Have a Lovely Weekend.

This is such funny timing because about two hours ago there was suddenly a wasp swarm INSIDE MY HOME, completely out of nowhere. As in one minute there were no wasps and the next minute there were about sixty wasps inside my living room. I assure you peppermint oil on a couple cotton balls will save me. I want to bulldoze my house hahahahaha

*will NOT save me, darn!!

Not this Mom ! :)

it was pushed through, don’t worry! (we are just a little slower moderating over the weekends.) thank you so much for your note! xoxo

I agree with you so much.

I had a similar reaction. It just felt a little ick to spend so much money for something like that.

Yes, thank you Farhana!

So cool!

What a small world CoJ is. Love this!

I totally agree, Laura! I know the majority of sales clerks are only this way because they’re required to be, but it’s so overwhelming to folks who need a calmer experience when they shop. It’s a big reason why I typically stick to thrift stores, but then that’s usually much more time consuming if you’re shopping with a specific vision. It’s quite an undertaking, maintaining a good wardrobe! Hope you loved your color assessment!

believe me Sar, it’s pretty overwhelming for us as sales associates too sometimes! Funnily enough I used to work at an Apple store in London and it’s a totally different experience to working in a British retail environment. They expected us to deliver American style customer service, which doesn’t really come naturally to people over here and so it felt even more fake and performative than usual as well as just being pretty exhausting for us. i much prefer the typical UK customer service experience where you’re left to get on with it unless you actually ask for help, haha

I thought the same thing. Maybe the organization he was a part of promised “satisfaction guaranteed”? I don’t recall her mentioning it in the article. If refunds are so easy to obtain, it makes me wonder if clients would be more likely to abuse the system… All speculation aside, I really appreciate how COJ is a sex-positive place. So many other sites either make it their entire raison d’etre or pretend it doesn’t exist!

+1, I agree. I don’t take issue with her hiring him, but I absolutely take issue with her asking for her money back. I think she had unrealistic expectations, and that’s on her. He’s a human being doing a job who didn’t get paid for that job.

I felt the same way … he still worked the hours and kissed her, massaged her, etc.

Starstuck was the perfect version of this genre. There needs to be a little fairytale to the blunders.

Absolutely agree. Also it just feels like a re-hash of Hannah Horvath from Girls. The main character is completely unlikable, whiny and ridiculously entitled and clueless. It’s more like an advert for a mental health drug company than a show.

Just ordered it for my 38 year old self :-)

I just picked it up from the library yesterday for my 11-year-old daughter!

Oh, yay!

I’ve stayed at the Hike Inn! I LOVED it. The food was so good and the staff was so friendly. I’m vegetarian (and had notified them ahead of time) and they made me a veggie curry that really hit the spot after the hike in. I’m so glad your comment reminded me; now I’m daydreaming about going back.

Please email us — newsletter@cupofjo.com — and we will email you the house tour issue, if you’d like! We featured the gorgeous English countryside house of author India Knight, who runs the substack newsletter Home. But when we emailed out the issue, we immediately got reader comments about her husband’s charges of child sex offense — which we hadn’t known about (learning moment for me as an editor) — so we removed the post from the Big Salad site. It’s complicated because she herself seems wonderful but that’s the decision we felt was best. Thank you so much for reading. Xo

I was one of the commenters that Jo refers to. I wanted to say that I really respect and support Big Salad’s decision to both delete the post, but also to delete it quickly to minimise potential harm and hurt, including to victims of such crimes. We have a great saying in Australia: the standard you walk past is the standard you accept.

Respectfully, how wonderful can she be if she’s still with the guy? He was found guilty.

I can’t see it either!

I just wanted to sincerely thank you for your decision to remove the article featuring the woman who has publicly stood by a known pedophile. It takes integrity to make that kind of call, and I truly appreciate your sensitivity to the broader impact of that content.

