Friday, May 16, 2008

Gin In My Apron Pocket: Using my gym membership


As a member of Lotta's gin tipping club, I am proud to report that I went to the gym this morning for the second time this week!!!!!

I mentioned before that for Christmas my Mom gave me a year membership to a gym that I had been wanting to join. So I went a couple times in January, maybe once in February. I think I'm being a little generous with myself here. But the point is I have not been in quite a while.

So this morning and Wednesday morning both I walked on the treadmill for an hour. I have to play little mind games with myself. I start out slow for five minutes then increase every five minutes until I hit my maximum speed at 15 minutes. At that point I say to myself all I have to do is five or ten minutes at this speed. By the time I reach ten minutes I feel pretty good and can go for a little longer. So I went at my max speed for a full 30 minutes and then slowly decreased my speed by five minutes increments.

One of the lovely things I inherited from my Mother's side of the family is a little dizziness. All the women in the family suffer from a little vertigo here and there. Some worse than others. But for me if I don't slowly decrease my speed and baby step my way off of that treadmill then I am in trouble.

All the treadmills at the gym have televisions with cable in them. So you just bring your headphones and plug it in to the treadmill and you can watch tv while you walk. That makes a big difference to me. It really helps to pass the time.

When you finish using the equipment you are supposed to use this rag and spray to clean it up a bit before you leave. But they also have this guy that walks around wiping things down too. So I see him getting a little closer to me and he starts wiping down this treadmill next to me with a guy walking on it. I'm thinking please don't come over here because I just knew it was going to throw me off. Sure enough here he comes. He totally wiped all the edges of the track off while I was walking on it. I kept thinking "please don't let me fall".... I didn't fall, but it was a little awkward. I have my headphones on trying to find my zone and this guy is wiping down by my feet. Am I supposed to chat with him? Make eye contact? Smile? Just a little weird.......

5 comments:

Mom O Matic said...

Your rock! That's not an easy thing to do. Try for 3 times next week if you dare.

so tired said...

Lotta,
I walked outside around the park in my neighborhood yesterday for one hour. Let me tell ya, walking outside is a lot harder than the treadmill. I did enjoy the music on my ipod though!

Preppy Lizard said...

Way to go! I try to get on my treadmill for an hour a day.

That is so wierd that the guy was cleaning your treadmill while you were on it. That would have thrown me too.

Muffy Willowbrook said...

Congratulations! Great job! keep it up, sista!

Ok: the guy wiping down your machine while you're ON IT, is just stupid. It's intrusive! Maybe you should ask Mgmt if this is absolutely necessary.

I work out at a club nearly every day and all the members can manage to clean their own machines.

Anonymous said...

Very good on the gym thing-keep going. My favorite part-I drop off the kids and can focus on me for an hour or so every day.

If the guy does that again-politely ask him to wait until you are finished. Don't let someone invade your space like that-ridiculous!