Since getting back from my trip to Deep Creek Hot Springs, I’ve been in a real funk. That was such a totally charmed trip in every respect; regular, workaday life couldn’t possibly compete. When I got home, there was hot sauce all over the carpet from my roommate feeding my dog birria, I had a mountain of laundry, and because it’s summertime in Vegas, the house was hot as hell. I’ll tell you, I was ready to sell it all, buy a van, and take off into the sunset!!!

My ever-practical nature kicked in, though, and I scrubbed the carpet, washed the laundry and settled back into my usual routine. But after spending all that time in the beauty of nature and then at the beach, Vegas seemed gross and dirty.

To make matters worse, it was EDC week — that’s the Electric Daisy Carnival, the ginormous rave they hold every year out at the Speedway. Something like 100,000 ravers drive up from So Cal for this event each June. Every hotel on the Strip is clogged with ding-a-lings in muffin-topped tutus, and traffic is a clusterfuck. I tried to avoid the Strip during the siege, but you couldn’t get away from ’em — the rich ones hire helicopters to ferry them back and forth to the racetrack (which is pretty far north of town), so even the fuckin’ sky was abuzz with whirring choppers full of blissed-out e-tards blathering platitudes about PLUR. The city was literally under attack on all fronts, like Da Nang in ’75…if the VietCong had been made up of chubby, scantily-clad suburbanites with terrible taste in music.

Thankfully, I didn’t have much time to fret over it, though, because I had work booked pretty much every single day until my next adventure (I’m driving down to Baja California, Mexico tomorrow morning…YEE HAW!!! Sun, sand, booze and caftans!). So I tried to just concentrate on making money. First on the docket was the ever-fabulous, always amusing Licensing Expo.

As I’ve written before, the Licensing Expo is a show focused on any and all brands/characters/personalities that are available to be licensed out and used to sell everything from bookbags to buttplugs. You may recall that last year, even Pope Francis had a booth — come to find out, you can license the Pope’s name and image to sell shit. Wow. Anyway, there’s always a huge demand for actors to wear various mascot costumes and walk around the show floor as Garfield, Pac-Man, Cookie Monster, etc.

This year I really lucked out and got an awesome costume — a fairly popular character that people really responded to, and the costume itself was pretty comfortable. As a bonus, DreamWorks Studios had just licensed the character to make some shitty new CGI movie, so I got to hobnob and pose for photos with the likes of Jeffrey Katzenberg and Lassie (yes, a live collie dog…which must have been totally drugged up, as it didn’t even blink when I lumbered over to stand beside it in my giant, maniacally grinning outfit). It was truly thrilling, let me tell you!

Even better, during my breaks I got to walk around and schmooze with all kinds of other fabulous characters — WWE wrestlers, Harajuku girls and even Internet sensation Grumpy Cat! (I have no idea who that even is, but it was really popular — some live cat, also drugged to high heaven, no doubt, that happened to have been born with a grumpy-looking face, and which just sat there looking grumpy while people lined up around the block to take a photo with it. WEIRD!)

Anyway, the Licensing Show was cool because being in a mascot costume all day meant I didn’t have to look particularly good, face-wise…which was lucky, since my face was all broken out from the stress and excitement of my Deep Creek trip. But before you know it, the Licensing Expo was over and it was time to work the Beauty Show! Ruh-roh!!

Oh well, nothing to do but spackle on a shit-ton of makeup and get to it! I was working for the same client I worked for last year, a manufacturer of high-end über-industrial-strength eye-makeup products with real staying power. I’ve worked a billion tradeshows in my day, and have promoted a billion dumb-ass products that are complete bullshit but which I have to pretend to get behind — well, I’m here to tell you, Blinc eye makeup is one product I really CAN endorse! In particular their “brow mousse,” which is a product for filling in/drawing on eyebrows: I can personally attest to the fact that Blinc Brow Mousse is not only waterproof — it’s also Burning Man-proof, mascot costume proof…and mudwrestling-proof!! It’s true — every time I wrestle, I wear Blinc Brow Mousse so that my eyebrows don’t come off either in the “mud” or in the shower afterward (we have to go back out and mingle with the crowd after showering, so you still have to look good).

Anyway, working the Beauty Show is always a riot because women are such easily hypnotized dingbats when it comes to beauty products, you can pretty much spew any line of b.s. at them and they stand transfixed as if it were the Sermon on the Mount: “This product will not smudge, clump, flake or run.” “I’ll take fifty!! Do you accept food stamps?” I didn’t even have to mention the mudwrestling — this shit sold itself!!

Speaking of mud wrestling, I also did that one night during the Licensing Expo — which was a bit of a jam, since rasslin’ goes til 1am and I had to be back in my mascot suit at 9:30am. Also, despite my best and most thorough efforts at cleaning every last bit of “mud” out of my crevices, the distinct aroma of chocolate pudding filled the head of my mascot costume the next day, making me slightly nauseous. But wrestling is so much fun, I can’t complain — this time, a woman won the bidding war to be my towel boy (girl), so that was novel. Alas, I was defeated (again) by Little Red Riding Hood, who is one bad bitch…but everyone had a great time, and I made some extra money for my adventure fund, so it was all good!

I also found time to squeeze in one final gig — an art-nude photo shoot, out at one of my favorite locations in the desert near Searchlight. This was with a photographer I’d shot with last year, a really classy guy who shoots artsy black-and-whites and who, unlike other photographers, isn’t constantly trying to get me to spread my vagina open. (I’m serious — on something like 65% of my shoots, the photographer never stops trying to get me to spread my legs just a liiiiittle wider, past my clearly stated comfort level. I’m actually thinking of taking a cue from one of my favorite fulltime traveling art models on Model Mayhem, and purposely growing my bush out super big and thick, so that my vag won’t show no matter what cockamamie pose the photographer wants to put me in! I’m sure I’d lose a few bookings because of the bush, but…..do I really need money that bad, that I should subject myself to constant battles with perverts? I haven’t decided yet….stay tuned!)

Anyhoo, everything was going swimmingly at this shoot — cool photographer, no vag shots, weather not too hot, acne well-concealed — until it happened: for the first time in six years of outdoor nude modeling, I was busted by Johnny Law!!

