$1 per day during September at Fitness First is a great deal and I signed up today. It was my first time in a big, fancy gym chain and it really showed!
I got on a HUGE elliptical machine and started pedalling/running (can't decide which it is) away. When I felt like increasing the resistance, I pressed the upward pointing triangle. That looked like "increase" to me. Nothing happened. Pressed it some more. Still nothing. I thought perhaps it was not working and was about to jump off when I noticed that I was not pressing the triangles on the main console. This was a smaller thing attached at the side. At first I thought it was for convenience, nearer my hand, but eventually, I worked out that I was increasing the volume to the TVs. Who would have guessed that they put the capability of individually selecting whichever TV you wanted at every one of the 50 machines they had there? I would have known this if I had some ear phones on but I didn't. D'oh!
Then at the weights machines...another blurry moment. There were no stack of weights attached to the machines. There as a display in front of the seat that said "Resistance" and "Repetitions" and then described how to use the equipment safely but that was it. Sat down, tried to push off for some sort of arm exercise but nothing budged. I circled the apparatus and eventually a helpful staff member noticed my strange behavior and came up. These fancy machines have little buttons attached to where your thumbs rest so that you can adjust the resistance 'conveniently'. Change the AIR PRESSURE with your thumb! Now why didn't I jump to the conclusion of convenience as I did with the elliptical machine?
As I finished my exercises, I thought of how happy I felt. For one, I really needed the time to quiet my mind with all the daily mess of a baby in it. But the bubbly feelings seemed to stem more from the 'WOW' factor I had floating around me. Its been a long time since I've used something for the first time that I thought was really cool. I may sound like a villager to the rest of the world but I enjoyed my new experiences today at the fancy gym.
2 comments:
Woah, that is way too fancy for me too. I'm just used to using free weights and have my personal trainer passed me my weights! None of these fancy schmancy stuff. Haha.
Agnes was bitten by the fitness bug some time ago and decided we should sign up at our local Gold's Gym. Note that I wrote "we." As I might have expected, I lasted longer than she did, and really enjoyed some of the yoga and stretching classes. I had to quit, though, when I hurt my shoulder overdoing things that might not have been as tough at 18 as they are at 55. As the joke goes, I'm in shape...after all, "round" is a shape!
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