Prior to last week salt was just a regular crystalline substance that enhanced or diminished the flavor of my food, but after spending a day with different forms of salt, I grew a new appreciation for the chemical compound. My “salty day” came in three different forms: a salt spa, a salt restaurant and the movie “Salt.”
The Salt spa visit was one of the most peculiar experiences in my life. The premise of the spa is that you pay money to sit in a closed room that has salt on all of the walls, on the floor and on the ceiling and then they gently launch tiny salt crystals at you while you absorb and inhale it all. Before entering the room there was a waiver that was thrice as long as the closing documents for my house and it contained such statements such as “there are no therapeutic or medical benefits to this procedure and any benefits experienced are purely coincidental.” Also, by signing this agreement I agreed not to hold them liable for any coughing of blood, sudden death or cancerous growths. IS THIS SALT OR IS THIS ANTHRAX?!?
Nevertheless, I signed the agreement because my interest was peaked and they already had my nonrefundable payment. I received my new stylish, blue booties and I was led to the room, which seemed like a hollowed-out block of salt. As I sat, I closely observed myself for cancerous growths or bloody saliva. Everything seemed fairly normal so I relaxed and listened to the soothing songs from the album “Songs of the Humpback Whale” while I waited for my salty session to end.
When it was all over, I left feeling as salty as ever and went over to a restaurant called “Salt.” Despite its name, everything that this restaurant served was not supposed to be salty. At Salt, there were three types of salt on the table: sea salt, table salt and a third type of salt that I believe to be Morton’s Road and Sidewalk Salt with extra snow-melting power. My friend and I were the only two people in the restaurant, which made me a bit nervous, but it made more sense after I received my chicken caesar salad. My salad featured a piece of “grilled” chicken was so white and undercooked that it was nearly alive and walking around inside the bowl. In the spirit of the salt-themed day, I named my new half-alive chicken friend “Salter” and made him my pet. Then I ate him.
Instead of complaining about my under-par food, I left my autograph on the table with the note “you’re the best” and promptly left.
Later in the day, I headed over to a drive-in movie theater to see “Salt.” Had I done my research beforehand, I would have known that the movie was about a Russian spy and not a canister of iodized salt, but the movie was still enjoyable because of the drive-in experience. If you have not yet visited a drive-in movie, I highly recommend it! You drive your car or truck into a parking lot with a large movie screen in the front, then you tune your radio to the specified FM station. When the movie starts, you will see the movie projected on the giant screen in front of you and you will have full control of your surroundings. You no longer have to worry about cold movie theaters, hard theater seats or crying babies sitting behind you–that is, unless you bring your own crying baby and leave him/her in the backseat without a bottle or a fresh diaper. The experience was great and I plan to revisit the drive-in many times in the future.
When the Salty movie was done, I went home to take a shower and cleanse myself of all of the salt (and half-dead poultry) that I encountered during the day. After I was all clean, I spent a half hour checking my spit for blood and my body for cancerous growths. Although I did not find any growths, I found a new mole on my leg which I named “Salter,” in memory of my fallen friend.
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Recently I went to Central Park with a friend to row boats and calmly float around in the 130 degree weather. Although I’d never formally rowed a boat in real life before, I’ve seen people row at the Summer Olympics games and it seemed extremely easy. While watching the teams compete, I took notes on the procedure required in order to move the boat:
When we got into the boat, all of my notes seemed like they didn’t apply to this situation. Somehow, rowing the boat seemed like an impossible task and regardless of how hard I rowed, I couldn’t seem to move the boat in the correct direction. Eventually I got a surge of energy and all of my muscles worked in harmony to allow me to steer the boat (which was a large 100ft oar-propelled yacht in my mind.)
After rowing for about 20 minutes we stopped to relax and that’s when I noticed a childhood friend who I’ve been trying to find for years…I saw Waldo and he was driving (steering? navigating?) a gondola! Just as I stared at Waldo, in awe of the celebrity who sailed in front of me, I noticed him take a gulp from a wine bottle that he had stashed away. At that moment, I cracked the age old mystery–Waldo keeps getting lost because he’s always drunk! For all of the naysayers, I’ve included a video for further proof:
Once I got a hang of the boat, the experience greatly improved and I wanted to row all day long. Since I’m so good at boat rowing now, I’m considering trying out for the US World Rowing Championship team and I think that I have a good chance of making it, as long as drunk Waldo steers completely clear of my boat!
