Strutting your stuff downtown

Is there a correlation between blushing and spontaneous combustion? I’m afraid that if I read Fifty Shades of Gray, I might find out. I’m kind of a vanilla girl, so I admit to some ignorance about safe words, harnesses, and why some people spend good money to see Carrot Top.

I pride myself on an extensive vocabulary, so I was surprised yesterday, when my daughter used a word I’ve never heard before: merkin. I blame it on my revulsion at watching The Real Housewives of Anywhere. Apparently, one of these women sells merkins.

I looked up merkin on Wikipedia, and was nearly blinded by a picture of a hot pink hairpiece pasted to a woman’s lady parts. A merkin is a pube wig!! Even though I’m genetically predisposed to post-menopausal hair loss, there is no way I’m going to walk around with dryer lint glued to my naughty parts.

The first step in wearing a merkin is to have all your God-given hair south of the navel yanked out by the roots. Merkins are for people who like to shake it up with different colors and textures. PETA has recently issued statements condemning the use of animal fur to cover these particular bald spots, although they were blushing as they said it.

Are you shitting me?

Yes, you can purchase a fox or mink merkin. Personally, if I had mink, I’d have my hand down my pants 24/7. I can just imagine the indignant look on the fox who learned that his fur would be used as a human hall runner.

Not to be outdone, they’ve come out with a new line for men called the Jerkin’ Merkin. (OK, I totally made that up, but it has a nice ring to it.) The question on everyone’s mind at this point is, “Are they dry clean only?” I can’t imagine the cleaning bill for such a specialty item, or the looks on people’s faces when you pick up your pubes at the dry cleaners.

What you do in the privacy of your own pants is your own business, but I don’t think there will ever come a day when I decide to super glue something to one of the most sensitive parts of my body. Taking it off would be a bitch.