Inside Baseball

Do you have any idea how difficult it is to photograph your own cervix? I'm here to tell you, it ain't easy. Even if your camera is moisture-proof and equipped with a timer, the task demands dexterity and skills I apparently don't possess.

You're probably wondering why I was attempting such a thing. I'm not ashamed to admit that I got a little freaked out when I saw that the new editors had installed this Dr. Dot person. I wasn't even aware that they were in the market for a new sex columnist until I picked up the paper. I'm woman enough to admit that I got a little paranoid. I mean, there she was, on the cover, dressed in a naughty nurse uniform. (I prefer the sexy executioner outfit myself.)

Inside it was even worse! Not only was she posed in her scanties-she professes to have rubbed down Sting! Now I had a youthful fling with the dearly departed Dave from Reagan Youth and made out with Jesse Malin once or twice when we were both teenagers, but Sting? How am I going to top that?

So I called Harry, the newly anointed editor-in-chief (thanks, Uncle Russ!), and asked him if I was being replaced. I pondered busting out my dusty French maid's uniform. He chuckled at my fears and assured me that my column would continue to run indefinitely. Apparently there was room for two racy ladies at the New York Press.

Phew. But despite his assurances I was still a bit on edge. It seems that every sex columnist (except me) has a shtick. Dan Savage has the whole gay dad thing going for him. Tristin Taromino is all about putting stuff up her butt. And now this Dr. Dot and her collection of saggy rockstar flesh. . . what did I have?

Sure, for a while I was known as that woman who wrote the sex and love advice column for a widely unread free weekly, but now I had competition.

I needed a gimmick and I needed one fast.

After much deliberation, I decided to become the Cooter Columnist. I was going to fire that nice Wendy Koontz and from now on each column was going to be illustrated with a close-up shot of my glistening vulva.

I busted out the clippers and cleaned things up downstairs. Once I was all trimmed and ready to go, I took a look in the magnifying mirror. While my pubes certainly looked neat, they weren't very sexy. What they needed was a bit of shine, so I grabbed the bottle of extra-virgin olive oil and dumped a half cup or so onto my business.

This time I didn't need a mirror, I knew I was looking goood down under. I slid into the living room, grabbed my camera, and awkwardly squatted on top of it. Trying to maneuver the lens without looking through the viewfinder is not something I advise readers to try at home. Especially while dripping olive oil all over the place. Just as I had my tiny Canon perfectly positioned, my computer chimed to tell me I had mail.

I jumped up to read it, but my feet slipped out from under me and I thwacked down on top of my camera! Because I was so lubed up, that fine piece of Japanese technology slid up inside my vagina and became lodged inside. I guess the stress of having a camera up my cooter caused my muscles to contract because try as I might, I couldn't pull the damned thing out!

Shit.

I decided to see who'd emailed, and waddled over to my computer. It was from some guy named Tim Marchman. Apparently he's the new managing editor at the Press. I figured that as Harry had-just the day before-assured me my job was safe, young Tim was writing to introduce himself.

Not exactly. I shifted in my seat, inadvertently causing the zoom to activate. Ow! Apparently Tim was neither writing to tell me how great I was, nor gas on about how much he was looking forward to working with me. No. Tim was writing to fire me. But to even get to the part where I was getting canned, I had to wade through about six of the most patronizing paragraphs I've ever read. [Their decision] "has literally nothing whatsoever to do with the Dr. Dot column, and very little to do with the quality of the column, which is and has been high." Snore. Save it, sister! If you're going lie to me and then fire my ass, don't wrap it in pussy paper.

As I read on, cursing myself for not thinking of a job-securing shtick sooner, I became enraged. My insides squeezed up so tight, I could feel the camera working its way up my lower intestine. Hey! That's not anatomically possible, is it?

I fired back an email, basically accusing Harry of being a testicle-free pantywaist, not man enough to do his own dirty work, but Tim assured me that impression was all wrong. He then (some would say foolishly) offered to let me write a farewell column which he vowed not to edit for content. Tim clarified that Harry hadn't been lying when he said my column would run indefinitely. It's just that indefinitely in this case was only 24 hours long.

For the record, Ms. McGuire's relationships column was ended for reasons having nothing to do with Dr. Dot's sex column, and will be replaced in this space by another relationships column in the coming weeks. -Eds.