Day-in and day-out I handle high levels of stress that [I like to think] is the same level of stress that my cousin, President Barack Obama, encounters when running the United States. In order to equalize this stress and avoid turning into an angry workaholic, I went on a one week vacation to Mexico.
My itinerary for Mexico was very simple:
Day 1: Arrive at hotel and unpack
Day 2: Eat, read, eat, read, eat, read, sleep
Day 3: Read, eat, read, eat, read, eat, sleep
Day 4: Read, shop, eat, read, sleep
Day 5: Read, sleep, play “Angry Birds,” eat, read
Day 6: Eat, leave
This plan seemed flawless to me! During the first few days everything was going great! My travel mates and I had a great continental breakfast, then we went to the bar to order lots of creative non-alcoholic drinks–my favorite was the self-created “Bloody Transmission,” which was a fusion of a Shirley Temple and a Pina Colada. After this, we usually went to the beach, where I either listened to music, read books or attempted to use as little muscle power as possible.
We spruced-up our relatively uneventful routine each day by attending a show, visiting other restaurants on the resort (which proved to be a bad idea when I think I ate iguana thigh), or speaking with other guests on the resort. As each minute went by, I felt as if I was in the most serene environment ever, but this feeling was rudely interrupted by…..a grain of sand.
I did not know that one grain of sand could affect my life the way that it did, but soon I came to realize that I should not underestimate the power of the sand. On day 4 I heavily lathered my skin with sunblock as if it was the first coat of paint primer and I plopped myself on the beach–reflecting on the past and thinking about the future. Soon, a gigantic gust of “Hurricane Alex” wind blew a sandstorm of sand on my face. I dusted away the majority of sand, but one stubborn grain of sand insisted on making its new home on my eyelid. Hours later, I returned to the room and took a shower, and that’s when the sand stealthily made its way into my eyelid and it annexed the space as its own.
I tried everything to get the stubborn grain of sand out of my eye, but nothing seemed to help. Even though it began to hurt as if I had a needle stuck in my eye, I tried my best to handle the pain and act normally. As I ate dinner in the dining room, I realized that my rapid blinking in my injured eye started to make people think that I was trying to flirt with them. Instead of running the risk of luring-in someone that I wasn’t fishing for, I returned to the room and began my eyesand removal treatment, which consisted of me repeatedly dunking my eye in a full cup of clean, spring water. To illustrate this process, I recorded the following video with my phone:
Unfortunately, this only resulted in me having a wet face and an even wetter room floor. The resilient grain of sand persisted. I repeated this process every 6 hours, until I decided that enough was enough and I wanted a hospital or doctor to surgically remove the sand from my eye.
I marched* to the hotel lobby and requested that I be taken to the nearest hospital. The concierge said that the nearest hospital is over an hour away and they probably wouldn’t be able to help me anyway. Instead, she generously offered to call a private doctor to assess my eye and make recommendations for $180 USD. I assessed my own situation and made an accurate recommendation for free:
Assessment: Grain of sand in eye
Recommendation: Remove said grain of sand
This assessment and recommendation saved me $180, but did not solve my issue. Instead of continuing to whine about the sand, I learned to live with it and decided to enjoy what’s left of my vacation.
By Saturday, we returned to the US and I had to say farewell to the calm life that I lived for an entire week. Although we were back in the US, I still had to face the problem that I brought back from Mexico with me–the sand grain. I decided that I will forget about removing the grain and just take a nap. By the time I woke up from the nap, the grain was gone and I could see without pain!
In kindergarten, Ms. Pipkin would always end every story with a lesson, so I will pay homage to my teacher by doing the same. The moral of the story is: When little things start to annoy you, just go to sleep and those things will work itself out…..either that or, don’t hang out on a beach in the middle of a hurricane because terrorist sand grains will infest your eye sockets.
*marched=gently stumbled, because I couldn’t see where I was going
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…and boy do I’ve got some stories share with you! Stay tuned for my experiences and associated images shortly.
P.S: I can now speak on a firsthand basis about the pain felt when you have sand stuck behind your eyelids!
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As I so boldly declared to the world a few months ago, I am going to own an Embraer Phenom 100 Jet by 2015. In preparation for this, I knew that it was important for me to surround myself with other jet owners so I can adopt a similar mindset in the area of aircraft ownership. Also, I felt that it was important to learn every aspect of jet ownership so I can develop a good business model behind it. So when I heard about a national aviation trade show taking place, I knew that I had to attend regardless of the cost.