Now, I’ve been run out of Valley of Fire, Ash Meadows and Red Rock for being nude — but it was always just park rangers bawling me out, not actual police. Well, this time, none other than a Nevada State Trooper pulled over, hiked across the desert, and proceeded to lecture the photographer and I on the indecency of what we were doing. Thankfully, the photographer is from the South, and laid on the drawl real thick: “We apologize, Officer…we’ll be on our way.” And to his credit, the cop was pretty cool (he was young, maybe early 30s, if that), and left us with this parting shot: “Well, hopefully they come out good.” Wink!

But I mean, really — aren’t there much worse things going on out there to worry about than two people shooting art nudes in an old building?! Shouldn’t you be busting a meth lab or something?!? The irony is, if I’d been out there shooting up tin cans or something, I’d probably have been fine. In this fucked-up culture, guns are OK but female nipples are destructive as hell! Check out this meme I made for Facebook — I think it makes the point pretty well. (Note: I am well aware that is an AR-15, not an AK-47…I just figured it reads better this way, since no one but gun nuts and humorless pedants know what an AR-15 is.)

ANYhoo, the photographer and I were forced to cut our shoot short, get back in the car and drive back into steaming, stinking, raver-ridden Vegas…where we shot the remainder of the two hours in his room at the LaQuinta Express on Tropicana. The whole hotel smelled like pot smoke and was crawling with tutus — in fact, coming back over the mountain into town, we noticed a thick, gray miasma hung over the entire city. I thought it was smog, but the photographer joked that it was probably a cloud of pot smoke…and I think he was right!!! Those fuckin’ ravers obliterated the city!!! It was insane.

So anyway, I basically hustled my ass off all week, and through it all I was experiencing no small degree of discomfort: I don’t know if it was the Bikram yoga I did last week, or the sitting around in hot spring water, the sweaty-ass mascot costume or the pudding wrestling….but somehow, I picked up a nasty-ass yeast infection!!! I’m inclined to blame the hot springs — you may recall that I was on my period, wearing a tampon, the dangling string of which probably acted like the wick on an oil lamp, sucking up murky hot spring water and filling my nether regions with questionable water. Yuck!!!!!

Either way, it took three seperate doctor’s visits for them to diagnose me — I kept telling them I suspected a yeast infection, but for some reason they were loath to give me a pelvic exam and be done with it. I wanted to be sure I was ok before heading to Baja — the last thing I want is to end up in some janky Mexican clinic, ya know?! But the first guy just thought I just had jock itch, and prescribed an ointment. The second lady thought I was ovulating, and made me feel like a hypochondriac. Only when I went back to the first guy again, and insisted that I had yeasty symptoms, did he prescribe a Diflucan — but again, without doing a pelvic exam. He basically just took my word for it!!

I mean, srsly — what’s a bitch gotta do to get a pelvic exam in this town?! It’s not like I like having my hoo-ha cranked open and probed, but if it saves time (you saw how busy I was this week; it’s not like I had time for three doctor’s appointments) I’m all for it!

And don’t think the irony in all this was lost on me, by the way: I spend all my photo shoots trying to stop men from looking into my vagina. But when I actually want a man to look in there…he won’t.

This world is all kinds of fucked up!!

I just got back from one of the most amazing adventures of my life. And if you know me, you know that’s a strong statement! But this really was up there.

It all started when one of my readers messaged me, asking if I wanted to meet up and camp out by some hot springs sometime. Meet up with some random guy in the middle of nowhere?! Sure, why not? It’s the Wonderhussy Way! After all, I go out to the desert with strange men for photo shoots all the time — why not do

it simply for fun?

Actually I’m being a tad facetious — I did sort of look the guy up (well, emailed back and forth with him, anyway) and we did talk on the phone a few times. He seemed pretty cool — a traveling musician who frequents nude beaches, and who also happens to live in his van. A real Jack Johnson type! Anyway, he seemed legit enough…and besides, I was SO ready for an adventure that I would have said yes to just about anyone — it had been awhile since my last desert adventure, with my frenemy Alex. (I usually go adventuring with guys — not because I’m looking to hook up, but simply because I know few adventurous cool chicks who want to do this shit with me.)

Anyhoo, I suggested we meet up at Deep Creek Hot Springs, near Apple Valley in the high desert of southeastern California. I had been there once before, and knew it to be a fantastic spot…and it’s pretty much halfway between Vegas and the area where this guy happened to be at the moment, so it worked out. So we arranged to meet out at Deep Creek on Monday afternoon.

Of course, nothing in my crazy life ever works out as planned — I ended up staying out really late on Sunday, working a gig as the craft services lady on the set of an NHL commercial featuring American Idol winner Philip Phillips. I am the last person you want running the crafty table at a shoot — I ate half the snacks and junk food!! But it was a fun gig — we shot some scenes at the fabulous Neon Boneyard, where they store all the old casino signage of yesteryear, and then we shot inside the old PURE nightclub at Caesars, which they had just closed for remodeling.

Being in there was a trip! Back in its day, PURE was the shizz — mobs of people out front, throwing hundreds at the assholes at the door for the privilege of getting in and spending hundreds more on booze. The amount of money that changed hands in that place was mind-boggling — the bottle waitresses made bank; in fact pretty much everyone in there was raking in cash. So much so, that the IRS had to step in at one point and investigate, LOL! I even met my ex-boyfriend in there, which should have been a big red flag, since our relationship ended badly with me up to my balls in debt from a house he advised me to buy (which mess I have thankfully resolved, after 4 miserable years).

But anyway, after 9 years of operation, PURE’s popularity was waning, so they closed it down and will reopen bigger and better, under a new name, next year. But every day it remains closed costs the hotel something like a billion dollars in lost revenue — so they wasted no time in knocking down the walls and starting with the reno. At the time of our shoot there, it had only been shut down for a few days, but the place was already gutted!

Anyhoo, Philip Phillips was nice enough (actually really nice), but the shoot went way late, so I got kind of a late start the next morning on my journey to Apple Valley. To make matters worse, I accidentally followed the wrong directions, and ended up coming in the back way, over the mountains up by Lake Arrowhead — which area is astonishingly beautiful, and which is now on my list of places to go check out!

