Yesterday I woke up and felt bad: really bad. My shoulder had been spasming for over a week and the entire right side of my face hurt. I've been fighting a cold for two weeks and my throat was raw. And I my body ached.
However, it was my day off work and I had things to do. First, I attempted to workout. I got on the exercise bike and just peddled without actually turing on the resistance and that made me feel like I might fall over.
I decided to call it a morning and watch some tv on the couch. When the tv came on it was the fourth hour of the Today Show with Kathy Lee Gifford and Hoda Whatever. These women are nuts. There is a great SNL parody here which really isn't that much more extreme than the show. KLG was holding this little Bichon Fres up against her face and screaming about terrorists. It was obnoxious. This is how I knew I was really sick: it was more than I could do to decide how to turn the channel. I just stared at these nutty women screaming at each other for half an hour.
Finally, I felt good enough to stream some back episodes of Chuck. I'm all caught up. I took a couple alieve and got in the hottub to cook out my virus and my shoulder. Then, I took a nap.
I haven't been blogging much because I am working two jobs and taking a class. Just because Tuesdays are my days off doesn't mean I don't work. I had to tutor in the evening. The first kid didn't have much work and even though he had blocked out an hour and a half sent me home after twenty minutes.
This left me with about an hour and a half to drive from the Villages of Memorial, a community of large houses on large lots, to Bellaire, a community of large houses on small lots. Driving south on Chimney Rock, I decided to stop at a Starbucks and study a little. But my neck was really killing me. I called my sister to see if she knew of any good spas on the west side. Yes, this was ridiculous, but its already been disclosed that my judgment was impared. As per usual for the women in my family, she didn't answer her phone.
I called Frank, but hung up before he could answer. I didn't want to admit how nutty I was feeling. Just as he was calling me back, I drove by a Spa on Westeimer. So, for those of you not native Houstonians, Westeimer is a street that runs east/west with bars and clubs and drag racing on the western side, and tatoo parlors and bars on the east side, and a large, fancy shopping mall in the middle. So I was sort of near the mall with its shops aimed at the affluent consumer to the north and south, but as I entered the Spa, the thought occured to me that maybe I wasn't close enough.
I looked around. There was sparce entrance and prices listed on the wall. There was a harsh looking man sitting behind a desk. Was this really a brothel? The hours posted were 10 am to 10 pm. Is that a little late for a massage? Well, what if you work 60 hours a week, when else would you get a massage?
But I was already in the door, and my shoulder was causing me a great deal of pain. I ordered a massage and the gaurd made me pay upfront. This cause anxiety because: 1) Nice spas let you pay after your massage, this is shady and 2) I had already paid, I was committed.
Another man led me to a room and a friendly woman came in to give me a sheet. There wasn't a massage table but a palet on a raised platform. This made me think brothel, but this is also how Shiastu is often performed. Shiatsu is a kind of massage, not a happy ending.
So what happened next? I considered leaving but also realized that in my paranoia about massage parlors I was becoming my mother. (There is a whore house near her that advertises massages. Therefore, she worries about it all the time and told me aunt from wholesome Green Bay not to buy my aunt from insulated The Woodlands a spa gift card over the internet. Now, of course we laughed because while massage gift cards seem lucrative, who would buy a gift card to a whore house?) I went ahead a took off my clothes and got under the sheet. And the friendly looking lady gave me an awesome massage. She certainly knew her anatomy. While I was getting my shoulders pummeled into submission I considered whether or not this massuse was also a lady of the night and how did I fell about being touched. Given the way she was working my shoulders, I didn't really mind. I might have been a little defensive when she asked if I wanted a full body massage or just the upper body. I believe I squeek-yelled "Only my upper body!"
In conculsion, I feel way better today. My back is sore but the spasming has stopped and I'm considering going back there for a full hour next time. Also, to my releif there was no attempt at a "full release" although she did cop a little feel of side-boob.
