According to some people who give way too much of a shit, Jeremy Paxman has grown a beard.

Think what you like about it, but by God you have to think something. Today the internet has been bubbling with chatter: are you for or against the beard? Does it look good? Does it look scary, because for some reason someone once decided that all bearded men are Harold Shipman? Has your attitude towards Paxman’s hard-hitting interview questions changed because he happens to have some hair on his face? Let’s do a sodding online poll about it, shall we?

Anyway. Because I’m fucking contrary and annoyed, I’m going to weigh in to the beard debate with the definitive answer as to Whether Beards Are Good. Ready? Here goes:

Growing a beard is good

I’m a fan of beards – they’re often a pretty sexy way of framing and defining a man’s face. I’ve been with a few guys who have had some sort of facial hair, and with one guy who found facial hair so amusing he would regularly grow a beard just so that when he shaved it off he could experiment with various comedy styles.

They’re occasionally a bit scratchy when you’re kissing someone, and might irritate you if you’ve got sensitive skin, but the same can be said of a particularly coarse jumper fabric.

I love running my hands over a guy’s beard, feeling the scratchy texture of the hair on my palms. I love watching him trim the edges, that ‘I’m so grown-up’ feeling I get when I think about him doing something so adult. I enjoy the way it frames his face, and the variety – the different stages of beautiful he looks as it gets longer, shaggier, and eventually gets tidied up.

But the best thing, I think, about men who have beards is that they are clearly capable of making independent decisions about what to do with their own face.

Not growing a beard is also good

I also, though, like clean-shaven dudes. There’s a certain elegance and beauty about a really smooth shave. Again, I like to watch men do it, particularly the bit where they tip their head back to get at the hairs on their neck. I love the slight scratch of stubble as it starts to push through in the evening. I utterly adore the smell of a freshly-shaved guy when he rubs his face up next to mine.

But again, the best thing about a clean-shaven gentleman is that he is capable of making independent decisions about what to do with his own face.

Growing a beard is your own decision

I’m surprised at the number of people who would respond to the ‘should women shave their legs?’ question with a loud and decisive ‘it’s none of your fucking business’, yet are happy to pass judgment on a TV presenter just because he has chosen not to shave. I wouldn’t bother writing about this issue if it were just Jeremy Paxman – I appreciate that people are having a bit of fun and Paxo isn’t going to be sobbing into his autocue because some people on Twitter said his beard was shit. But the beard vs no-beard debate leaks awkwardly into a lot of our sexual discussion in a way that is pretty offensive to men, and this seems like an appropriate time to tackle it.

People say things like:

“I just couldn’t kiss a man with a beard”

“Men with beards just look untrustworthy”

Or even, in a move designed to hit not one but two of my ‘rage’ buttons: “The only thing worse than a beard is a ginger beard”

I’m not making these up, incidentally, these are all things people have said to me – the latter prompted a bollocking in the form of a tedious drunken lecture. Mumbled apologies ensued. Awkwardness happened. Lessons were probably not learned.

Preference vs pressure

I understand that people have personal preferences: some gentlemen really do prefer blondes, and some people really can’t get aroused unless their partner is clean shaven. Fair enough – passions like these are hard to control, and there’s no rule that says we must bestow equal lust on men no matter what their facial hair situation. However, there certainly is a rule that states we must avoid pressuring people to do certain things to their bodies just for our aesthetic pleasure. It’s the ‘don’t be a total arsehole’ rule.

Most adult men, in their natural state (and most women, come to that) will grow some hair on their faces. It might be dark, light, thick, coarse, downy or patchy, but ultimately most people will grow some hair on their faces. Having some hair on your face is the natural default for the majority of the adult population. The decision to remove it is one that can only be made by the owner of that face, and making them feel bad about their decision based purely on your aesthetic opinion about beards makes you a total arsehole.

So, just as it’s none of anyone’s business whether I shave my legs, wear make-up at work or wax my pubes into the shape of a lightning bolt, likewise it’s not for us to decide what hair Jeremy Paxman should or shouldn’t remove from his face.

I’m a girl of my word. And if I promise a prize for someone who writes an amazing description of their orgasm then by the God whose name they scream when they have it, I shall deliver a prize.

A while ago I encouraged people to write a description of their orgasm. For two reasons, really:

• it’s an interesting challenge for any erotic writer, and I wanted to see if people could do it better than I could (spoiler alert: they definitely can)
• I like reading about other people’s experiences, especially if they’re beautifully and sexily different to mine.

So, I’ve finished sifting, re-reading, and generally wanking myself raw, and was utterly bowled over and delighted by all of your entries. There were some stunning things in there, and if you’ve got time I’d strongly recommend you read the past entries.

Orgasm competition – top 5 entries

Because I don’t like the idea that my opinion comes top purely because I’m the one with the blog, I’m going to ask you to help me narrow down from the top 5 to the winner. I’ve chosen the five that – in my humble opinion – felt like the best ones, and that give an idea of the range of different feelings and sensations people described. I’m really sorry if yours isn’t in there – I would utterly love to have given a prize to everyone. All you need to do is read some entries and rate the ones you read on a scale of 1-10. Those scores will be averaged with the scores I’ve given them, and the winner will be sent the amazing trophy pictured above. I can take no credit for the amazing “Veni, vici” (Translation: “I came, I conquered”) joke – that was suggested by @Aug24 on Twitter.

