Oranges, apples and vibrators.

Did that get your attention? Yeah...probably. Because a woman making remarks about something to do with her sexual pleasure is kind of...shocking.

And that is more what this is about than anything I personally am doing.

Many years ago a couple of friends and I would laugh about going to a sex shop on K-Road. One day the two of them actually did. One of my friends was almost obsessed with carrying out what almost amounted to a dare.

Bear in mind that we were 'good Christian girls.' Sex and sexuality beyond its reproductive potential was rarely discussed, other than the widely accepted idea that it was fun, and that was ok, but it was only fun to have with your husband. The idea of sex toys in sex shops was taboo, and the idea of actually walking into one of these shops bordered on scandalous.

In recent times, I have learned more and more about patriarchal policing of women's sexuality. On a very basic level, of course, we have the slut vs stud mentality. Men are supposed to sow their wild oats, but women are supposed to be careful and discreet.

Lesbians are a threat to men's sexual superiority because...well...it means women don't need men to have a good time.

Sexuality was draped in shrouds of secrecy, and shame unless it was conducted within a certain set of rules (and I use the word 'conducted' rather than 'expressed' on purpose.)

As for self pleasuring? Well...that was the on-ramp for the highway to hell.

I don't really know if I was explicitly taught these things, or if they were somehow ideas that I absorbed from people around me, but they were there nevertheless.

For the most part, I have moved on from those days, where my sexuality was something I did, not something I felt. I started acknowledging myself as a sexual being, and as a woman.

I have moved away the idea that women independently exploring their sexuality without commitment is a source of shame.

Then I came across the opportunity to put independent, sexually liberated woman to the test. In Countdown.

Yup. In a chain supermarket.

Where I found this little beauty. The Durex Delight Vibrating Bullet.

I don't know if you've checked out the price of vibrators lately, but a quick glance puts them in the hundreds-of-dollars price range. I'm sure they are long lasting and great quality, but its not a price point that appeals to the first time consumer, to people on low incomes, or to people who still have those old hangovers about the sex shop on K-Road.

This post has two points. One was that I decided to make a stand for women's sexual pleasure, and carry that goddamn vibrator up to the (self) checkout at my local supermarket.

The second is that we have moved along as a society to the point that it was there in the first place. You can now buy a reasonably priced sex toy at your local supermarket. You can throw it in your trolley as you stroll down the aisle with the paracetamol and nappies.

I am willing to bet that there are lots of women out there who still carry the baggage of shame around their own pleasure, and are too self-conscious to engage with an 'adult shop' to buy a sex toy.

But if you can chuck your $35 vibrator into your basket with your bread and milk, then maybe you might just give it a go.