Pet Peevin'

Things annoy me.

Obviously, I'm a human (maybe not so obvious, considering you - if anyone is reading this, this means you- are reading this on a screen and have no way of knowing if I actually am a human. Could be a robot or computer generated blogging device, but I'm not.) and thus, things annoy me. I think it's a pretty basic principle. This is one of those things.

Sometimes, yeah, as in multiple times in my life, I go to a tanning bed. I pay some girl (I am sexist against tanning salons where men run the counter. Don't know exactly what's up with that.) at the front counter my hard earned cash (or card) and pay for a fake-sun to real-burn my skin for 10-15 minutes. Within a day, there is slightly more color added to both sets of cheeks and for those 10-15 minutes of the tanning experience, I sit there butt naked hanging out doing absolutely nothing but breathing and absorbing fake sunlight. It's awesome.

The problem is that I guess I feel some kind of guilt every time I do this. I feel guilty that I didn't do something more helpful to my fellow humans with that money or more productive with that 10-15 minute time span. I also feel like, because of an undeniable stigma, this awful feeling that I am somehow really self-absorbed or fake for going along with the whole thing. But to be honest, what bothers me the most is that I feel like I am always experiencing this guilt internally over completely useless external opinions. Mostly, I feel mad because I think about the people who have said something negative in conversation with my appreciation of the indoor tanning experience - and how basically every one of the people who have said something about this to me smoke cigarettes. I mean, honestly. I just really dislike that dynamic and I realized today how unfair to myself it is that I allow the opinion of other faulted, self-abusing, selfish aspects of other people's perspectives to make me feel guilty for participating in an activity that makes me feel good. Personally, it's not a wholly appearance thing as it is an overall pleasurable physical experience. I don't go everyday of my life. I'm not afraid of wrinkles (duh, if you're in regular sunlight you'll get them all the same. do you really want to be out in the GEORGIA sun for five hours though? Bad news bears.) and I'm well aware that I could be buying... you know, pencils or something with that money but how would that be any more productive? I'm not orange-glowing and my hair is naturally blonde and I didn't become more stupid after going to a tanning bed or anything... I am the same person with fifteen more minutes of selfish enjoyment on occasion. I'm just sayin'. That's my stance.

"In addition to psychological benefits, exposure to UV light helps the body produce the activated form of vitamin D, which plays an important role in overall good health."

What the world needs now is love, sweet love. And I'm going to give a lot more of it as a happy person. If I find the fifteen minutes of warmth and nudity and complete undisturbed burning as a means to my feelings of happiness, I think that's all right. Everyone has their demons, and everyone also has guilty pleasures. I'm done with the guilty part. Let's just embrace the pleasure.

In other news, Boyfriend Bramlett is in GA in EIGHT days. Woooo!