Summer Lovin’

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Turn up the Summer Lovin’ Heat by Taking Your Sex Life Alfresco

Maybe it’s the feeling of the hot sun as it penetrates our bare skin, balmy evenings, the potential of a sun-kissed summer fling, or simply that everyone wears less clothes at this time of year. Whatever the case, there’s just something about the inescapable heat and sunshine that makes us all feel damn horny.

After what feels like an eternity of being locked inside, the concept of thawing out your mojo and taking your indoor activities alfresco sounds very appealing — every year.

However, with the high reward of sex in the sunshine comes an equally high level of risk. So, before you go getting it on in the great outdoors, read our tips for turning up the temperature on your sex life — without landing yourself in hot water.

Location, Location, Location

The secret to having successful, stress-free outdoor sex comes down to scouting the right location. You want to find somewhere that raises your heart rate and gives you the thrill of possibly getting caught — without putting you at risk of actually being discovered.

Choose a somewhat public, but not obvious, outdoor spot. Get creative, and remember the fun can be in the journey as much as the destination! Get raunchy against a tree in the woods, on a high-rise balcony, in an open field, on a cliff, in an alleyway, in the back seat of your ride, on a picnic table, on the deck of a boat, or the hood of your car.

While sex on the beach returns as a fantasy for many, it also generally tends to be very public, thus coming with the very real potential of getting caught. But if you’re hell-bent on a seaside shag, opt for a romp in semi-private, such as behind a secluded sand dune, where you’re less likely to be seen by prying eyes. Also, if you’re going to have sex on the beach, avoid missionary wherever sand is involved and stick to her being on top to avoid a disaster of the gritty kind. Better yet, bring a towel.

Sex in water? You’ll need Summer Lovin’ lube.

You might think that having sex in water would make everything extra slippery, but water can instead be very drying to vaginal lubrication.

While some condoms can function relatively OK in water — if chlorine levels aren’t too high — they can still break or tear without proper lubrication, putting you at risk of STIs.

So if you’re planning a wet and wild underwater summer lovin’ romp, keep a bottle of silicone lube poolside to reduce potential friction and make penetration more comfortable. But make sure you avoid using water-based lubes because they’ll wash away the second you submerge your bits. (Because, y’know, water.)

We recommend starting the party in the water and heading to dry land for the finale.

Come Prepared

Successful outdoor summer lovin’ requires a mixture of spontaneity and careful planning; so if you have your heart set on exposing yourself to the elements, you need to be ready.

Packing a sex bag before you go on an outdoor sex safari will save you in the long run. Make sure to assemble things such as condoms, lube, bottled water, easy access clothes and a sarong in case you need a quick cover-up. We note again it being essential that you toss in a towel, blanket or yoga mat, You need something comfortable to roll around on, while also protecting you and your playmate against prickles, poison ivy, grass burn, gravel, sand and whatever else Mother Nature might throw at you.

Don’t Get Caught

A big part of the excitement of having sex in the great outdoors tends to be the thrill and danger of potentially getting caught — without actually getting busted. You will find that the reality of being collared by a cop or interrupted by a screaming child will be the direct opposite of sexy. Nothing kills the fantasy quicker during an outdoor romp in the sunshine than a stranger slapping some handcuffs on you — unless getting arrested is your kink, in which case, you do you.

Bottom line, as it were, when getting frisky outside, good summer lovin tends to be all about being discreet and keeping hypervigilant. Stay within the law. Don’t trespass. Keep an eye out for surveillance cameras, and refrain from doing anything that might see you end up with a hefty fine or jail time.

Stay frisky without getting too risky!

First off, we threw in that photo set of Sophie Sparks because it says Summer Lovin’ if nothing else. Secondly, and please note we speak from painful experience here, if you really, really have your heart set on sex on the beach, we highly recommend this option. Then go back to the hotel room like civilized people. Glean a bit from the professionals: “Taint” no fun getting sand in places that were never intended to have sand in them. Finally, you need to be ready because Summer Lovin’ can surprise you. Still, you can have a blast even if it happened so fast.

TikTok Goes the Clock

Posted on by Team Penthouse

TikTok Fast Tracks

If the Bible of TikTok and the music industry is ever written, its Genesis chapter will feature singer Lil Nas X, who was only 19 in 2019 when he posted a genre-bending rap-country song to his SoundCloud and social media accounts.

With rumored production costs totaling $30 for the drum track, “Old Town Road” has since become the most successful single of all time. It sat atop the Billboard Hot 100 for nearly five months and went 15 times platinum, in no small part because it was an early TikTok meme, adopted and reused by millions of creators in their own videos.

It’s not that TikTok — a video-sharing app owned by Chinese-based tech company ByteDance — set out to be a music industry king- and queenmaker but that’s what it has become. TikTok has taken an ever-growing role in minting global hits, launching new artists, foregrounding world music and plucking obscure performers from the shadowlands of the internet. Just five or so years into the app’s existence, its hit-making properties are still, in many instances, organic and unpredictable.

Even the parents of many TikTok users — the lion’s share of whom are under 25 — would have been unborn or infants when ’70s rockers Fleetwood Mac recorded “Dreams.” Yet the song reentered the charts in 2020 after the viral — and much copied — TikTok video of laborer Nathan Apodaca (@420doggface208) rolling down a highway on his skateboard, drinking juice and lip-syncing to the 1977 hit.

Most TikTok challenges start with a song and some lip-syncing and/or dancing, with those that go viral becoming trends. Alongside golden oldies, there are plenty of contemporary examples. Doja Cat’s 2020 song “Say So” became a gigantic trend on TikTok and has since racked up nearly 5 million YouTube views. Acts such as Olivia Rodrigo, Megan Thee Stallion and Popp Hunna have also tasted the audience-exploding potential of being featured on the apps hallowed “for you” page.

“TikTok has taken an ever-growing role in minting global hits, launching new artists, foregrounding world music and plucking obscure performers from the shadowlands of the internet.”

For obvious reasons, many eyes are now on the correlation between rhythm and algorithm. A study by MRC Data last year found 67 percent of TikTok users are more likely to listen to songs on streaming services after hearing them in 15 to 60 second snippets on the app — a music marketer’s dream, if only trends could be manipulated. Which, more and more, they can. 

TikTok has its own division for monitoring music trends on the app and “promo levers” to boost the popularity of certain songs to make them more discoverable. Artists, marketers, record labels and influencers have likewise converged, with money changing hands in the hope that top influencers — or more commonly, a diverse spread of cheaper “micro” influencers — will use a song in a way that will help shoot it into the stratosphere.

Dedicated agencies are now on hand to assist artists and labels with music promotions, and TikTok-focused consultants can even be hired to offer advice on creating music that will thrive on the app.

Just remember, when the charts are dominated by tracks that last between 15 and 60 seconds, it started here.

Andi Sue Irwin, Lion to Us

On the upside, almost all of the TikTok afficianados would be too young — or too disinterested — in recalling Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” we venture. Yet some of us cannot help thinking of that tale, every time we hear about the popularity of TikTok. Although unlike the story, in this case we will find something beating under those floorboards. You just wait. … Oh, and if you’re wondering about the picture of Andi Sue Irwin there (Penthouse Pet, September 1993) we can explain that. We set out to search the Penthouse Vault archives looking for a nice woman on horse shot we could use — to tie with the “Old Town Road” and so we could quit thinking about dogface. Searching for these things can be a challenge, not so much for the horse as finding the woman wearing clothes on the horse, you see. Then we ran across this adorabe photo of Andi Sue that Earl Miller shot — proving, obviously, that with us you CAN believe your lion eyes. We went with that, for (perhaps painfully now) obvious reasons.

Masha Diduk

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Social Premiere Masha Diduk — Penthouse March/April 2022

Height: 5’10”
Measurements: 32D-25-26
Hometown: Ukraine
Fun Fact: Modeled for Coach & Loreal

Quick Facts

Her favorite sleepwear: In the summer, just a pair of panties is the way to go.

The most daring things she’s done: I’ve gone skydiving and swimming with sharks. Nothing scares me!

Her travel goals: I’ve yet to visit Australia and Egypt. I also fantasize about moving to Bali.

Her celebrity crushes: James Franco and Jared Leto—MY LAWD those men!