So I ended up not rolling into Apple Valley until almost sunset. But fortunately for me, the guy I was meeting — we’ll call him “Jack” — was also running late, so it worked out. I got to our rendezvous point before him, and sat on my tailgate drinking wine, watching the sunset, until he finally rolled up in his van just before the sun went down. You know how you can tell pretty much right away if you’re going to like someone or not? Well, this fool rolls up in his hippie van, windows down, with a shit-eating ear-to-ear blindingly-white grin, radiating sunshine and happiness, like, “Heyyy! Let’s go!!!” and I knew we were going to get along juuuuuuust fine. Relief! He was basically the polar opposite of my frenemy Alex, who can be pretty dark and grumpy.

Anyway, we convoyed up the rest of the dirt road to Bowen Ranch — the easiest trailhead to the Deep Creek Hot Springs is located on private property, but the people who own it are super cool and only charge $5 per person for day use, and $10 per person for overnight camping. There are no toilets or running water, just open desert out by the trailhead that descends into the canyon where the hot springs are…but they give you this awesome J.R.R. Tolkien-esque map, which is worth the $10 alone. The last part of the road to the parking/camp area is pretty rough; my 2WD truck was able to handle it fine, but Jack had to be pretty careful in his VW van, although he made it OK by going slow.

We rolled in just before dark and set up camp on a bluff overlooking the trail — well, I set up camp, anyway; all Jack had to do was park his van, and he was ready to go. You know how I’ve been wanting to buy a Scamp trailer? Well, seeing Jack’s VW van made me think twice — it was awesome! Self-contained, no fuss, no muss…just enough room for the essentials. I always thought it would be better to have the option to unhitch and cruise around, but now I think it might be better to have all your shit with you at all times. Hmmm…anyone selling a van??? 🙂 🙂 🙂

Anyway, Jack offered to let me sleep in his van (it has two bunks), but I demurred, figuring he would just try to get in my pants (even though Deep Creek is a nudist spot, and I wasn’t really even wearing pants). I had told him ahead of time on the phone that I wasn’t looking at this as a romantic hookup — just a campout. Fuck, I do this kind of shit all the time — I can’t be sleeping with every dude I camp with!!! Besides, a) I have a low libido and am hardly ever attracted to anyone…and b) he mentioned something about having been staying at a girl’s house lately, so I figured he had a girlfriend. Either way, to set things straight I set up my little one-person tent in the shadow of his van, and was good to go.

By now it was totally dark, but the moon was almost full, so there was plenty of ambient light and we set off on the hike down to the hot springs, which are located in a canyon down a fairly steep 1.5-mile trail from the camp area. The trail is pretty smooth and sandy — in fact, we did it barefoot — but does get a bit steep at parts, so you have to be careful, especially in the dark. But we had headlamps, so it was pretty easy.

The trail descends into the canyon and comes out onto a sandy beach area by the creek, which you have to wade across to get to the springs on the other side. On my previous visit, it was January, and the water was pretty deep and icy fucking cold — actually kinda fun, making the hot springs even more of a reward. In fact, all along the hike I had been warning Jack about this freezing wading part…so imagine my surprise when the water turned out to be super warm and awesome in the summertime! I’m telling you, this place was amazing in winter…but was M A G I C A L in the summer.

Adding to the magic, the entire canyon was bathed in this crazy ethereal silvery moonlight, making it really look like a mystical, sacred place. Now, I am a total hard-assed atheist cynic who doesn’t bandy about words like “sacred” lightly…but I’m here to tell you, if there is magic in the world, it’s in places like this. I can’t imagine what it was like for Jack, seeing it for the first time in that light. Awesome!

There were about 25 people hanging out down there that night — you’re not supposed to camp out overnight at the springs themselves, but apparently people do anyway. As long as you clean up after yourself, it’s cool — the real trouble is from all these day-users who leave beer cans and trash behind; the hardcore overnighters are much more respectful and into preserving the springs.

Once across the creek, I couldn’t remember where the real trail was, so we scrambled along in the dark through the rocks until we came upon a tall, super-thin Zenlike old man with a white ponytail and a super-deep, quiet voice who was kind enough to give us the lay of the land. I think he’s a regular down there or maybe even lives there, I don’t know. All I know is he was fascinating to look at, almost like a wizard, and I wanted to take his photo so bad, but didn’t want to come off as a looky-lou, so we just kept going, headed for the beach on the far side.

The next guy we came upon in the darkness held out a bong and said, “Hey, do you guys smoke weed?!” That’s the kind of place this is! From there, it was on. I think everyone was on drugs down there — weed, ecstasy, mushrooms — but it was all totally peaceful and cool; people just tripping quietly in nature. Except this one poor kid tripping balls on ketmamine, who kept circling around asking us where he was, what was in his hand (a GoPro camera), and if he was dead. LOL! The best part was, the GoPro was on the whole time…and that has to be the most awesome footage ever. Finally, a good use for a GoPro! One of my readers sent me one a while ago, and I haven’t been able to figure out a good use for it, since I’m not into extreme sports. Now I have an idea! 😀

Anyway, imagine sitting in this amazing hot spring on the edge of a river, in the middle of nowhere, in the dead of night, with nothing but moonlight to light the scene, after a bong hit from a stranger and a glass of wine, totally naked and talking machine-gun style with some guy from the Internet you only met two hours ago. That was magical!

Jack and I really hit it off right away — I know I said this about my frenemy Alex, but Jack really is the male me: good-looking, charismatic, free spirited and somewhat directionless. It was kinda freaky, but it made for excellent and abundant conversation. We drank wine and blabbed away until around 3am, then hiked back up the steep-ass trail to our campsite and passed out.

Anyway, I only got a few hours of sleep before the sun baked me out of my tent in the morning — I thought I had set it up on the shady side of the van, but apparently I miscalculated because the sun was shooting dagger-rays into my eyeballs from the time it came up around 6am. If you camp here, be advised — there is VERY little shade, and it gets hot as fuck in the summer! I dragged my sleeping bag out and tried to sleep in the shade of the van, under an umbrella, but it was pretty crappy going, so eventually I gave up and started the day. Jack was making fun of me for refusing to sleep in his van with him, but like I said, I only met him the day before, and he appeared to have entanglements. My name might be Wonderhussy, but I don’t give it up that easy!

