Not so Mystic Tan.

As you may have noticed by now...i'm white.  Not just a little bit of white, but Mary Kay Albino 101 makeup white.  I don't spend much time in the sun as i'm locked to a chair in a building from Monday to Friday - my job.  I am trying to spend more time in the sun for  health purposes and so that I can have a smidge of colour on my pathetic body.  I watch others who look golden tan how nice they look and I dream of looking that way too.  So I did - for only $24.10.  In my quest to look golden I went to a tanning salon to do the Mystic Tan.  It is a chemical that gets sprayed on your body and after 5-6 hours it brings out your natural pigment.  My husband said to me, "What if you don't have any pigment?"  Smart aleck....he's just as white as I am too!  Anyhow I thought i'd give it a try to see what it was like.

This golden girl brought me into this tiny room and told me to put on a hair net, and then this barrier cream in between my fingers and toes and on my nail beds on both hands and feet and the palms of my hand.  She told me to gob it on. Sounds easy enough?  Well it wasn't!  I had barrier cream everywhere!  Everytime I thought I was ready to go into the booth i noticed there was cream on my hand or fingers which I dont' want because it will block the tanning stuff.  After gobs of this stuff and being extremely frustrated wondering if this was really worth it, I finally was ready to go in to the booth.  I went in and tried to rmember all the instructions she gave me. This was just too stressful.  So I pressed the button, turned my back to it, put my hands in the right position and spoosh out came the tanning stuff moving up and down my body.  Golden girl told me that I only had to hold my breath when it came to my head and face so I breathed as normal and now i'm pretty sure my throat and vocal chords are a lovely tanned colour!

Ok so now the machine stops temporarily and I have to turn facing it with my hands in the right position and spoosh here it goes spraying all over me and darn it I forgot again to hold my breath.  Oh well maybe i'll sing better now ;)  The machine stops spraying but is making a humming noise and i'm afraid to move or get out in fear that it will spray me again so I stand there hands up like i'm being arrested or something.  Should I yell for help?  No don't yell for help or you will become the laughing stock of the place.  So I wait until the machine stops humming, I open the door and ask golden girl if that is it, she says ya.  She is probably wondering why it is taking me 30 mins to do a quick 2 mins procedure.  She obviously doesn't know me ;).  So I get out of the booth, pat myself down with  a towel, and now proceed to take the little wet wipes they provide to get the barrier cream off of me, BUT i have to make sure not to wipe where I was just sprayed.  AAAAHHHHH this is too complicated!!  Finally I get out of the place, reminded that I cannot use any form of creams, makeup, deodorant, sprays, even water - showering or bathing for 5-6 hrs.  Lovely, we are going out to the movies with friends.  At least it will be dark!

So in 5-6 hrs I should be like golden girl right?  We  head off to the movie, Robin hood, and I realize that I may walk in to the movie white and come out tanned.  How cool is that?  Maybe my friends will be like, "where did Michelle go" and then realize it is I but I have now joined the golden clan!!! :)

All through the movie I catch myself trying to look at my arms to see if i'm tanned.  I keep asking Martin if it looks tan, only to have him continually roll his eyes and say, "I can't tell , it's dark in here!!"  We leave the movie, everyone still recognizes me so it hasn't come in to effect yet.  I am starting to wonder if Martin was right - maybe I have no pigment.    Later on in the evening I see it starting to work and i'm not dark but light golden.  The next morning it's at it's peak.  Not dark but medium golden.  The problem though is the areas around my fingers and toes where I battled with the barrier cream are a bit streaky becuase I got the cream on parts of my toes and fingers.  Oh well I still look fairly nice though.  All that for only $24.10 - such a deal!!!!  I'm being sarcastic, because even though the tan looks nice, what I had to go through to get it wasn't!

Will I do it again?  Probably.  Read the blog just before this one and you'll understand why! ;)

Toodles