Former columnist on the prowl with TV series

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Three months since her departure from the Toronto Sun, Etobicoke's resident sexpert Valerie Gibson is still as colourful and controversial as ever - and just as busy, too.

The Dear Val columnist said she looks back at the "overpowering workload" of her 24 years at the city tabloid with horror (although at the time, she loved it), realizing now that she had little time to work on the projects that presently give her so much pleasure.

"It's such a different way of life I'm leading now. I've been in newspapers since I was 16, so I'm still testing my footing as a media entrepreneur," she said. "It's scary in a funny way - to leave something you love is hard, but exciting...And I have so much more freedom now to give the time to the things I enjoy."

Case in point: Gibson just returned from filming Cougar Camp in the Hollywood Hills. The series, commissioned by the American cable company Comcast and set to begin airing Sept. 4, is based on the principles of Gibson's book Cougar: A Guide for Older Women Dating Younger Men.

In the boot camp style show, older women from across the States were gathered to be schooled by Gibson in the art of the pick-up. Seven hours worth of gruelling lessons later, they were sent to hit the streets, clubs and beaches of Los Angeles to test out their newly learned cougar moves on fresh, young Californian prey - all of which was captured, for the pleasure of American viewing audiences, with hidden cameras.

"It's all about enjoying becoming older instead of wailing about it," she said, noting that contestants simply needed to be retaught the basics: conversation, flirting and body language. "It's all about reclaiming the lost art of connection."

The term "cougar," which Gibson first heard used as a derogatory term in the clubs of Vancouver, was popularized by the five-times-wed columnist in a very different light. According to her website, Gibson's definition of a cougar is that of a "new breed of single, older woman - confident, sophisticated, desirable and sexy, she knows exactly what she wants - What she wants is younger men and lots of great sex. What she doesn't want is children, cohabitation or commitment."

It's a combination, Gibson said, that's irresistible to younger men - and one to be commended.

"I was sick of older women being put down instead of celebrated for their sexuality and I thought what a waste it was to use the term in that way," she said. "The cougar itself is such a beautiful, graceful animal in such control of its own destiny, so I took it and turned it into a symbol of female empowerment."

Gibson said she's been thrilled to see her cougar vision so warmly embraced in the last few years - making note of all the "fabulous, wonderfully minded and spirited" women out there over the age of 50 who have reached out to her.

In addition to Cougar Camp, Gibson has lent her name and face, as the celebrity figurehead, to the soon-to-be-launched dating website cougarlife.com.

Not a fan of online dating herself (she tried it out for three months while writing about the phenomenon for her column), Gibson said this new site will work to remedy the issues of dishonesty she encountered in her brief experience.

"I was just so disappointed with how many people lie on those sites about their age, height, job, income, picture - everything," she said, noting that for women 35 and older, the current sites just don't work. "Mine will be of much better quality...and offer an alternative to women who have had enough of the misrepresentation."

Gibson is also working on a follow-up book about dating in the boomer generation. She promises it to be a "fun and cheeky" read, challenging society's notion of older women as undesirable as "rubbish."

"Youth is nothing. It hasn't got the experience yet," she said with a laugh. "Sixty is the new 40."

With so much on her professional plate, one is left to wonder if the quintessential cougar has time for someone special in her own love life.

"Of course, I've always got someone on the go, and of course he's younger than I," Gibson said with a giggle. "I'm happily enjoying my time with him - no expectations."