well colour me sunshine

Astrolozy recommends sunshine for several ailments.

through sun ray therapy a person can attain victory over all diseases and become long lived. One can increase body energy and live to an age of hundred.”

“Bring pure water of the rain or a mountain stream and fill bottles of various colours. Close the mouth of the bottle and seal with clay. Then place the bottles in the sun”

“After two or three days the effect is produced and the water becomes miraculous. It has the power to remove ailments. Make the patient drink some of the water daily and soon he will be well.”

If a patient suffering from smallpox is made to lie in a red room and is made to drink water from a red bottle he will be cured in a few days.

If one suffers from paralysis one should be put in a red room and made to drink red bottle water too

for those suffering cold, liver disorders, constipation, jaundice, kidney trouble, bronchitis, pneumonia, and disorders of the digestive tract, water from yellow bottles should be used and one should be made to live in a yellow room.

For retardness of brain keep the person in a blue room and make him drink water from a blue bottle

By keeping a person in a green room and making him drink from a green bottle, eye trouble can be cured and the mind made more sharp.

nursemyra is unimpressed by Astrolazy’s recommendations. And for those who want to live to be 100, I’d recommend some slip, slop, slap if you’re trying that sun therapy thing

white corset friday

presentation is everything

nursemyra loves a spoof, especially one where the creator keeps a straight face throughout. Burton Silver and illustrator Heather Busch published a charming little book called Kokigami about the ancient Japanese art of gift wrapping a penis to enhance and prolong love making. a lot of people took the idea seriously, I’d like to have been a fly on the wall when measurements were being taken according to these instructions.

“For accurate sizing the organ should be firmly pressed against the screen image. As this creates a rather difficult viewing angle, it is a good idea to get your partner to check your reading. Measure the size at the thickest part (usually the stem) by holding a flat vertical object like a ruler against the organ’s edge and lining it up with the appropriate line.”

(image from Meiji period in Japan)

the letters from supposed enthusiasts are also rather creative

“I like my husband wearing the Squid Koki most of all but there’s good news and bad news on the squid front that your readers might like to know about. The good news is that when he’s wearing it in front of our large tropical fish tank, all the fish are attracted to its quivering tentacles and crowd around for a few minutes to take a look.” (Mary, Sydney)

…when Arnold wears the fire engine with the ladder extended, it comes up so high he can blow on it and make it sort of quiver…and I find it really gets me going. (Prue, Auckland)

ah Prue, you must be one very lucky lady……..

pieces of cod

ever wondered why the codpiece went out of fashion? At the wonderful Frick Museum in NYC there is a painting of Lodovico Capponi by Bronzino where the codpiece he is wearing really draws the eye.

Once considered a fashion accessory, they also functioned as a purse, holding coins, keys, handkerchiefs and sweeties with which to entice damsels. there is another theory that they may have been utilised to protect clothing from stains caused by syphilis creams containing mercury.

back here, nursemyra showed you a picture of Eldridge Cleaver’s unsuccessful attempt to revive the codpiece. perhaps if he’d used an attractive chick in the ad he may have had more success……

image sourced here

the scots have their own version of the codpiece. the sporran is available in plain leather for daywear and beautifully decorated fur varieties with intricate silver filigree cantles for more formal occasions. I particularly like the red one featured below. as well as providing the same function as a pocket, the weight and placement help preserve decency when indulging in a wee bit of wild dancing on a windy day…..

spin me round

if I end up a crazy old person I hope my sons put me somewhere like the gimcrack because at least the staff are attractive and generous with the S8 drugs plus church attendance is not compulsory. I don’t want to end up in an asylum where they treat their patients with this regime:

“No salt food — bacon particularly — or flatulent vegetables ; no onions, legumes, radishes, or turnips ; no wine. Severe discipline — chains and stripes — to cure the fury, and depress the elation of mind.”

“Foolish deliriums are often cured by foolish remedies ; for instance, a man imagining serpents within him
was cured by putting them secretly in his evacuations”

 ”Cold bath once a day from May to August. For convulsive motion in throat, open the jugular vein.”

‘”strait waistcoat answers every purpose ; legs, if violent, may be secured in a bag”

“To be immersed in water as cold as possible, and kept under it, covered all over, for a long time, until he is near killed.”

bleeding, purging with emetics and swinging patients round and round until they vomited were all popular ‘cures’

“Very obstinate ; but by means of the swing, which exerted its full effects, made to do anything necessary. Swing used only once in five days, though compliance often procured by threatening it”

“Don’t make me bring out the swing………!”

the beard to marital bliss

 Abdelwahab tells us how husbands should behave and look:

“The beard is a male prerogative. It must be the object of scrupulous and continuous attention. Indeed five things are defined as ‘natural’ (mianl fitra): circumcision, mourning, shaving of the armpits, cutting of the fingernails and wearing a beard. Another hadith adds shaving of the pubic hair and the trimming of the moustache. It may also be dyed, henna being particularly recommended. One may ask one’s wife or concubine to assist in this matter.

