YMCA

There are several characters at the YMCA that really get on my nerves. First and foremost on my list is the old guy who wears tiny little spandex shorts. He is there, without fail, everytime I go. He runs around the track as fast as his feeble old legs will take him. He has a really high pitched voice- tainted by a ridiculous southern accent. The only reason I know this is because every once in a while my mp3 player will run low on batteries and leave me naked to the sounds of the gym.

My greatest problem with this guy, of course, is the fact that he wears tiny little spandex shorts. They are essentially briefs. If you ever watched WWF wrestling back in its heyday- Hulk Hogan, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Junkyard Dog, etc... you would recognize his shorts as being "Wrestlers' Undies". This is completely unacceptable. Everytime I see him I convince myself a little more to hate him.

Second on my list is a crippled guy who I think might be a trainer of some sort. He rolls around in a go-cart and gets up every now and then to hobble around and get in someone's face to tell them how to lift weights properly. He is a large man with a buzz-cut. He wears glasses and most days he wears really high socks of different color, green on one side, red on the other. In one arm he has a crutch with a forearm brace that he uses to support himself as he hobbles around. His legs are crippled- specifically the right one (I think). I often wonder if he once was a successful bodybuilder who was tragically crushed in some accident. But if you ever hear him talk or interact with people, you might guess he has some sort of crippling disease (he sounds borderline retarded). Why is this guy on my shitlist? Again, he's always there, and you know what they say, "Familiarity breeds contempt." Also, one time I was using the leg press machine and he came up and scolded me for not letting people get on in between sets during peak hours. It really pissed me off for some reason.

Finally (actually there are more but for this entry I will only discuss 3) there is the lady that walks on the good treadmill. This lady has an infant daughter (or son) whom she drops off at the little daycare facility inside the YMCA before she proceeds to hog the good treadmill. The worst thing of all is that she WALKS on it. No running, occaisionally a slight jog, but that is very rare. Normally this would only make me moderately angry, but seeing as there is only ONE treadmill of this type in the entire complex, it really annoys me. She reminds me of the red-haired girl from "Sex in the City." She is fatter and uglier, but just as snooty and self-important as the character in the show. Just looking at this lady makes me tingle with hate.

There. I feel better now.