July 28: Steam Room

Other than the maybe dead man laying in the middle of the road, this has been one of The Most Amazing weekends I've ever had in Las Vegas!

 Take note, all other Las Vegas weekends, this is how I would like this shit to go all of the time. 

If I could relive this weekend, and relive it, and relive it, I would. Exactly three more times I'd relive it. Then, I'd like to do something else.

However, staying up all night being young and aggressively strange has its price. I must sweat out these toxins asap. My skin is not nearly as happy as I am today. I head straight from the strip to the steam room. 

Because it's early morning, I'm the only one in the steam room. Fantastic. I close my eyes and cross my legs. But it's not hot enough. I like it almost too hot to stand. 

I get the hose, to spray the sensor, to turn on the steam. While I'm standing, a man and woman enter. The man takes over spraying duties.

"Champagne!" the woman laughs when the steam pops on loudly. Fitting because that's what I've been drinking all night.

I sit back down. The man and woman begin talking, and I know they'll talk the whole time. They've just met. Based on her accent, the woman is from Russia. The man is flirting with her and it seems he may actually have a chance. At least she's willing to talk to him. This is further than men get with me in the steam room because of the No Talking rule. I take the rules I make up very seriously. 

I wonder if he did die. The man in the road. Three men stood around him calling  911, protecting him from drunken 2 am traffic. I sat in my car and stared. What a way to start the night. 

Ambulances drive by every day, and it makes me sad. I wonder: what's happened, what's burning, who's in trouble, whose final day has come, who finally gets to be asleep forever... Asleep. Forever.

I'd like to go to sleep. I've been awake for a long time. 

Last night, two roads away, when I saw the ambulance turn on its lights, I didn't have to wonder, I knew where it was going. To the maybe dead man laying in the road. 

It really was a great weekend! Maybe a pool party today! 

Time: 12 minutes

July 26: Steam Room

Only me and two men today.

I'm thinking about the boy. Months ago, I recommended he read a book because it reminded me of us, but it's not actually that great of a book. Our story is better and we're much better characters.

I imagine his disgusted face as he wonders why I recommended something so mediocre to him. I smile as I think about him frowning.

"Thinking of something funny?" one of the men asks me.

"No, not really," I answer.

"Because you were smiling and looked like you were thinking of something funny..."

"No."

He gives up on the conversation. Everyone sits in silence.

I forgot my water again. It was embarrassing. I went into auto pilot and drove to the wrong gym. I was fifteen minutes late to my class. Luckily, they all waited, because I called ahead, and it was a good workout even if it was 10 minutes shorter than usual.

I drink from the hose.

I think I'm an idiot, but I also think that's not a very nice thing to call myself. I do my best, and that's all I can expect of me. And think of the hundreds of times I drove my car to the correct gym! That must count for something. Not just any idiot can do that!

I leave to sit in the women's steam room. Me and two women. One woman leaves. The other woman farts. I consider adding no farting to the steam room rules, but I decide against it.

Time: 14 minutes

July 25: Steam Room

I forgot my water bottle in my car. I drink from the hose.

Four others sit quietly. I close my eyes and my mind is quiet. I open them and only me and one other man remain. I close them and feel the toxins leave my body. I scratch my arm and there's black under my finger nails. Only a few days out of Vegas without my yoga/steam room routine and I have black gunk in my pores?

I'm happy to be back in Vegas where no one can see me unless I want them to, and I can write and read and do yoga and sit in steam rooms.

Time: 13 minutes

July 22: Sauna

I'm visiting Pat and Ryan for a vacation. We all love music and dancing, and that's why we're friends.

I met Pat at a Pretty Lights concert in Las Vegas. Then, I met Ryan when all three of us were at Ultra Music Festival in Miami. Then, they came to Vegas for a weekend, and I moved into the Hard Rock with them, and Pat and I stole money from Buddha so we could buy a bottle of vodka.

Ryan is gone for the day listening to music and dancing, but I'm lazy and Pat's saving money, and we stay home.

Pat and I go to the apartment's sauna. Guest appearance sauna. The sauna is in the women's bathroom of the apartment complex. The one in the men's room is broken. I go in first, check the coast is clear, and then Pat joins me.

Neither of us are sweating yet. It feels like we're burning in a tanning bed.

"Here! This will make it better!" Pat leaves to shower quickly, right outside of the sauna, and comes back. Now he's all glistening and pretty. I want to be glistening and pretty too. I  shower and return.

It's a very small sauna, claustrophobic if I look ahead, but really good if I look toward Pat.

"Let's meditate!" says Pat. Pat reads Today in the Steam Room and knows that the sauna is meant to be quiet meditation time.

"Okay!" I explain to Pat how I meditate. We sit quietly focusing on our breathing. Pat starts laughing about a thought he's had and that ends the mediation. Good. It's exhausting to focus on nothing.

Pat turns off the light, and it's very dark now. I lay down and pretend I'm dead, entombed in wood and heat.

We hear a woman enter the bathroom. She's coughing - a smoker's cough. I listen to her pee. I hope she doesn't take a poo. I wonder if Pat could be arrested for being a pervert - hiding in the dark of the women's room sauna listening to a coughing woman peeing.

"I'm really hot," Pat says. "I'm going to get out now."

We leave to listen to music.

Time: 20 minutes

July 11: Steam Room

It’s only me and four people - two couples. Low visibility. Lots of room. 

          "He's expressed some concern about sharing the hotel room with four people," the woman in her 60s says to her husband. 

"What about sharing a hotel room?" the husband grumbles. 

"That it'll be crowded. I asked him if it was more crowded in prison. He worked in a prison for a while. I told him that I thought these were much different accommodations."

