1. The tampon in your ass swells as it absorbs lube and rectal mucus and whatever else, TAMPAX, and stimulates — yes indeed — your prostate as it swells. Yanking the tampon out when you're coming further stimulates your prostate at the exact moment it's being zapped by orgasmic contractions — contractions that involve your anal sphincter, which you're also stimulating as you yank. A butt plug would provide you with the exact same sensations — well, the exact same physical sensations. Part of the tampon-related thrill for you, I suspect, is the gender-transgression aspect of this. You're not just penetrating yourself, TAMPAX, you're penetrating yourself with an absorbent feminine talisman. Not all men who enjoy anal penetration are interested in being symbolically feminized — ahem — but clearly you are, TAMPAX.

2. My hunch: as long as you're using lube and not leaving 'em in for days at a time, you should be fine. And a medical expert I consulted — who wished to remain anonymous (he didn't want his name linked forever to anal tampon play on some server somewhere, either) — backed me up. "This would pose zero risk," says my medical expert. "Medically, there's nothing else to say about it."

3. When it comes to human sexuality, TAMPAX, deviation from imaginary and tyrannical "norms" is the norm.

4. Seeing as condom manufacturers still refuse to market their products for anal sex — or directly to gay men — the odds that Tampax will move aggressively into the straight-dudes-with-strings-hanging-out-of-their-butts market seems pretty slim.

There's a lot of cross-orientation play in the BDSM scene these days, LDT, which has become less sexually segregated with every passing year. Skills are skills: an inexperienced straight bondage top can learn a lot from a gay bondage expert. The experience may be less erotic, or less intense, than being tied up by someone you're physically and emotionally attracted to, of course, but it is still erotic — street clothes and/or magic underpants notwithstanding.

As for the Mormon Church's "Clean & Safe Media Pledge," LDT, that seems to work about as well as those purity pledges taken by countless unwed teen moms. Utah has the highest per capita online-porn consumption rates in the country.

You can scratch "drink a random bartender's piss" off your bucket list, WASP, but everyone else out there reading has to add it to theirs.

Drinking urine presents no risk of HIV infection and low to no risk for just about everything save cooties. Hepatitis is blood-borne, and if there wasn't any blood in your bartender's urine — and if you didn't have any cuts or open sores in your mouth — then you probably don't have anything to worry about.

But you know what? You're going to worry regardless, WASP, until you know for sure that you didn't catch anything. So go see a doctor and get your bad ass tested.

Thanks for the tip, IHOP. And you weren't the only reader with a tip for someone whose letter ran in last week's column.

Seeking Slave Food's mistress wanted to deny him the pleasures of food, and he was looking for a "slop" that was "highly nutritious but as bland-tasting as possible." I urged him to patronize vegan restaurants where he lives — much to the consternation of the vegans. (Apparently, vegans are prejudiced against BDSMers and don't want to dine with them — who knew?) But readers suggested that SSF try Nutraloaf, "a food served in United States prisons to inmates who have demonstrated significant behavioral issues," according to its Wiki page. And my readers had lots of suggestions for the man who wanted to find straight porn for his iPhone: www.mobileboner.com, www.pornhub.com, www.tube8.com, www.thehun.com, www.americansfortruth.com, and www.spankwire.com.

Savage Love: It's about people helping people... smell like maple syrup, avoid vegan restaurants, and porn out their iPhones.