribus et choris cantandæ comitantibus instrumentis atque imaginibus magicis ("Songs of Beuern: Secular songs for singers and choruses to be sung together with instruments and magic images.") Carmina Burana is part of Trionfi, the musical triptych that also includes the cantata Catulli Carmina and Trionfo di Afrodite. The best-known movement is "Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi (O Fortuna)" that opens and closes the piece.

Text

Orff first encountered the text in John Addington Symonds's 1884 publication Wine, Women and Song], which included English translations of 46 poems from the collection. Michel Hofmann, a young law student and Latin and Greek enthusiast, assisted Orff in the selection and organization of 24 of these poems into a libretto, mostly in Latin verse, with a small amount of Middle High German and Old Provençal. The selection covers a wide range of secular topics, as familiar in the 13th century as they are in the 21st century: the fickleness of fortune and wealth, the ephemeral nature of life, the joy of the return of Spring, and the pleasures and perils of drinking, gluttony, gambling and lust.

See also: Carmina Burana

Carved Phalli

Starting on a tangent, plurals can be so difficult!  Is the plural of phallus -- phalli or phalluses?  Is the plural of penis -- penes or penises? (Actually, all those plurals are acceptable -- take your choice.) Maybe I should have titled this post "Carved Cocks" or "Carved Dicks" as the slang words are more easily made plural.

Following up on my last post about amulets, which are often carved, I thought I would give you a sampling of some carved male organs of reproduction, and as you would expect they are erect.

Thai penis amulets (palad khik)

from the BangkokLibrary.com

Thai penis amulets are a common sight in Thailand. Known in Thai as palad khik (ปลัดขิก) pronounced bpà-làt-kìk, these amulets usually measure less than 4 cm in length and may be carved from wood, bone, or horn. Amulets cast from metal (especially bronze and brass) are very common, and those cast in resin are relatively easy to find. Some amulets are plain or have very simple decoration, but others are intricately detailed, often incorporating the shapes of animals including monkeys, snakes and tigers. All have one thing in common: they are worn or carried (by Thai males) in the belief that they may afford special protection or good luck.

Larger (sometimes much larger) phallic objects are also used by men and women to bring good luck and prosperity. Although it may be an unusual sight for a westerner, it's certainly not uncommon to find a large wooden penis placed next to the ingredients in an authentic Thai restaurant.

More pictures of small Thai penis amulets (palad khik):

I own a Thai penile amulet made of wood, painted and inscribed, shown here:

Perhaps some readers from Thailand can identify it, read the inscriptions on it and tell me more about it in the comments below.  Thanks.

This post would not be complete without showing a typical guy from Thailand that would wear such amulets:

Gay? Whatever, Dude

The above NY Times headline surely caught my attention and it is by columnist Charles M. Blow.  Read the article here.

So society's attitudes, particularly among men, seem to be changing.  Of course, we have thought that all along with gay TV shows, movies, and new discussions of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  Mr. Blow references a new Gallup report on American's Views on Homsexuality.

Mr. Blow concludes with the following in his last paragraph:

Professor Savin-Williams says that his current research reveals that the fastest-growing group along the sexuality continuum are men who self-identify as “mostly straight” as opposed to labels like “straight,” “gay” or “bisexual.” They acknowledge some level of attraction to other men even as they say that they probably wouldn’t act on it, but ... the right guy, the right day, a few beers and who knows. As the professor points out, you would never have heard that in years past.

Be sure to review his article and the Gallup poll information.  Then leave your comments below.

Is Your Genital Skin Color Darker Than the Rest of Your Body?

If you have looked at lots of pictures of dicks and balls as I have, you will surely have noticed that the skin color of the penis and scrotum is often several shades darker that the rest of the skin.  This is true of women as well.  However, there are some caucasian males that do not have darker skin in the area as in this picture:

It has been suggested that this may be related to our genetic heritage.  For example, light skinned blacks may have had dark African people in their heritage.  I have been told by some caucasians with Native American heritage that there genitals are also darker.

This blog reaches readers around the world, so I would like some feedback about what you think.  Do you think it is related to genetics or not?  Can you give examples, especially pictures where your dick is darker and you know the explanation.  Please comment and give me your opinions.

I'm also adding a couple of polls in the sidebar related to this question.  Please vote to help us better understand the darker coloration.