Monday, June 30, 2008

Overheard in a Treatment Room...

"Yeah, I injured my rotator CUP a few months ago..."


*snort*

Sunday, June 29, 2008

What a Sweet Lady!

There was quite a drama at the spa yesterday afternoon.

Inside the women's lounge, we have a big screen TV on a raised platform, sort of like a stage. This platform is carpeted with the same carpet as the floor, and blends seamlessly. Next to the platform is a trashcan and a recycling bin for the plastic water bottles we offer to our guests.

My two o'clock client was a little old lady from Ontario, Canada, who was getting a half-hour shoulder, neck, and back massage. She had a laundry list of illnesses and an entire pharmacy of meds, but luckily nothing that would make a massage contra-indicated.

She walked with the aid of a cane, but was still rather spry and didn't need any assistance getting on or off the massage table. After our session, I gave her a bottle of water with the usual instructions of "drink lots of water today," and beat feet to my next client (with the half-hour sessions, there's only five minutes in between.)

This client was a male, so it wasn't until after this session that I headed back into the women's spa to get my next client. As I rounded the corner by the jacuzzi and headed into the lounge, I saw the sweet old lady sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall, with blood splattered all over the front of her robe! Security was there, and the paramedics had been summoned. Apparently she had finished her water (you know, THE WATER I HAD GIVEN HER) and decided to be a good citizen and deposit the empty bottle in the recycling bin. Unfortunately, she overlooked the corner of the platform, tripped, and since she had both hands full (cane in one, bottle in the other), she fell right on her face, causing her nose to bleed copiously!

Security had everything in hand, and my next client was waiting, so I didn't hear the end of the story until it was time for me to leave that evening.

She refused to go to the hospital, so her grandsons came to the spa to wheel her back to her room. Of course the spa comped her massage, but she was still inconsolable because this fall drove the fact home that she's "an old lady". She was crying and repeating that over and over again, while her grandsons tried to comfort her. As she was being wheeled toward the elevators, she suddenly cried out, "Stop - Stop!"

She made her grandsons roll her back to the front desk, even though S., the front desk coordinator, told her that everything was taken care of, she didn't need to sign anything, etc.

My client merely said, "I need to leave a tip for Christina!"

Now THAT'S class, Folks.

Under the circumstances, of COURSE I wasn't expecting anything. Her experience at the spa was traumatic and painful, yet she still left me a tip.

What a lady.

Christina's Words of Wisdom #4,729 (No, not really!)

If you have an entire afternoon of back-to-back massage services scheduled, it might be a GOOD IDEA to avoid the FIVE BEAN SALAD at lunch.

Just sayin'

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Seen on my way home last night...

a Dodge Durango, with California license plate:


L8ASEVR


Well, I laughed, anyway!

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Please...

if you're still my friends in 30-40 years, have mercy on me and don't let me go out in public wearing only a sports bra and short-shorts, even if I'm "just going to the dog park."

Thank you!

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Overheard after a screening of "The Incredible Hulk"...

"But...but...he's Asgardian...! He needs his helmet, and everything!"



Geeks of the world, unite!

Friday, June 13, 2008

Happy Birthday, Silver!

Silver is SEVENTEEN today! How appropriate that it's Friday, the 13th...

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I love you, Silver! Hope you have a great day...:)

Twinkies!!!

This past Tuesday, my fourteen-year-old twin daughters arrived from the Midwest to spend (most) of the summer with me. I'm so happy! They've been known as Thing 1 and Thing 2 on this blog, but I gave them the option of choosing their own handles so here they are...(they take after their father, in that they almost always have to make faces when having a picture taken):

Here's Tahlia, or Tally for short (formerly Thing 1):

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And Chaos (aka Thing 2):

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Here are all three of my daughters together, a rare sight! From left, Silver, Tally, and Chaos:

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Expect light posting for the next week or so, especially since I'm also taking an on-line class!

Don't worry, though...I always find time to read everyone else's blogs!

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Embarrassment Redux

Do you remember when this happened? Ah, I remember like it was yesterday...

See, I did it AGAIN!

I must be a gesticulating fool, because I nailed a lady's chocolate cream pie with my hand as she was walking by.

Some of it ended up on the floor, some on my hand, but the mangled remains were still on the plate. Of course, I disposed of the pie and helped clean the floor.

The victim, a housekeeper, just laughed when I expressed my hope of finding another slice of pie for her. She said, "I guess I wasn't meant to have it!"

Talk about a silver-lining-lover!

I'm just thankful she didn't shove the rest of the pie in my face...it would have been my just desserts!

Monday, June 09, 2008

Highs and Lows of the Massage Bizness...

Lows first, 'cause that's how I roll:

-Douchebags who take "Feedback appreciated" to a whole 'nother level.

For example:

"The pressure's great, but could you do more on the calf, less on the hamstrings and more on the glute?"

"Can you please massage my C-1?" Gladly, if you'll tell me how you'd like me to get inside your skull...

"Could you use your fingertips more, and your forearm less?"

"I think you need to use more massage oil now."

I've barely touched the client, the massage started 30 seconds ago
"Oh, you can do harder!"

I'm working on the client's neck and scalp, he winces when I massage the base of his skull..."Tender at the hairline!"...I move on to the scalp..."harder - Harder - HARDER!!!" I'm now drilling my fingertips into his skull and wishing I could use my elbows (or maybe a hammer) instead...that'd be HARDER!