According to the Masha Diduk Copywriters

Meet Sin City stunner Masha Diduk, a social media sensation with more than 400,000 followers on Instagram. The Las Vegas native has been modeling professionally for nearly 15 years, posing for national print campaigns and walking the runway for top designers. Though her work has taken her to countless cities, Masha admits she loves her hometown because it attracts so many “interesting characters.”

Playful but ambitious, the green-eyed beauty confesses, “I know when to have fun, but also when to pull it together and be a boss bad bitch!”

Self-sufficient Masha tells Penthouse, “I don’t want to ask anyone for anything. I want to provide for myself and the people I love. I want to be a rich wife — not a rich man’s wife.”

So that was all fine, and at least 400,000 people from Instagram probably enjoyed it a lot. For the record, a Subscription to Penthouse would have given you slightly more revealing photos, but honestly — shameless plug aside — you will not find the kind of nudity you may associate with Penthouse even there, so don’t go looking for back issues just for that. We like all alluring and powerful women around here, regardless of their comfort level in front of a camera. Go figure. … Now, of course, we can dig a little deeper.

Did/do you play any sports?

My dad really wanted me to play basketball, but I’m uncoordinated.

If you could have any job in the world, what would it be and why?

I would be a Vet. I love animals, and I even have 3 cats and 2 dogs. But 12 years of School ain’t for me.

Have any favorite foods and drinks?

Pretty much all things unhealthy for me, honestly. McDonald’s and pasta are my go-tos.

What do you look for in your partners?

Someone kind, loving, and hard working, who’s totally obsessed with me.

Who is your hero and why?

My parents are my heroes because they came to this country and left everything they knew to give me a better life.

Do you collect anything?

I collect hotel room keys. Before you ask, I’m not sure why, but I have a massive stack.

What’s your hidden talent/skill that people don’t know you have?

I can make a dolphin noise … haha. I know it’s pretty pointless, but it’s funny

As befits a “Social Premiere” you may find Masha Diduk on social media via Twitter, Instagram, or on various other “Who Be” places. Of course we should also shout out to the Photographer and the Stylist, because they matter perhaps more than you know. … Other than that, we just have one final question. We completely believe Masha when she says her most daring adventure in life so far has been to go “skydiving and swimming with sharks.” That said, somebody should have asked her how she got the sharks into the airplane, right? (For the record, Masha put a comma in between those two items in her written answer. Maybe we had passed our comma printing limit this month. Who knows?)

Ear of Jenkins

Posted on by Team Penthouse

The War that Stared Over an Ear

Ears have, of course, played a large part in the history of warfare. The Anzacs at Gallipoli used their ears to tell whether the Turkish guns had stopped firing or not. George Washington, in commanding his forces in the American Revolutionary War, famously had two ears and regularly used them both. Being able to hear is, generally speaking, an asset in battle.

Although ears have been a constant on battlefields for centuries, very few wars have actually been caused by ears. The one notable exception being, of course, the War of Jenkins’ Ear, in which Great Britain and Spain came to blows over the titular appendage.

The whole affair began in the 1730s, during the historical age of European Nations Constantly Fighting Wars Over Basically Nothing. At the time, South and Central America were mostly owned by Spain, which had acquired them by sailing there and saying, “This is ours now.”

Britain was allowed to trade with Spanish America, but by the same token, Spain was allowed to stop British ships and search them for contraband. Such was the fate of the HMS Rebecca, commanded by the plucky Welshman Robert Jenkins, which was sailing home from the West Indies in April 1731 when the Spanish ship La Isabela stopped it on suspicion of smuggling.

Jenkins was deeply offended by the accusation, but he was even more deeply offended when Spanish captain Juan de León Fandiño (a bit of a show-off) had him tied to a mast and cut his ear off with a sword. “Go and tell your king that I will do the same, if he will do the same,” said Fandiño, not realizing it was pretty unlikely the king of England would personally sail to the Caribbean to smuggle contraband. In any case, cutting off the king’s ear would’ve been extremely unwise: That’s the kind of thing that really riles kings up.

Of course, as it happened, cutting off some random Welshman’s ear turned out to be a bit of a faux pas itself. Not immediately, mind you. At the time, losing an ear while trading with the West Indies was seen as simply the cost of doing business, and Jenkins was seen as a bit of a crybaby for complaining about it.

But as the 1730s went on, the situation changed. Great Britain started getting itchy feet. Spain, it decided, was really annoying, what with all its ship-searching and general bossiness. What’s more, Spain had been cozying up to France as a preferred trading partner, and being friendly to France was seen by the British as basically equivalent to getting into bed with Sauron. For its part, Spain was kind of pissed off, too, as Britain had just founded the colony of Georgia. History might suggest that this in itself was an extremely offensive move, but the Spanish complaint was that Georgia was a bit too close to Florida (in the 21st century this is also Florida’s complaint) and might be a threat to Spanish control of the hot swampy bit down at the bottom of North America.

Things were set to explode, when in 1738 the British government realized it had been nine whole years since it had a war with Spain, so no wonder it had been feeling so tense and moody. But you couldn’t just declare war on a major European power. You needed some piffling little bit of nonsense to use as a pretend excuse. And that’s where Jenkins’ ear reared its ugly head.

Someone in the government remembered the heinous act of aural severance from seven years earlier and called up Robert Jenkins to the British Parliament, where he informed those present that yes, indeed, the Spanish had whacked his ear off, and yes, indeed, it had hurt like a bastard. With many a huff and a puff, the assembled members decided that, in light of this outrage, Britain had no choice but to use military might to enforce dominance of trade in the New World, and so it came to be.

The War of Jenkins’ Ear, as it came to be known, lasted from 1739 to 1748. Though the major hostilities had mostly fizzled out by 1742, when it was absorbed for purposes of efficiency into the larger War of Austrian Succession, a huge conflict in which everyone in Europe lost their minds and started caring about who succeeded in Austria. Jenkins’ ear was quickly forgotten and the war relegated to the minor leagues of wars, although 35,000 people managed to get killed in it, which isn’t at all a bad haul — for a war that was started over an ear.

Every so often a topic will come up from the magazine that just seems too bizarre to even draw a tangent from for future edification, and this from a publication that once brought you stories of the chart-topping nun. We thought about putting togther a gallery of all the great ear shots featuring the Penthouse Pets over the years, but the intern who would draw the short straw with that research looked at us like … well, like at least one of us happens to be literally more than twice her age, and he probably needs a nap. So we found some Fun Facts about the ear instead. It turns out that if you live long enough, you really can tie ‘em in a knot or tie ‘em in a bow. Maybe the whippersnapper will recognize THAT song reference. Kids today … are honestly pretty much like kids yesterday it seems like.

Our First Penthouse July

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Penthouse July 4th 2022 with Lauren Ann

Years of grueling experience has taught us that when at all possible, one should start with the beautiful woman.

While Lauen was on set shooting her Pet of the Month layout and video, we had her do a quick take to camera for an upcoming hoiliday, and then some fortunate editor got to play with Lauren for an afternoon. Good work if you can get it.

Of course that hardly qualifies as a “post” out her in erudite world of sophistication and readership, so we thought of a grand idea. You see, executives here have started this “go back and put all the old magazine issues up in digital format so people can view the entire library” project again, so that got us to thinking. Because of the publishing history we have been compiling, we now have the ability to go back to the very first Penthouse July published in the United States so that we might see how the celebrated the birth of the country way back in 1970. It was a great idea.

We can now reveal what we found. … Nothing. Nada. Nichts. … They did not mention the holiday at all in the 1970 issue. As with many great ideas, the reality did not turn out to match the epic nature of theory. So that sucks.

We did sneak a couple photos of Lauren Ann off the server, taken while she was shooting the promo video, so feel free to simply move along after taking a look at those. As it turns out, instead of celebrating the birth of our freedom, they talked about Rollerderby. … Maybe that was freedom?

A Peculiar Form of Violence (from the first Penthouse July)

”Fans want blood. They want to see us broken up and my body carried out” says Ann Cavello. star villainess of the perennial Roller Derby.

