Meet the Hedgehog

As a sex columnist, I am often presented with opportunities the average citizen can only dream of: testing potentially health-threatening sex products, being squired free of charge in limousines to suburban swinger clubs for those two venerable aphrodisiacs “champain [sic] and strawberries” and, most recently, a live interview with adult film star Ron Jeremy. Seriously, though, what better way to spend the first day of the last year of my dirty 30s than in the presence of a porn legend?

It was the Canadian launch of Ron’s book, Ron Jeremy: The Hardest (Working) Man in Show Biz, and it took place in a beautifully restored boutique hotel in Toronto called the Gladstone. Ron was late, and as soon as he arrived via the backdoor, a classic cougar floozy duo—one “pretty” because she had breast implants, the other “plain” because she didn’t—materialized from out of nowhere. They eyeballed me with simmering insouciance and managed to velcro onto the scrum as we were ushered upstairs to a hotel room, which smelled of the two dishes of deep-fried snacks laid out in anticipation of the Hedgehog’s famous appetite.

Ron was wearing a black suit, a black t-shirt spattered with food stains and a pair of those rubber clogs that lesbians wear when they garden or grocery shop. His entourage included his agent (who also represents K-Fed) and someone who appeared to be his agent’s agent. Ron hugged me impassively and then asked two things of no one in particular: “Are we going to lose the audience?” and “Is Susan Cole here?” Ron loves a packed house and Susan Cole. (Susan Cole lives in Toronto and is a famous anti-porn feminist with whom Ron toured the university circuit.)

We then made our way back downstairs to the ballroom for the Q&A. As we walked, Ron and his agent and his agent’s agent nattered and schemed about business. It was a riot. I couldn’t get over how filthy, gorgeous and crummy the three of them were. As I was to introduce him, Ron pressed a fondly worn copy of The New York Times’s “Extended Bestseller List” into my hand, where his book sits at 32. He was adamant I mention this prestigious commercial triumph.

As soon as he hit the stage, he charmed up and began circumventing my carefully planned questions with the Catskills shtick that he pulls out for every interview. (If you were there and were wondering why I was cutting him off so much, this was the reason.) We nevertheless had a lively conversation and a receptive audience. And Ron is pretty cute, despite his oddly tanned yet simultaneously pallid complexion, and he has great Ashkenazi green eyes that twinkle when he’s amused. The nickname “Hedgehog” is totally inappropriate for him. He looks much more like one of those big cane toads that wreaked havoc on Australia’s biodiversity. (Speaking of animals, Ron is a spokesperson for PETA. His ad reads: “Too much sex can be a bad thing. Help end overpopulation—spay and neuter your dogs and cats.”)

After the interview, Ron signed books and I signed autographs for my fanboys, who, much to my delight, swarmed me like I was Seven of Nine. A few of my friends got their tits signed by Ron, and one acquaintance had the great pleasure of having him slip his finger down the back of her pants with surgical precision.

After I’d done tucking into a bottle of birthday tequila, I stumbled outside for a celebratory cig where I saw a big, fat Hummer idling. I’d never been in one before so some goading smokers shoved me up into the passenger seat and I sat with Ron’s affable driver until he and his retinue came out, a few of them sneering at me like I was some kind of parasite. I don’t blame them, I mean, what’s worse than a barnacle barnacle, right?

I’m still reeling.

Got any questions for Sasha? E-MAIL: POULEDELUXE@YAHOO.COM