By Justin Juul
Doesn’t it sometimes seem like the world is working against you? It’s bad enough those days when you wake up feeling like shit for no reason, but it really sucks when things just get worse from there. And it’s always their fault, isn’t it? The dickhead at the liquor store forgets to stock your brand of cigarettes. Some yuppie in a fancy car nearly runs you off the road. Your manager fires you, your landlord evicts you, your friends diss you. Sometimes other people are just too much to bear. Don’t you wish you could just make them all disappear for a while? Or better yet, don’t you wish you could disappear?
I mean let’s face it, even if you could temporarily get rid of all those other assholes, you’d still be stuck with the biggest asshole in the world: yourself.
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When the wheel of contentment begins to rotate downward, most of us turn to drugs, go into workaholic mode or — for those who can afford it — go on a vacation. But all that stuff is too predictable and it often leaves us feeling worse. What if there was a way to temporarily disconnect from life without any of the usual consequences?
Well, if you’ve ever seen Altered States, you know all about sensory deprivation chambers, those weird water-tanks psychology students use to study brain chemistry or whatever. It’s supposed to be the coolest experience in the world, something like meditating on acid.
In a deprivation chamber you are utterly alone. Your body is suspended in warm Epsom-water, your ears are submerged so you can’t hear a thing, and it’s totally dark, odorless, and soundproof. After a minute or two in an isolation-tank, the entire world melts away and you’re left with raw brain waves. Outside of a bad ketamine trip, it’s the most detached experience humanly possible. Sounds great right? The only problem is that the tanks are hard to get access to unless you work in a medical lab or live in Spain or London where they’ve become fashionable for some reason. Not anymore.
The owners of FLOAT, an urban art gallery in Oakland, got their hands on some tanks a couple years ago and are offering their services to the public. A psychedelic dip in one of FLOAT’s tanks is the perfect cure for those post holiday-with-the-family blues. Just strap on some Speedos, shut your eyes, and forget about those assholes (and yourself) for a while.
New Year Package at FLOAT – 3 Floats for the Price of 2 ($140.00)
1091 Calcot Place, #116 Oakland
510-535-1702
www.thefloatcenter.com