Anyway, Jack made a fantastic breakfast and then we packed up and hiked back down to the springs for the day. They were even more beautiful in the daylight! Lush and green and shady, with birds and butterflies and dragonflies buzzing around over the sound of water rushing over the rocks — it sounded exactly like the intro to Pink Floyd’s “Grantchester Meadow,” a song about some guy getting baked in the English countryside. Some things are universal, I guess.

I laid out my sleeping bag in the shade on the beach, and we spent the day soaking, snoozing, smoking weed and chatting with the other hippies down there. Deep Creek is located along the Pacific Crest Trail (a trail that goes all the way from Mexico to Canada, which many people hike every year), so we met some resting PCT hikers as well, which was really interesting for me, as I’ve read a few books on the subject and am possibly interested in doing it myself one day. The hiker in this photo is Louis Mayer Maude, all the way from New Hampshire, and this was his first time on the West Coast! Can you imagine?! Welcome to the West…where we know how to live!!!

Everyone was cool, and almost everyone was naked. I love places where you can be naked in a completely non-sexual way — naturism! There is no place like that in Vegas — here, if you’re naked, it means you want to swing (and I hate swinging). But in Deep Creek, it’s different. Hell, I was on my freaking period the whole time — my tampon string was dangling down, and no even even blinked!!!

That being said, I guess just being in that environment around all those bare genitals gets people fired up, because around 5 o’clock shit got freaky — one guy was jerking off in the bushes, looking at a naked black guy stretched out on a rock…who later went over and gave it to his girlfriend, right there on the beach in a little cluster of trees. Far out!!! Thankfully, aside from a few lewd remarks, Jack was pretty classy and never molested me.

Around that time, we ate some mushrooms, and went for a walk back up along the creek to this beautiful, peaceful lagoon. I swear, I’ve never seen such beauty!! I felt like the guy in that Small Faces song “Itchycoo Park,” where he eats acid in the park and cries because “it’s all too beautiful.” It really was!! Jack spent about an hour taking astonishingly beautiful nude photos of me with his iPhone — if even these crappy iPhone pics came out this good, imagine what you could get with a real camera. AHEM!!! Any photographers who want to go out there, hit me up!!!

I took a bunch of really cool photos of Jack as well, but unfortunately he isn’t quite as free spirited as I am in that respect, and asked me not to post them. In fact, he didn’t even really want me to write about him at all, which really knocked me back — I hate when people are ashamed to be associated with me, ya know? It happens now and then — people think I’m fun and awesome, but don’t want their wife or boss or girl whose house they’ve been sleeping at or whoever to know they were with me. Fuck! I am an exceptionally good person, and I’m not doing anything wrong (except drugs) — so why the shame, people? It makes me feel dirty, and really hurts my feelings, to be honest. So you’ll notice I have concealed Jack’s identity with Jack Johnson (the musician)’s face — he doesn’t care for Jack Johnson’s shtick at all, so I figured I could at least exact a small amount of revenge that way, however petty and meaningless. It was a real bummer though, because all the people we met kept asking how long we’d known each other, and when I told them we’d just met the day before, they were blown away: “Wow, I thought you guys had been together forever! You’re like one person!” And it was true. Plus, he leads such an interesting life that I am dying to write about it…but I guess I’ll honor his request, because like I said, I’m an exceptionally good person.

Aside from that, the only other bummer was all the trash and litter down there — people had left all kinds of crap behind! Beer cans, tequila bottles, food wrappers, half-eaten bags of potato chips. I mean, really?!? Who hikes all the way down there to do that?! Jack and I bagged some of it up, but didn’t pack it out with us 🙁 But at least we tried. Also, the other bummer was a two-foot rattlesnake that came slithering along in the gloaming — we gave it a wide berth and were fine, but you really have to watch yourself!

By now, it was getting dark, and the moon came out — even fuller than last night, bathing the entire canyon in fabulously beautiful silver light. We soaked in one of the cliffside pools with the Zen wizard guy and this bisexual dude from L.A., the one who was jerking off earlier to the naked black guy. I think the Zen wizard was gay too, because they both kept looking at Jack, who seems to be one of those people everyone wants to fuck…but they kept the party polite, and we had a great time soaking and talking. The moonlight reminded me of that song from the movie “Babe,” so I treated everyone to a performance:

“If I had words to make a day for you,

I’d sing you a morning golden and true

I would make this day last for all time

and give you a night deep in moonshine.“

That song pretty much summed up the day, for sure. Awww! I love that movie 🙂

But it was getting late, and Jack had some steaks up at camp he wanted to grill…and I knew we had to get out sooner or later and hike back up the trail. Nothing gold can stay! I stalled as long as possible because I didn’t want it to end, but eventually the thought of steak and wine won out, so we bid our adieus and hiked back up the trail, naked and barefoot in the warm desert night, and made a bad ass steak dinner with a fantastic salad and lots of wine. Despite the entreaties of Jack to “just sleep in the van!!” I moved my tent to the shady spot in front, and slept great 🙂

The next morning we had to decide where to go next. Jack didn’t have a gig until Friday night, and I didn’t have one til Saturday evening, so we were in no hurry. I was fine just staying at the springs, but Jack wanted to check out Lake Arrowhead or another spot in the area, and brought up the idea of checking out a nudist resort in nearby Palm Springs. I was open to the idea — I’ve been to nudist resorts, and they’re OK, but I have a friend in Vegas who’s been telling me about this place in Palm Springs, so I was kinda curious to check it out, depending on price. Well come to find out, there are a few resorts in the Palm Springs area, and Jack initially wanted to check out the one with a “younger” clientele, which turned out to be a seedy swingers’ paradise. NO, thanks! I am just not into being hit on by sunburned douchebags in gold chains, ya know?!?!?!

We finally agreed to go to the Desert Sun Resort, which is the one my friend had told me about. It’s popular with an older crowd but is a solid no-swing zone, so it sounded much better to me. For $90 each we could stay the night in one of the rooms, plus use the facilities all day and until 4pm the following day. I didn’t really want to lay out $90 when I could stay at Deep Creek for free, but I was curious, and had always wanted to check out Palm Springs…and also, a shower really sounded good, so I agreed, and followed Jack down to Palm Springs.

