I was getting a manicure the first time I learned that not all wives want to, ahem, go for a roll in the hay with their husbands. I was 16 and had picked out orange nail polish (oh, sixteen). I had a book with me but it wasn't long before I found another source of entertainment. In-between buffings and polishings, the two women next to me talked about how much their husbands wanted IT and how little they wanted to give IT.

For a girl that had not even been asked out on a date this was a whole new world. I had a suspicion that their experience was more realistic than the articles I sneaky read in Cosmo while getting my hair done at the salon. (I am supposed to put my hand WHERE? while simultaneously doing WHAT?) So I kept my eyes on my book, let the words blur into lines and listened closely.

"Doesn't he know how tired I am by the end of the day? As if after the kids are finally asleep I have the energy to do anything but sit down and watch some TV."

"For me, it isn't even the energy it takes. I am still losing weight from the baby. I don't feel sexy. I can hardly undress in front of a mirror, let alone in front of him. I honestly think it is selfish that he expects me to pretend to feel something that I don't."

"Selfish? That's a good word. Maybe if he took care of the kids when he got home or made dinner once in a while I would be more interested. Hell, just pick up the milk on the way home from work. I am not asking for much. Now that I think about it, I don't think we have done it in the last three weeks."

"Yeah. It's been at least two for us."

Wait. These women were married...they lived with a guy....who slept in their bed. They could have sex all the time! And they didn't want to? It made no sense. It was like turning down a zero calorie but as delicious-as-creme-brulee dessert. (Or at least I assumed. At that point everything I knew about romance was gleaned from Anne of Green Gables and Moulin Rouge.)

How sad. How wasteful. How stupid. When I got married, I would always want to have sex with my husband! And I would never be too tired. My goodness, it was just ridiculous to want him to bring home a gallon of milk just to prove he cared. Wasn't it just like a woman to make a grocery run a test of love. As the final coat of polish was applied to my nails, I swore to never be like them. My life would be different. I would be better. I would never feel too fat or too tired. Ever.

And then I grew up.

Intercourse, carnal knowledge, lovemaking, knocking boots, coitus, SEX! is everything 16 year old me imagined plus a little whipped cream on top. (Whipped cream, see what I did there?) And once Riley and I got married there was lots and lots and lots of it. Then we had a baby and I really was just so tired my bones hurt. And for a while I did feel fat. Even after I lost the pregnancy weight everything just looked different. Like a cut flower that has been left out in the sun, still lovely just a little...wilted. I became a little distant. We started to fall asleep without talking or kissing.

Then one day while washing dishes, I realized that we had gone eight days without touching each other. Eight days was a quite some time for us. But the thing that bothered me the most was that I hadn't missed it. And I knew that was a problem. So that night after we put the baby to bed, I gave Riley my best come hither glance. Yes, I was tired and felt about as desirable as the "feed the birds" lady in Mary Poppins. But while drying the dishes, it occurred to me that 16 year old Meg must have understood something about sex that 20-something Meg had forgotten. And maybe, just maybe it was worth remembering.
Without further ado here are five reasons you should have sex with your husband every night:

1. Being a mother, one of the ultimate expressions of womanhood, can often leave a girl feeling stripped of her femininity. There is something about being covered in spit up and attending to the every need of another human being that makes one feel distinctly gender neutral. Most of my days are spent playing with dolls, wiping baby food off of my clothes, changing diapers, wiping snot off of my clothes, going to the park, and wiping what-the-heavens-is-that off of my clothes. There is something restorative about kissing the boy you love. There are times in Riley's arms when I remember who I am before I even realize I have forgotten. Yes, I am a cook, cleaner, teacher, and wiper of all things disgusting. But I am also something more, something delightful and completely apart from my roles. I am a woman! And there is potential and depth and heck, I am pretty darn good kisser, too. It is a lovely thing, finding yourself through the touch of someone else.

2. If you want your husband to act like a man, you need to treat him like a man. Hold the eye rolls. I am not pushing for a return to the 1950′s. (Although, heaven knows an era in which low rise jeans did not exist is basically alright by me.) Women need any number of criteria met to feel loved. Men are far simpler. They need to be fed, they need to be appreciated, and they need to have sex. That is it. Really. So make or order dinner once in a while. Say thank you for the long hours spent at work with a hug and smile when he walks through the door each night. (Better yet? Smile as you hand him the kids and walk out the door for a long, much needed break.) And my goodness, let the poor man see you naked. It is astounding what a good man will do for a good woman that has made him feel loved. After a few weeks of meals and make outs, you will sit back and wonder why you didn't insist on having sex every night sooner. Talk about a small investment and big returns.

3. You need to have a moment in each day that is just about the two of you. Remember that boy? The one that made your heart thump and hands sweat? The one that called when you hoped he would, that made you run hot and high up to the stars until you thought you would never come down? He is still there. Under the years and bills and worries, that smiling boy is still in love with and needs his smiling girl. Every night after the kids go to bed is a chance to find him again. A moment to remind yourself that you are living a picket fenced adventure and my goodness, there is nothing the two of you can't do.

