My First Pedicure

For years my wife has bothered me relentlessly to get a pedicure, even threatening to schedule one as she schedules her own. I must admit, I have disgusting feet. Even so, I always had the same response, "not gonna happen, don't even bother." So you can imagine my surprise when our trekking friends arrived in Delhi and both Judith and Glenn were excited about the prospect of a massage and pedicure after we returned from our Ladakh trek (which believe me, there will be multiple posts in the coming days on the trip). Never one to shy away from a massage, I was in for that; however, after reflecting if it's good enough for Glenn (who is a typically obnoxious and funny North American male that I don't have the chance to interact with nearly enough while here) that it was certainly good enough for me. Using that and the fact that I was spending ten days walking 150 kilometers up and down passes as high as 16,500 feet as the two excuses, I finally relented and "allowed" Lindsay to schedule a treatment. If ever there was a time, this seemed to be it. I hadn't seen her this giddy since our engagement.

Here's the thing, and I know I'm going to take a load of crap about this from my buddies, it was awesome. In fact, I firmly believe if they simply changed the name from "pedicure" to something more manly like "foot pummeling" or "intense foot massage" and changed the venue to include sports on TV (kind of like those haircut places in the states) and some sort of alcoholic beverages, the industry would open itself up to an entirely new and mostly untapped demographic. In fact, I'd be shocked in this hasn't already happened.

For all those years, Lindsay had simply said, "I want you to get a pedicure." Wrong strategy. Had she said, "I want you to get a 45 minute intense and focused foot and calf massage where they may also touch your toe (without polish) and remove the callouses from the tips of your toes (note, like I said, I have disgusting feet)," her requests may have had a slightly different outcome.

Do I need this service on a weekly or even monthly basis? No. Am I glad to know it's there? Absolutely. Make fun of me all you want, but I may just be a convert. Deal with it.

Like I said, much more to come on the awesome Ladakh adventure, including hiking high passes and unreal landscapes, watching our dinner get caught, an aborted landing when arriving back in Delhi, trying to figure out the point when Ladakhis look their age, the wonders of Diamox (an altitude drug), comparing life on a Ladakh trek to life on a Nepalese trek, and a day-by-day account of the trip; however, I felt it important to start with the story of my first intense foot pummeling.