This all-American mixture of contact-sport and theater-of-the-rough-and-tumble is the gladiatorial combat of today. Its gratuitous violence now provides release for vast numbers of ordinary citizens. No sooner does a fight erupt than the audience begins roaring and grunting as though each one was himself delivering an elbow full tilt to the ribs or a knee to the groin at 20 miles per hour. Cheers double when there is a body. writhing on the floor or folded over the rail-and if it’s a girl. so much the better.

The secret of the Roller Derby’s recurrent commercial success 1s the vicarious thrill it brings to the sadomasochistic streak in all of us. Even “in” movies like Medium Cool use it to show how we savor the violence of our times. The Derby isn’t a sport. ifs the Roman circus of the day. with Mr M1ddle-Amer1ca playing emperor and villain and hero pre-cast. When there are not enough fights the players stage them to liven up the game. It is accepted that giving the fans what they want 1s most of the Job. and a veteran performer like Ann Cavello can be relied on to come up with a fracas on demand.

Ann Is flamboyant. tough. amusing. yet peculiarly feminine. A halo of shamrock green hair. contrasting purple and white harlequin legs with flowing scarf. stamp her unmistakably as the target for all the S & M fantasies of the crowd. She’s cruising when a blonde from the oppos1t1on pats her fanny in passing and Ann takes off 1n vengeful pursuit. Up ahead Is Margie Laszlo. going slow and flexing her fists. Ann smashes her with an elbow from behind and Margie screams. They are all over each other. wrestling. tearing. swinging punches and kicking. when the referee pulls them apart. But somehow Ann escapes and sends Margie crashing to the floor, finishing her by stomping her kidneys with her skates. With the final kick the ecstasy of the crowd has reached orgasmic proportions. A little later when Margie stuns a young girl from Ann’s team and she takes a beating in defense, the crowd roars approval and doesn’t notice the team-mate’s tears.

Mostly the girls start the fights and it is the brawling ladies of the track who pull the audience, both live and on television. Roller Derby is the only “sport-like activity” where men and women compete on an equal basis (women’s liberationists, take note). It seems likely that one reason the fans are predominantly female is that there are a lot of housewives back home strongly identifying with Margie as she belts the hell out of Ann.

Not surprisingly. good girl skaters are hard to find-the image is not appealing. “If you’ve got a good body, it’s one way of using it”, says Margie, an ex-model and Roller Derby’s beauty queen. “Sure I have a fear of getting hurt”, Joanie Weston admits, who has a fan mail of movie-star size. But a skater is bound to be somewhat schizophrenic: a man who has been skating since he could walk has a more philosophical interpretation: “You learn that there are two sets of rules. Let’s face it, the things you do out on the track, you can’t walk down the street and do. I don’t think you should hurt people all the time, but you can do anything if you’re going for a bundle. There’s no feelings then. Besides. the big thing in this game 1sfear. If you can get somebody afraid of you, you got it made.” Another explains: “We’re shy people who ran across skating and loved 1t. It became like our release.”

The injury toll is high enough but would be far greater without the hardy training and its resultant resilience. Unlike other body-contact sports the only protective equipment the skaters use are elbow and knee pads. Because the action can become so violent, the players adhere to a set of unwritten rules that transcend the rules of the game. For example, technically a girl can, with her elbow, use the zipper-head of a sweatshirt almost like an instrument to tear the softness of another girl’s breast. This technique, far more agonizing than the conventional elbow smash, 1s rarely used. “Oh, we’ve had some vicious skaters”, says Ann. “Some are still around, but they’re few and far between. I could never hurt anyone deliberately.”

To see the girls in action with bared teeth and fists flying, they look like enraged Amazons. Not so off the track. Ordinary and unassuming, they are mostly surprisingly small, with such feminine things as carefully applied make-up and a special hair-do. The histrionics are strictly for the track. Once off it, they are quiet and placid, taking things as they come. Social life is limited. All too often, the evenings are spent soaking out the soreness _in their bodies. Like a circus, life on tour becomes a string of one-night stands and all-night drives.

Mostly the girls, looking like enraged Amazons in action, start the fights. In Roller Derby men and women compete on equal terms, each team having a male and female unit skating in five – minute shifts. Striped helmets denote “jammers” who score by breaking out of pack and passing opponents.

And what makes a girl or boy Join the Derby? A simple answer: the perennial “hanging round the rink and watching on TV’. Hooked, the kids go to a Roller Derby school and, 1f they show potential, they may be picked to skate with the stars. That doesn’t mean instant fortune. A rookie starts at around £4,000 and good performers rarely triple that figure during their career. But it Is a path to the ego-gratification of the tawdry star system. Skaters are on a “profit-sharing” basis, but the profits are not enough. Most have to supplement their income by taking other jobs on the side. Kids who join the Derby come from the streets, not the campus. “Few of us ever had the chance to be good athletes or go to college”, says Larry Smith, one of the stars. Ask them about the future and you will hear about the girl who skated till she was 50.

Today’s Roller Derby has simple rules. Each team has a male and female unit of five skating in alternate five-minute periods. Two members of each unit are called the Jammers and are identified by the striped helmets. When jammers break out of the “pack” and complete a circuit by passing members of the opposing team-they score one point per person passed within 60 seconds. The rest of the unit consists of two blockers, and a white-hatted pivot-man who can sometimes score. Though the referees dispense assorted penalties, the person who starts the biggest punch-up seems to get the points. The rules stipulate the do’s and don’ts in terms of physical violence, but they are only casually observed.

On Sunday, March 22nd, this year, a world record attendance figure of 15,874 bloodthirsty fans trooped into New York’s Madison Square Garden, paying up to seven dollars for seats — this for an event whose death knell was prematurely tolled in 1955. The match was also televised in color for later tape distribution to morning audiences of some 25,000,000. In several areas of the United States, Roller Derby hada larger viewing audience than NBC, CBS and ABC combined. General TV ratings show that interest in Roller Derby is as high as in pro basketball and ice hockey-a phenomenal statistic.

Ignored by the “legitimate” sports world, this bastard offspring of marathon endurance tests climbed to fame and fortune in the early 1950s. then tumbled to disrepute and bankruptcy, and has now soared to renewed and increasing popularity-all in the space of 35 years. In a Chicago sporting hang-out called Ricketts Restaurant in 1935, a promoter of Walkathons and six-day races named Leo Seltzer read about how 93% of all Americans had used roller-skates at some time. He added his past experience in promoting the marathon business and his first Transcontinental Roller Derby in Chicago was a great financial success. At this point the Derby was simply an endurance test. Couples skated round and round the track taking advantage of short breaks by resting on cots in the center of the small rink in full view of the public while the audience rooted for the couple that survived the longest.

Mr Seltzer’s banked track was not yet paved with gold, however. The success of that first Derby was followed by a disastrous national tour when even the most unsophisticated audiences ceased to be interested. Roller Derby did not of course, die bankrupt on the road. To the gallant rescue came the immortal sports writer, Damon Runyon. While watching a contest with Seltzer he discussed the Derby’s troubles. Players had been tangling with one another during the race, resulting in some ferocious fisticuffs. This appealed to Runyon and he suggested that the rules be changed to permit such fracas. And so what would be considered “unsportsmanlike conduct” in most games became the norm for the non-sport Roller Derby.

By the early 1950s, the “game” had expanded so rapidly that a league was formed. Through TV saturation coverage it was brought to every American home, and Derby stars became household names. However, television proved a fickle follower, dropping the Roller Derby almost overnight.

But good commercial propositions don’t die. A second generation Seltzer, who owns and cleverly manipulates all the Roller Derby teams, is now marshaling his forces. He stages their national tour, packaging his product for local audiences as well as for the vast and lucrative TV market. Business acumen and timeliness have enabled him to update his father’s product.

Thus, at a time when kids confound the cops with bombs and go to jail, their parents, within the safety of the arena, can taste their own peculiar form of violence.

Yeah, fireworks are better. The first Penthouse July sort of fizzled on that count.

For the record, you can obviously see more of Lauren Ann here in these very (digital) pages, and if you’re curious about the “digitize everything” project, we encourage you to hit the contact page in order to express your opinion, whether positive or negative. They were all excited about in early 2000, and then something happened to distract everybody. Can’t remember precisely what that might have been, but the corporate world changed substantially, at least around here. If you think putting that Team back together to expedite this task might be an important priority, we encourage you to let the executives know. They actually do read all the comments that come in off that form, if for no other reason than to question us about something that did or did not happen that someone wanted (or did not want) to happen. Executives occasionally have odd ways of “being involved” we have found.

