GYMTASTIC

So I joined my local gym. I’ll spare you the details on how I got a MASSIVE deal and will be slightly gaming the system when I leave for New York in November. Instead I’ll just tell you that it’s 800 meters away from my house. It’s really hard not to go to the gym when it’s that close and it’s quite enjoyable to just ramble down on a whim, instead of taking a bus or train.

There are good points and some bad points. I’ll start with the bad and then migrate toward the fantastic once I’m done whining.

Bad Stuff

• It’s really close, so there’s no excuse for not going.
• All the cardio and weight machines are in the same room, which means us lowlifes who like to run/walk/crosstrain/row get stared out of it by all the meatheads.
• Aforementioned meatheads LOOOOVE to grunt. Imagine listening to womens doubles at Wimbledon on the radio with zero commentary. Now replace all those orgasming women with hulking men sporting giant upper bodies and TIIIIIIINNY legs. Each has their own specific mating call.
• The bendy  eastern European lady who comes every day (as far as I can tell, since I don’t go everyday) and uses that weird floaty step machine that I don’t know the name of. She comes dressed in her suit, all six feet of her, and then she goes to the changing room, smiling smugly to herself. Seriously, all the time with the smiling, but never to anyone but herself and not in a “she must be happy” kind of way. In a “she must be happy with herself” kind of way. Anyway, she’s got frizzy blonde and grey hair and a thin-as-a-rail-but-somehow-flabby body. You can tell she goes to the gym ALL the time, but you can also tell she either drinks a lot/eats junky food, because though she can spend an hour on that cardio thinger, she does not look like your average, toned gym bunny. All muffin-top and bingo wings. Anyway, once she’s done, she walks to the middle of the weights part of the room, where there’s this big weird mat thing that stands on it’s side. She then proceeds to lift one leg over her head, up by her ear, and lean it against the mat, while casually smiling at anything with a penis.
• Anything with a penis.
• Having to beg for a quarter because I forgot my padlock and needed to use the vend-a-lockers.
• Forgetting to bring flip-flops.
• Chancing it and getting athletes foot so intense, I’m sure I must have had it before I got into the showers.

The Good

• The eastern European lady. She may be full of her own self importance, but watching her in the weights room is HILARIOUS.
• Getting TWO bottles of Gatorade from the vending machine. That’ll teach you to charge me $3.50 for a bottle!!! ONE. I can get SIX in Walmart for $5.
• The ginge with the slamming body but a wrecked face. You can come every other day, but exercise canNOT make you pretty. You know what can? Being NICE TO PEOPLE. I may be jealous of your muscles, but you missy, are jealous of my face. And the fact that I CAN CLEAN THE FUCKING MACHINES WHEN I’M DONE!!! IT’S A RULE FOR A REASON! No one likes to touch sweaty buttons/handles when they’re just arriving at the gym.
• Watching a kid measure the outside of the building with a banana. He looked like he was on some kind of scavenger hunt so it wasn’t THAT weird, but it was entertaining for everyone at the gym.
• The entire front of the room is glass, allowing us to watch the aforementioned kid, puppies in the park, bums by the river and of course, feel like we’re actually pedaling somewhere.
• Using my charm to get a quarter from a beefed up guy who didn’t even make me take off my clothes.
• DISCOVERING CROSS TRAINERS.
• Taking up weight machines by trying to figure out how they work.
• Taking up weight machines by only lifting a puny 30lbs. It counts!!
• Accidentally forgetting to clean my sweat off the machines. Yes, I know slamming-hot-ginge does this and I hate her for it, but really, there’s no point beating yourself up over something you can’t change. SOMEtimes, if I remember in time, I act like I was just casting a very WIIIIIIIDE spray-bottle-and-towel net, and come back to clean it, but if I’m already on another machine, fahgedabowdit. I just vow to be better next time. See, constant self-improvement is what I’m all about.

I feel like I’ve learned so much, despite only having gone four times. What will I learn/encounter next week?? WHO KNOWS!!

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