-Inconsiderate people.

For example:

-The woman who was unable to disconnect from her busy life for one freakin' hour, and kept her incessantly ringing cell-phone in the pocket of her robe during the entire massage.

-The women who are apparently freaked out by being nude during the massage and keep their WET bikini bottoms on, thereby soaking every bit of linen on the table and necessitating us therapists to completely strip the entire table after the massage, including the fleece heating pad cover.

-Generally loud and obnoxious clients, who don't care that they are disrupting the OTHER clients' services.

Clients who are incapable of paying attention to instructions.

For example:

-I enter the room and the client's face-up. Or naked on top of the covers, instead of between them.

-Instead of waiting for me to collect them in the lounge area, as they were instructed to, the gentlemen are often wandering the hall in their robes, asking anyone in uniform when their massage is going to start.

-The lady yesterday who was IN MY ROOM while I was on break and had all my stuff spread everywhere, who asked me innocently, after I had stopped suddenly on coming in the room and said "Oh!",
"Aren't I supposed to be in here?"
Well, NO, Lady. Actually you're supposed to be in the lounge in ten minutes, when my break is over and your massage starts!
At least it taught me that even when I get the client's ticket early...always turn them to face the wall, so that no client can read the name on it! (She also stayed in the room far too long AFTER the massage, which made me late for my next one.)




Now the highs:

Clients with senses of humor.

For example:

-The lady who thought it was amusing that the toilets make a sound like a dying cow when flushed...Grooooooooooooooonk!

-The client who busted out laughing WITH me when a muzak version of Brahms' lullaby started playing during the massage. Which I've never heard before or since, thank goodness!

-And generally all the folks who realize that it's not necessarily the therapist's fault when things go wrong.

Here's my biggest high of last week...

I gave a young (very hungover) man a 90-minute deep-tissue massage early Tuesday morning. He paid by credit card, and for many hours after the massage, as I was coming up to drop off and get tickets, his ticket and credit card receipts were still at the front desk. I kept asking K., the (ditzy) front desk coordinator, if he was sure that the guest was still back in the men's spa, and K. kept assuring me that, yes, the client was still in the back and hadn't checked out yet. Of course, I was right. At some point after the massage the client had left and the front desk had totally missed it, which K. finally admitted to me after lunch. Oh, well, I thought, there's one tip I've missed. (I've learned to be rather philosophical about people stiffing me, otherwise I'd be nuts right now.)

That evening when I left, T. (the UN-ditzy) front desk coordinator was practically beside himself with excitement..."Hey, Christina, you know the guy you massaged this morning? He just came back because he remembered he didn't tip you. He felt really bad about it."

I opened the tip envelope T. had set aside for me and found THREE crisp, fresh out of the ATM twenty dollar bills! Sixty bucks, the biggest tip I've gotten so far!

What a great way to start my weekend.

That's my spa roundup of the past few weeks! I'd blog more often about the happenings, but my new schedule has been kicking my ass, and I'm often too beat at the end of the day to blog anything semi-meaningful.

We'll see what happens tomorrow...

Sunday, June 08, 2008

Just too much FAIL

I have to post this, I'm sorry!

It made Silver and me laugh and laugh and laugh...

fail-owned-pwned-pictures
more funny fail pictures at FAIL Blog

That website offers hours of failin' fun.

Friday, June 06, 2008

Woo-HOOOO!

I just saved a crap-load of money, not to mention two years of my time, by taking a German CLEP test.

Scored an 80, and I only needed 63 to get the 12 credits. Thus fulfilling my foreign language requirement in about an hour, instead of four semesters.

The whole thing only cost me $95.00

Yes! I kick ASS!

Monday, June 02, 2008

No Apologies

I was going to regale you with a tale of massaging assholes who masquerade as human beings, but I'll save that one for another time, because I was pissed off today by something a client said to me.

She was a very, very large lady, getting a sports/deep-tissue massage. We were about twenty-five minutes in, I'd already massaged her back, and had just draped her leg, when she said to me, "I'm sorry, I have huge legs."

I was taken aback.

I replied to her, "Never apologize for being who you are! Do your legs work, do they do what they're supposed to do?" She said yes, and I told her, "I've never had a client with bad acne apologize for his pimples, or one with crooked teeth say, 'Oh, I'm getting braces.', so why is being overweight any different? I'm a stranger you've paid to provide a service, you'll most likely never see me again, so why apologize?"

As I'm a rather large lady myself, we got to talking about fat stereotypes, you know, the ones where skinny people think we sit around all day, stuffing our faces with candy and ice cream, when usually, we don't eat more than anyone else. Or the fact that total strangers feel entitled to come up to us in the grocery store and chide us on our food choices. Or my favorite, when people say, "You'd be so beautiful, IF YOU LOST WEIGHT." Well, fuck 'em, I say.

Thanks to Holly, I've recently read a marvelous book on this subject called "The Forbidden Body: Why Being Fat is Not a Sin", by Shelley Bovey. I told my client about the book, about how much it had affected me and caused me to think. After the massage was over, I gave her my business card, with the book info written on the back of it. I hope she gets it, and reads it.

No more apologies.