I also wrote in because it seemed like CoJ were probably not aware of this. Ms Hick’s thoughts on being realistic about the complexity of one’s spouse, when in context for her long time partner’s child pornography and various assault convictions, which she must have assumed Jo knew about, read very differently when presented with no acknowledgement of what she is referring to. CoJ is an editorial team I would trust to hold that difficult conversation about the reasons women choose to stay with, or back, their spouses who have been perpetrators of the types of experiences many of us have been hurt by. Also conversation about being friends, as Jo mentioned she would like to be, with someone who has a challenging or even dangerous partner. That’s a needful reality. The post as it was, despite India’s charming home and anecdotes, made me feel ill inside which is why I was pretty sure that the CoJ team did not know. I would trust them to provide context if they had.

I didn’t know a think about the woman featured in Big Salad until I read the comments, but I just wanted to add my voice to support and thanks for acting quickly and decisively to remove the post.

I completely agree, Sarah T – I made a comment on the original post, fully assuming that Jo didn’t know the context but thinking she would probably appreciate knowing. I don’t fault Jo for not doing a background check either – I feel like having a column on your lifestyle in the Sunday Times should be a sort of high bar for things like this! (I’m sure it’s a coincidence that her ex-stepfather is the editor… it’s pretty grubby, the whole shebang). I love that Aussie saying, Nithya – so true. Well handled, Jo.

I definitely fell in the “this is seriously creepy and exploitative, and I’m surprised Cup of Jo included it” end of the spectrum for this article, for reasons you described. Would this article ever in a million years be included in the weekly round up if a man had written it? And demanding her money back was a particularly horrifying touch. I do think it’s an interesting thought exercise, but yikes. Cup of Jo staff, you should included some sort of note so people don’t think you’re endorsing this.

I’m so intrigued by this discourse. I’m thinking about why I am rooting for Gail and would admonish a man doing the same. I gather it’s because women often lose their sexual desire as they focus on family, go through menopause, are told repeatedly in the media that aging is explicitly NOT sexy. Age stereotypes seriously taint one’s views on aging and I think these stereotypes are responsible for a lot of deadened sexuality in aging women. Statistically, men experience less ageism than women. They can still be seen as sexy and virile well into their 70s. It’s so often not the same for women. So, I think that’s why I’m rooting for Gail, she’s putting herself out there and trying to find her sexual side again. Get it! Have an orgasm! Feel sexy! *But I do think the escort should have been paid for his time, at least

I had no problem with the article. He’s a sex worker and she hired him for that purpose. He chose to take her as a client. I don’t see the exploitation here.

I am pro sec work and think it should be fully legalized. This woman was very unfair. A partial refund – at least for the man’s time- would be a fair request but not expected. The full refund she demanded (and got) was exploitative.

Great question, and I saw a fantastic answer to a similar question posed to a male (sexy) content creator here: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DJVNpIESLTU/?igsh=dmFjY3dpaDZiZmZ4

Like imagine a 70 yr old man was like she didn’t get me hard so I demanded a full refund. She gave 3 hours of her time!

There is definitely a DIFFERENT standard. But also, the reason you might feel outraged by a man that said ‘a woman failed to arouse him so he wanted his money back’ is that men historically did not care at all about women’s feelings about sex. Women had very little say. So for a man to demand sexual satisfaction – it is just outrageously over the line, since they held all the power. But a women is much much more vulnerable, both physically and emotionally. Men are, (or have not been) generally not at all vulnerable on either count where sex is concerned. That she is in no way a danger to him is one of the main differences but your confusion stems from the limited thinking that men and women are held to the same standards. Women have been discriminated against (to put it mildly) since the dawn of time. As a result, collectively, we have been shamed for our desires: an intelligent, caring sexual experience, for example. Also, women have very different needs sexually than men. Men are fully capable of experiencing casual, anonymous sex as perfectly satisfying. Women are generally not as disconnected from the experience, for many many fascinating reasons. Almost all our feelings about sex, historically, have been entirely – ENTIRELY – ignored, so much so that we’ve trained ourselves to ignore them too. Obviously I am speaking about the general experience of women globally. But even this very privileged white woman has to work to understand what SHE wants. And she is facing public scrutiny about it, even when you know she has been culturally repressed in the past but is now relatively free to explore her own needs. And she is sharing that process publicly. Cultural repression is both invisible and powerful – it doesn’t look like anyone is stopping you, but the invisible force that constrains your self expression can be fully active. Just like an abuser who only inflicts pain in ways that are not obvious. Anyway, I love that you are asking these questions because it really helps to question all the ways we are expected to be like men. Men have taken a dominating presence sexually, at the expense of women’s needs. They could have extended common courtesy and been decent but have largely been allowed and even encouraged to just use women as they please. That a woman might want to engage with a man sexually, even in a transactional experience, as a way to discover what SHE prefers is very adventurous and vitally necessary! We are allowed because we have been denied. I’m sure there are holes in my perspective but it would be an even longer comment to work through them all so I look forward to other commenters contributing greater clarity.

