Aaaagh

I went to the gym tonight.

I haven't been for a long time and decided to cancel, but with a three month cancellation period, I still have to pay until the end of May.

So, what the heck, not as if I have a social life and I REALLY need to lose weight and get fit.

Ok, so "fit" is a relative term.

So, there I was, climbing the stairs to the gym and wondering when they retained Esher as their stairway architect. I swear that the last time I went, it was a simple staircase. Not even a Fiddler-on-the-roof jobbie, with one long staircase just for going up and another even longer going down. Nope, just a simple climb up open the door enter the gym common or garden staircase. I now know how those figures in his staircase picture feel.

Knackered. That's how they feel.

A few years ago, I was using the gym regularly and had an entire schedule worked out. I'd put together a playlist on my original MP3 player to take me through the whole thing so, in a rare display of organisation, I found said player where I'd left it and took it with.

I swear, by the end of song one, I was wondering whether the imagined extra stairs were real and I'd climbed to around 14,000 feet.

By the end of song two, I was thinking that maybe the MP3 player had gone wrong and was playing at 10% of normal speed.

By the end of song three, I was in pain. Not aches, not twinges, but the sort of pain no man should have to feel. The sort of pain that defines why women have the babies.

I have to drive about 500 miles tomorrow, and am severely worried that I may not make it to the car, let alone the meeting.

I hurt.