Outside the Old Navy, a young guy was showing a couple how to turn a one-foot bright orange square into… an inflatable vagina? Wait, that can't be right.
The beauty of the iLounge is that you can bring it everywhere — it comes in its own tiny backpack — and you blow it up by letting the wind whip through each of its two chambers. The guy at the mall kiosk demonstrated, with much jogging and swishing. He made it look so easy — and, honestly, when has anything sold at a mall kiosk ever been a bad idea?
The first time I try this, I'm at the beach. And, yeah, I'm getting some looks, but I assume it's because it's such a cool lounger and everyone's envious. After all, no one on the beach has one, and they want one, I tell myself. Yeah, I feel a little awkward running up and down the beach with a pink thing fluttering behind me, but once inflated, it's super-comfy.
At home, I blow it up again — lots of running and missteps. Finally, I put in the pool and climb in. And flip over.
Three times.
I thought maybe it was me, so we invited our fearless graphic designer to give it a shot. We call him, lovingly, our splash test dummy.
Here's how that went.
\\It took a few tries, but here's how our splash test dummy finally triumphed:
1. Unfold iLounge.
2. Put on your running shoes.
3. Hold open one of the two chambers.
4. Run until air fills the chamber.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4, as you failed to run/close the chamber fast enough.
6. Repeat steps 3-5 with the other chamber.
7. Roll the end of the iLounge (where the chambers opened) until the iLounge is of sufficient firmness.
8. Clip the ends together with hook attached to iLounge.
9. Put iLounge in shallow end of pool.
10. Attempt to climb on iLounge.
11. Fall off iLounge.
12. Curse that you just fell in the pool with your news Brooks running shoes on.
13. Take off shoes.
14. Repeat steps 10-11, as needed.
15. Order inflatable raft from Amazon using Prime same-day.
16. Fix drink and wait for new raft.
This article appears in May 11-18, 2017.