(I’m not yet sure if he’d like to be credited, so if he wants to be I’ll add a link to his Twitter profile above)

But there you go – five very hot and very varied descriptions of people’s orgasms. Please do peruse them, rate and share with your more open-minded friends. The more people who do it, the better idea I can get of which ones people love the most.

Voting closes this time next week (6pm GMT Sunday 11th August) – have at it!

Editor’s note: I know that it’s often possible to game competitions that include voting, but I don’t think that will happen here: I have access to the back end of the system, so if I see someone’s rated everything low except one, those votes won’t count. It’s uniquified based on IP address, so you can technically vote and rate more than once via a proxy if you give a massive and substantial shit about winning. However, I’m working on the basis that most people who read this blog (and those who entered the competition) are lovely enough not to cheat. Well, that and the fact that the prize isn’t worth much money.

Summer’s come around, eventually. Time for us to run to the park to play cricket badly, burn things on barbecues while sipping lukewarm Fosters, and – if you’re me – growl with resentment at the fact that you have to show people your shaving rash if you want to go swimming.

I shave my crotch sometimes. Not all the time – in fact, one might say I’m reasonably lax about the removal of body hair. Ultimately, shaving things takes time and effort that I’d rather spend on having fun. However, I don’t mind the occasional shave because I like it when people come all over my cunt, and I get to rub it in. I’m gross like that.

So I have no problem with shaving, or hair removal, if it’s something people want to do. What pisses me off, though, are situations where I feel uncomfortable if I don’t. Situations in which I feel singularly incapable of channeling all of the angry liberal feminist rage I feel most of the time, and simply end up looking wistfully at my crotch and wondering why I give such a massive and disproportionate shit about how it looks. In this case, the thing that has made me angry is the prospect of swimming in the sea.

Caught between a rock and a hairy place

I understand that aesthetically some people prefer smooth thighs and a bald crotch, with no pubic hairs poking out of the sides of a swimming costume, but unfortunately for me (and, I suspect, a hell of a lot of other women too) this isn’t actually an option.

The choice for me is between a hairy crotch or an ugly shaving rash, ingrowing hairs, and a desire to scratch myself that’s likely to get me arrested in public places.

When I’ve confessed this to people before, their response has usually been ‘well, why don’t you wax?’ Great thinking, kids, but unfortunately waxing makes no discernible difference to whether my cunt turns bright red and causes me immeasurable discomfort for a week. What’s more, it hurts like… well… like a sadist ripping hairs out of your pudenda.

I got my crotch waxed once, so I know what it feels like. Anyone who suggests that I do this, in the same casual tone as they would if they were recommending a certain film, needs a quick, sharp lesson in empathy. Because my God, people, it hurts. A lot.

When I regaled my Mum with the horrible tale of my inaugural cunt-waxing, she summed up pretty much how I felt about the matter.

“I had it done once,” she said “and it hurt, but only slightly more than childbirth.”

I would probably have been less upset by the pain if it turned out there was a ‘gain’ from it afterwards, but unfortunately the very next day I was nursing bright red patches and itching again, still unable to wear a bikini in case people on the beach thought I was contagious.

How do you solve a problem like a hairy crotch?

I challenged myself to write this entry without recourse to my usual rage-fuelled bile-spitting about society’s expectations of presentation and body. Not because it’s unimportant (it’s very important) but simply because I recognise that no amount of raging and ranting and writing empowering blogs on the internet can magically stop someone being bothered about crotch hair.

If someone gives you an odd look when you stand on the beach, straggling pubes waving in the breeze, your discomfort won’t be lessened any by knowing that I wrote a feminist blog about it the week before. Knowing that I shouldn’t care about this stuff – that I’m intrinsically happy in my worth as a human being whether my crotch is bald or not – doesn’t make the slightest difference to my irrational, emotional insecurity about it.

When we arrive in Utopia, no one will ever have to worry about whether they have crotch hair, or a shaving rash, moles in unusual places or stretchmarks or cellulite or any of the other things that cause us to panic. We’ll all be far too busy swimming to give even the smallest flying fuck about anyone’s perceived imperfections.

But right now that’s not helpful or comforting. Right now I’m preparing for a holiday, staring mournfully at a bikini and dreading the moment I have to show it – and whatever state my crotch is in – to the world.

There’s no conclusion to this that’s in any way satisfying. In the short term I’m buying shorts. Long shorts. Swimming shorts. The really baggy ones that go down to my knees. Twinned with a bikini top and an angry stare, they should get me through this summer, at least.

And in the longer term, well. There’ll be more angry blog posts and rants about what is not wrong with you and why no one should feel compelled to shave their body hair. And I’ll keep my fingers crossed that we reach our Utopia before summer 2014, when this whole charade begins again.

