soak in hot water, then in cold water, repeat

[cjsmith]

For alternating hot and cold soaks, of course I'd use the hot tub, right?

This led to me balancing half-clothed on the slippery edge of a hot tub and swinging my legs around to stick my toes in a pan of ice water. Yikes it was cold.

Important Safety Tip: this causes full-body flinching! Being mentally prepared for the shock didn't seem to matter. Fortunately, every time I did this I managed to just save myself from pitching over backwards into the water. This is especially lucky because the smallest timer I could carry out there was my laptop.

Given the way my luck's been going the rest of the day, I'd say I'm about even now. Fortunately the laptop is now safely indoors.

Comments

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

It's also okay to use basins of water while sitting on a cushy sofa. :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah, but I woulda had to HEAT some, and that's like WORK, *big heavy sigh*. :)

[datagoddess.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm with Mary. I would have gone with pans of water, but I'm not as creative as you.

Glad you didn't fall in :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Thanks! :) I got the hot tub idea when I read the suggested temperature range. The temperature of the water in the hot tub is known and sufficient. I don't have the right kind of thermometer for heating stuff on the stove. (All the people with well-stocked kitchens, including little TIMERS, are probably snickering now!)

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

half-clothed

*whimper*

Sounds like a foot-only version of what I've heard a number of Scandanavians do (the whole run-from-the-sauna-into-the-icy-water-and-back-again thing). Sheesh. Did you encounter that over there?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I didn't see it done, but I definitely heard of it. It's mostly the Finns who are into that (they're adamant about saying they're not Scandinavians) although I believe the Norwegians will do a version involving a hot tub. I can imagine it's very healthy. I can also imagine expiring on the spot. :-)

[eichin.livejournal.com]

Swedes seem enthusiastic about it too (high temperature sauna, followed by jumping into nearby lake that you may have had to chop ice out of :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

My guesses seemed to say they would be, but I've never met one who was, so I didn't include them. :-) Maybe you have better info!

And yeah, "lake you had to chop ice out of" seems to be accepted as the most convenient way, as in "why would anyone go to more effort to do it differently?". As I recall, in Lake Tahoe they fake it with snowbanks.

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Wow, you have some pretty nice friends here! They're being all supportive and offering advice and stuff. Me, I read the whole thing and my first thought at the end was "I wonder what she meant by half-clothed?" ;)

I'm glad you didn't fall in, though. I second (fifth?) everybody elses recommendation of using the sofa for this process in the future. The hot tub was a good one-time test to see if you could save yourself the work of heating the water, but I think maybe it's time to admit the test didn't work. :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I tried heating water and concluded that was MUCH more dangerous than using the hot tub. Fortunately all my toes survived that little experiment. I'm getting much better at the balance thing.

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Dangerous in what way? I mean, I've heard people say they can't boil water, but I've never known anyone that was serious about it. :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Got it too hot. The problem was that I can boil water. ;-)

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Now you just need to work on letting it cool off, I guess. :)