As a first-time gym member, I find gym culture, such as it is, to be quite fascinating. It's a great place to people-watch and there are many things that amuse me about the whole place.

Therefore, I present to you….


Things I like about the gym:


The naked women

Perhaps this is limited to my own experience, but I have had very little opportunity in my life to check out other normal, everyday naked female bodies. If I think about it, most of my references come from movies and television. I was never a member of a women's sports team, I've never hung out in locker rooms, I attended a co-ed university and I've never visited a European beach resort so my opportunities for a careful study of female bodies have been limited. I can't even remember the last time I saw my mother or my sister naked. It's just not done. So it's quite interesting to me to see all these different bellies and thighs and muscles and boobs on a regular basis. I especially like to see the older women, the ones in their 50s on up because their bodies are just as lovely to me and just as various.

The geezers in their retro sportswear

My gym is patronized by an older crowd, and there is this cadre of older men, in their 70s and older whom I adore, mostly because of their adherence to their own fashion ethic. You'll never find these guys in wicking fabrics or highly engineered performance wear. These guys favor white Keds with white knees socks pulled all the way up, white canvas shorts and old t-shirts washed so many times they are almost see-through. And of course, there is the ubiquitous terry-cloth headband worn smack dab across the middle of the forehead. What's more, they are universally pleasant and good-humored and are just pretty much goofing off and having a blast. Love 'em.

The growlers and groaners in the weight room

First of all, I love the fact that the weight room stereo system is always playing some kind of thrash-metal, but the volume is set at a very unobtrusive level. It seems like such an obliging, polite thing to do, while still acknowledging the fact that weight lifting should apparently be accompanied by some sort of screaming mood music. There are always a few guys in the weight room who are extremely serious. First of all, they move their weights really, really fast. I'm over in my corner lifting my weights nice and slow, but these guys are in a race of some sort. My theory is that the weights are so painful that they have no choice but to lift in a frenzy. Second, they groan and growl while doing their mad dash. These always put me inappropriately in mind of certain sex-like noises, which just makes it even more impossible for me to be deadly serious about the whole thing.

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I did a good job this week of running regularly. I'm doing 35 minutes now, but I'm not measuring distance so I don't know what my mile times are. Some of these runs are relatively easy, but some still are quite a struggle. I've heard that one should breath in through the nose and out through the mouth, but I'm still breathing in and out with my mouth and if I try through the nose I feel like I'm about to faint. My point here is that I my aerobic capacity is still in need of improvement.
I'm also doing my beginner's dumbbell routine, though I upped the weights from 5lbs. to 10-12 lbs. for most of the exercises, and more for the ones that I do on machines.
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My parents got me this for Christmas: the Journal 10+. I'm excited about it and thought some of you out there in journal land might be interested in the concept.