Finally, should you really be interested in the struggles that represented the birth of this country, we heartily recommend “Angel in the Whirlwind: The Triumph of the American Revolution” which will give you a keen insight into what being truly tough really means.

Weird Life

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Weird Life … in History

Romeo & Ghouliet

A woman who claimed to be dating a ghost named Edwardo has hit a dead end in the relationship after claiming her ghost lover has ghosted her.

The eccentric 38-year-old singer-songwriter from England, who performs under the name Brocarde — real name Alayna Salter — said her spooky soul mate gave her the cold shoulder after she was transparent with the media about her relationship with the deceased Victorian soldier, who allegedly died at age 35 after falling down a well during a storm.

“I truly feel like I’m being ghosted by a ghost,” Brocarde mourned.

“Edwardo seems furious with me since I’ve gone public with our romance — he’s gone completely cold. Usually his presence surrounds me with a warmth, but now a cold breeze follows me around the house.

“There’s an unsettling vibe everywhere. It feels like death. Or maybe I’m just dead to him.”

Maybe ghouls just wanna have fun?The lovesick lass said that despite the fact that Edwardo has frozen her out of his afterlife, she is keen to rekindle their relationship.

“I’m going to light a hundred candles and scatter rose petals. I may even cook him some typical Victorian dishes to win back his heart — maybe some sheep’s trotters or a boiled calf’s head, if I can find that in my local supermarket.” That’s the spirit.

For the record, we did not think of the “gouls just wanna have fun” line, but we applaud it heartily. As for dating a ghost, if nothing else, it should make it pretty easy to break up as you’d really just need to invite a live person over and spend the evening saying “neener-neener” every time you found yourself alone. … Weird life. … Speaking of mating rituals…

Giant Sex-Crazed Spiders Invade the U.K.

Weird Life Living with SpidersSpider mating season in the U.K. always arrives as great news for arachnids and nightmare fuel for literally everybody else.

During autumn — the start of spider copulation season in the region — giant sex-crazed spiders, described as being “as big as a hand” and with “biting fangs,” invade homes across the land in search of a shag.

While female spiders are typically homebodies, happy to chill out in their own webs, horny males tend to frequently wander and actively seek out steamy spider sex.

Despite being creepy to look at, house spiders are said to generally only attack if they feel threatened, so experts say it’s best to leave the horny beasts to their amorous pursuits in peace.

Honestly this kind of advice could apply to basically any mating ritual anywhere with any species of living animals or insects. You really do not want to get in the way of either sex pursuing a path lit by a pheromone trail. A person could lose something important to them that way. Say, for example, this next woman considers you an impediment to reaching the object of her ardor… Weird life. …

Woman Turns Heads after Towing Van with Her Hair

Weird Life with HairA woman in London swapped follicles for fuel and pulled her van to the nearest gas station by using her hair as a tow rope.

Using a specially constructed harness that connected her waist-length hair to her nearly 9,000-pound van’s front bumper, Anastasia Sawicka,

a 34-year-old circus performer, turned heads as she hauled her van headfirst down a busy central London street in front of alarmed pedestrians.

However, this type of hair-raising stunt isn’t new for the former Britain’s Got Talent finalist, who makes her living as a “hair-hanging aerialist.” Sawicka, who lives with her professional sword-swallowing husband, Hannibal Hellmurto,

said when she’s on the road, she abides by a strict hair regime that includes conditioning her tresses five times a day.

The painful and highly specialized art of hair-hanging is thought to have originated in China and involves securing the hair to a metal ring before hanging from it and performing other acrobatic feats.

Seriously? This must be a fun couple to have over for dinner. If distraught, she could simply whip you with her hair, and he could whip out one of those swords he carries around. You should ask them what kind of wine they like before the invitation it seems like to us. And speaking of dinner (amidst a Weird Life)…

One Way to Eat Your Words

Weird X-RayCoins, batteries, buttons — humans end up in the hospital every day for swallowing things they shouldn’t. But one man in Egypt took things a step further after he fronted up to a hospital with severe stomach pains and was found to have a mobile phone in his belly.

Doctors at Aswan University Hospital in Upper Egypt were shocked to see X-rays revealed a mobile phone wedged within the man’s stomach.

The man confessed to doctors he had actually swallowed the phone six months earlier but was too embarrassed to tell anyone and hoped he could just pass it naturally. Spoiler: He didn’t.

Although we’re desperate to hear the details, no one knows what turn of events saw the man swallow his own phone, but after having the device surgically removed, he is expected to make a full recovery.

Even more bizarre, last year a 33-year-old guy from Kosovo found himself in a similar situation after managing to swallow an entire old school Nokia phone. No doubt the Nokia battery was still going strong after it was removed.

Oh, c’mon. This one’s easy. Girlfriend wanted to see the boy’s phone. Boy thinks, “I bet I could just swallow this.” … Never fail to factor in the male self-preservation instinct, particularly when he’s trying to maintain access to another person’s parts he rather enjoys. People have been living this weird life a very long time, despite what every single young person ever has thought.

Granny’s Got the Goods

Frost-Ade from a Vintage Weird LifeWe generally think of our grandparents as wholesome, but one woman is seeing her granny in a new light after finding her deluxe cocaine-snorting kit from the ‘70s!

The woman was cleaning out her grandma’s belongings when she found the world’s best family heirloom: a smart leather pouch containing drug paraphernalia.

Her friend took to social media to share a picture of the discovery, which people were quick to point out was a vintage Frost-Ade kit, designed for “truly exquisite snorting,” according to the manufacturer’s advertisements from back in the day.

The kit included a slice of polished stone for racking up, a razor blade for chopping lines, a straw for sniffing, a stash pocket for the illegal powder and a little spoon — all housed in a handy suede pouch.

Grandma certainly knew how to party.

One should always remember that odds would be very good that whatever weird, kinky, totally bizarre sexual things happen to run through your mind, they almost certainly ran through your parents and grandparents at your age too. How do you think they got to be parents and grandparents in the first place? … We will admit that knowing this does not make it less oogey to think about, however. … To distract you, we suggest understanding that people were chewing Coca plants even in 3,000 B.C. We are neither encouraging nor justifying here, mind you, simply stating that people like to have their minds altered as a rule. … Considering recent judicial events, though, rather than reading about the history of cocaine, maybe grab some knowledge on the more important things that “grandma” had to deal with just because she happened to be female. Weird life INDEED. … We should not let this happen again, folks.

Richard Meleski

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Stolen Valor

Richard MeleskiTo his friends, co-workers and loved ones, Richard Meleski was a war hero. To hear him tell it, his bravery, strength and selflessness were routinely tested over his six years as a member of the Navy’s vaunted SEAL Team Six. Perhaps his most harrowing mission came in 1984, when Meleski experienced 18 tortuous hours in Beirut, Lebanon.

The Middle Eastern country was then in the midst of a bloody civil war. Complicating this conflict were proxy fighters from numerous countries, including Hezbollah forces backed by Iran. In September 1984, a suicide car bomber associated with Hezbollah attacked the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, the second such attack in as many years. Twenty-four people were killed.

U.S. forces were deployed to the region with orders to protect American assets and put a lid on the violence. Shortly after Meleski and a string of fellow SEALs touched down, they were captured, tortured and, in the case of one soldier, killed by an unidentified faction of belligerents. As part of his abuse, Meleski’s hand was smashed with a hammer.

In one brief moment during his captivity, Meleski saw an opportunity for him and three other SEALs to escape out a window and took it. This maneuver brought freedom, and later, a Silver Star. But Meleski fell hard from the window, incurring a traumatic brain injury so intense he couldn’t speak for months.

When he retired from the military in 1986, Meleski had many scrapes and bruises that required attention, including hearing loss, back injuries and PTSD.

In 2010, Meleski sought help from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Due to his status as a former Prisoner of War, he was put in the VA’s Priority Group 3, which entitled him to swifter attention than other former troops. Decades on from his service, he continued to tell his war stories to anyone who’d listen. On his Facebook page, he also inveighed against the unpatriotic: “If you haven’t risked coming home under the flag, don’t you dare disrespect it.”

