I had my first brush with an American tanning bed today. No, I’m not being discriminatory – there is a difference between the ones here and those in the UK. And it’s not just the accent… but I’ll get to that later.

Now, when I say “brush”, I mean it quite literally. The owner of the tanning salon I went to took one look at my pasty white skin (thanks, England!) and told me I didn’t need to be in there for more than three minutes. Yes, THREE minutes.

So, I’m thinking, WTF? Are these things super-powered, mini-nuclear-reactors or something? Am I going to survive this? Should I don a full radiation suit, complete with protective headgear??? And if so, can I have a purple one, please?

I felt somewhat letdown to discover that the tanning bed looked very, well, tanning bed-like. The disappointment was soon pushed to the back of my mind when the owner sets the timer and tells me I have three (yes, it’s that magic number again) minutes to get undressed, get the lotion on and get under the thing before it comes on.

Three minutes later, my clothes are strewn in all over the floor and I’m double checking that I’ve managed to get the lotion everywhere and wondering whether other people bother with their backs, and if they do, what sort of ungodly position do you have to get into to reach it properly?

I’ve just pulled the top down when it fires up. And before you know it, it’s stopped again. Three minutes really isn’t very long, you know! Surprisingly, I was ever so slightly red. I didn’t burn, or anything, but at least it was something. Next time, I might be really brave and go for FOUR minutes!

Quite honestly, I’m really glad there was someone there to advise me on the amount of time I needed to spend under there. When I lived in England, I’d spend 45 minutes under a tanning bed, with little or no result…

My overall goal is to be able to wear shorts without people recoiling in horror at the pale blue hue of my legs. :)