Now this was my first time ever visiting Palm Springs, and it was pretty cool — all retro mid-century architecture and palm trees and gay guys, etc. The Desert Sun resort is right in the middle of town, a sort of walled fortress to protect the delicate ballsacks and labia within from prying eyes on the street. The grounds are beautifully landscaped, and there are three pools, jacuzzis, volleyball and tennis courts and a workout room. Hanging out there is like being a tiger in an enclosure at a zoo — all these water features and shit to keep you busy, but you can’t leave the enclosure. Grrrrrrrr!!! I much prefer a natural outdoors experience, but that being said, it was a pretty nice place.

Since it was midweek, and summertime (temps in the 100s), the place was fairly deserted — there were one or two other couples hanging out, but that was it. So we took showers and ate some of my patented pot cookies, getting baked in the sun by the pool and pretty much wasting the afternoon away. After dark, we got dressed and walked around downtown Palm Springs and had a burger, still pretty much high as kites, and then went back to the room.

Now is when shit got real: there was only one bed in the room, so I pretty well expected some hardcore molesting to go down…and to be perfectly honest, I wasn’t that upset about it, because Jack is pretty good-looking and I felt a real attraction to him, which is really rare for me (I’m hardly attracted to anyone). But I was uncomfortable with the fact that he had these entanglements, even though he swore it was an open relationship, so I fended him off for around 3 hours, expecting him to finally give up and go to sleep.

First he just wanted to hold my hand, which was fine, except for that it turned out to be the most intensely erotic hand-holding I’ve ever experienced! I’ve never been a big hand-holder, so I didn’t realize how many nerve endings you have in your palms and fingertips and whatnot. The simple act of hand holding can be super intense, I’m here to tell you! It was a trip!!

Anyhoo, I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice it to say I fended him off for quite some time until finally caving, to my eternal shame and self-loathing, and giving up third base. (I don’t think he even really wanted to go to 4th base, because then he’d have some ‘splaining to do back home — this way, he could pull a Bill Clinton. Lame, and super depressing position for me to be in.) I felt really shitty about giving it up, but I honestly couldn’t help it; I really was attracted to him — he had the right pheromones or whatever, and I liked him as a person, too. Fuck!!!!

Anyway, I slept surprisingly well after that (I usually can’t sleep for shit if someone else is in the bed with me), and we got up in the morning for more lounging by the pool. Things were slightly awkward, but I had brought some champagne and orange juice, so a few mimosas cleared that right up. We met this super cool couple from L.A. out at the pool who are working on a reality show about naturists/nudists, and of course I gave them my info so they could hook a sister up. Jack was a bit more reticent about appearing nude on TV, but you know me — IDGAF!!

We were allowed to stay at the resort until 4pm, at which time I planned to drive back to Vegas by way of Wonder Valley, so I could stop in at the Palms Restaurant for a burger or something, and say hi to my fabulous friends there, the Sibleys. But Jack decided to go to Hollywood that night to meet up with his publicist, and see this amazing Canadian rockabilly act called Petunia and the Vipers, and he invited me along.

Now, I had no reason to be back in Vegas til Saturday (this was Thursday), and a jaunt to Hollywood sounded fabulous…but my conscience was telling me NOT to go, that it was a bad idea to hang out with this guy one second longer. I already liked him way too much; who knows what would happen next?! So I sobered up with the intent of driving home when we left the resort. I was in a pretty shitty mood about it, but I felt it was ultimately the right decision. That didn’t mean I was happy about it, though 🙁

But Jack kept badgering me to come with him, and after talking to the L.A. couple for awhile I cheered up and had a change of heart, and decided Fuckit, I might as well go have one more fun night. It’s better to regret doing something, than to regret not having done something, right? All I had to lose was my self-worth and dignity, and that ain’t worth shit anyway. So I followed the hippie van down the highway to L.A., feeling somewhat like I was running away to join the circus. The circus of broken hearts! Ah, Hollywood.

After getting a burger in Hermosa Beach, we cruised up to Silverlake to this amazing old-timey little club called El Cid, where Petunia and the Vipers were playing. They were freaking awesome!!! It’s basically this one yodeling rockabilly Slim Whitman-type guy and a backing band, but let me tell you something…that kid can yodel! His voice is amazing!! It didn’t hurt that he was super handsome, either, and all tricked out in old-time cowboy gear. Sweet!!

L.A. has a big swing dance/rockabilly scene, so the place was packed with dressed-up kids dancing and doing all these fancy moves. I can’t dance for shit, but the groove was so infectious that I had to get up and at least start jumping around. Now, please keep in mind that I had just been camping in the desert for three days, and hadn’t expected to go to a rockabilly show in L.A., so I was severely underdressed, in my trusty WalMart shorts, a tank top and flip flops. But I went in the bathroom and rigged up a mighty rockabilly conk, so I at least fit in somewhat.

Anyway, it worked too well, because some French guy asked me to dance!! I’m a horrible dancer — I mean, horrible — so I demurred as vehemently as possible, but he kept insisting that he was a “dance instructor” and could show me. So, in the spirit of the moment I let him drag me around the floor, and tried not to step on his toes too much. But every second was excruciating for me, and I couldn’t wait for the song to end. If you ever see me out and about where there’s music playing, for the love of God don’t ask me to dance!!! I MEAN IT!

Then Jack and I did a sort of drunken reel (I don’t think he’s much better at dancing than I am, if at all) and we spent the rest of the night drinking and carousing and smoking weed on the patio with various kooky rockabillies, until last call at 2am. Living in Vegas as I do, I always forget there’s such a thing as “last call” — what a quaint, antiquated custom! But we had to leave the club, so we stumbled out onto Sunset Blvd. and back to where we’d parked our cars.

Now, whenever Jack does gigs in Hollywood, he has this one secret location he found to park his van, on a quiet side street overlooking the ocean and the Santa Monica Pier, where he can sleep overnight without being bothered. So I grabbed a few things from my truck, and climbed aboard the hippie van to get a taste of the vandwelling lifestyle. It was bad ass, and now I’m addicted!

To get to our overnight spot, we basically cruised all the way down Sunset Blvd, passing all the douchey nightclubs and hotspots that line that strip, blasting all kinds of weird music from Alison Krauss to AC/DC (like me, Jack has eclectic tastes in music). We rolled up to a stoplight by the club 1OAK, and I looked over and noted “Oh, there’s Ron Jeremy,” like it was the most natural thing in the world. He was standing on the sidewalk with some crackhead-looking methhead chick, and Jack rolled down the window to let some AC/DC waft in their direction. Ron Jeremy was not interested in the slightest (two hippies in a van…meh) but the crackhead’s ears perked up like a dog hearing a bag of potato chips being opened! Then the light turned green and we cruised off, but it was one of those funny, surreal moments that make life so interesting…ya know?