@ katie. I feel like we read different articles? Did you not get the part about where she paid for a service and he did not even come close to delivering? OF COURSE she was entitled to a refund! It is transactional sex – he did not deliver. He should not have accepted the job if he didn’t feel up to it but at least he tried in what was surely a pioneering experience for humanity – he was correct to refund her money immediately and I think she deserves a LOT of credit for sharing her experience publicly. I used to daydream about how I wish I had the courage to hire a male sex worker for the occasional experience. I never did though. It’s not my ideal, but there were times when physical contact with someone contractually obligated to be nice to you (as opposed to a Tinder experience in which you might get any kind of behavior) would have been really nice. I would daydream that there should be a sort of sexual spa center for women only, where we could go for literal, sexual healing and choose from a menu of clean, normal men. Maybe one day something like that will exist commonly.

I also found the ending deeply unsettling and it just highlighted the transactional nature of sex work. He didn’t provide her the “service” she wanted, and sought a refund. A financial exchange for intimacy is hard. I found myself having a lot of empathy for the escort, who admitted there was no connection between them. It’s hard to feign connection, even if the author thought that was his “job.” Bizarre. It felt overly entitled to me. Her experience is her experience, but to me it highlighted how tough it can be to have sex be a commodity without dehumanizing someone in the process

Not saying I agree with the premise of the story or disagree with you, but I do wonder if the difference here is that men already often expect (typically younger) women to be bought and theirs. It is a clear part of our world that women are supposed to fulfill male fantasies.. and it’s very interesting to me when a women can claim her own desires. It is not a built in part of our society for men to be treated as sexual objects the way women are. And maybe someone who is a better writer than me or not mentally exhausted by two toddlers could better dive into that, lol.

I love Oldster and respect that they keep it real/highlight varied experiences. That being said, that essay was so cringy! but at least she was trying to identify what made her feel desire and desirable. I think that sets it apart from the gender-flip scenario. Like, most 70 year old men know what they desire.

I’m often have similar thoughts (eg about older women objectifying men, particularly where there is a power imbalance) but in this case it didn’t bother me. I think because the context was how much the author had deferred to centring men’s sexual pleasure and emotional comfort in the past (as many women, particularly of her generation, have). In the context where social norms and structures condone that implicit power imbalance, while there were aspects of the article that made me pause, overall I found it an interesting exploration of the author using the experience to flip that internalised narrative around who is centred in a sexual experience – and therefore entirely distinct, more nuanced and more interesting from a narrative where the man was older and the escort was female. Curious to hear others’ takes on it!

I thought it was creepy too. I was uncomfortable reading it. I’m not exactly sure why. I got the feeling the escort felt uncomfortable during the “interview” and was unable to perform. There is something a bit off about the whole thing, her being a psychologist and then using the experience to write an article. It does feel exploitive.

This reminds me of something women her mom’s age (this author’s generation) were encouraged to do as an exercise in feminism—sending food back at a restaurant. But to me, there is nothing empowering about a member of the purchasing class exercizing institutional authority over a wage laborer.

But @Katie Jameson they are endorsing it. If they weren’t they wouldn’t have posted it.

I agree with you. The writer shouldn’t feel proud for asking for her money back. The escort should have been paid for his time and effort, not whether she orgasms (which is not ever guaranteed).

