Sweat, decapitation, and Tigger: All in a day's work at the gym

I've had a quite a few weird moments at the gym this past week, so I think they need to be shared. Some of them involved my own weird moments, and some involve the oddities of others (yay, good alliteration!).

• I'll start off with the guy I will will henceforth call Sweaty Grunting Man (or SGM). I was about to start on the elliptical yesterday when this older man came over and went on the elliptical beside me. SGM was very chatty and started going on about how he did the elliptical for 3 hours the day before (after seeing him in action, I have serious doubts about this story). I had no problem saying hello, but I am not a talker when I'm doing cardio. I become pretty antisocial for that time period, mainly because of that laser-like focus I have mentioned in earlier posts (actually, I originally said that jokingly, but it has kind of become true). So I put in my earbuds and all was quiet for a few minutes. And then, coming through the beat of my inspirational music, I hear grunting. And when I say grunting, I don't mean quiet, little grunts. I mean, OMG-this-man-is-going-to-die-any-second grunts. And along with the grunts, came the motivational talking. And again, not quiet phrases under your breath to keep yourself going. I mean an actual conversation with himself. It was quite disturbing to bear witness to. And then, as I glance to the floor beside me, I see the massive amount of sweat under SGM's elliptical. The floor is soaked, so I think that he must be going pretty fast, or perhaps have some sort of sweat gland dysfunction. But no, SGM is barely moving, which is why I have my doubts about the 3 hour elliptical story and why I feared he may actually die beside me, and not just make grunts alluding to that scenario.

•  So as not to be a hypocrite, I will admit that I also talk to myself when pushing through a hard section of cardio. The difference between me and SGM though is that 1) I speak very quietly and 2) I speak only an occasional short phrase such as, "You can do this!". I also sometimes lip synch to my music. As I've said before, I have a somewhat embarrassing exercise playlist that mainly consists of inspirational and corny songs. As an example, I will say only that the old Biggest Loser theme song "Proud," as well as "The Climb," are on that list. To anyone who makes fun of my playlist, I say, you can't argue with the results! Most of the time no one notices my lip synching or talking to myself, but every now and then someone does and I get a weird stare. And sometimes I weird myself out by not just lip synching the motivational parts of a song, but also parts such as, "my humps, my humps, my lovely lady lumps."

•  The same day I had to deal with SGM wrecking havoc with my focus, I also had to deal with Brave, Yet Irritating, Handyman (BYIH). For some reason, the paneling on the partition in front of the ellipticals needed to be replaced that day. So all the ellipticals were moved back so BYIH could work on doing that. However, when actually using the elliptical, the machinery came disturbingly close to BYIH's head. He did not seem to be disturbed by this, which explains the brave part of his name (or perhaps just stupid). But it was really freaking me out  because I'm pretty sure decapitating BYIH would wreck my concentration, plus I might feel some amount of guilt and horror over that situation.  But it wasn't BYIH's fault that he was messing up my routine, because after all, he was just trying to do his job. So I decide to change ellipticals, so I can focus on my work-out rather than BYIH's imminent decapitation. And of course, he then moves down to work directly in front of that elliptical! I tell myself, maybe it's not so bad. But sadly, it is that bad. And so I move again. And 5 minutes later, so does he, right in front of me. At the point I add the "Yet Irritating" part to his name and decide to do the treadmill instead.

•  At my gym, the treadmills are located directly in front of the ellipticals. Aside from the occasional eye candy, I usually do not really pay much attention to the treadmill people. But sadly, Weird Sweat Pattern Woman (WSPW) demanded that attention be paid. I see this woman all the time and she always wears these very tight, short,  light grey bike shorts. It's not really a good look, but she pulls it off as well as a 65-year-old woman could, so I usually silently applaud her fitness, dedication to the gym, and brave fashion forays. Anyway, when this woman is about 20 minutes into her run, I see a disturbing sweat pattern start to emerge. There is no way to describe it other than her sweat made a thong pattern on her butt. And as she worked out harder and harder, the sweat pattern became darker and darker until it was impossible to ignore. Then WSPW turns around to get off the treadmill, and I see the the weirdness continues onto her front. No thong pattern here, no, not nearly anything that innocuous. On her front side, it seriously just looks like she wet herself. And this is a pattern I see repeating itself day after day, week after week. And that,  folks, is why you will never see me in tight, short bicycle shorts even at my goal weight. Because I fear the same fate could await me or anyone else who attempts such fashion bravery. 

• Finally, I will share the story of Freaky Running Boy (FRB). As I said, I do occasionally enjoy watching some nice eye candy on the treadmill. So when FRB came over to the treadmills looking nicely muscled and quite hot overall, I noticed. Unfortunately, the admiration turned into incredulity and confusion when he started to run on the treadmill. He ran at a pretty good pace for a pretty long time, so he's definitely in shape. I'll give him that much. But the only way I can describe his running would be that of Tigger from Winnie-the-Pooh running. Every other step he took, he bounced. And not just a little hop. It was perhaps the weirdest running I have ever seen. But hey, at least FRB is pretty. 

The gym: Not only a place to get in shape, but also a place to observe some pretty weird crap. And to people I have described (not that they read this blog), I really do admire all of you for getting healthy. But sometimes weirdness such as this must be shared. And in a few cases, I mean shared with a medical professional because there is something weird going on internally.