On my bday, I got mud butt!

If you know me personally, you will probably know that I went to the mineral water mud baths in Calistoga for my b-day. If you don’t know me personally, you wouldn’t know that unless you’re a really good stalker.

The mud bath surprise was borne of my reply to Fiancé about what I wanted for my b-day. I am aloof and really un-helpful when it comes to answering such questions. If I do know what I want, it’s usually jeans or bras and underwear (things I don’t like buying for myself) which has put him in the awkward situation of rummaging through my clothing drawers for sizes and then having to explain himself to salespeople. And then I usually take the stuff back.

In an attempt to break this chain this year I said I wanted a “day trip or something surprising like that” because I am way more into experiences than “things and stuff”. He did well, very well indeed.

He’s so tricksy, that man. He took me to Calistoga (like the water) and I didn’t know what we were in for until we pulled into the mud spa place.

We entered the steamy, sulfurous building and a man with a finely-trimmed moustache asked for our names. I let fiance answer and began my recon. I always check out what is on counters because you can learn a lot about places and people by looking around on desks and things. It went something like this:

Brochure, more brochures, business cards, sticky pad, filthy dirty pen, weird lotion, more brochures, muffins… Whaaaat? Muffins! Muffins for Sale! Muffins for sale for $1.50?!?!

Now, with the smell of minerals, peat moss and stranger sweat, the plastic-wrapped muffins didn’t sound so great, but I guess they gave a homey feel, kind of comforting I suppose. I sweetly smiled at moustache guy and asked, “So what’s the mud like?" He had a soft, feathery voice, “Oh our mud is wonderful. The consistency is beautiful; it’s soft and delicate...it’s really just like floating in the womb.”

I said, “Wow, you have a really good memory.” He stared. I blushed, then turned to the muffins. They were comforting. “Um, how much are these muffins?”

“They’re $1.50” Great, now I was having a Clerks moment.

We left Moustache and headed to the mud room. Tell yah what – mud is gross. I like the idea of mud and in fact I have idealized mud to some extent throughout my life. “Oh, remember the days when I used to play in the mud, make mud pies, mud between your toes?” Well, that was then and mud is GR-OSS.

But, I gotta give it to him. It was like a womb. A hot, mushy, dirty womb.

I drew you a cartoon mashup of my birthday. You're welcome.