Yet Meleski had himself never undertaken these risks or served in the military at all. For much of the time he claimed to have been a globe-trotting Cold Warrior, he’d actually been serving a prison sentence in New Jersey.

The VA and federal prosecutors sniffed out Meleski’s fraud, but it took nearly a decade. Over that period, he received VA health care and benefits checks worth in excess of $300,000.

During his trial, which concluded in 2021, U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Savage railed against Meleski, 60, as a “man who lived years in a fantasy.” Clearly, he had a warped need for public acclaim. Meleski’s incarceration in Jersey, after all, stemmed from a similarly mind-bending scheme of faux heroism, one where he quietly set homes ablaze, then helped extinguish them as a member of his town’s volunteer fire department.

“I guess I wanted to be someone who I wasn’t,” he acknowledged in court.

After pleading guilty to numerous charges, including faking a military career, Meleski was sentenced to more than three years in prison.

While wild, Meleski’s tale is far from an aberration. For as long as America has waged war, some citizens have been falsely identifying as fighters. But in 2005, Congress increased the consequences of these lies by ratifying the Stolen Valor Act, which makes it “illegal to fraudulently wear medals, embellish rank, or make false claims of service in order to obtain money or some other tangible benefit.”

They just want the recognition. They don’t want the pain. They don’t want the nightmares. They just want to be somebody’s hero, and it doesn’t work that way.

Yet despite serious criminal and reputational deterrents, stolen valor persists.

These schemes have repeatedly emerged in the political arena, where military service not only confers trust, but protection from attack. And even among those who have actually served, there have been unnecessary embellishments.

One of history’s most egregious cases involved Utah Republican Douglas Stringfellow, who won a 1952 congressional seat by concocting a story strikingly similar to Meleski’s. Specifically, the Army veteran billed himself as a World War II spy, who parachuted into Germany, was captured, tortured and became a paraplegic — none of which was true.

More recently, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat who said he’d “served in Vietnam,” actually secured numerous deferments and served stateside in the Marine Corps Reserve during the war, and Tom Cotton, a Republican senator from Arkansas, claimed to be an Army Ranger, when he merely attended the Army’s two-month Ranger School. This behavior has also trickled down into local politics, including a bizarre 2020 Texas sheriff’s race where both candidates concocted fake military stories.

These sorts of stories appear mostly motivated out of a selfish thirst for power. Others include elements of greed, but also seem symptomatic of a deep American discontent with day-to-day life.

Some have stolen valor to buy BMWs or fancy homes. Other run more modest schemes in hopes of securing basic stability. While Meleski clearly enjoyed the respect afforded through his phony veteran status, his assumed valor also gave the forklift driver free health care and a supplemental income.

In a similar case, Kristopher Voyles was indicted last year for falsely claiming to have served. In 2018, Voyles, now 31, ripped off the identity of a real veteran to secure care at a Georgia VA hospital. He later pulled off the same stunt in Tennessee, where he was provided with more than $20,000 worth of psychiatric care.

In June, Voyles was sentenced to more than two years in federal prison. While egregious, his case stemmed mostly out of medical necessity.

A less tangible disorder shows up in the cases of those with a warped need to feel heroic. For decades, and particularly in the post-9/11 era, men are overloaded with militaristic and hypermasculine imagery. These messages make many feel subpar and spur them to buy everything from big guns to tactical diaper bags.

This mindset seemed to have infected Shane Ladner, a cop and former veteran, who in 2018 lied about being injured in a top-secret military mission in Central America to secure a Purple Heart license plate for his Ford F-150. Even the late marksman Chris Kyle, of American Sniper fame, felt the need to falsely bolster his credibility. Despite a legendary military record, Kyle inflated the number of Bronze and Silver Stars he’d received.

These cases offer urgent evidence that the American dream is slipping away, while masculinity is becoming poisoned by militarism. This trend also diminishes the very real and painful impact of war on real fighters.

This was pointed out by Mary Schantag, chairwoman of the P.O.W. Network, who has unmasked hundreds of fake veterans over the years.

“You get these guys that want that status,” she told the military news site Task & Purpose in 2018. “But they didn’t earn it. They don’t have the nightmares these other guys wake up with because of what they went through. They just want the recognition. They don’t want the pain. They don’t want the nightmares. They just want to be somebody’s hero, and it doesn’t work that way.”

Sometimes people completely and totally suck, y’know? If you suspect someone of this sort of abuse, you can try to do something about it. Oddly, people can lie all they want to without committing a crime … but they cannot attempt to profit from that lie. (We have definitely said enough on that subject for now.)

Tech This Way

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Walk this way. Tech this way.

The Sense of Self

Tech This Way - FitnessPenthouse offers up a little there-step session with some excellent way to work the body while getting into the mind.

1/ NordicTrack VAULT

The VAULT is a premium personal home gym — an all-in-one unit with a full-length mirror, immersive HD touchscreen, and storage for a suite of dumbbells, kettlebells and other fitness accessories. Featuring a full-length, 60 x 24-inch mirror and 32-inch HD touchscreen display for immediate visual feedback, it allows you to match the form of the iFit trainer for a better workout.

Tech This way: NordicTrack

2/ The Hydrow

Skip the gym membership and get a full body workout with the award-winning Hydrow. Featuring a 22-inch touchscreen, impressive front-facing speakers and realistic visuals, the Hydrow has been designed to be an immersive experience, with each stroke making you feel like you’re out on the water. The Hydrow’s 10-roller system seat has been ergonomically designed, guaranteeing you comfort for your workout’s duration.

Tech This way: Hydrow

3/ Wave Roller

Designed to assist in pain reduction, tension release and improve flexibility, the Theragun Wave Roller, with its five-speed vibration and Bluetooth connection, takes muscle rolling to the next level.

Tech This way: Therabody

Just a couple of clarifications here before we move on. First of all, the NordicTrack Vault differs in some key ways from our own “Tech This Way” Penthouse Vault. Secondly, despite these being truly exemplary fitness tools, made to the highest quality standards, and back by first-rate organizations, there still may be better ways to get sweaty while still building cardio.

The Sense of Others

[Since this article went to press, the company Penthouse profiled changed its name from PORTL to PROTO, for whatever reason. We have updated Jennifer’s article to reflect that change. – Ed.]

Hot Damn! Holograms!

Tech This Way - Road TripChances are if you’ve thought about holograms in the past 40 years, you’ve thought of Star Wars’ Princess Leia being projected by R2-D2, asking Obi-Wan Kenobi for help. More recently, a hologram of late rapper Tupac Shakur played Coachella in 2012, introducing a new generation to the sci-fi technology. But in the decade since, holograms have gone from real life to science fiction once more. However, L.A.-based company PROTO is trying to change that.

Founded in 2019, PROTO has created what founder David Nussbaum calls “holoportation” devices, allowing more than intergalactic royalty and legendary rappers to access the Jetsons-style technology.

At this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Nussbaum’s devices — the Epic, which is PROTO’s original full-size device, and the Model M, or Mini — received three CES Innovation Award honors, with each device being cited in the Video Displays category, and the M adding a second honor for Streaming.

The holograms we’ve all come to know so well, including that 2012 Tupac, were done with Pepper’s Ghost, an illusion technique which essentially shoots an image at a tilted piece of glass, and that glass then reflects the image back to create a free-standing 3D image. But it requires darkness to look crisp and clean. Not so with PROTO. Nussbaum’s creation lives in the light, with the devices using light to create realistic shadows and depth.

“I can’t tell people to turn the lights off every time [they turn on their PROTO],” he says. “I mean, it doesn’t make any sense.”

Another shortcoming of previous holograms? Interactivity. Sure, you could watch a hologram perform at Coachella, but you couldn’t have a conversation with it. PROTO’s devices both include built-in external mics and cameras, so whoever is holoporting in can see and hear the people around them and respond instantaneously. Instead of the hologram being a piece of art, PROTO’s holograms are as close to real people as you can currently get.

That real-life feel is what has made PROTO the hologram of choice for the University of Central Florida’s medical school, where the device is used to beam in patients for students to examine and diagnose, allowing them to interact with a broader range of people and ailments than they might otherwise experience so early in their careers.