I don’t think we always need to think, well if a man did this… the circumstances for men and women are different still, especially in terms of sex. There’s still an orgasm gap for one. Women are often still encouraged to have maintenance sex, sex they don’t want to have with a partner because they want it, etc. hookups and one night stands have more risk for women than they do for men in terms of physical harm. Like we can’t do a straight comparison because the lives of men and women aren’t equal. I think part of the labor she paid for was having a sensual experience. She should have spoken up faster and maybe called it sooner. But it sounds like she didn’t get the experience she agreed to and paid for. I don’t see an issue with sex work or with hiring a sex worker to fulfill your needs. I don’t think she should have gotten a full refund because that was time he could have spent with another client. But I also think it was a fascinating article.

I really see why this brought up mixed feelings for people, especially the ‘would we ever publish this if it were a man?’ angle. That double standard is worth noticing. For me, what stood out was that she was really upfront about wanting touch and intimacy without misleading anyone. I also didn’t see asking for her money back as awful. It was a costly service that wasn’t delivered, so it made sense to me. But I know sex work is so layered and can be full of exploitation too, so I don’t think there’s one easy read here. I appreciate everyone sharing different angles. It definitely made me think more deeply about it.

I’m glad to see someone talking about this, because the whole part about asking for a full refund made me go ewww… It’s clueless behavior at best and exploitative at worst. I would not expect all my money back (partly maybe), the person still spent their time, all of almost 3 hours which they could have spent at a paying gig. I get that as an “older” woman, this experience is worth writing about, I do not necessarily feel that it is a double standard. Just that Gail needed to temper her expectations of what that experience could offer her. She did not seem to approach it with an open mind, as such an experiment warrants.

Agreed. It boggles my mind that anyone would either seek or condone “sex work.” What an absurd euphemism. Same for only fans. Don’t get me started. No one should want this as a future for their son, daughter, friend, whatever. It’s sick. I wish more people viewed sex and their bodies as the sacred thing that they absolutely are.

This is an interesting convo! I get where you’re coming from, and I agree that she could have been more careful about describing her preferences. However, I don’t think it’s a double standard because patriarchy actually exists and is used to systemically objectify and subjugate women and queer people. You can’t simply swap a man into her place because men have tremendously more political and as you say physical power. I think there’s also some level of mental distancing we have to do related to sex work. When she said she didn’t like it, it wasn’t an attack on his personhood, but a return of a service, and I think, despite the political baggage, the same would be true if the genders were reversed. The sex worker should have some kind of policy in place to protect their time/financial best interest in the case of a dissatisfied customer.

I personally enjoyed it. I think women in general are often repressed sexually and older women specifically are often discarded sexually by age 70. I think hiring an escort felt empowering to her rather than exploitative, and when she wasn’t given what she specifically asked for-she told him rather than making excuses for him as we often do as women. I think the theme for the author was simply that she learned how to identify her wants and verbalize them to someone else. In my opinion this article is about so much more than sex and just because you don’t like it or agree with it, doesn’t mean COJ should be shamed for sharing it. Said

(That last part of my reply is to Katie, and for reference was said in a kind manner-it’s hard to tell tone in text.) Just sharing my perspective, love this community.

I just felt grossed out by this article. Even if she is less likely to physically hurt the younger sex worker (honestly many 70 year old men I know would also have a hard time hurting me as a 40 year old woman), she has all the power in this dynamic. That she used that power to spend 2 hours and forty minutes of another person’s time (not including travel) and then ask for a full refund seems wrong. I think this behavior is wrong and shouldn’t be celebrated; I don’t think the purpose of feminism or female empowerment should be that women behave as badly as poorly behaved (gross) men.

I don’t find this to be a curious thought at all. I thought this was a very strange article in which the author decided to reclaim an embarrassing act (hiring a male lrositite) by calling it empowering (demanding her money back). In fact, there was a serious power dynamic here – in my state, at least, prostitution is illegal. She may not have been a physical threat to this man, but all she would have to do is place a phone call to make this man’s life extremely hard. Just because this is a woman purchasing sex work from a man does not make it any less exploitative, in my opinion.

