If Girls Designed Condoms ..

What a wonderful world it would be. Skip the ribbing, skip the lube. If women designed condoms there is no question that they would be padded. "But size doesn't matter!" comes a chorus of voices. (The loud- est voices come from boys who are peeking. Stop that right now. Turn to the sports page immediately.) Sure *length* doesn't matter. But give any girl a small dose of truth serum and ask her about width. Admit it. If padded condoms were placed on the market, hordes of screaming women would storm their local druggists and dash out with tote bags full. Unfortunately, it wouldn't work. After all, there is that ticklish issue of boy sensitivity, which we can't overlook, even if we occasionally want to. Padded condoms would rob boys of the skin-to-skin sensation they already claim condoms rob them of, and we can't have that. No, modern women, being kind and sensitive lovers, would design whisper-soft condoms, completely transparent and micro- scopically thin. The paisley, rainbow, and floral-print condoms we designed would be strictly novelty items, kept for special occasions only. Ditto the condoms with cute sayings: "Hang in there, baby, Friday's coming"; "My girlfriend went to Florida and all I got was this lousy condom"; and the classic "I'm with stupid" (arrow pointing back toward the boy). Other specialty items would include the male-ego condom, which, like black olives, come in three sizes: jumbo, colossal, and humongous. Naughty subversives would enjoy the Karen Finley assortment, colorful, decorative condoms that turn ordinary penises into bananas, hotdogs, yams, and more. But I digress. The best place to buy condoms is your local massive drugstore that has them on display, self-serve, just like corn pads or athlete's foot spray. So go shopping. Dress cool, hold your head high, read labels, make your selection. Be assured that most popular brands come with little instruction booklets much like the ones found in boxes of Tampax (uh oh -- don't mix them up!). While at the drugstore, be sure to purchase at least one of the following items: Tickle antiperspirant, Ban Roll-on, or any of the Calvin Klein line of men's grooming aids. You'll need these for impor- tant condom experiments at home. At home, be alone. Light candles. Play inspiring music; any record by Rick James will do. Remove one of the condoms from its packet. Examine it carefully. Then put it to work. Experiment with your slippery new friends; whip those sons-of-gummi-worms into shape. Recruit those deodorant bottles and practice, prac- tice, practice. And how about some new nicknames for the old standbys? Love skins. Slicks. Wet suits. Silk stockings. Eight-by-two glossies. Soon enough, you'll be happy and relaxed, perfectly in control of those silly little slips o' sin. But wait. Something's missing. Oh yes, the hard part. I mean the good part. I mean, both.