Anyhoo, we got to the secret parking spot and peed in the bushes and brushed our teeth and stuff, then went to bed. Of course now there was little question there would be some hanky-panky, but again, I won’t go into too much detail. Suffice it to say I went to 4th base and finally gave up the old wonderpussy — all of it, all the way, much more than I usually do — and shockingly, I don’t really regret it. Life is short and shitty, so sometimes it’s best to grab whatever fleeting moments of pleasure/happiness come your way…even if they leave you with an overwhelming melancholia in the morning. But whatevs — melancholia is a cloak I wear on a near-daily basis, so one more day of it ain’t gonna kill me. Although it did kill my dad (he committed suicide), so I guess I should be a little bit careful.

Anyway, after this bizarre intimate interlude in a van parked on a backstreet of an upscale L.A. suburb, I fell asleep in a tangle of arms, legs and confusion…and slept astonishingly well. I woke up to the sound of the surf far below, and now I got to see what a typical morning in the life of a vandweller was all about: get up, piss in a bottle (well, I didn’t — I waited til we got to a bathroom, since I didn’t want to pee in the bushes in broad daylight) and then head down the hill for some delicious gas station coffee and a vigorous toothbrushing on the beach. This particular beach had nice bathrooms, so after finally peeing I ran into the ocean and took a fantastic, invigorating saltwater bath. It was so frustrating to be in the middle of Santa Monica, and thus unable to go in nude…but I still managed to do it topless, so I guess that made it better. Still, I really missed the freedom of Deep Creek 🙁

Alas, all good things come to an end, even this trip…and after drying off, Jack drove me back down Sunset Blvd. to my truck, and we parted ways. He hit the road off to his next gig, and I drove back across the desert to Vegas. I hate saying goodbye to people, and it was an exceptionally awkward one at that…but who knows? No regrets; I had a fantastic time, and had plenty of time to mull it over on my drive back through the Mojave.

Around Victorville I stopped to pee, and was sorely tempted to go back to Deep Creek for the night…but by now the spell was broken, and my practical nature had already resumed its stranglehold on me. Live practical, dream magical! I continued on to Vegas, and even went to a Bikram yoga class when I got home….to sweat out all the bullshit oxytocin in my system. Did it work? Only time will tell…

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Of all the drugs in the world, I’ve been wanting to try ayahuasca most of all. For those not familiar with drug culture, ayahuasca is an herbal potion brewed from Amazonian plants that causes crazy hallucinations, puking…and eventually (they say) spiritual clarity and transformation. They also say a middle-class white hippie can find her true self by drinking ayahuasca, as it contains DMT and will really open up your consciousness and allow you a glimpse of the divine truth of nature.

Though there are recipes posted, and the herbal ingredients can easily be ordered online, it’s not advisable to just chug ayahuasca alone, willy-nilly — you need the guidance of a trained shaman, who can mix and administer the brew, and guide (babysit) you on your trip. If you Google “ayahuasca,” you’ll find all kinds of crazy/terrifying firsthand accounts…so you really don’t want to fuck around with this potent stuff. Among all the far-out drugs in the world, ayahuasca is definitely one of the furthest out — this ain’t mushrooms, fool!

Ideally, the ayahuasca experience consists of flying to Peru or Ecuador or someplace in South America, then trekking deep into the jungle to the hut of a grass-skirt-wearing ancient wise man, and swiping your credit card on his iPhone. But some of us don’t have the cash to fly to South America…so luckily for me, there are shamans in the U.S. who also conduct ayahuasca rituals. So if interested, all the intrepid drug explorer has to do is find one of them. How convenient!!

Now, keep in mind that because ayahuasca contains DMT, it is considered a Schedule I drug, and is totally illegal…unless you’re a member of a church that uses it for religulous purposes. And even that is a kind of gray area. But you know me!!!

That being said, I don’t want to get anyone else in trouble…so I have to be kinda sketchy with details here, which you know I hate. But it’s the only way.

Anyhoo, let’s just say a friend I ran into at that Burning Man party I went to last weekend invited me to an ayahuasca ceremony she was hosting at her home last night, and let’s just say I said FUCK YEAH!! This friend spends a lot of time in a certain New Age woo-woo town in the Southwest, where she had fallen in with a Brazilian ayahuasquero (shaman) and his group, and she ended up inviting them up to Vegas for a special ceremony. One night only!! Like I said, I’ve been wanting to do this forever…so not even the steep “recommended donation” of $150-200 scared me away. I signed up, saved my pennies and dimes, and started reading up on what to expect.

As previously mentioned, if you Google ayahuasca, all these terrifying personal accounts come up — tales of puking and freaking the fuck out, people screaming and crying and masturbating uncontrollably while simultaneously enjoying cosmic revelations. Whoa, man! I couldn’t wait!!! If there’s one thing I need, it’s truth — I mean, I can’t go around flashing my twat to old men forever, ya know?! I need to know my special purpose! Maybe ayahuasca would help me find it.

Because I’m a sensible type, I followed the recommendations in the RSVP email and avoided certain foods (avocado, garlic, meat, alcohol) the day before the ceremony…and then fasted on the day itself, so that my stomach would be totally empty, and I’d be less likely to puke. If I’m shelling out $150, I want to make sure I get the best experience possible! So by the time the ceremony started around 8pm, I’d been fasting for 24 hours.

Now meanwhile, I was also working as a booth babe at this bullshit convention — the JCK jewelry show, a huge expo where all the diamond dealers and gold-hawkers of the world converge to contrive new ways of convincing idiots into spending an entire year’s salary on carbon crumbs. I’m not a jewelry fan myself, so the whole idea of spending thousands of dollars on something as intrinsically meaningless as diamonds leaves me ice-cold…but whatever, plenty of suckers line up to buy this shit, so every year they have this ginormous convention in Vegas. And I usually end up working it.