4. Sex relieves stress. I don't know that this one needs much explanation. As a mother I eat stress for breakfast. So it seems to me I have a choice. I can let off steam by A) driving around at night and bashing in strangers mailboxes or B) I can get down and dirty with that one guy I married that one time. I choose option B. (So far the mailboxes in my neighborhood have escaped unscathed, so Option B must be working.)

5. It is so much blasted fun. Seriously. Why are we so quick to refuse the good things in life? We will slog through our children's Algebra homework, do Zumba in public and pluck the hair from our body ONE PIECE AT A TIME. But tell a girl to have sex every night and she looks at you like you are crazy, An orgasm? Every night? What do I look like? A Nymphomaniacal Super Woman?

Where is the logic in that?

Are we really too busy doing dishes to participate in an activity that is so good it has inspired genius (that saucy Shakespeare) and changed history (Okay, Helen of Troy, we get it. You were super hot)? My goodness, what a crazy way to live. Ladies, did it ever occur to you (to us!) that we should have sex because WE DESERVE IT?

Yeah, you deserve it.

So, tonight put the kids to bed. Leave the dishes in the sink and the floors unswept. They will wait. Take a moment to remember that you are the girl you hoped you would be and then go find that boy and remind him that he is the man you knew he could be.

Flies may not scream out in ecstasy during sex, but they do create quite a buzz with their wings. And now researchers have found these mating moans can be heard by bats hungry for a meal.

The result: Wild Natterer's bats get a double-size meal of copulating flies; the mating flies, rather than offspring, get death.

In the study, detailed this week in the journal Current Biology, Stefan Greif from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Germany and colleagues found bats didn't seem to notice the flies walking on a ceiling or just sitting. That suggests there's something about mating sounds that outs the flies to bat predators.

The researchers said this is one of very few studies to show that copulating animals are at a higher risk of being eaten by predators. Other examples include studies on amphipods, water striders and other aquatic insects, as well as land insects like the Australian plague locust.

In a cowshed in Marburg, Germany, the researchers video-recorded the movements of 9,000 houseflies over four years. Results showed the flies rarely fly at night, when they mainly sit or run on the ceiling; the faint, lower frequency, noise made by these movements, it seems, was drowned out by a strong background echo. [The Animal Sex Quiz]

"The faint insect echo [of non-mating flies] is fully overlapped and masked by massive echoes from the background," the researchers write.

    1- During 30 minutes of active sex, the average person burns approximately 200 calories.e
    2- On average, adult men think about sex every seven seconds.e

    3- Having sex at least once per week can lower a man’s risk of heart disease by 30%,

 4- stroke by 50%, and diabetes by 40%. It has also been shown that men with an active sex life are more likely to live past 80 years.f

    5- The average size of an erect penis measures between 5 and 6 inches, while the average size of a flaccid penis is about 3.5 inches.e

    6- The sperm count of the average American male in 2008 was down nearly 30% from the sperm count of an average American male 30 years ago.h
       
    7- Viagra was released in 1998 with over $411 million in profits within its first three months

    8- Viagra, the well-known blue pill designed to help with erectile dysfunction, made $411 million in profits within the first three months of its release in 1998 before going on to make $1.8 billion in 2003.g

    9- Use of the condom was first noted in published literature in the early 1500s. The device was originally made of linen, and historians believe the legendary lover Casanova used linen condoms.a

    10- Historical records show that even in 1850 B.C., women attempted to practice birth control. The most common method was a mixture of crocodile dung and honey placed in the vagina in the hopes of preventing pregnancy.a

Steve Carell's character in Judd Apatow's "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" can breathe a sigh of relief; he's no longer the oldest virgin capturing pop culture's attention. Cabaret singer "The Sexational Pam" (or perhaps interested suitors should call her Pam Shaw, her real name) has announced that at 70 years old, she's ready to lose her virginity, UK's The Sun reports. Shaw said she has yet to lose her virginity because she believes in waiting for marriage. But Mr. Right never showed, though there was one close call, she told The Sun: "In 1976 I was proposed to by an oil rig worker in Blackpool. I said yes but later broke it off when I realised I didn’t fancy him." With more than 50 years of performing under her chastity belt, it's not that the vivacious Shaw didn't have her share of offers: “Men saw the outfits I wore on stage and thought I would be easy. But I’ve never really been intimate with a man, just a bit of kissing. I had a sexy stage name and dressed sexy but that was all for my career." From the oil rig worker in Blackpool to stars like singers Tom Jones and Englebert Humperdinck, Shaw's charms attracted flirtations, but never went further than that. But she remains optimistic: “I feel I am ready to give marriage a go and maybe go to bed with a man. You are never too old for anything. Just look at Joan Collins.”