{"id":3674,"date":"2016-01-31T18:12:01","date_gmt":"2016-01-31T18:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=3674"},"modified":"2016-01-31T18:16:49","modified_gmt":"2016-01-31T18:16:49","slug":"musings-from-the-gym","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/?p=3674","title":{"rendered":"Musings from the gym"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Bicep<\/a>

Bicep curl\/Jaggerhaze\/flickr
Any resemblance to the author is highly improbable<\/p><\/div>\n

Oh, no\u00a0 . . . only one more minute to go. I won\u2019t find out if that cloisonn\u00e9 enamel box makes enough to cover what the red team spent on it . . . What! I\u2019ve only covered 4.7 km!<\/p>\n

Where next? Bench press \u2013 occupied. What is it with these blokes who just sit motionless on pieces of equipment with towels over their heads? How\u2019s that supposed to work? Does communing with the spirit of the lateral pull-down machine do as much good as actually pulling down laterally?<\/p>\n

Ah, the lateral pull-down is free . . . I\u2019ll just move this key up about a foot. That chap\u2019s good at skipping. I wonder what would happen if I gave it a go . . .\u00a0 Could I still do all the fancy stuff like a double-turn or going through a cross-armed loop backwards? Probably not. Recipe for humiliation. But would I get any takers for an elastic skipping class for the mature fitness fan?<\/p>\n

Blimey! Look at that singlet! Do you think that\u2019s really the thing, lady, what with you being . . . NO! I must not even think that!<\/p>\n

What does that vibrate-y machine do? It looks as though all you have to do is apply different bits of your anatomy to it. Maybe I\u2019ll give it a try . . . one day when there\u2019s absolutely no one else in the gym.<\/p>\n

Well at least I can lie down now . . . 22-elephant . . . 23-elephant . . . 24-elephant . . . can I come up a bit higher? 28-elephant . . . 29-elephant . . .\u00a0 30-elephant . . . Oof! Germaine Greer was right: let\u2019s bring back laced bodices and voluminous skirts accommodating babies, beer guts and tubes of Pringles and forget about this ridiculous obsession with having a flat stomach.<\/p>\n

Aaarrrrgghh . . . Blerrrggghh . . . Yerrrrggghh . . . oh, my god, someone\u2019s being sick! Bring buckets and Dettol, quick! Oh, it\u2019s OK; it\u2019s only that bloke doing a bit of a clean and snatch. Why don\u2019t these weightlifters all have hernias? (And don’t they realise those six-packs just look as if they’ve got creepy mutant insect thoraxes?)<\/p>\n

. . . coffee, tomatoes, mushrooms, lettuce . . .<\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Only<\/a>

Only the calf machine\/Kat\/flickr<\/p><\/div>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

. . . eight . . . nine . . oh, too late . . . my trouser legs are falling up . . . why didn\u2019t I tuck them into my socks? Weedy white leg alert! But I can\u2019t stop now.<\/p>\n

Oh, no, not that track again! Why can\u2019t they do a \u2018Workout to the Classics\u2019 session? Perhaps I\u2019ll put it in the suggestions box. Or what about a \u2018Blast from the Past\u2019 one, with all the songs with the best tempo for exercising: Let\u2019s Go to the Hop<\/em>, Johnny B. Goode<\/em> . . . and Queen and Abba strictly verboten.<\/p>\n

. . . Can I get any nearer my toes this week? . . . No. Why not? I\u2019ve only been doing this every week for the past 15 years, for heaven\u2019s sake. Relax, breathe, pretend you\u2019re not trying.<\/p>\n

Trust me to have parked myself next to one of the kids from Fame<\/em>, whose idea of a comfortable pose is to do the splits . . . Ooh, is that bit of dried mud off my trainer?<\/p>\n

. . . Ouch! Perhaps I\u2019m overdoing it . . . it\u2019s feeling a bit achey along there. Perhaps it\u2019s groin strain. Can women get groin strain? \u00a0What do you do if you\u2019ve got it? Crash the pain barrier or sit on the sofa for a week?<\/p>\n

. . . do we need loo paper too? . . .<\/p>\n

Last stretch . . . 28-elephant . . . 29-elephant . . . 30-elephant . . . IT\u2019S SO BRILLIANT WHEN YOU STOP!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/u><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Weedy white leg alert!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":3694,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,55,56],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3674"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3674"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3674\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3699,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3674\/revisions\/3699"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/damesnet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}