I love spas. There is nothing more luscious than escaping for a few hours to a serene environment of soft music, soft colors and soft towels, slipping into a robe and being waited on by handmaidens who are all extremely nice to you for the best and most reliable reason: They are paid to be.

Many men have a fear of going to a spa because they believe that breathing the fumes from one of those bamboo oil-diffusers for too long will turn them into metrosexuals. One hot stone massage and poof! They'll be spending more on hair and skin products than on pay-per-view sporting events and caring more about their nails than fantasy football.

But originally, spas were not about beautification and aromatherapy and trickling tabletop fountains. As ancient cultures invented leisure time, they invented things to fill it with, like soothing their aching muscles in hot water and networking. Ancient men spent a lot of time at baths, lying around naked, BSing and avoiding their wives. Modern men accomplish the same thing by playing golf, though they rarely do that nude.

I tried to explain the allure of the spa to my old friend Ferrari Boy, who wasn't getting it.

"An afternoon at a spa is like a vacation," I sighed.

"Whatever," he said. "What's so great about lying around with goo on your face?"

"The goo isn't the point," I explained. "I can put goo on my face at home. I often do -- scares the hell out of the Mormons when they come to the door.

"The point is the atmosphere. The service. 'Can I get you a cup of tea? Some chilled water with lemon? Would you like a scalp massage? Fresh cucumber on your eyes? Eunuchs waving feather fans while you nibble high-end gorp out of a porcelain dish and read Real Simple?' The face-goo is incidental."

And this is true. Often, when you schedule a goo application at a really foofy spa, they let you slouch around in your robe as long as you like before and/or after, sipping the lemon-water and bubbling in the Jacuzzi. You get use of the "facilities," which typically include locker room, showers, pools and maybe a sauna and steam room.

That's the part I don't get.

Sitting in a confined space and sweating? Where's the fun in that? If you leave someone shut in a car on a hot day, passers-by will call the cops.

Every so often, I sit in a steam room or sauna just to see if it will suddenly become enjoyable. (I do this with other unpleasant things, too, like drinking martinis and going on blind dates, though I draw the line at oysters. I will not date oysters.)

The steam bath was invented by the ancient Greeks, probably on a dare. It then spread like a fungus to Rome, Turkey and wherever people enjoyed wilting like broccoli.

Primitive early steam baths had no heat control and did occasionally cook bathers, but this was considered excellent for the health and particularly for the skin, if you could get it to stay on.

Although modern steam baths won't crisp-tenderize you like a frozen green bean, I find them eerie because they fill with swirling mist so thick you can't see who else is in there with you, especially with your glasses outside in the pocket of your robe. Film noir is not relaxing.

The ideal environment for a steam bath is between 110 and 116 degrees, with humidity over 100 percent. Astute readers will recognize this as Pittsburgh in July and the reason we herniate ourselves wrestling air conditioners into our windows.

"Sauna" is a word you hear a lot in Pittsburgh in July, and not in a complimentary tone. "Sauna," from a Finnish word meaning "my lungs are on fire," is a wooden box originally used to desiccate fish.

There are more saunas in Finland than cars and trucks, which makes for an interesting rush hour in Helsinki.

In the winter, Finns who are really hard-core sauna fans will cool off after a good bake by jumping into the nearest river. This is even more healthful if they make a hole in the ice first.

And that's another problem I have with the whole sauna thing: I believe cold water should be taken internally, not applied topically to the delicate skin area. After roasting in a 190-degree room, plunging yourself in cold water could snap all your pores shut at once, collapsing you into a thermal black hole until there's nothing left but a hardened little wad of gum on the floor.

So I think I'll continue to skip the hot pockets. I'm really enjoying my herbal tea. Could you bring me a fresh towel and some more cuke slices? They're pretty tasty with lemon on them.