In preparation for an upcoming sojourn to la cote du golfe, I found myself deep in the heart of New Orleans' gay ghetto, roaming the aisles of my favorite bookstore (Faubourg Marigny Books on Frenchmen Street, FYI) in search of summertime beach reads. I passed quickly by the obvious choices -- Vidal, Winterson, Wilde, Rice, and several contenders for hot-new-blonde-novelist-du-jour -- nonplussed by their overwrought cover blurbs penned by even more obvious choices. "Alas," I thought to myself, "is there nothing interesting to be read that I've not already devoured five times over?" In fact, there wasn't. And at the precise moment I came to that realization, I stumbled upon Ken Probst's striking coffee-table opus, Pornegrafik (the title is actually spelled out phonetically, but I can't manage that on my poor little keyboard). The long, sleek, black cover brought numerous images to mind -- none of which had the slightest thing to do with beaches or reading. Giving up the search for good literature, I cracked open its thick, stiff pages, and -- oh, gentle reader! -- what an interesting assortment of photographs did I therein find. continues