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As we often do, Courtney and I skewed down the average age a bit. And I skewed the average gender*. If you're looking for a place to cruise 50-something women, LASR is the place. The facilities are new, roomy for amount of guests, and well appointed. The resort is made up of a large structure for activities, dining, and administration, and several single story townhouse-like buildings with guest rooms. The main building is built along and near the shore of Lake Austin (looks more like a river), so the dining, exercise, and other rooms have a nice view of the lake. The guest room buildings also run along the shore, but are set back about 50 yards. Some have lake views, while some are blocked by the main building. A short meandering trail (actually, a sidewalk) through a rock garden leads uphill to the spa section of the spa resort. There is a unique "pool barn", a long lap pool with 2 or 3 lanes housed in a glass-walled faux barn -- cute. There is a hang-out-and-chill pool, with plenty of pool chairs, shaded areas (under tents) and a hot tub. Finally, a new, expansive structure houses the Spa facilities: massage and "treatment" rooms, hair and nail salons, men's and women's locker rooms, whirlpools, saunas and steam rooms. I'm leaving out details for brevity. The place is equipped! Personally, there were many firsts for me on this trip. First stay at a spa/resort. First pedicure. First facial (hey, it's in the "treatments for men" section -- the "Manmade Facial"). First Yoga class. First Tai Chi class. First time I've done 150 minutes of cardio within 4 days. The meals were generally pretty good to excellent and were portion controlled. Every item on the menu had an associated calorie count (except dessert) and portions were moderate to small. If you skipped dessert, you'd probably be taking in between 1200 and 1800 calories a day, depending on your choices. Coffee, iced tea, and iced herbal tea were available all day. I was surprised to see that the resort hosted nightly writer's talks with renowned writers and poets. I sat in on an intimate talk with "San Antonio's most celebrated poetess"** Naomi Nye. It felt a little strange being the only guy in the rather intimate, living-room like setting. The talk was captivating, though. How often do you get to hear a real poet reading her work unamplified? I even got to write a poem. The assigned subject was forgetting. Alloted time: 5 minutes.

    Remind me again
    I know I've asked you this before
    The name of that guy
    in that movie?
    with the girl from "Moonlighting"?

    Jeff Bridges

    yes!

Ms. Nye is Arab-American. Going into the talk, I had no idea how political it might be, though her Open Letter to Any Would-Be Terrorists gave me some idea. I was definitely curious and a little nervous at how her views would fly at the (let's be frank) pretty right-leaning clientele of LASR. As it turns out, the readings were politico-neutral, from a book Ms. Nye wrote for tweens. Also, she didn't look obviously Arabic and spoke without an accent (unlike the twangy guests). So, not a breath of controversy. I recommend the place. *Average gender, there's a concept. Similar to having 1.2 kids, I guess. **San Antonio Community College