The people who work out in this gym are Serious about working out. Many of them look as if they may be physical labourers by trade, so why on earth they would want to follow ten hours of hefting bricks with yet more hefting is completely beyond me, although perhaps that indicates how Serious they are about things.
The Serious men lift dumbbells that weigh more than I do. No really, they do! Said dumbbells seem suspiciously homemade; the weights of said dumbbells are scrawled on the outside with white-out and the ends are all jagged as if they'd been mangled by a hacksaw. When you are Serious about getting ripped, there is no time to be worried about what might or might not cut your hand open when you pick it up. If anything, the thought of a severed artery just makes you want to pump out a few extra reps.
Being in this gym is an eye-opening experience. Often I'm reminded of a scene from the movie 300 in which the main character is standing on a pile of his vanquished foes and his minions are roaming around sticking the odd survivor with a spear, and he is standing there eating an apple, and he is all "that's right, watching this sort of shit go down is just so totally normal for me. In fact, watching this sort of shit helps me relax. That's just how motherfucking manly I am." And while he may not have sworn that much in the film, I think it's just because the ancient Greeks hadn't invented swear words yet, because the Serious men at the gym having taught me that swearing copiously is a very manly thing to do indeed.
Also manly:
- Shaving your head in the change rooms and then drying your scalp with the hairdryer;
- Leaving the tap on FULL FLOW while doing so, because of course the only way you will be able to get rid of all the thick, masculine hair from your razor is to subject it to a force equivalent to Niagara Falls;
- Continuing to leave the tap gushing while you brush your teeth. And when I say "brush your teeth" it is perhaps easy to underestimate just how punishing you should be towards those white pegs in your mouth. The look on your face must suggest that you are thinking "fuck you plaque, I will hunt you down and DESTROY YOU." When you spit into the sink you must do so with a sneer on your face, as if to indicate that you have been insulted by the futile efforts of the long chain polysaccharides that attempted to cling so pathetically to your mighty incisors;
- Getting tattoos inspired by Maori and Pacific Island culture, even (perhaps especially) if you are not of this lineage;
- Complimenting other Serious men on their physique, and perhaps giving certain parts an objective squeeze. It is important that you look like an anabolic steroid on legs when you do this, otherwise it will be interpreted as quite Unmasculine and in fact Rather Gay, and then you are in trouble.
I hope this has been helpful to you. I will report back with more manly updates as I see fit.
