Fun day in Houston

 I'm spending a few weeks with my brother Luke, and his family in Houston. It's very peaceful. Luke has a toddler and we basically play all day, and we have nap time, so I get a nap everyday. Golly I'm so grateful for naps. Yesterday morning Luke and his wife had to run an errand so I was babysitting for a few hours, Luke gave me permission to use the TV if his baby was going out of control. It's nice to have the TV as a safety net, but I know Luke doesn't want his child to get addicted to screens. There's this balance of short term compromises against the grand vision of how to raise a child. We didn't watch TV, we read Calvin and Hobbes. 

I had friends Daniel and Addison visiting from Austin and I wanted to meet up with them, at noon we met at Spa World, the Korean spa on the west side of Houston. It's quite a drive, but everything is a drive here. On the way I listened to "I'm Glad My Mom Died" by Jeanette McCurdy, so I guess the drive wasn't that bad. Korean Spas are incredible. Everyone should go to Korean Spas, and this was a really good one. And I wanted to catch up with Daniel and Addison but the first room we went to was the ochre clay ball room, which had other people trying to meditate in there so we had to be quiet. But of course I loved the ochre room, it feels so nice on your back. It also reminded me of how when you were a kid at the grocery store, and you dug your hand in the bulk dry beans and the way it felt on your skin was so fun. 

Then we went to the wet room, no clothes are allowed in the wet room. So we're all naked, and we can talk. Daniel and Addison are so cute and I never got tired of hanging out with them, which is good because Korean Spas typically take more than 4 hours to experience. In one of the hot tubs another man asks me "are you Paul Bird?" And I of course was like yeah! And turned out this guy was a gay post-mormon and recognized me through that world, so I made a friend he was so sweet. The 4 of us all hung out. It's always funny when I get recognized in public. A few people ask me if I'm famous, and I have to tell them no I'm just really, truly extroverted. 

After hours in saunas my body was feeling so good but also so done so I gave all my friends naked hugs and started driving east. I wanted to see a cemetery, I drove to two different cemeteries but both were locked. Which was totally weird. Houston is weird. Why can't people walk around cemeteries here. It wasn't that late in the evening, and the hours all said "til dusk" and the sun was still very high up so that was frustrating. So I went to Sonic. I wasn't really hungry, I just had 15 minutes to kill. The guy behind me in line was REALLY yelling at the poor cashier. So awkward. I would have left, but I already ordered my food.

Then it was contradance! My favorite thing ever! I worked in the evenings in Utah so I didn't get to contradance at all up there so this was so needed. During the first dance I was caught up in the moment and having the time of my life and I got this big stupid grin on my face. I danced every dance and by the end of the first half my cheeks were hurting from smiling so wide. That always makes me laugh. Everyone should do contradance. It's so fun and so wholesome and moving your body is fun. Making eye contact with strangers and not talking to them is so good for the soul. The Houston contradance has some drama going on, which I found very entertaining. All in all this was a very welcoming bunch people and I made a few new friends.

I assumed contradance would end at 10, but it really ended at 10:30, and then clean up took a few minutes too. During contradance another gay post-mormon texted me and asked me to come to Montrose, the gay neighborhood of Houston. He wanted to meet at 10 really, and keep it a fairly early night, so by the time I got there it was already time for him to go home. But I'm glad I went to Montrose for a little bit. All over Montrose there's gorgeous men with gorgeous acrylic nails and crop tops, when I walk past them they yell "hey daddy." It's so flattering. I chit-chatted with some boys in  JR's bar and eventually they invited me to go to the Eagle, which is a dancey club with flashing lights and Madonna & Rhianna blasting so loud, and I just finished dancing for 3 hours so I just walked them to the Eagle. As we were walking other men complicated my clothes and legs. Montrose sure is friendly, and I'm friendly too so it's great.

I got back to my brothers house after midnight. I finished "I'm Glad My Mom Died" it only took two days to listen to the whole thing. I enjoyed listening to it, but I don't know if I liked it that much. Tons of people recommended it to me and I'm really at a loss for why, I don't think it was that great. I don't know what values it was trying convey, or if it was just supposed to be entertaining. I think people liked it because it's about a Nickelodeon child star with a shocking title and cover. 

My phone was so close to dead, and I forgot to do the wordle, so my streak was broken. Oh well. But it was such a good day, broken wordle streaks are a sign that an adventure happened. And I thought about how wildly different everything I did yesterday was. Babysitting, a Korean Spa, looking for a cemetery, Contradance, gay bars, listening to a sad memoir. Life is so fun, and Houston is growing on me. 

Love you all.