The other couple talks in a language of sinister-sounding whispers. Is it racist to think that a language I can't understand sounds sinister? 

An attractive Asian man enters. He sits as close to me as possible while maintaining acceptable space. I look over at him briefly, and make eye contact. 

“Hello,” he says.

“Hi,” I say, turning quickly to focus forward.

He puts on headphones, turns on music, and assumes a confident, relaxed position.

Nice. I like it. He’s following all of the rules. 

He starts singing along with the music in a loud whisper.

I spoke too soon. 

shhhShut up.

I silence him with my thoughts. Great! My mind-control abilities grow stronger by the day! I congratulate myself on my growing powers.

Next, he lies down and begins to do leg lifts. He’s grunting, breathing heavy and working out at a frantic pace. He’s breaking the No excessive, disruptive movements rule. 
He's doing leg lifts wrong, using momentum to bring his legs up and down instead of his muscles. I stare ahead, ignoring the heavy breathing.

He stands in front of me. He places his hands on the seats to the right and his feet on the seats to the left so that he’s now in a push up position over empty space in my direct line of view. He begins doing pushups. Okay, fine, you win. I count along silently.

1… 2… 3… 4… he is kind of cute… 5… 6… keep going… 7…8…9… I’m growing more impressed by the pump… 10… 11… 12… Should I clap when he’s done? 13… 14… … 15… 16… mmm… 17… 18… 19… 20. 

He finishes and stands right as another handsome muscled man enters.

Oh! Maybe the two shirtless men will begin competing in physical acts of strength and endurance to win my affections! Cuhhmmm onnn, please? 

With another alpha male present, the Asian man can’t keep vigorously pumping away without risking potential ridicule. The Asian man sits down quietly and leaves shortly after.

I leave and enter the women’s room and go in to the smaller steam room. Two pretty young girls sit quietly inside. It’s pink colored in here and it smells like lavender. This is awesome! The girls and I all sit quietly together. I sigh contentedly. 

One girl leaves. I stand and sit - indecisive. The remaining girl looks up. She must use Latisse because her eyelashes are long and pretty. I should use Latisse too. 

“I can’t decide if I want to leave or not! I keep changing my mind!” I say. We laugh. I like her. She has a nice smile, and she was nice to me. 

Time: 30 minutes

July 10: Sauna

I'm in the smaller sauna at the smaller gym, because I subbed a morning yoga class. Only me and one silent man. I lay down. I can hear and see three older men talking clearly outside of the glass door.

"A respected theologian said that he doesn't consider Scientology a religion. If it's not a religion than what is it? Apparently, the Scientologists built a nine million dollar mansion out in the middle of nowhere in California. The mansion is so that when L. Ron Hubbard returns he'll have somewhere to live. Isn't that ridiculous? A big empty mansion for when L. Ron Hubbard returns."

If L. Ron Hubbard and Jesus return to Earth at the same time, Jesus is gonna be so jealous.

Maybe Jesus can live in L. Ron Hubbard's guest house.

The skepticism fits. This weekend, I'm "dancing" with Penn Jillette's NoGodBand, at Penn Jillette's Private Bacon and Doughnut Rock and Roll Dance Party, adjacent to TAM, an annual celebration of science, skepticism, and critical thinking held every summer here in Vegas.

"What does a fish know about the water in which he swims all his life?"

The men continue their talk.

"Mormonism's got to be the silliest though. Some of the things they believe are ridiculous. They have holy underwear that's supposed to protect them."

"Seriously? Magic underwear? That is silly."

Cuhhmmm ohhn, that's not fair. All religious beliefs are equally silly. No one's beliefs are sillier than anyone else's.

In Einstein's book, Out of My Later Years, one of my favorites, he talks about science and religion.

"All religions, arts and sciences are branches of the same tree. All these aspirations are directed toward ennobling man's life, lifting it from the sphere of mere physical existence and leading the individual toward freedom."

Einstein explains that the question of the sages throughout history had been how to encourage the common man to live a life of love. Their answer was to attach these guidelines for better living to religion.

I've reluctantly been in sales for what feels like my entire life. If only I could sell my "wares" to people by telling them that they'll be rewarded when they die... If only all manipulations could be so simple.

"At least religion tricks stupid people in to not killing each other," Jim said.

Einstein explains that our disillusion with religion is due to realizing the stories we were told were bunk. But just because the stories aren't true, doesn't mean that their aim was.

"But this part of the Bible can't possibly be true! Therefore, there's no God! There's nothing more than shitting, eating, fucking and dying."

Maybe that's true, but a book written thousands of years ago being proven inaccurate doesn't prove anything. It proves people wrote and distributed a book a long time ago. That's all that proves.

As long as religion reaches towards love then I'm for it. But we've bastardized the word to such an extent that it's synonymous with ignorant people spewing hate and being cruel in the name of "God."

"I pay 1,700 dollars a month for health insurance," one of the old men says. I guess, that's because he's much more likely to get sick and die, any day now, than I am.

"What a drag it is getting old!"

Time: 19 minutes

July 6: Sauna

Only me and two Mexican men. I lay down and concentrate on how sweat feels when it forms on my face.

Out with the old toxins, in with the new toxins.

The Mexican men are having a conversation. I close my eyes and concentrate on how much I can understand. About 1/4th. Maybe I'll break out my Spanish Rosetta Stone... if I could find it. This is why I can't have nice things.

The two men talk for the duration. I'm not annoyed until the end when they get loud. White people are the quietest, other than Asians. I think black people are louder than latinos, but latinos are still too loud for me.

A few minutes before I leave, one of the men leaves.

"Sorry about the conversation," the remaining man says.

If you were really sorry you wouldn't have done it in the first place.

Time: 20 minutes