Fit on the walking side of lights

I am not for the gym

You will not see me in a gym pumping iron, the truth is I have never been a consistent gymgoer, the draw, the interest, the desire, and the drive soon wears off in novelty whilst the gym happiest cashes in a direct debit payment monthly with glee.

When it comes to gym equipment, I have enough stashed away around my apartment and under my bed for any regime to tone anything you want on your body to the muscles that can make your ears wag like elephant ears.

The walks do suit me

Yet, I find myself enjoying the walking exercises with some consistency that surprises me. The rain, the sun, the cold, the time, and whatever the weather is no impediment to getting out to do the basic 10,000 steps and a little more.

Now, I might not wake up early for my dawn walks especially if I have not put in enough sleep overnight, but soon after work, I will be on the trot, the regular route if there is still some light or the major well-lit roads when it is dark.

Black objects in the dark

I do worry about many of my fellow road users, the cars would obviously have their lights on, too many cyclists have no lights, especially the delivery couriers and they are in dark clothes too, a danger to themselves and others as moving black objects in the dark. I will have flashing LED armbands to at least make people aware that I am there.

Four vehicles flashing their blue lights, some with their sirens blaring probably needing to be somewhere fast to bring help or take the wounded or ill to the hospital. Emergency Ambulance the writing on the vans read. It made we wonder when is an ambulance not an emergency vehicle? Then, maybe there is a fee for the number of letters painted on the vehicle, do you know?

I paused the video so she could take a rest

Too mule to train

My Brian would love the role of a personal trainer, bless him, but not if I could help it. For one, I respond better to gentle persuasion than instruction. 4 years of secondary boarding school was enough of being ordered around that I was unpersuadable about going to sixth-form school and my mother who was a principal then could have obtained entry to any school of choice, but she could not get between my ears.

Obviously, he has taken interest in my return to the gym, discipline and persistence are rivals to my continuing to the point of seeing benefits. The topic of music for my workout came up again and his suggestion just was far from impressive. Yes, I could say to rowers in Cape Town, “Put your back in it, just a little more.”, God forfend in my sweating exhaustion I play that back to my own hearing to urge myself on. [YouTube:Masters at Work – Work at your leisure.]

My drumsticks hurt

As for calling me chicken as if to dare me, what I decide to do is what I do, names are just that, names. Don’t forget chickens are probably the hardiest and most maltreated animals in the whole, yet they thrive in whatever condition they are in. To be chicken is to have tenacity, the will to live and hold life sacred without unnecessarily courting danger.

I picked up a little more speed in my brisk walk on the treadmill, going at 6 km/h for starters and then up to 6.6 km/h for the last 15 of 25 minutes. I worked up a good sweat. Then moved to the floor exercises, going back to an old favourite Rebecca-Louise Smith on YouTube and she left me in the dust. It would take time. Maybe I should take the advice of a comment. “I paused the video so she could take a rest.”

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Meanwhile, for my workout music, it was Anita Baker which strangely was not on my phone, I had it in the cloud on OneDrive and thankfully, the gym offers free Wi-Fi. To stream directly from the cloud, I use the CloudPlayer Premium app.

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Suffice it to say, by the time my timeslot was up, I was ready to up and leave. Tomorrow is another day.

Right back on the treadmill

Getting up to speed

It is still baby steps at the gym, a process of gradually helping my body adapt to exertion and exercise whilst slowly discovering the muscles and regions of imminent pain I never thought I had.

Brian is somewhat interested in what I am up to as I have now booked 14 50-minute dates at the gym. Most of what I have done is brisk walking for 25 minutes going up to 6.5 km/h and then some floor exercises.

I don’t know if my time slot is quiet or my village community is not that keen on this kind of trouble. The only other visitors have gone to the swimming pool instead. Now, earlier we talked about music to workout to, he just needs some pace and rhythm to work out to whether or not he likes the music. I would playback my music collection of Anita Baker or the Emancipation album of Prince.

The workout was energetic with me breaking a sweat as I reached and maintained the target heart rate, the track that stuck in my memory after the exhausting session, says everything. That’s my only mission, get trim and get him.

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I do my hair toss in the gym

Terms of wordy abuse

With the progressive easing of the lockdown restrictions, gyms are not open subject to regulatory requirements of social distancing and strict cleaning protocols. My village leisure centre that serves occupants of 5 apartment blocks became a venue of interest.