This year, I was repping a group of inscrutable Chinese who manufacture modest mens’ engagement rings made from cobalt, ceramic and titanium…none of which retail for more than $300-$400. (Come to find out, many guys spend all their money on the woman’s ring…then sort of cheap out on their own band.) Whatever, it’s all completely alien to me, and I don’t give a fuck. I just pretended to be enthusiastic about it, as per my job description.

But the convention was fascinating, on many levels. First of all, this is not a racist statement, but a fact: there are a ton of Jews in the jewelry biz (in fact it was really fun to watch them interacting with the other two main demographics, which were Chinese and Indians. All three are known to be hard bargainers, so it was pretty entertaining). Many of the Jewish exhibitors at the show are observant Orthodox, so even though the show ran Friday-Monday, half the show was dead on Saturday because it was Shabbat, and the observant stayed back at their hotel rooms. This is so prevalent that the show even has a “Shabbas Vault” where companies can safely store their gems while they’re observing Shabbat from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.

I think I may have mentioned this last year…but I really wonder what all those Orthodox Jews do all day on Saturday. If they’re really observant, they can’t even turn on a light switch — do they stay in their hotel rooms all day and pray?! They can’t get downstairs without operating an elevator…so I guess they must. I find this bizarre. Why don’t they change the days of the show to Tuesday-Friday or Sunday-Wednesday?! But for whatever reason, the show always runs over a weekend.  All these observant Jews end up paying for an extra night in the hotel, for nothing. It seems counterintuitive!

Anyway, this was a particularly long and physically draining show for me — four 8-hour days of standing on concrete in high heels under fluorescent lights, braying “Cobalt? Ceramic?? Titanium???” at passers-by. By the fourth day, I was exhausted, and to make matters worse I wasn’t even able to eat anything, since the ayahuasca ceremony was that night. I didn’t even have a glass of wine the night before!! (I did, however, smoke weed…against their advisory. But, really?! Am I to have no enjoyment at all?!) Anyway, somehow I made it through the day, and was looking forward to the ayahuasca trip as a sort of celebration that the damn show was finally over.

So the second I got off work, I raced home to prepare, donning an all-white outift as per the email instructions: they recommended loose, comfortable, modest clothing for women, so I wore a long white skirt and white cami. But I also brought a blankie and a shawl and some warm socks, as they say ayahuasca (or “the medicine,” as they call it) can make some people cold.

I also brought a crystal I was once given by a Thai saleswoman at a hippie boutique on Haight Street in San Francisco, as a sort of good-luck talisman — I was really trying to go into this with an open, believing mind. I tend to be an incorrigible skeptic/cynic, so I really tried hard to banish my usual snarky thoughts and believe! I even spent time meditating on my intentions for the ceremony — what did I want to get out of it? I decided I was going in with no expectations, but that I was hoping to become a more open person, better able to connect with those around me. Because truthfully, in my day-to-day life I have a hard time taking many people seriously…most people I meet strike me as insufferable dumbasses. And that’s no way to live.

The ceremony was taking place at my friend’s suburban McMansion up on a hillside in the farthest reaches of town…not very far, in fact, from the house where I used to film all those breath-holding fetish videos back in the day. This struck me as possibly meaningful, since my insomnia set in right around the time I started doing those videos — maybe if I had a revelatory ayahuasca trip in the same area, it would negate all the negative vibes lingering from that previous shitty experience (I used to shoot for a medical fetish site that required us to hold our breath to the point of almost passing out, while hooked up to an EKG. I have often wondered if that experience contributed to my inability to “let go” and fall asleep, for fear I’d stop breathing.)

Anyway, there were about 15 people there for the ceremony — a shaman and priestess, plus a triad of male acolytes who had accompanied them up from their desert retreat, and a couple other regulars. The rest of us were first timers — and a fairly diverse group: a few single guys, a hot Asian bottle waitress from one of the pool clubs, and a mysterious quiet couple. We all sat around chit-chatting nervously until the sacred space was ready for us, and then we were ushered in to the hostess’s casita, which had been transformed into a sacred ayahuasca-drinking chamber, with an altar in the middle covered in sage bundles, crystals, candles, etc and surrounded by pillows and blankets for everyone to get comfortable on. We all sat down, and the ceremony began.

After a welcoming speech , the priestess administered some kind of weird snuff to each of us by blowing it up our nostrils with a little bamboo gun-type thing, to sort of prime us for the experience. Damn, that stuff burned like hell!! It did clear out my perpetually clogged sinuses, though, and gave me a really heady buzz…so I couldn’t complain. After everyone had their snuff, the singing, chanting and drumming began…and the shaman poured out little glasses of ayahuasca for each of us.

Now, I was pretty nervous. Aside from fearing what sort of freak-out I would experience, I was also apprehensive about all the incongruous plastic puke-buckets ominously strewn about amidst all the incense and crystals and flowers. I hate puking…but I was ready to give myself over to the medicine — to let go, and let ayahuasca! Still, I wasn’t looking forward to that aspect of the trip.

After drinking the cup of bitter, sweetish brew, we all sat back and sang songs from this songbook they passed out, while the shaman played this little electric guitar and his acolytes drummed along and shook gourds. The lyrics to these songs were about stuff like Mother Ayahuasca, Queen of the Forest, show us true wisdom in the loving arms of your eternal embrace, etc. Since this was a Brazilian shaman, some of the songs were in Portuguese, but most were in English, so we could all sort of bumble atonally along: “Let your ego die, love is the only truth,” etc. It actually felt very Spahn Ranch to be sitting around chanting about ego death in the company of a bunch of longhaired, dashiki-clad white people — because that’s what it was; aside from the one Asian chick, everyone there was white, middle-class, in their twenties or thirties. But so very earnest! 

Before long, the first chick started puking…and from there, we all sat back and got progressively high, while the singing and chanting and drumming continued, accompanied by the sounds of intermittent puking from various corners of the room. I got mildly nauseous myself, but never did end up puking — I think I was the only one who didn’t. Apparently I’m such a Bitter Betty that my ego refused to let go and be purged, so all that blackness and bile is still trapped within me. D’OH!!!

