Another Fun Saturday at the Gym

Evidently I need to print my "Gym Nuisances" essay and post it Martin Luther-style on the doors of my local cathedral of sweat because I observed something today that just...well, reminded me why we have road rage and other rages.

As I was heading over to the adductor/abductor machine, I noticed it was currently occupied by a woman. Hey, no biggie, I told myself, I'll just go knock out my abs routine then hit the inner thighs before heading up to run. Then I noticed the woman had a cell phone glued to the side of her face. Oh joy.

The woman with the cell phone glued to the side of her face was there almost the entire time I was doing my abs thing, which takes at least 10 minutes. I was almost finished when I saw her getting up to leave. Well, that's great timing! I thought.

But oh no. I was thwarted from overexerting my adductors (I don't work abductors since they're already strong enough and tend to crank on my SI when I do) with 115 pounds of resistance by a second woman with a cell phone glued to the side of her face. This woman had been on the squat machine (more like a weighted Lazy Boy it reclines so much) yammering away while the first woman with the cell phone affliction had been yammering away while hogging in the thigh press machine.

Knowing damn good and well anyone with a cell phone glued to his or her face while occupying weight equipment will not finish his or her routine expediently to allow a fellow gym member to use the machine, I did a quick urdhva dhanurasana counterpose to all the ab work I'd done then popped up to put away the 25-pound weight plate I'd been using for resistance. By that time, the husband had joined me in the abs corner and asked what was wrong (evidently I was wearing quite the "pissed off wet cat" look). I tersely summarized the situation. I felt better getting the chance to vent.

I've said it once and I'll say it again:

Hang Up and Work Out!
Don't make me get all Martin Luther on your ass.

Batman, You Rock My World
So we all know Dark Knight is coming out on July 18, right? Been kind of hard to miss the commercials on TV--and I don't even watch that much TV. Or else the human adults of Chez Boeckman-Walker watch the channels most watched by the movie's target audience (y'know, those golden man-boys ages 18 to 35 who give sales, advert and marketing folks the best wet dreams). But believe it or not, I had no idea there was a new Batman movie coming out when Batman Begins hit theaters in 2005, and that was a total treat. I enjoyed the movie by and large then (that third act is still overly long and has way too much Katie Holmes in it, but she got hers, didn't she?), I've continued to by and large enjoy it since becoming a regular reader of comics (ahh, there's a nasty disease) and I continue to enjoy it when it's playing in the gym's cardio cinema. Here's why:

• Despite the mole (which the husband actually had to point out and now, of course, never strays too far from my awareness), Christian Bale's pretty easy on the eyes, and I find that with each viewing, he's looking less like the George Clooney/Noah Wylie frapped in a blender product the husband and I assessed him to be back when the movie first came out and more just like an older Noah Wylie after his indenture on E.R. was up and switched to a few contractual guest spots every season.
• The story flows fairly well (not that there weren't some script flaws), so it doesn't tax your attention span, letting you devote most of your attention to your stride and pace and breath, which is far healthier than letting yourself get absorbed in some distraction and letting your body's movement go to hell.
• There's enough action to, well, motivate me to keep running, as damnedably cliched as that sounds.

But today I was in for a special treat, courtesy my iPod. It decided to provide an alternate soundtrack to that turgid third act of Batman Begins, and I discovered that the James Bond theme works very well for Bats. The Oakenfold's version of the theme did work a bit better than Moby's rendering (don't ask me which one of his renderings it is), but they both synced well with the action.

The surprise standout in my impromptu alternate soundtrack was "Sakura Saku," the theme to Love Hina. It's crazy-ass J-pop, but the craziness synced nearly seamlessly with the sequence on the subway. Forget syncing Dark Side of the Moon and The Wizard of Oz; instead, pop your iPod onto its library shuffle option, start up your favorite movie and see how well your iPod can read the vibe of the movie.

Anywho, big thanks to Bats for getting me through the run today. I clock 7.25 miles and a little over 1,025 calories (or somewhere there abouts) in 64:30, which is damn good. I think my average pace was 6.4, and yes, I had it on the 3.0 incline. I never thought of myself as a fast runner, but a 6.4 pace feels right. Nice!