The lockdown has focused minds towards a kind of fitness regimen to lose the weight acquired over 18 weeks of sequestration with the dearth of engaging physical activity. The management company of our village fired off an email seeking interest from the village and on responding we received a 55-point Terms of Use & Disclaimer document that we had to sign before having our gym entry cards activated and getting a link to the booking system.

Definitely maybe

That in itself was a mental and agitated workout because what could have easily been digitally signed with evidence of the duration of viewing the document was sent as PDF file, in 2020. I could not let that pass without intimating them of a better way of doing things.

The leisure centre consists of a gym, a swimming pool, a games room, a steam room and a sauna. The last two are not currently open and the games room will not provide snooker or darts. The equipment in the gym is marked out for spacing, some taped off rather than being moved out. There are no weights, lots of sanitising stations and cleaning materials for post-usage cleaning.

We are allotted 50 minutes per session for one of the leisure centre facilities per day and I spent my 50 minutes in the gym, doing a brisk walk on the treadmill before attempting some floor exercises. I think it is a good thing, it might get my mind off my weight too. We’ll see. Whilst Lizzo helps me look good as hell.

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Anyone for the gym?

So, I sauntered off to the gym,
Not really expecting to see a guy named Jim,
Even if many went there for the trim,
It was a feast of muscle filled to the brim.

To some classes, I got to late,
Before to music we repetitively did gyrate,
To exhaustion, we inflate and deflate,
Not once did the trainer berate,

I realised I didn’t know right from left,
My rhythm not anything near deft,
In sweat to my body, my clothes were cleft,
This was before we had much to heft.

For all the sizes there on show,
It was the Muscle Marys in afterglow,
Preening and prancing on the weights with gusto,
A distraction from the general flow.

Some exercises seem so tough,
Tugging on muscles that make you gruff,
With time and grit, you’re trim and buff,
The result of many a huff and puff.

Caught skipping with the girls again

Between Jim and the gym

Just after my birthday, I thought about it again, the need to keep fit and trim, knowing that the passing of time leaves changes one must have in control before it is too difficult to rein it in.

Having been away from home for weeks, I first had to update my swipe card access to the village gym which has everything including a swimming pool, a sauna and games room. The swimming I have to get to eventually, I have been too much of a log or a stone in water, there is no fun in that.

Knowing me, knowing shoes

Then, I needed to get the best shoes to cushion the effect of running because of lifelong shin splints. My research online yielded lots of information which boiled down to the best shoes that had fitting, quality or durability issues, not one stood out as the best and I was in information overload already.

A visit to the shopping mall with sports shops belonging to chains did not seem to offer much encouragement, I did not see anyone who appeared to have any useful knowledge about running shoes or trainers apart from their projecting the necessity to make a sale to the most gullible customer who dared to believe anything they said.

A size for a length

I took a walk down the main street and happened upon a small family shop that had one customer inside who had tried nothing less than seven pairs of shoes, the attendant, patient, understanding, explaining and serving. He seemed to know what he was talking about as I pulled up my references to guide me in decision making.

It became clear that my shoe size for normal shoes was probably two sizes smaller when trying on trainers, but when I slid my feet into Size 19 shoes, I could only presume something was wrong with quality control or the sweatshop makers of the shoes were making skis rather than shoes.

Eventually, I settled for a pair of the most comfortable and well-cushioned shoes, the fitting was so good, knowing how my feet have suffered through spurts of growth that shoes did not expand to, this is like shoe heaven.

Altogether, with Christmas approaching, I got discount on everything and probably paid 30% less along with free merchandise to boot. I was ready for the gym.

Skipping with the girls again

I then revived my gym membership with The Gym Group with the bundle that allows me the countrywide use of any gym in the group and we were on to an exercise program for the first four weeks and then the next four.

Down in Reading, I registered for an induction that went well before opting for a boot camp class. No gym equipment, just running, jumping and stretching over the course of 30 minutes. The setting reviving a childhood experience as I was the only male apart from the trainer in a group of 10.

My childhood fragility meant I was left skipping with the girls rather than playing football with the boys, it appeared I was back doing things with the girls again. Such is life at the gym.