Katie‘s comment re a notr: so people don’t think you’re endorsing this“ stuck with me this weekend. For me it reads vers one-sided and narrow-minded (English isn’t my native language, so I have trouble finding a good way to explain my feelings without sounding too harsh). I wish we could just have a conversation that is open-ended. A link-list without harsh „how could you“. A discussion without „if you are not on my side you are immoral“. I just listened to an interesting podcast from Trevor Noah with Chinamanda Ngozi Adichie, where they talk i.a. about purity culture in discussions. Do I personally agree with everything she says? Probably not. Do I agree with sex work, and donI have a different stance if it is done by women or men? I haven’t formed an opinion yet, I also know too little about. The article questioned sone assumptions I have – isn’t it interesting to think about it? And how would it be if there was already a note „we don’t endorse it“ with the article?

i feel like our social and sexual expectations are really showing in these comments and i honestly love the discussion that’s happening, because it’s so important that we talk about this stuff. when i read that story after seeing the comment about feeling grossed out by her request for a refund, i fully expected to agree that it was gross. however, i really just felt so sad for that woman. to hire a professional to get you off and he does everything but? she didn’t hire a companion–she hired a sex worker. i SO empathized with her feeling of disappointment and resignation during the session, because i’ve felt that way with partners myself (unpaid ones, but still!) and it makes me feel like a failure every time. at least in this case, she had recourse. she didn’t get her orgasm, but at least she got her money back. however, i agree with the commenter that said he should still have been paid for his time. i’m not sure that the double-standard is relevant here, either. after all, the view of men’s and women’s sexuality is so VASTLY different that it seems a fool’s errand to compare how we’d feel if a man had written this. in our society, generally, women are not supposed to demand sex/orgasms because it isn’t demure and it doesn’t reflect the proper amount of shame a woman is supposed to feel about her body, sexual drive, desire, and relationship(s). maybe jo needs to make a post wherein we discuss this further?! :)

Just to clarify, I assumed Cup of Jo included this post to spark exactly this kind of conversation in the comment section. I thought it was an interesting thought exercise, while also objecting to the refusal to pay the man for his time. (This feels deeply exploitative to me.) I didn’t intend to shame anyone – I just thought Cup of Jo might include a question like “empowerment or exploitation?” I never said they shouldn’t have included it – I just assumed they were posting it to spark a conversation about it in the comments section. (I know we all love the comments section!)

I agree that the article made me feel icky- and I didn’t view it as an empowering move on her part to ask for a refund, but more of an entitled one. I have had regular massages where I did not feel relaxed throughout the massage for whatever reason, but I still paid for the service!

That is the best cookbook I own, hands down.

I love this cookbook! We make snacking cakes all the time around here! Delight!

My hubs got me Snacking Cakes for Mother’s Day after a friend brought that passion fruit cake to a party! I make the cakes with my 6 year old! I also recommend. I love whipping up a casual cake :)

Can confirm that this cookbook is excellent. The powdered doughnut cake is a favorite in our house!

This is so cute! My firstborn turns 4 (!!) tomorrow and I am so into this idea.

I have a lot of food allergies. Plenty of recipes are posted that look delicious and like something I wish I could eat, but I just can’t. The writers of these recipes aren’t excluding me, they’re just making what they want to make and I just move along and find what does work for me.

That is what we call a false equivalency, Jo.

That’s nice you do that, Jo. When you’re in a body that doesn’t have clothes made for it in general, it is different. When only 25% of manufacturers have been able to figure out how to produce clothing for you and the other 75% just can’t seem to manage it, having a blog that is focused on inclusion etc consistently show a manufacturer that is not inclusive stings. They also get clicks and make money from people who click and purchase the clothes. Since the average size of women in the US is above a 14, that’s also this blog leaving money on the table. Which maybe that’s what they want? Or their audience of straight-sized people is sufficient so it doesn’t matter as much in terms of affiliate money for larger sizes? I don’t know. I like the blog, it is chatty and kind. But there is a giant problem with fatphobia in this country—in the medical community, in gyms, in clothing shops. And when you can’t dress well and people are already judging your body…. it is a lot. And the continued promotion of size exclusive companies just continues to contribute to the air of shame and discomfort around people in larger bodies. It is very different from having food allergies. Not saying it is worse or whatever, but very different.

I remember the mall game being the Disney Store which existed during my childhood while the Apple Store most certainly did not! (80s baby!)

In my hometown mall it was Buckle! Funny how the stores change but the game stays the same.