“For me, it’s about connecting people,” Nussbaum says. “That’s why we started adding audience-facing electronics like microphones and speakers and cameras, so that the person being beamed sees the audience in real time and can feed off of the energy of the [audience] and interact with them.”

Currently, that interaction is only available for big spenders who can afford the Epic — an eight-foot-tall PROTO largely used by Fortune 500 companies, medical schools and other organizations looking to serve a big audience. But by the time you’re reading this article, the Model M, or Mini PROTO, will have likely launched, allowing anyone who wants a PROTO to get a version fit for the home. And the ability to bring PROTO to the masses is something that Nussbaum is excited about — and not because of revenue.

“I think this is a travel replacement,” he says. “Some of our customers are Fortune 500, Fortune 100 companies, [and they are] saving billions of dollars in travel. But even more importantly, they’re saving the Earth because they’ve seen their carbon footprint shrink to almost nothing because they’re just not traveling.”

While travel was largely cut back because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Nussbaum believes that once the pandemic ends, more and more people will forgo unnecessary business travel and simply holoport in when they’re needed, saving time, effort, money and, yes, the planet.

Not looking to give up your frequent flier miles just yet? You still may want a PROTO M, which has a starting price point of $2,000.

“What if we could put a face to Alexa?” Nussbaum proposes, name-dropping Amazon’s AI device. “What if we could make hologram Zoom, but also make hologram MasterClass?

“[We could] make hologram gaming, make hologram life. We can take all of our favorite things and add volumetric effects and depth and dimension and just make it all much more real.”

The home-sized devices, Nussbaum says, can be used as displays for NFTs (non-fungible tokens, or digital art cryptocurrency) or other art, as a Zoom alternative for more engaging meetings, or as a way to attend concerts from the comfort of your couch. Or, yes, you could use it to have an almost in-person meeting with one of your favorite adult performers.

“You could beam in any person, whether it’s the president of the United States or an adult performer, and I find that very exciting,” Nussbaum says. “Anybody can use the PROTO however they like. And if someone wants to use it [adult performers], I support them.”

With end-to-end encryption, PROTO is also incredibly secure, so whether an individual is using it for personal pleasure, or a government is using it to conduct top-secret meetings, only those they choose to beam to will ever know what they’re doing.

“When two people are communicating through a PROTO, it’s like those two people are in a room alone together,” Nussbaum explains.

“If you can’t be there, beam there,” Nussbaum says. Anyone with a camera and the PROTO app can beam into a PROTO device if they’re invited, and because of the all-in-one design, anyone who buys a PROTO can set it up right out of the box with little effort.

So whether you want to display your NFTs, safely visit with grandma during a pandemic, hold meetings, attend concerts, or even get up close and personal with your favorite adult star, PROTO can help you do it. Just remember before you beam that PROTO sees all.

“Sorry, world,” Nussbaum says, “but you have to wear pants again.” 

Yeah, that doesn’t sound scary at all. What could possibly go wrong? … It does sound like grand fun before all that happens, though. … Should you wish to reserve your adventure immediately, you can (currently) do so for a mere $100. We invite you to check it out — and then start thinking about what kind of furniture you need to put between you and the camera. Pants? … They still have those?

2021 POYRU Meaghan Stanfill

Posted on by Team Penthouse

POYRU Meaghan Stanfill

Penthouse put out a press release on our POYRU a month or so ago, but operating on the theory that most of you cannot find yourselves on the Penthouse Press Release list, we thought we’d run it here as well. For the record, our press releases are better because we can use pictures and video. (So neener-neener.)

The platinum blonde California model, who originally hails from a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia, says she has wanted to model for Penthouse since the age of 18.

Standing 5’8” tall, this statuesque beauty enjoys volunteering at Mary’s Kitchen and the Sweet Paws Animal Rescue, and reveals her secret talent as the ability to create recipes out of anything. With “scuba diving at a wreck site” on her bucket list, she admits the most daring thing she’s ever done is swimming “in open waters with tiger sharks.” Stanfill is a former nationally ranked swimmer who confides she used to dream of becoming a marine biologist. “I’ve always felt a deep connection with the ocean, and growing up this was my dream.”

Stanfill, who describes herself as open, outgoing and kind, held several professional positions prior to modeling full-time — including paralegal, mortgage finance firm manager, and transcranial magnetic stimulation therapy tech, the latter of which she is most proud. “I’m extremely empathic and able to understand other people’s perspectives,” she says. “I put a lot of energy into spreading awareness of the world’s tragedies because they are something that impacts my heart.”

An advocate against bullying, Stanfill says her father is her personal hero. “He came here at a young age as an immigrant from the Philippines,” she reveals. “He then joined the Air Force and flew F-18 fighter jets, then dedicated his life to saving others as a paramedic, then firefighter, then battalion chief! He received commendations from the Governor of Georgia for saving a young boy from a burning aircraft and other heroic acts.”

“We are thrilled to announce Meaghan Stanfill as Pet of the Year Runner-Up,” praised Moose, CEO of Penthouse. “She is not only beautiful and intelligent with a big heart, but also a top-notch professional in every way. We are incredibly proud and honored to call Meaghan a valued member of the Penthouse family. Congratulations, Meaghan!”

“Shooting our 2021 Pet of the Year Runner Up, Meaghan Stanfill, was such an honor and a privilege,” adds Penthouse Photographer, Gerald de Behr, who photographed Stanfill’s POYRU layout. “She’s a natural beauty and a great model on set, who had numerous suggestions for poses and was attentive to every detail. As a photographer, you really can’t ask for a better partner to capture the erotic beauty that is expected of a brand and legacy like Penthouse Magazine. Congrats to Meaghan on being crowned Penthouse Pet of the Year Runner-up for 2021!”

“We are thrilled about Meaghan Stanfill’s newest status as our Pet of the Year Runner-Up, said Drew Rosenfeld, Penthouse VP Broadcast. “Meaghan exemplifies beauty, grace, charm, and wit among many other positive notes. We look forward to a long standing relationship with Meaghan Stanfill, as she is now part of the Penthouse Royalty.”

Photo Editor, Director of Pet Projects, and Production Manager, Sam Phillips had many great things to say about the new Pet of the Year Runner-Up. “Penthouse POYRU for 2021 Meaghan Stanfill epitomizes elegance and style, while exuding an unrivaled and breathtaking beauty.

Meaghan doesn’t just stimulate the eyes, she also saves lives through her work as a transcranial magnetic stimulation therapy tech, a paralegal, and as a fundraiser for the charity organization INARA, which raises awareness for children impacted by war.

This multilingual, half Filipina and half German, leggy blonde stunner loves to create healthy alternative recipes in her spare time when she’s not creating delectable images as a professional lingerie model. Check out Meaghan’s life of luxury themed layout and learn more about our 2021 POYRU burning up the pages in the May/June issue of Penthouse Magazine entitled “The Movers and Shakers Issue.” For more exclusive access, please visit PenthouseGold.com.

As a frame of reference, the video of Meaghan for her POYRU feature took place roughly a year after her Pet of the Month (March 2020) shoot. It can be interesting to watch the evolution of a model as they do more and more nude sets, although honestly Meaghan tends to be fascinating at any moment in time. Should you wish to participate in more granular evolution, you can find our POYRU 2021 currently @meaghanstanfill on Instagram.

Adult Anime

Posted on by Team Penthouse

The Colorful And Cartoonish Erotic Art Of Cheunchin Bunnag — Adult Anime

This Thai artist has been drawn to erotic art since being captivated by a poster of a nude woman on the wall of a barber shop he used to visit as a child. He says he started drawing as a teenager, but his father destroyed his artworks when he found them. This led to Cheunchin following a path other than art, initially choosing to study architecture before dropping out and instead graduating with a bachelor’s degree in computer games. He continued to be drawn back to art, dabbling in art direction and 3D art, but he says, “It didn’t work out.”

Twenty years later, at the age of 35, Cheunchin still wanted to pursue art and made the decision to give drawing one last go before abandoning it for good to open a family restaurant.

He hasn’t put down a pen since.

How did you become an artist?

