A NUMBER of things came to mind when I walked into the backyard that terrible evening.

The first was this: my friend Patrick (not his real name) had come over to visit. Patrick is a fellow journalist, and a winner of the Pulitzer Prize. He works for a very respectable American publication. As you would expect, Patrick is engaging company, and I was glad that he had come over. And yet, there was a problem — hence the other thoughts that followed in quick succession.

Patrick was completely naked. And he was holding a Budweiser while talking to my wife. I remember this moment vividly, because it accompanied an epiphany so dramatic that my life in California has never been the same since. It was a moment when my reserved English nature finally triumphed over an element of LA culture that I had never been comfortable with. Yes, I pledged there and then: as soon as Patrick left, I would sell my “hot tub” and never own one again.

Luckily, my wife experienced the same moment of clarity during her tubside chat with our hirsute and sweating guest who, without a moment of hesitation, had ripped off his underwear and climbed into the pool of steaming hot water with a long and low groan. “Patrick, did you just take off your boxers?” my wife inquired calmly. He replied cheerily in the affirmative.

Before I moved to America, I had never even heard of a hot tub before. Perhaps this is because they require a lot of space and a tolerance for four-digit electricity bills (although I’ve seen hot tubs built into portable wooden gazebos, which can be wheeled indoors).

Wikipedia offers this definition: “A small pool of heated water used for soaking, relaxation, massage or hydrotherapy, in most cases [having] jets for massage purposes.” What it doesn’t say is that Americans spend more than $7 billion on these human cauldrons every year, usually crane-lifting them over their homes into their back gardens.

Personally, I’ve always regarded the hot tub as a scam invented by single men to get single women to wear bikinis at social gatherings. My evidence? Both of my neighbours are single men. Both of them paid about ten grand to install luxury hot tubs (or “home spas”, to use the marketing term) in their decks within weeks of moving in.

Having seen their house party guests arriving, I can assure you it works — although perhaps that’s just an LA thing.

Unfortunately, however, a hot tub party means the men also have to get naked — which, in my case, means displaying my reverse tan and one-pack belly. And then there’s the heat: I always end up sweating like Tom Cruise at a Prozac convention. Also, because the hot tub is used communally, the water is pumped full of chemicals to kill the bacteria from people’s bodies. Sometimes, the bacteria survive — hence the medical phenomenon known as “hot tub lung” (some argue that chlorine loses its ability to disinfect above 84F). A nasty case of hot tub lung can take up to a year to clear up.

Now, I realise that the issue of hot tub usage is not among the most pressing in America today — what with the approaching midterm elections, the 9/11 anniversary, and the crisis over immigration. But there is growing evidence that Americans are finally beginning to come to their senses. This week alone, hot tubs have set fire to a house in Massachusetts, drowned a toddler in Orange County, been used to “cure” gays in Palm Springs (I’m not kidding), killed a man from Arkansas (he fell out of one), and inspired a grisly family murder in Indiana (a man’s strangled wife was found dead in one). How much more of this can the country take?

Not much, suggests the Los Angeles Times. This weekend, it ran a story entitled “You want to take a what?” about squeamish hotel guests refusing to use baths because of their fear over what other guests had done in them (watch Pretty Woman if your imagination isn’t working).

Does this mean what I think it means? Will the hot tub be the next victim of the “ick-factor” attack?

Alas, not yet. A few weeks ago, we had a real-estate broker over to see what our house would be worth if we put it on the market. I can remember only one thing he said: “Hey, why don’t you guys install a hot tub? It’ll add fifty grand, at least.”

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