Ever wondered what an orgasm feels like for someone other than you? Well, wonder no more! After posting my enthusiastic yet relatively incompetent description of my orgasm on Wednesday, lots of people have had a go at putting one of the most complicated physical sensations into actual real-life words.

If you fancy trying it yourself (and why wouldn’t you? It’s a good excuse for both wanking and wordplay) then either describe your orgasm in the comments below, email it to hellogirlonthenet at gmail, or post it on your own blog and link here. There’ll be a prize for the best one (prize TBC but I’m open to suggestions) and in the meantime you get the glory and joy of creating yet another piece of content for vast swathes of the internet to pleasure themselves to.

What does an orgasm feel like? Entries so far…

I’ll let the lovely Cammies on the Floor begin:

“It starts with pressure inside of me, a pressure of fiction, an awareness of movement in and out of me.

“Then I begin to tighten into the pressure. I can do this at whim, but more often than not, it just happens. When I am short on time, know this is a quickie, or am tired, I can tighten, making me come closer to the sensation faster…” If you’re already dribbling a bit – that’s the idea – please do read the rest over on her blog.

Rebecca’s entry is hot – in both the metaphorical and the literal sense:

“It begins with a warm buzzing around my heart. This spreads to my upper arms and my head and grows, just as the nerves pulse downward towards my groin. Then the burning starts. The burning starts low and wide, around my crotch, then it intensfies and localises in my clitoris, burning more intensely as I hold my breath and stretch out my legs…” Hotness continues in the story over  here.

Not to be outdone by the first Rebecca, another Rebecca joins in:

“First, the anticipation. The delicious knowledge of what is waiting. This is what makes me start to breathe a little heavier and start to writhe, ever-so-slightly. Just the mere expectation of the orgasm raises my heart rate, widens my eyes and causes me graze my teeth across my lips…” After an excellent start, her orgasm builds spectacularly.

Ritchie has taken a more methodical approach, breaking orgasms down by type:

“Generally, there is an extremely pleasant warmth that starts around my balls and (and I’m not too sure how to describe this) the ‘root’ of my cock. By root I mean that a cock isn’t blu-tacked onto that bit of your stomach 6 inches or so below the belly button. It goes further in to your body to the pit of the stomach. The warmth spreads, but not too far, and at the point where I am about to come it kind of becomes all encompassing…” If you’re anything like me, you might want to print his comment and keep it under your pillow.

Commenter George has written a charmingly lyrical description:

“I lose control and forget the world; Arms and hands stiffen; My buttocks clench as a mellow pleasure engulfs me; With each contraction, my eyes screw up as ecstasy travels from groin to brain in heartbeat…” And here’s the comment with its poetic conclusion.

Steve dropped me an email with his entry, and it brightened up my evening no end:

“I can vividly remember my first manually induced orgasm. As with many men, this first furtive spanking of the monkey took place in the bath – once that most innocent of pastimes, but from age 12 onwards the location of much fumbling, stroking and general yanking of teenage pork sword. I knew from whispered playground conversations what the mechanics of “having a wank” were. But I’d never actually tried to put these instructions into practice until this occasion.” I’ve posted the full thing in  a comment and it’s as funny and evocative as it is hot.

Ian’s description of a building pressure almost makes me feel the pressure in my stomach:

“It’s like a slowly building, but perfectly pleasant, pressure. Something inside that makes me more sensitive, that makes every movement filled with a little more joy, and in amongst that an urge for something more: to increase the pressure, to keep increasing it, with each increase feeling better and better, until you reach the point where the only thing that would feel better than holding this delicious pleasure is releasing it. In that moment of release it’s like a whole body and mind exhalation.” Read the rest of his entry.

Bubbleburst hits on the trembling, shaking feeling:

“When he makes me cum my hands shake. That’s what he likes to focus on after the withering and growling. After my world has become very big and suddenly very small. My hands shake, like proper tremors you can feel right through me….” And it is completely amazing.

Last (but by no means least) Anon put her finger directly on what I couldn’t – her description of an orgasm which ‘radiates’ struck a chord with me:

“Bringing myself to an orgasm is something that I can do in seconds. A few quick rubs, and a tiny orgasm builds up and suddenly there’s a release of pressure and tension that I didn’t know existed. It’s almost like when you get a really good massage therapist, one who rids you of knots you didn’t realise were there. Except these balls of tension built up in my lower back, in my thighs. I get tense and suddenly – poof! – a release…” In case you can’t tell from that, it’s well worth reading her description in full.

Describe your orgasm

As I wrote in my original post, I love the idea of trying to describe an orgasm – it’s something so personal and intimate and – frankly – bloody difficult, that by writing it down for someone you’re giving them a window into something incredibly unique. I can taste the cake you’re eating, I can hear your favourite music, but I can never fully put myself in your shoes (or your pants) and feel exactly how you come.

If you fancy having a go, the competition’s still open. I’ll find something nice (yet not massively expensive because I’m skint) to give as a prize, and keep your entries coming in via comments, email or on your own blog.