Three partial workouts to report.
The last of the three — today’s gym induction — was never going to register as an over-rigorous ordeal. You usually expend more effort trying to sound convincing when asked about weekly alcohol intake, than you do on any particular piece of apparatus.
A gym induction comes close to being almost faintly exciting. For the first bit you sit there and say all the things that you want to hear yourself saying. You’re talking not to the instructor but to yourself; to the plump shirker within. It’s intra-propaganda, and it’s cheap and easy. Like bragging about running the marathon that’s still several pages away in the calendar. You can afford to sound utterly self-assured about your athletic future, while still leaning on the bar, sucking on a pint, and chewing those communal nuts that are said to exhibit traces of urine from an entire swarm of snuffling barflies.
And so early this morning I spent a pleasant ninety minutes talking to a nice skinny lady — perturbingly cheerful at seven thirty — about how this time I would do what I’ve never done before, and stick to my plan. This time I will adhere to my mission with zeal and fortitude. At least twice a week my desk will depopulate. Should anyone notice my absence (unlikely), and want to locate me in order to seek my wisdom on some vital issue of team business (totally unimaginable), they will have to dive into the building’s lower intestine, where I’ll be found in a small pool of salty water, face aflame, colour of a September pimento, making a noise like the soundtrack of a porn film.
These weren’t the precise words I used to the cheerful skinny lady, but she beamed at me anyway. Did I detect the faintest vestige of dubiety on the Mona Lisa’s lips? She must have heard all this before.
The other two partial workouts have been filed in the running drawer, but towards the back, in the folder marked “OTHER”. They were nearly runs. On each occasion I sort of taxied for 45 minutes, without quite taking off. Too much cargo in the luggage hold. But the ballast is being slowly discharged, and soon… soon I’ll be gliding through these brightening spring skies towards heaven.
Oh yes, it’ll be different this time.
