I feel better today, though still not entirely well.

For one thing, I have a tickle in the back of my throat that is making me nervous. Might be the start of a cold or whatnot. Plus I still have that vaguely hot feeling.

On the plus side, I took that bath I was talking about yesterday. It wasn’t as boring as I thought. Turns out that, as long as I have the Cracked podcast to listen to, I don’t get bored, and I can relax and enjoy.

Couldn’t find my scrubby gloves those, so all I could do was soap up and rinse like I was in the shower. Disappointing. But I stayed in the stub for a good long while, so hopefully, the soak did me some good.

Who knows, I might try again tomorrow after a very thorough search for those darn scrubby gloves. I really want to stimulate my pores to unclog themselves. I feel stopped up on like, a cellular level.

And I am, more or less.

I might even consider getting some kind of bubble bath type stuff. I normally avoid those because I don’t like how they leave an oily or (gah) sticky residue on my skin when I get out of the water. Kind of makes it so I come out feeling dirtier than when I went in. I hate hate hate that kind of thing. Any kind of persistent, monotonous sensory input is going to provoke a reaction in me, whether it’s the way spicy food lingers on the palate after you eat it or an annoyingly repetitive song.

But I might just break that rule in pursuit of something I prize very highly : deep skin cleansing.

I am not surprised that my pores are clogged. I have my mother’s big pores, and she warned me about having to be careful to keep them clean when I was still in elementary school.

I also inherited a tiny bit of her excema (sp?) as well, and thank God for that. Not for my getting it, but for the very mild dose of it I got.

I have seen hers cause the skin on her hands to crack and bleed. That’s something no child should ever see. And that was just the worst of it. There was times where she had to put lotion all over her hands then put on gloves so that the lotion would sink in deep without drying out, all to keep the skin from freaking out and wrecking itself.

Me, I just get itchy, tight skin on my hands. The worst it has ever been was when it made my hands turn red. And the reaction is quite rare. It is only triggered by some cleaners, whatever they use to clean clothes before putting them on a rack, and pet hair in high density, like at a vet’s or the home of someone with a LOT of dogs.

So, dodged most of a bullet there!

And I also inherited her gentle, animal loving ways, and I treasure those. Like I have said before, I feel like almost everything that is good in me came from my Mom.

So the bath thing was a semi-success. At least I know now that baths can be quite pleasant as long as I have something with which to occupy my mind. My tablet handles the conditions in my bathroom just fine, as long as I keep it as far away from the shower/tub as I can and drape a towel over it. Then it stays nice and dry.

Oh, speaking of baths, I really think that someone needs to invent the indoor river.

See, the shower is basically an indoor waterfall. Or, if you like, on-demand rain. And what I want is the same thing, but horizontal instead of vertical.

Now admittedly, this would be amazingly expensive and would use a LOT of water. But I would love something that is like a bathtub where the water flowers over you like a rivers, washing you clean while staying constantly fresh.

The “in” part would be simple enough. Enough water spouts of sufficient power would do the trick. But the “out” part would be pretty darn tricky if you want the water filtered.

Then again, you won’t be stewing in it like you do in a whirlpool or a Jacuzzi, so I suppose there is no reason why it couldn’t couldn’t just go out like a waterfall into the waste water system that handles the water from your bathtub or shower anyway.

There would be a grating to make sure you don’t end up going down as well, of course.

I think it would combine the best aspects of showers and baths, and feel utterly amazing to boot. You could adjust the flow rate from “pond” to “white water rapids” as you pleased, and the temperature of course.

I could see this catching on as a rich person lifestyle accessory. The sort of thing that makes them feel good because they know that nobody poorer than them can afford it. That alone makes it appealing to the rich. Add in the luxury factor, and some needlessly opulent styling, and it could be a big hit with the rich and awful.

What else… oh, right. My therapist called up to ask me to switch my appointment from the usual Friday at 1:15 pm to noon Saturday. And I agreed, of course, for I am an agreeable person.

But after I hung up the phone, I imagined this conversation :

Me : And what would happen if I said no to the change? Would you show up at 1:15 tomorrow?

Doc : Well, no….

Me : Then you weren’t really asking me, were you? You were telling me.

Not something I would actually say. There would be no point. All it would do is make him stammer and be uncomfortable, and why would I want that?

But still. These are the thoughts I think that help me stay calm. I am very assertive… in my mind.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.