This Is Your Brain On Exercise...

Walked this morning - what is now my usual route, which you've heard before.

Walked at lunchtime too, doing the pathways walk, and again, being the only actual walker with two gym-instructors.

Then tonight, we hit the centre for our now-traditional Wednesday double-bill of swimming and gymming.

Got on the treadmill, and ran. And ran. And ran. 2km, thankyouverymuch - and no, I didn't feel like I was about to die at the end of it, so that's my mile run. One thing though...

Ahem...

I need a sports bra if I'm gonna keep this running shit up. At one point tonight, I was running with my fists clenched to my still-prodigious man-breasts, hoping no-one noticed. Thankfully, no-one did, or if they did, I didn't hear, because I was in a world of sweat and Thin Lizzy.

d did rat me out to the Instructor after the running though.
"He needs to do upper body work!" she said.
"Ohhhhh right - well, have a go on here, Butty," said the avuncular, young, altogether appallingly healthy Instructor, sitting me in a machine that would tear my chest muscles...I'm sorry, work my chest muscles to shreds...

As soon as he wandered off, I was out of that thing like a cat on a hot plate.
I tried something else. It seemed to be a pair of pedals. I stared at it, then collared the older, but still offensively healthy Instructor, Christine.
"What is this, and how does it work?" I asked.
She explained. It was a step machine.
I got on, and sank to the ground.
"Step!" said Chris.
I stepped, slowly sinking.
"STEP!" she yelled. "Step, step, step..."
"Ohhh...." I almost moaned. And then I stepped, going up and up instead of down and down. The second I paused, I sank back to the ground.
"Clearly, this was made in Hell..." I muttered, buggering off somewhere else.

Eventually, our eyes met across a crowded gym, and we didn't-run out of there. I went back to the changing room, and popped into a cubicle to de-sweat a little.

Erm...
Have you ever had one of those moments where you think "Did I say that, or did I think that?"
There was a father and son out in the main changing room.
"Hey Nath?" said the dad. "You want some chips now?"

From my cubicle, I heard a voice call.
"Oh Christ yes!"
I gulped, freezing in a yogic position that could probably be described as The Blasted Tree.
"Nah, you're alright..." said the kid, not even giving me anonymity in agreement. I hid in my cubicle till I heard them leave...

As we were coming home, I turned to d.
"Alright, what is it?"
"What?"
"There's a word..." I said. "There's a word for the thing we usually mime at this point, and the only words I can think of are stromboli and luge, and I know it's neither of those..."
d laughed. She was remembering how the mime began. We've always wanted to try segwaying, and when we come back from the gym, we mime segwaying the last few blocks, just because we can.
"Stromboli?" she asked. "Seriously?"
"What the Hell is a Stromboli again?"
"Big filled Italian...pasty," she explained.
"Then that's definitely not it," I said.
"No dear. You mean Segway."
That's the one...
"Are you alright, dear?"
"Just goes to prove," I muttered. "Exercise is all very well, but it fries your brain...
"C'mon honey," said d. "Imaginary segway with me..."
And we did. It's been that sort of day.