I have loved drawing cartoons since I was a child. My father didn’t like it, to the point that he would destroy my art. So, I started studying architecture at university before I dropped out and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer games instead. I didn’t study fine art, but art was always around me. In the 2000s, I did some card game illustrations for a local title here, back before I worked as a 3D artist. Then I became an art director in movies and TV series for years, but it didn’t work out. So at 35, I decided that before I abandon my love for art stuff and open a family restaurant, I’ll do one final thing: draw stuff for a living. And here I am. It took me 20 years before I could finally start my dream job.

What drew you to creating erotic images in the first instance? 

It’s a bit of a weird story. There was a barber next to my house when I was a child, and there was an old tradition for barbers in Thailand to have a poster on the wall featuring a beautiful naked woman right in front of the customer next to the mirror, so you can enjoy yourself while getting a haircut. I was about six years old when I first saw the poster, and I think that’s where my attraction to nude art all began.

What’s the difference between anime and manga?

From my point of view, anime is simply animated and viewed on TV, whereas manga is typically in graphic novels and includes more movement and speed lines. It’s basically the equivalent of Western people differentiating between cartoon and comic.

Would you describe your work as anime or manga?

I’m not sure how to describe it. I get inspiration from both Western comics and Japanese manga. If I had to choose, I would describe my art as manga, since I don’t watch much anime.

Where does your inspiration for Adult Anime (or Manga) come from?

I just love drawing pinups and beautiful things like nature. I love how the muscles in the body work and interact with their surroundings. I enjoy expressing that through my art. I draw from both Western comics and Japanese manga. My characters are a summary of the best things I find in everyone and everything around me.

Who are your favorite artists?

The artist who changed my life and the one I admire the most is Joel Jurion.

I’m also inspired by the work of Gil Elvgren, Alberto Vargas, Frank Frazetta, Kazushi Hagiwara, Yoshitaka Amano, Shouta Kikuchi, Frank Cho, Boli and Otto Schmidt.

Why is digital art your chosen medium?

I use digital painting because it’s the most flexible to work with and the easiest to reach out to people around the globe.

What’s the process for creating your pieces? 

Nothing complicated. I start by imagining how I want to see the character, how she smiles, and what she might look like.

What type of environment do you enjoy drawing in?

A dim, dark, silent room.

You also sell your Adult Anime artwork as NFTs. What first got you into the NFT space?

I saw my friends do it, so I decided to try it for fun.

Turtle by Cheunchin Bunnag

We have no idea how well or poorly goes the Adult Anime NFT business, but we did enjoy learning the difference between anime and manga. Had we a more understanding boss, we might even try to find an artist to start a new series for the magazine called “Manga America Great Again” to have some fun. Sadly, our executives have a rule against too much fun at the office, but one can dream. … On that enjoyment theme, though, we should mention that we also have no idea why Mr. Bunnag created a drawing of a warrior woman riding a bemused turtle, but we thought it great fun so we included it. The boss likes turles. It’ll be fine.

Seeing as how it appears the editors did not actually read the article before deciding upon a title, we also decided to give eveyone on Twitter Link for Cheunchin here. Tell him we agree that the title should have been Adult Manga instead of Adult Anime. What can you do?

Arianna Aries

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Arianna Aries : No Bull

Gorgeous globetrotter Arianna Aries lets her wanderlust lead the way, and it’s taken the leggy lovely to 23 countries within just five years!

AGE: 27
MEASUREMENTS: 32D-25-37
HEIGHT: 5’7”

Arianna’s admirers marvel over her sensual dance moves and stunningly good looks, but they also praise her intelligence and sparkling personality. With both inner and outer beauty, Arianna is as comfortable carrying on a deep conversation as she is putting on a sexy show.

She’s the first to admit, “People become happier near me.”

The blue-eyed brunette tells Penthouse she has big dreams, which motivate her to work hard and follow her passions.

Describe your perfect partner.

A smart mind is one of the sexiest qualities a person can possess. But having compassion for others is also important.

What would be your dream date?

Dinner on a rooftop at sunset just seems so romantic to me.

What are your career goals?

I’m studying to be a psychotherapist. It’s highly important to take care of your mental health, and I want to help people with that. Seeing how psychotherapy changes people’s lives inspires me.

What’s your favorite lazy day activity?

I don’t do it often. But just once a year, I need a day in front of the TV, eating chips and sipping prosecco.

Do you have a hidden talent or skill?

I enjoy singing, but I don’t do it often. I’m very much a yes person, though. I’m always up for learning something new!

Arianna Aries: ONLINE

As would be our custom in these free pages, we have selected a few photographs submitted by Arianna which meet the standards here. Although a subscription would display a more revealing group — “naturally” as it were — a little in-depth on the Q&A reveals that the impressive lass possesses far more than mere physical beauty.

What made you decide to model for Penthouse?

Flirt4free, destiny and luck.

If you could have any job in the world, what would it be and why?

I’m studying to qualify to have the best job in the world – Psychotherapist. It’s highly important to take care of mental health and I want to help people with that. I feel motivated and this job inspires me a lot when I see how psychotherapy changes people’s lives.

Favorite shows and movies?

Friends! The best way to learn the English language.

What do you like to do in your spare time?

During warm times of the year — sunbathing, wakesurfing, sup boarding, picnics, driving car somewhere with no reason; At cold times — mountains, skiing, snowboarding, making and drinking hot drinks, partying, singing, karting.   

What is the sexiest quality a person can possess?

A smart mind.

Who’s your celebrity crush? 

Jared Leto

Who knows you the best? 

My psychotherapist.

Now … Arianna: Frame of Reference

Should you know anything about printing deadlines, you will know we got that information in mid 2021. (Even if you do not know anything about printing deadlines, you now know that important detail, so, “Yay!”) As to that “perspective” we promised, you can now read what was the second sentence in the original publication. … The charismatic camgirl still calls her native Ukraine home, but she regularly connects with online fans from all over the world. …

So that adds some perspective, right? How differently we viewed the world before February of 2022. If you still want to help, early on Marie Claire provided an excellent list of places to consider early on in the … horrible thing, whatever you call it.

We encourage you to find and assist Arianna Aries where you may find her, either on Twitter or Flirt4Free. Freedom counts for a lot — and may extract a heavy price — as we have all sadly learned this year.

Bud Bucks

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Making Bank with Buds

While the COVID-19 pandemic has seen a lot of businesses go up in smoke, the cannabis industry has hit new highs, emerging as the nation’s fastest-growing industry.

Since 2020, legal cannabis sales across the U.S. have jumped a whopping 50 percent, topping $20 billion and adding almost 80,000 jobs to the economy. The pandemic has played a huge role in the spike in cannabis’ popularity, with many U.S. states deeming dispensaries “essential businesses” and cannabis delivery companies seeing surges of 25 percent. Ultimately, the boring, never-ending tedium of the stay-at-home coronavirus saga has even seen cocaine sales drop, as more and more people choose to get stoned at home instead.

With weed’s popularity and the fact that recreational marijuana is now legal in 19 states, the lucrative promise of selling Mary Jane to the masses is luring lots of investors to the canna-biz, including a growing number of celebrity cannapreneurs. While once upon a time numerous celebrities had wine brands attached to their names, celebrity cannabis strains are now blowing up in popularity.

From actors, comedians and musicians, to sports stars and TV personalities, here are a few of the biggest celebrity cannapreneurs right now.

Bud Bucks: Highest Roller

No conversation about celebrities and cannabis would be complete without mentioning the ultimate high roller himself: rapper and self-dubbed “master of marijuana” Snoop Dogg. Snoop, 50, is more than a famous cannabis user and activist. The man is a weed icon and one of the most recognizable faces of cannabis culture today. He even once said he took his first toke at the age of eight or nine when an uncle offered him a roach.

Snoop has openly discussed his love of cannabis in past interviews, and in his marijuana-related songs: “Smoke Weed Everyday,” “Smoke the Weed” and “This Weed Iz Mine.” He even once boasted in an interview that he smokes “81 blunts a day.” Toking that much pot hardly seems realistic — until you learn Snoop has a professional roller on his staff to ensure he and his posse always have fresh blunts on hand. Sounds like a cushy job, if you ask us.

In 2015, Snoop launched his own cannabis brand called Leafs by Snoop, making him one of the first celebrities to front a line of cannabis buds, oils and edibles. The Colorado-based company is renowned for its indica and sativa hybrids, which are personally selected by the big Dogg himself, and many smokers claim they’re the best flowers in the canna-biz.

