5 people at the gym who annoy me and 1 who makes me sad.

I really want my blog to be a POSITIVE place, but sometimes I will go on a rant. I will try to make the rant funny and not hateful. I want people to be laughing after reading it, not wondering why I am a bitch who takes herself too seriously- because I'm not! And if I ever am... please just call me out on it!

I'm usually never annoyed at the gym, but once in awhile I run across one of these people! Luckily my gym is pretty big so I can usually avoid the wackos. But I thought it would be fun to list the types of people that irritate me, and consequently, probably make me work harder! (I get my best workouts in when I'm angry/annoyed.)

5 People Who Annoy Me

1. The person who sniffs their nose or makes disgusting throat clearning sounds on the treadmill next to me. This would typically annoy me anywhere, but at least I could walk away (presuming it was a stranger). When I'm doing sprints on a treadmill, it would totally kill my mojo to move to another machine. Though you could argue that if I have enough energy to focus on the gross noises the person beside me is making, then I'm not sprinting hard enough...

2. The person who "claims" a weight bench. You've seen it. There is a water bottle sitting beside a bench, yet no one is in sight. There's a sweat rag draped across it but no one is there. And the worst of the worst- someone leaves a pair of dumbbells by a bench, staking their claim. This person is not just hogging a bench but DUMBBELLS too! If you're using the bench, fine, but that means you are actually on it, or maybe just switching out your dumbbells and you'll be back in a second. But don't go over to a whole other part of the gym and feel like the bench is reserved for you for when you get back to it in 5 minutes.

3. The person who just chills out on a machine between sets. Technically, I guess I could go up and ask if I can work in, but I don't like talking to strangers. Plus they could get annoyed with me. They could write a blog post about the people in the gym they find annoying, and #1 could be "The girl in the bandanna who asks to work in during my sets."

4. The slow walker. I like to keep my heart pumping at the gym. If I bang out a set of pull ups and need to head over to the mats for planks, I don't like to take my good old time about it. In fact, if I could jog over without looking like an idiot, I would do that! But sometimes I get behind someone just taking there good..... old..... time..... getting..... to..... their.... next..... OKAY LET'S STOP THE MADNESS. They're walking slow and I get stuck behind them. I hate that!

5. The advice giver. Otherwise known as The Douche Bag. I had a sad encounter with one of these a few months ago at Planet Fitness. I was doing my push ups, minding my own business, when a guy who I saw around the gym quite a lot approached me. He gestured for me to take my headphones out of my ears. Oh great, I thought. This can't be good. He proceeded to tell me I should keep my head up during push ups, not look at the ground. Apparently, he had to see a chiropractor to correct a neck problem he had developed due to not having proper head placement during push ups. This made me wonder, how many push ups was this guy actually doing that he needed to see a chiro due to the fact he didn't hold his head correctly!? At the time, I was only doing 45 push ups ONCE a WEEK and never experienced any risidual pain from them. Needless to say, I was super pissed this guy interrupted my workout so I didn't even respond. I put my headphones back on and continued with my workout. Then of course, when I got to work, I googled "Should your head be up or down during a push up?". Mostly everything I read said your whole body should be in a perfect line from your feet to your head, with your head slightly up. But it's okay to look down if it helps you concentrate more. It didn't say anything about neck injuries, and I really actually had to FISH for someone to say something about the head. The most important things are not letting your hips sag and not letting your elbows flail out. The fact that I wrote a huge paragraph about the advice giver clearly shows I am not over the incident!

and..............

1 Person Who Makes Me Sad

1. The dangerously thin girl speed walking uphill on the treadmill. You know who I am talking about. She is clearly 30 lbs underweight. Her thighs are as thin as your forearms. She is hanging onto the console of that treadmill for dear life, trying to burn off every single calorie she has ever consumed and then some. It makes me very sad when I see girls like this. I know they are lost and in a lot of pain. Then I wonder, how many other people in the gym are suffering an eating disorder, just like this girl, but we don't notice because they are not so severely underweight? Maybe they are a normal weight or even obese. Just because someone isn't dangerously thin does NOT mean they don't suffer from an eating disorder.