Gym fail

The benefits of exercise are blindingly obvious when you are sitting on the couch feeling guilty about eating yet another piece of cherry nougat. All I can think about at that stage is how much healthier I feel after exercise, how much better I eat after exercise and how wonderful it feels to be fit enough to run 8km’s in the mornings without keeling over half-way from exhaustion. I felt this familiar nagging sensation after eating a steak laden with creamy red wine sauce on Friday night, after polishing off an insanely scrumptious chicken lasagna with ‘The Hot Fisherman’ on Saturday evening and after licking my plate clean of any visible traces of chocolate croissant on Sunday morning. After spending a considerable amount of time weighing up the beauty and informational benefits of an extra hour of shut-eye followed by an hour of long-distance stalking of Will Smith through the E True Hollywood Story vs. going to gym, I finally let ‘The Hot Fisherman’ bundle me into my car late Sunday morning.


After spending a small fortune on two bottles of water (I chose an expensive brand of water which is supposed to be equivalent to taking vitamins – great marketing gimmick that) we finally loped through the turnstiles of the gym. Coughing up half a lung and sneezing from the insult of chlorine on our mucous membranes, ‘The Hot Fisherman’ and I ascended the stairs to the weights section. There, we performed a series of death defying exercises such as:

• A gazillion lunges with 6 kilo weights in each hand,

• Squats with weights,

• Quadriceps extensions,

• Hamstring curls,

• Abduction exercises or the ‘Yes/No machine’ as The Hot Fisherman refers to it,

• Leg press AND

• Ab exercises

Finally, after an hour of torture, ‘The Hot Fisherman’ and I limped out of the gym to the car.

The second day after gym is always the worst. The benefits of exercise are no longer relevant when you wake up in the morning with legs so stiff that the only way you can get yourself mobile is to walk with straight knees. I am a walking stick man...or woman. It looks like my legs have been placed in Plaster of Paris. Forrest Gump in braces has got nothing on my limp. Worse still, my bum is so stiff that every time I sit down I have to let loose a little groan of pain like an old lady after a hip transplant. I have to hold onto the railing when ascending stairs as I may pass out from the throbbing in my quads and I am considering buying some ice during my lunch break to attempt to reduce the inflammation in my calves (I had to wear high heels this morning because it was physically impossible for me to put my heels on the floor). This evening, I will most definitely make a date with Will Smith on my couch and that piece of nougat I have been saving will never taste sweeter.