Today I learned the difference between the intellectual understanding of the cultural acceptance of nudity and actually experiencing.

In other news, I went swimming.

I got to return to Osaka today as part of a neighborhood trip to a day spa (I had previously reported that the trip was to a water park - my mistake, the water park was next door). It has a heavy roman motif to it (am I the only one who gets creeped out by naked, limbless, headless, statues?), but the pool was nice, and rather large, even if it never got any deeper than four feet. The game of the day seemed to be 'duck the gaijin' as several of the neighborhood children spent a better part of the day chasing me around the pool. I think that I managed to terribly impress them all when I swam upside down with only my feet sticking out of the water; it was either that or the way I went straight into the wall. I tried to teach them how to play 'Marco Polo' but at that point it was time to go (for which was actually rather thankful because it's really hard to explain a game when you're brain is cramping up so badly that you can't remember how to say 'say').

And that was when the naked happened. You see, after spending an entire day soaking in heavily watered chlorine, I really needed a bath. And baths this place had (being a day spa and all), except they were all traditional Japanese baths (more or less) which meant they also happened to be chock full of naked. Just in case I had any illusions about what I could get away with, there was also a handy little sign printed in two languages that said, 'No swimsuits in bath.' So my dilemma was that I could go home with a coat of chlorine and hair that felt like straw, or I could wander around sans pants (it actually was a hard decision). Finally I said 'hell,' put on my towel and snuck into the furo.

AT which point I saw the little sign that said, 'please leave towels here.' To my credit I didn't follow my first impulse and immediately turn tail and run. I left my towel, grabbed a washcloth, and crept into the bath. There is something undoubtedly weird about sitting in a chin deep bath the size of a small pool with a bunch of perfectly unconcerned Japanese guys. If I had ever done anything stronger than aspirin I might have some interesting anecdotes about the surreality of it all, but as is, just trust me, it was not weird. I spent the minimum three minutes that the nice little sign suggested, and then beat a retreat to the shower (which was a public shower for rinsing after soaking, and mercifully unoccupied - if I accomplished nothing else this weekend, I completely dispelled the myth about the inherent superiority of American wang dimensions).

The shampoo alone was worth the de-pantsing, because never has my hair felt this good, and after the shower, I felt good and relaxed. Being naked wasn't that bad (although I am rather disappointed that it broke my eight year or so streak of never ever having been unclothed aside from the shower - well, I'll just have to try and be record breaking doing something else, like nacho juggling).

I still moved with unseeming haste to reclaim my towel afterwards, and didn't let that come off again until my shorts were firmly in place. There are certain things that have no place in the rational world, and pantless Dougs are one of them.

Oh yeah, I did manage to loose something at the spa, my best efforts aside (or more to the point, finally discovered that I had lost something): has anyone seen five kilograms worth of fat ass wandering around, because I seem to have lost it. There was a scale outside the bath, that I asked, 'why not?' and then hopped on (I then double checked the result at home). That was a welcome surprise, if mostly because I hadn't even noticed it'd gone. I can see how my diet (and I am operating under a significantly decreased caloric load) and daily biking would be helping me out, but still, suddenly being confronted with the fact that eleven pounds of unwanted me have decided to go somewhere else was a very nice surprise. Maybe this new, healthy lifestyle will make me get some hair back.

And while I'm wishing, I want a pony.

And a Playstation 2. (suddenly I am reminded of the 'Calvin & Hobbes' strip where Calvin wishes for a space shuttle, a million dollars, and his own continent. Hobbes wishes for a sandwich. Calvin then goes on a rant belittling such a mundane wish. In the last panel, Hobbes sits down to dinner and calmly states, "I got my wish.").