Mister International Rubber 2012

I landed in Chicago Friday November 4 in afternoon and made it to the host hotel with some time to get ready, however I didn't get a chance to get into the Kink Market until Saturday. That flight across three time zones makes for a long day. My original roommate, Nicemuscles, the new Mr. TORN Toronto had to cancel his appearance at MIR due to illness; fortunately another good friend, Rubberbuck, took his place in the room at the last minute. Rubberbuck showed up around the same time I was unpacking in the room, so we got ready and headed over to the Center on Halstead for the 'Greet the Meat' Cocktail party and Part one of the MIR 2012 contest.

As soon as we got there, I felt like a gimp with an electro buttplug and a sadistic master as I jumped around the reception lobby saying hello to everyone, happily greeting everyone I knew and anxiously awaiting all my good friends to show up. The reception flew by and suddenly we found ourselves in the auditorium for the opening night of the Mr. International Rubber 2012 contest.

Nine contestants this year, all looking like they knew what they're doing. There was good representation from across North America - Fort Lauderdale, New York, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Toronto, Montreal -  only one European guy as compared to three last year. I see where Rubberwilli and Kinkrubber are now seriously thinking about having the contest in Europe (Berlin) on alternating years. I think that would be a lot of fun!  Highlight of the Friday night part of the contest was definitely the Wet Rubber portion.  It happened after an intermission; a lot of guys left, I don't think they realized the best part of the contest was still to come!

Anyways, I had lots of fun hanging out with the gang again tonight. Rubberbuck and I went back to the hotel after the contest and got ready to head to the private MIR play party. When we got there, it wasn't very busy but the space was huge and would be a great place to have a big party, however tonight the energy was pretty subdued. The crowd waxed and waned, a few activities were to be had in the slings and the piss space was busy, the guys that were there made the best of it. I managed to get laid on a couch in the in drain room so all was good :)

I was having energy problems all weekend. I had been sick all the week before and felt okay this weekend, but just didn't feel anything above 80% all weekend. So, I woke up Saturday all groggy, however managed to get out of bed, rubber up and head back to the Center. I was involved in the discussion panels in the afternoon, but I wanted to get some Rubbout promotional stuff out in the Kink Market before I got side-tracked with that. The Squeak Latex guys came up and asked if I wanted to be their victim in their raffle giveaway vac-bed but I had to decline since I was heading downstairs for the panels shortly :(

The first panel was cancelled because the speaker was sick (see a trend here?), but I got together with Tynan, Pup Nitro, and Topher to discuss our upcoming panel on 'Building Kink Communities' and the conversation got so interesting that we continued it all the way up to the room we had for the panel. We only had a few people show up for a lively and interesting conversation, however Topher seemed to like what was being said and it sounds like they might have an expanded version of this next year with more advertising and more topics.

I went back to the Market for a short while to push off some more Rubbout promo posters and cards, hooked up with Tigermasc and we headed over to our friend Junya's place who was hosting a birthday party for some of our rubberbuddies. We had fun over there, then I had to head back to the hotel quickly to change for the evening's contest. Of course, as always, I was running late and got to the Center again after the intro dance routine was done (merde!) so settled in at the back of the room for the remainder of the evening.

I saw video of the performance, it looked amazing. The contestants all looked amazing, did a wonderful job of their questions and kicked ass in the Mystery Bag round. After the crowd voted and a quick break, the winner was announced. Mr. International Rubber 2012 is Si Hands of Manchester, UK! He was an excellent choice and my vote. He is one of the nicest guys I've met! Si has almost singlehandedly grown the Manchester Rubbermen into the formidable group that it is and he is well-known in the rubber community in Europe and North America as a great photographer and role model! Congratulations Si!

Highlight of the contest on Saturday night for me was the 'Exploding Rubberman' performance by the Squeak Latex guys.  It was hilarious!  I wish I'd seen Eddie and Roger's opening 'Alejandro' number as I heard it was very very good as well.

After the excitement of the contest waned, we went over to Junya's for a quick drink then onto the Recon Full Fetish Party at the Jackhammer/Cellar complex. Things were crowded and fun but around 1:45 Rubberbuck and I decided to pull the plug and head home. I heard that the party went ballistic after the walls were taken down to the other half of the Cellar, but I was so exhausted I wanted to go home, even if my checklist for the weekend had fisting high on the list (and never got checked off, incidentally). Anyways, the big drama later was when I discovered I lost my wrist wallet with my driver's license and $150 in it on the way home. Still hurting from that one, but crap happens.

We got up in the morning. While Rubberbuck had a lunch date, I traipsed over the the Market again to finish distributing my posters and cards and finally do some shopping. I had a Mr. S gift card from last year that I used to help purchase a pair of the neoprene Cyber pant with red piping. What a great pouch on those babies! Roar! I also got a green latex polo shirt from Full Kit Gear and a few other fun small things to take back to Vancouver. The day flew by, we whipped back to the hotel and changed and then went to Sidetrack for ShowTunes Sunday. It was great to relax and chat with everyone though I was going through waves of totally feeling like crap and not feeling very sociable. I had a Red Bull then went back to the hotel as I had the opportunity to play with a few guys in the 'RMSF Room'. It was good to finally have some quiet time with Rick, Brent, Todd and Kai, though I was feeling wiped after a couple of hours and bailed out around 11:30. I headed over to Berlin for Madonnarama where I met up with the party crowd again and we had a great night dancing away to Madonna. I got back to the hotel around 3:30.

I crashed hard. Rubberbuck had to check out early for his flight home however I slept in, checked out and wheeled my luggage over to Junya's place. The guys were just getting up. Junya made a great brunch, we had a chance to sing Happy Birthday to Y before he headed to the airport. Rubberchris, Junya and I rubbered up and had another play session with them before RC had to head to the airport as well. Junya and I cleaned up and headed out for some food. Tigermasc met up with us, we went out for some drinks, he went home and Junya and I went to Drag Queen Bingo to end off the night. We headed back to his place and crashed. I got up, messed around getting ready and headed off to O'Hare to fly back to Vancouver. Exhausted, sick, but happy, I dropped off my gear, picked up another bag as Higherlycra came over to get keys as he was going to stay at my place for a few days while I was gone, and then headed over to Mr. P's for the night before getting up at six to head to the airport again. Whew!

I spent the next five days in Alberta, visiting friends in Calgary before heading north for family Christmas. It was nice and quiet -- perfect for healing, although I did get an opportunity to get together with Smileguy on Friday night for a bit of fisting fun (I love being a fisting top! How fun!). And that's the end of my story. The End :)