I got an e-mail yesterday from one of you guys. Greg asked: “You are in fact gay, correct? How come you don’t put any pictures of yourself on your about page?”

Let me first address the gay issue. I’m a little surprised that anyone would ask since My Dirty Sex Life section should pretty much leave no doubt in anyone’s mind, either that or I’m a very good fiction writer. But I wouldn’t be the first straight man or woman on the Web successfully impersonating a gay man, so I suppose it’s a legitimate question. So yes, I’m gay, 100% gay, never have had sex with a woman, not even a little bit.

As far as not including photos of myself here, it’s complicated. I used to weigh over 340 pounds and wasn’t very happy with my body. There’s nothing wrong with being a bear, if you’re happy, and I certainly like having sex with big-bellied bear men, I just wasn’t very comfortable being one.

But over the past couple of years, I have shed about 120 pounds, and I started feeling more comfortable in my own body. I started thinking about coming out with photos of myself, and I’ve even toyed with the idea of making some videos, not necessarily the kind where I get naked, but ones where I talk about issues important to gay men, or things that piss me off, or whatever.

So the idea has been there, Greg’s e-mail prompted me to get going with my plan.

In many ways Joe Spunk is the kind of man I’d like to be. I’m a comic book geek, and like many of the comic book heroes, Joe Spunk is my alter ego. Michael, that’s my name, is the Clark Kent and Joe Spunk is my Superman.

It’s not that I’m hiding behind Joe Spunk because if I were talking to you face to face, I’d tell you any of the things I’ve posted here. I don’t hide what I do with the people I know, or even new people I’m meeting. I figure if someone has a problem with gay porn, then they’re not someone I want in my life.

I guess Joe Spunk has allowed me to get comfortable with myself as I transitioned over the past couple of years. When I commissioned the Joe Spunk character from Dchooi Doodles, I was very specific about how I wanted him to look. I wanted him to be a bald man with some facial hair, I wanted him to be well built but a little on the beefy / stocky side, and I wanted him to have an uncut cock.

I’m a bald man with a full beard (at the time Joe Spunk was created, I had a goatee) so that’s the part that’s like me. Joe Spunk has a much nicer body that I do – I still have about 20 more pounds that I’d like to lose. And Joe Spunk’s body is something that I’d like to achieve when I start going to the gym in the new year. I have a cut cock, but I love foreskin, so Joe Spunk had to be uncut.

More about me … I’m 49 years old. I’ve been having sex with men since I was 15 years of age. I live in Toronto with my partner and we’ve been together for 17 years. We both like hairy men and bears, although my tastes in men wander a little wider than Ted’s. We have two fat cats and we lead a pretty quiet live, we’re home bodies.

And finally, most gay porn bloggers don’t expose themselves publicly. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of discrimination against pornographers, and not just from the fundy Christians, but even a lot of gay men look down their nose at us. Many gay men can’t even admit they watch gay porn let alone be friends with someone who is in the biz. But all gay men watch gay porn, and the guys who say they don’t are lying – well maybe there’s a small percentage who don’t watch porn. So, for the first couple of years I was running Joe Spunk, I just decided that I didn’t want or need any grief, hence, no picture on my about page.

So that’s about all I have to say for now, but if you have any questions, please feel free to ask away.