But I was nauseous, so I laid back on my blankie and just let the sounds of the music and the smell of the incense/sage wash over me. Alas, I was so fucking exhausted from the jewelry show that I kept dozing off…which I fear fucked up the experience for me. I mean, I sort of drifted in and out of a dreamlike state, with sort of dreamy visualizations appearing behind me eyes, but nothing that could remotely called a hallucination. It was more like the typical drifting-off-to-sleep experience — or at least my typical drifting-off experience, since I get high every night before bed. In fact, the whole experience felt like nothing so much as being really, REALLY baked…with maybe a touch of mushrooms added in for variety. I kept waiting for all the intense visualizations and shit to start in…but it never did. I also kept waiting for the urge to purge, which also never happened, despite the fact that there were puking people all around me.

The room we were in was totally sealed off, so there was no sense of time at all, and I had no idea how much time had elapsed. I’d read online that an ayahuasca trip can last anywhere from 4-5 hours to 8-9 hours, so I was prepared for an all-nighter…but had no idea when was when, or what was what. About 3/4 of the way through the night, the priestess offered everyone a top-off shot of the medicine, but I was afraid if I drank more I really would puke, so I didn’t drink any. Maybe that was my problem — I was unwilling to let go and allow the medicine to make me puke, so out of spite she denied me a true experience.

But I don’t know….I have my doubts. It felt like going to one of those comedy hypnotist shows, where you really wonder if the people pulled up onstage are really hypnotized, or just playing along for the sake of entertainment. My gut feeling was that all these earnest white kids around me really wanted to have a trip, so they had a trip. Skeptical me, in all my snarky cynicism, wouldn’t “play along,” so I was left out. Hmmm.

After the second dose, the shaman passed around a medicine staff and we all said blessings or prayers or thoughts that we were having, about stuff like relatives that had passed away, or the divine spirit of love that was filling us, or how blessed we felt, etc. One of the three acolytes, a tall, skinny kid with an adorable afro and hipster glasses, told a story about how the thirty-third day of a pregnancy is the exact day when a fetus’s heart starts beating on its own, and begins generating an electrical impulse. This, they say, is the exact day the soul enters the body! In retrospect, I’m not sure what that has to do with anything…but at the time, it was very heavy-duty stuff!!

Then it was my turn. It’s always awkward for me in situations like that, because I’m not a spiritual person in the slightest, and I don’t really put much stock in that hippie-dippie mumbo-jumbo. But in the spirit of the moment, I dragged some platitudes from my ass about experiencing wonderment and enchantment, which was actually sort of true, so I didn’t come off as an asshole, at least.

Meanwhile, at the beginning of the ceremony we had all pledged to the shaman not to leave until the ceremony was closed — but toward the end,  we noticed that the one mysterious, quiet couple had disappeared! Come to find out, they were hard-core psychedelic explorers who take mushrooms every other day in the interest of consciousness-expanding, and the medicine hadn’t been dramatic enough for their liking, so they bailed. How rude!!

I myself stayed til the bitter end, when we all held hands in a circle and said some more blessings and shit, then adjourned to the other room to talk about our experiences. (It’s bad form to talk about stuff in the sacred altar room, as it is filled with spirits.) I was finally able to check the time, and was startled to find that it was only 1:30am — much earlier than I expected! The entire trip was only about 5 hours from start to finish.

By now, I was starving, so I asked one of the traveling acolytes if it would be ok to eat now. This one beautiful white-blonde Nordic spirit-Viking kid advised that watermelon was a good thing to eat, and lo and behold our hostess had a watermelon in the fridge, so we cut it up and sat around beasting it, sitting on the floor talking. Another one of the acolytes told me that I looked completely different now than I had at the beginning of the ceremony.

“Oh, well probably because I put my hair up,” I explained.

“Ahahahahahahahah!!!!!” everyone chuckled heartily. Silly me, it wasn’t a physical change — my aura was different! “You’re shining now,” the acolyte beamed at me.

And he was right. I was shining like a motherfucker — my face was all sweaty and oily from being in that stuffy room with all those chanting puking people!!!

Anyway, after thanking the hostess and the priestess and the shaman, and bidding everyone else adieu, I walked back out into reality, got into my truck and drove home. I really felt none the richer or wiser, but it was a fabulously interesting experience.

Apparently, it’s fairly common to have a lukewarm first experience — they say it takes patience, and many sittings with the medicine before you really start chipping away at your ego…like a column of marble, with each subsequent trip chipping away more stone until your true self emerges, like a sculpture. Once you really start following the path of the medicine, that’s when shit gets real. Alas, at $150 a pop I can’t really afford to follow the path very far :-/

So, at the end of it all, what was my opinion? Well, I thought it was a fantastic experience, and actually worth every dollar. After all, people spend $150 on dumbass bullshit shows like Celine Dion and Cirque du Soleil all the time — this was infinitely more interesting, and interactive to boot!!! So do I recommend taking ayahuasca? YES! Just be careful about vetting your shaman, because they say there are some real mercenary types out there who only want your money, and don’t give a fuck about you personally. The shaman and priestess at this ceremony were actually really good — very attentive and kind and helpful.

Sure, I was a little disappointed that I didn’t puke/cry/scream/masturbate uncontrollably…but I guess it’s like everything else in this fuckin’ world: a letdown. Nothing is ever as amazing as the accounts you read online — in fact, it reminded me of nothing so much as my first Burning Man experience (as detailed in my last blog). Even though I really tried to go into both situations with no expectations…I guess I did have expectations, despite myself. And both just ended up being intense fun with friends.

Now, you might say the reason I didn’t trip out more is because I didn’t take the second cup of medicine — but to this, I argue that a) the second dose was very small, and b) I heard the others talking about how the second dose was much milder. They all tripped balls right off the bat, apparently.

You might also say my shaman was no good, or that the brew was faulty. To this I argue that a) the shaman was awesome, and b) everyone else seemed to trip out just fine. I’m just a particularly crusty nut to crack, apparently.

More realistically, I think if anything hampered my experience it was my extreme fatigue — I can’t express how fucking bone weary I was from working that stupid jewelry show! I can’t remember the last time I was so tired. Because of that, I drifted off several times during the ceremony. Maybe if I’d been better rested and more alert, I would have had a more animated experience.

So all that being said, I definitely want to try ayahuasca again. There are many different styles of ceremony — each shaman does it differently. They say there’s another shaman in town who does a Peruvian ceremony that is more meditative and religious in nature, whereas this one was more lovey-dovey and Spahn Ranch. It would be interesting to try a different method, and see how I react to that.

Either way, I’m super glad I did it!