In an incredibly short period of time, anal sex has become a common part of Americans’ sex lives. As of the 1990s, only about one-quarter to one-third of young women and men in the U.S. had tried anal sex at least once. Less than 20 years later, my research team’s 2009 National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior found that as many as 40-45 percent of women and men in some age groups had tried anal sex. [...]

So taboos persist and anal sex remains hush-hush even though more people are doing it. What changed to make it more common, anyway? It’s not entirely clear – after all, rates of masturbation, vaginal sex, oral sex and other sexual practices don’t seem to have changed too much. However, it’s commonly thought that the widespread access to porn played a role. [...]

The Zagreb team found that about half of women (49 percent) stopped their first experience of anal intercourse because it was too painful to continue – not surprising considering 52 percent of women report not even using lubricant when they first had anal sex! An additional 17 percent of women also experienced pain or discomfort during their first anal sex, but didn’t stop their partner. Only about one-quarter of women said their first experience with anal sex was pleasant.

That said, nearly two-thirds tried anal sex again (hopefully this time with lubricant), continuing on another occasion. Those women who found it positive, pleasurable and pain-free were more likely to try it again.

In 2008, Singapore Airlines introduced their Suites Class, the most luxurious class of flying that is commercially available.

The Suites were exclusive to their flagship Airbus A380, and they go beyond flat beds by offering enclosed private cabins with sliding doors that cocoon you in your own little lap of luxury. The interior was designed by French luxury yacht designer Jean-Jacques Coste and comes along with a plush soft leather armchair hand-stitched by the Italian master craftsmen Poltrona Frau. Perhaps most well-known of all, Singapore Airlines became the first and only commercial airline with a double bed in the sky.

And it only costs $18,400 for a roundtrip ticket! You should click the link and go look at the pictures if you really want to torture yourself.

The drug bust that earned Ferguson, Mo., police officer Darren Wilson an award for "extraordinary effort in the line of duty" has stalled in court because Wilson has gone into hiding and did not appear to testify at a Monday hearing. [...]

Wilson has not been seen in public since the shooting -- including at the preliminary hearing in Clayton, Mo., on Monday for a man he arrested in 2013.

“There’s a surreal aspect to this election in Kansas that the candidates have to be feeling,” said Bob Beatty, a political science professor at Washburn University. “If either of them lose … they’re not going to believe it.”

Polls suggest Roberts trails independent Greg Orman in a race in which Democrat Chad Taylor has dropped out. Likewise, surveys find Brownback behind in his re-election fight with Democratic state Rep. Paul Davis.

Losing is a possibility for both Republicans.

Which would, in itself, be unusual: Neither man has ever lost an election.

On 27 August 1883, the Earth let out a noise louder than any it has made since.

It was 10:02 AM local time when the sound emerged from the island of Krakatoa, which sits between Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. It was heard 1,300 miles away in the Andaman and Nicobar islands (“extraordinary sounds were heard, as of guns firing”); 2,000 miles away in New Guinea and Western Australia (“a series of loud reports, resembling those of artillery in a north-westerly direction”); and even 3,000 miles away in the Indian Ocean island of Rodrigues, near Mauritius* (“coming from the eastward, like the distant roar of heavy guns.”) In all, it was heard by people in over 50 different geographical locations, together spanning an area covering a thirteenth of the globe.