Yet another hadith ‘makes a link between the fullness of the beard and the breadth of the intelligence.’ There is, therefore, a definite connection between the beard and intelligence!

At a more general level, one recognized, in traditional Arab society, the social rank of a man by the length, shape and colour of his beard. ‘Thus a bourgeois sported a fine beard dyed either blue, yellow, green or red. A workman or a slave could be recognized by a small beard cut short. Notables and men practising the liberal professions, doctors, teachers, imams, wore very long beards, white as snow, while those of soldiers were divided into two tufts of the finest black.”

The female point of view must not be ignored, for it is crucial on this subject, as Shahrazad makes quite clear in The Thousand and One Nights. To a woman who expresses a preference for youths without prickly moustaches and beards, she replies caustically:

My sister, you are a fool…! A beard and moustaches are to a man what long hair is to a woman…. And yet you tell me to choose a beardless boy for a lover? Do you think that I would ever stretch myself out for love below a youth who, hardly mounted, thinks of dismounting; who, hardly stretched, thinks of relaxing; who, hardly knotted, thinks of unknotting; who, hardly arrived, thinks of going away; who, hardly stiffened, thinks of melting; who, hardly risen, thinks of falling, who, hardly laced, thinks of unlacing…. Undeceive yourself, sister! I will never leave a man who enlaces as soon as he sniffs, who stays when he is in, who fills himself when he is empty, who begins again when he has finished, whose moving is excellence, whose jerking is a gift, and, when he pushes, pierces!’

Between husband and wife sight is permitted of the whole of the body except for the partners’ sexual organs, which one is advised not to see for ‘the sight of them makes one blind’

tons of tongue

how far would you go to give a partner sexual satisfaction? would you allow yourself to look pretty stupid?

some people might argue that there’s plenty of opportunity during sex for both partners to look rather weird. nursemyra likes things that are aesthetically pleasing so I think I’d draw the line at wearing “The Oral Sex Helper”

if you had a partner with ‘exotic’ tastes, how far would you be prepared to go sexually? where would you draw the line? the majority of men who crossdress are straight, I wonder how many women would consider sex with a man wearing female underwear. Is a little light S & M ok or would you balk if someone handed you a paddle? what if your partner was into golden showers?

we’ve covered a lot at the gimcrack over the past twenty months or so. nursemyra has been learning along with her readers. I honestly had no idea that some cultures preferred dry sex nor had I heard of doggie style enhancement straps and ccyell minichairs.

I’m beginning to think my penchant for pearl necklaces and pierced nipples is rather tame compared to some of the ‘philias’ that are out there…….

peel me a grape

Johanna Brandt claimed that eating a diet consisting entirely of grapes cured her of cancer. She also claimed that the grape cure had demonstrated effectiveness against arthritis, diabetes, gallstones, cataracts, ulcerated stomach, tuberculosis, and syphilis. “It acts as a drastic eliminator of evil while building new tissue” 

Depending on the site of the cancer, grape juice gargles, enemas or douches may also be used. In 1892, William Kelsey (1851-1935) began marketing a patent remedy called “Dr. Baker’s Grape Cure.” An advertising circular claimed that several “fat and jolly Germans” had discovered that eating just grapes cleaned their system, made their liver healthy, and made their general health perfect.

the grape cure for cancer has been debunked but as they are rich in antioxidants and vitamins they are still very good for you. nursemyra recommends eating plenty of fruit, vegetables, cereals, yoghurt and fish and getting plenty of exercise.

Frequent ejaculation may help protect against prostate cancer. if you’re not taking my advice about diet and exercise, your penis may not be getting the workout it deserves either. if you need a helping hand, perhaps this is a time when adding a little ”grape” to your life may be apropriate…..

pink and white lace corselet friday

naughty nurse girls of the 19th century*

A medical correspondent (from another century) writes “many boys will tell you that if a nurse-girl is allowed to sleep in the same room with them she will attempt sexual manipulations. In fact, a nurse-girl may ruin a boy because she has been brought up to regard the sexual organs as a mystery and is in utter ignorance about them. she thus takes the opportunity of investigating the boy’s penis to find out how it works to satisfy her own curiosity. I know of a case in which a nurse in a fashionable london square used to collect the gentlemens’s children in a summer house when it grew dark and turning up her petticoats invite the boys to look at her vulva. I think people should take on a far higher class of nurse than they do.”

* if you follow the link you will see this is another excerpt from havelock ellis’s book. the servant girls being discussed here were most often teenagers themselves.

when I was about 7, playing “doctors and nurses” with the older girl next door was my first step on the pathway that led me here to the gimcrack. as i recall, she was very keen on putting me to bed and taking my temperature…….