Snoop is also a co-owner of Toronto’s Canopy Growth Corporation, the biggest cannabis grow operation in the world and one of the first companies to launch a cannabis brand backed by a celebrity. Canopy Growth has since partnered with more A-listers, including Seth Rogen, Drake, Evan Goldberg and Martha Stewart.

Bud Bucks: Most Dope

Mike Tyson has never been the kind of guy to do anything by half. The former heavyweight boxing champion fought his way to the top of his game, and now his cannabis empire is smashing the competition. After years of substance abuse, Tyson turned to marijuana for pain relief and credits it with helping him recover from the many injuries he accumulated during his boxing career. Tyson also says cannabis calms his anger and anxiety.

“In my 30s, cannabis really saved me from myself,” he told Vegas Cannabis Magazine in 2019. “The health benefits were so clear. As it continued to save me, I knew that everyone needed this kind of medicine.”

Instead of kicking back in retirement, the 55-year-old developed his own company — Tyson Holistic Holdings, Inc. — which has sold cannabis products, including flower strains and edibles, since 2016.

In 2020, the cannabis connoisseur launched Tyson Ranch: a 420-acre cannabis-themed playground for adults in Desert Hot Springs, Calif., which has earmarked 20 acres of land for growing new strains and cannabis research. The resort also features a dispensary, an amphitheater, a cannabis university, an edible-making factory, an extraction facility and a campground.

Tyson’s empire is said to be generating around $1 million per month. However, he reportedly smokes $82,000 of his own supply in the same amount of time.

Bud Bucks: Best Buds

Perhaps the most surprising celebrity potrepreneur is America’s foremost goddess of domesticity, Martha Stewart.

I guess you could say it was a joint effort that saw the domestic diva join the many celebrities who have created their own weed-related brands.

The 80-year-old businesswoman says her curiosity for cannabis was kindled by her bud Snoop Dogg while filming their Emmy-nominated cooking show, Martha & Snoop’s Potluck Dinner Party, which helped her learn a lot about the natural healing and palliative effects of cannabis. While she’s no stoner, Stewart has developed a passion for CBD — also known as cannabidiol, which does not contain marijuana’s psychoactive compound THC — and incorporates it into her daily wellness routine as “a natural way to manage life’s difficulties.”

In 2020, she launched Martha Stewart CBD in partnership with Canopy Growth. Stewart’s offerings include hemp-derived, cannabidiol-rich gummies — inspired by her favorite recipes and ingredients — a line of flavored CBD oils and soft gels, as well as chewy treats for pets. And she’s also cooking up the CBD-based skincare line 86 Elm.

“I’m not a user of cannabis, but then I got very interested in not only cannabis but also in hemp and the derivatives … I’ll leave the THC offerings to Snoop,” she said in an interview with CNBC.

Celebrity Roll Call

No story like this could be complete without at least mentioning, say, the top dozen “other” in this category of famous weed endorsements. Certainly you could take exception to our rankings. You might have options we have missed, or disagree with the hierarchy below. We can tell you two things for certain. First, you are not crazy, and that last picture shown happens to be of Willie Nelson, and not Martha Stewart. In at least one (influential) editor’s opinion, Willie would probably qualify as better known for for this particular mood stabilizer than Ms. Stewart. (We have zero idea whether or not Willie makes an excellent soufflé.)

OH! And second, doing the research should be a blast.

  1. Willie Nelson — Willie’s Reserve
  2. Bob Marley — Marley Natural
  3. Cheech Marin — Cheech’s Private Stash
  4. Tommy Chong — Tommy Chong’s Cannabis
  5. Seth Rogen — Houseplant
  6. Jay-Z — Monogram
  7. Jim Belushi — Belushi’s Farm
  8. Rachael & Megan Rapinoe — Mendi
  9. Wiz Khalifa — Khalifa Kush
  10. Carlos Santana — Mirayo by Santana
  11. B-Real — Dr. Greenthumb’s
  12. Melissa Etheridge — Etheridge Botanicals

No true country music fan could possibly assist in putting together an article like this without mentioning perhaps the best “Bud Bucks” song ever written — admittedly limited in this case to that specific music genre. We’ve already provided a couple of Toby Keith memories in these digital pages over the years, highlighting his USO work, Mr. Keith in general, and even his tequila. It just seemed reasonable to do a bit of an aside on his song-writing skills as well. Not wanting to get into even a hit of copyright issue, though, we will leave you with a mere suggestion: Head on over to YouTube and look up I’ll Never Smoke Weed with Willie Again. Life needs more smiling moments.

Kylian Mbappé

Posted on by Team Penthouse

Revere Kylian Mbappé

Known for his dribbling, speed and finishing skills, he’s widely considered one of the best players in the world.

Off the field, luxury fashion brand Dior will be giving the Paris-born athlete a helping hand to make a style statement for the next two years.

While being fitted in striking tailor-made suits and parading other formal pieces in a promo video, Kylian and his teammates say they think looking good helps you feel good.

At the ripe old age of 23, Kylian will be lining up alongside Johnny Depp as a face of the French fashion giant.

It’s the latest accolade in a rather long list for Kylian, who was just 16 when he made his professional debut in 2015. He then became the second most expensive player, and most expensive teenager, when he moved from Ligue 1 club Monaco to league rival Paris Saint-Germain in 2017.

At his latest club, he’s won a heap of titles and has finished as Ligue 1 top scorer for three consecutive seasons — even if you don’t speak French, you get the gist. Oh, and he’s also the third-highest goal-scorer in the club’s history.

Remember when he set the 2018 FIFA World Cup on fire? He became the youngest French player to score at a World Cup and was only the second teenager, after Brazilian legend Pelé, to score in a World Cup final.

Raised near Paris, Kylian went to a private Catholic school in Bondy, where it’s said he was academically gifted but extremely unfocused.

Let’s cut him some slack. His idol growing up was Cristiano Ronaldo, so it’s fair to guess he had his sights set on the pitch rather than academic success.

He’s admitted the development of African sports is important to him because of his parents’ African origins. His father, Wilfried, originally from Cameroon, is his agent and a football coach. His mother, Fayza Lamari, of Algerian Kabyle origin, is a former handball player.

In an interview with Time, Kylian spoke about sacrifices he made as a teenager to focus on his game development.

“I did not have the moments of so-called normal people during adolescence, like going out with friends, enjoying good times,” he said. But, he added that he’s now “living the life he always dreamed of.”

It’s a life many have dreamed of — at age 23, he already has a net worth of nearly $100 million! Kylian has amassed more than 50 million Instagram followers, just four years after making his professional debut. And, of course, followers equal sponsorship cash. Kylian has had a sponsorship deal with Nike since 2017; his collaboration with the sportswear giant has been phenomenal. He was only 18 when he launched his own personalized soccer cleats for Nike, the Kylian Mbappé Nike Hypervenom 3.

In 2018, he unveiled the Nike Mercurial Superfly VI shoes, inspired by the R9 Mercurial footwear of his idol Ronaldo.

If you’re a gamer, you’ll also have seen Kylian featured in EA Sports’ FIFA video game series. His trademark goal celebration is posing with his arms crossed and his hands tucked under his armpits, a stance inspired by his younger brother, Ethan, who would celebrate like that when beating Kylian at FIFA.

When Kylian landed the solo cover of FIFA 21, he became the youngest to accomplish the feat. He then was featured on the FIFA 22 cover, making him one of the rare players to achieve the back-to-back honor. With all of his superstardom, it’s refreshing to hear him tell an amusing story about his first meeting at age 14 with Zinedine Zidane. Before getting in the Real Madrid player’s car to drive to a training session, Kylian says he nervously asked if he should take his shoes off!

Hmm. Presumably if we properly revered Zinedine Zidane (who sounds like a Douglas Adams emperor, let’s be honest), this might have made more sense. Maybe it comes down to a cultural thing, but if anybody asked me to take off my shoes before getting into their car — absent, camping, fishing, laying down hot tar for a new asphalt surface, that sort of thing — they should probably roll down their window too. That way I will not break the glass when I throw my shoe at them. Kylian Mbappé soudns like a great guy to hand out which, however. No matter how you look at it, 71 million followers sounds darned impressive. Zinedine Zidane only has 32 million. How embarrassing for him.