I booked two reservations: one for me and one for my pilot friend, who came along as my advisor. As we went from jet to jet it was easier for me to picture myself owning one. The first thing I did as I entered each aircraft was to choose a seat as my future base station and then adjust that seat until it was perfectly comfortable for me. Then I pulled out the table for the seat and imagined my 17″ Macbook Pro sitting there. Then I went to the bathroom of the plane and, yes folks, I sat on the lavatory to get a sense of what it would be like to make strategic decisions while sitting there. If I liked the feeling of the jet, then I’d take note of its name as I moved onto the next one. I did this several times before reaching MY jet.
I saw the Embraer Phenom 100 Jet sitting on the tarmac and it immediately said to me “you found me–welcome home!” It felt oh-so-right in there and I began to mentally make styling decisions of how I’m going to differentiate my plane with the G-Head logo plastered across everything and anything. I spent a considerable amount of time in my plane, but I didn’t feel like I became fully acquainted with it. Later in the day, I reached out to a contact and scheduled a one-on-one meeting so I could have full and exclusive rights to sit around and acclimate myself to the plane…..to MY plane.
This event worked wonders for me and now I know that I’ve got to start saving up for this jet. In preparation for the first flight in August of 2015, I am taking meeting requests around the US for the latter half of the year 2015! Expect to see me zooming through the sky very soon!
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While you were spending your Memorial day remembering our Veterans and Fallen Heroes, I was out causing trouble as a member of THE SEGWAY GANG! That is the name that I gave to the members of the Segway Tour that I participated in around Washington, DC. We cruised around the city on our Segways, looking like nonthreatening mall cops, living life on the edge with our super-safe (and horribly nerdy) bicycle helmets.
According to the most credible site on earth (Wikipedia), a Segway is a “self balancing electric vehicle used for personal transport,” but according to the most credible opinion in the galaxy (mine), a Segway is a cool yet incredibly nerdy machine that balances and propels itself using the power of thought [or magic].
It took me about 5 minutes to figure out how to properly use the machine because I believed that I was smarter than it was. The instructions were simple: lean forward to go forward, lean backwards to slow down, lean right/left to go right/left and stand still to stay still. Mostly everyone else in my group caught on quickly, but I had a bit of trouble because I was a bit too power-hungry. I kept getting into weird bouts of “man vs machine” fights with the Segway when its smart computer chip brain kept overriding my decisions and making decisions on its own. After some fights and discipline we began to play well together and we cruised around at a riveting max speed of 12.5 mph.
Our journey went mostly well as we cruised through the town. Our first stop was at my cousin Barack Obama’s house, but he wasn’t home and forgot to inform me. Then we continued through DC visiting other important places, like the Air and Space Museum and the US Capitol building. At one point, a member of the gang collided with a traffic cone, which freaked the Segway out and caused it spin in circles, eject her and thrust itself into oncoming traffic, but no one was hurt—not including the Segway, who likely suffered a little “brain” damage.
I would recommend that you sign up for a tour if you want to experience a Segway in the future, but go far away from your hometown because if anyone you know recognizes you on a Segway, your “street cred” will be dissolved forever.
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For my last and final giveaway, I would like to share a product that I’ve been using for a few weeks now and absolutely love. The Water Bobble is an interesting-looking water bottle that filters water as you drink. I could go on and on about how great this product is, but I would like for it to speak for itself. Beginning today, I am giving away three new water bobbles to Geremology.com site visitors as a way to say thanks for the support over the years, and also to allow you all to have a water bobble for yourself.
A few rules and restrictions:
1) Individuals who signed up for past giveaways cannot sign up for this one. Sorry, everyone should get a turn!
2) Open to individuals in the United States only.
3) Please don’t sign up for a water bobble if you dislike water or will never use it.
UPDATE: Since I am so nice, I am extending the giveaway to include 6 bobbles. Sign up if you want one!
Sign up here:
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Sign up for your gift:
Note: I will not use your address for any other purpose except to mail your postcard, so don’t expect me to visit your home!
]]>Note: I will not use your address for any other purpose except to mail your postcard, so don’t expect me to visit your home!
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Geremology.com is a creative and editorial outlet for the thoughts, experiences and creations of Geremy F
