Ireland day 0316. Wednesday 10 August 2022- Gym!

Today’s summary	Spent the morning finishing off paperwork then plucked up courage and joined the gym in the afternoon. Tried out some of the instruments of torture then had a swim. Stressful but glad I did it.
Today’s weather	Sunny and dry. Light easterly wind. About 22C

Today’s overview location (The blue mark shows the location of our route)		Close-up location (No GPX today) (Click button below to download TCX file of the Crosstrainer session): Crosstraining first session

Commentary

I did it. I joined a gym.

It took me quite a long time to work up the courage to do it – so much so that finishing off my tax affairs this morning seemed like a more attractive option. So naturally I did that first.

Then I thought I’d just have lunch and then I thought I would go down to the beach and sit by the shore practicing my Spanish for a bit. (It felt quite appropriate actually, as the bright sunshine and buzzing crowds definitely gave Malahide beach a bit of a touch of the Costas this lunchtime). Once I’d whiled away almost an hour doing that, I almost decided to go to the gym but thought the better of it and did some shopping instead.

Finally I got back to the flat and put the washing on. By this stage I had completely run out of excuses so I pulled together all the cool gear I had bought at Decathlon yesterday, packed my bag and made my way nervously down the coast road to the gym.

Actually once I got there it wasn’t as scary as I expected. The nice lady on the Arena gym reception took all my details, relieved me of my money, and gave me a membership card. Then lo and behold I was suddenly a fully fledged gym bro. I could feel my muscles bulging almost immediately! Even more enthusiastically, I booked myself on an induction session next week. And by the way I have noticed that most male gym instructors have short single syllable names. My coach next week is “Ben” and I know one of the other tutors is “Matt”. I think in the future I may re-brand myself as “Brad” – at least perhaps I will when I go to the gym.

Because I had successfully prevaricated most of the day, and because I bought a cheap off-peak membership, I only had an hour (thank goodness) actually to try out the facilities. Nevertheless I managed to do 10,000 things on a cross-training machine while looking out of the window watching the tide going out over the Malahide estuary. It was quite relaxing actually, although I’m fairly certain that’s not really supposed to be the idea. After that, I did 5,000 more things on the rowing machine and finished off the afternoon with a quick swim in the pool.

It was relatively quiet there today, so I wasn’t overwhelmed by massive men lifting 50 kg weights over their heads with one hand. In fact, the whole thing was much more enjoyable and less stressful than I had expected. I am actually quite looking forward to going back!

But that wasn’t quite the end of the day. We’ve got a friend coming tomorrow and staying with us for a few days. So as soon as Val got back from work, we had a cup of tea, shared war stories, jumped into the trusty Yaris and drove down to the giant Tesco at Clare Hall. The price of everything has of course gone up (the Tesco “Finest” sausages for example were €5 for two packs whereas only a month ago they were 2 for €4 – a 25% price hike – gulp) but with a bit of self-restraint and judicious own-brand selection, we have found that it’s still possible to shop relatively economically.

Well that’s more than enough excitement for one day. Goodness knows what tomorrow will bring. Tune in at the same place, same time to find out!

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


Heading down the coast road. With a bit of imagination you could convince yourself you were on the Mediterranean today.	Artists at work on Malahide beach. there were at least half a dozen of them there – the view of the beach, with the Portrane peninsula and Lambay Island in the background must be deemed suitably picturesque

Busy farmer out this lunchtime collecting and baling the straw he harvested from the wild meadow outside the Casino model railway museum yesterday.	Apparently he managed to retrieve three bales – though it had to be doubled wrapped in plastic because it was so dry and if any more of the moisture escaped it wouldn’t make good silage. A bit of a problem though as the cost of the wrapping film has quadrupled in the last 12 months, making the whole process barely worthwhile (This information was by the way all gleaned by Val while she was at work at the Museum – and chatting to the farmer)

I have spent 287 days practicing Spanish with the Duolingo app (which is pretty good, actually – especially if you go for the free version) and yet it is still asking me if Juan eats apples. Honestly. Does it think I am incapable of learning anything?

My gym from the coast road. The main instruments of torture are on the upper floor by the window. This means you get a good view of the coast while you are working out those muscles, but it also means that all the passers by can watch you while you are at it.