Monthly Archives: August 2012

Public Service Announcement: Gym Etiquette

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I cannot offer you free deals, coupons, or schooled advice, but I can give you a way of handling issues that may be bothering you. Public Service Announcements can be used by you, anytime, anywhere. If you have a printer handy, it’s even easier! Feel free to hang them at the office, in the subway, tuck them into airplane magazines. Pass on the information that you feel other people might find relevant!

Public Service Announcement # 321: GYM LOCKER ROOM ETIQUETTE

Many people don’t know this, but there are certain rules that should be followed when one is at the gym. Sure, the basics: no running by the pool, lock up your valuables, etc. But I have found the rules could be expanded, especially when it comes to the locker room.

1)  WHEN YOU ARE FINISHED SHOWERING, FEEL FREE TO PUT YOUR CLOTHES BACK ON.

i.e., Soonish. We are very happy for you, toned men and women, who parade around the locker room naked, flaunting nut-brown asses, acquired through vacations or the salon. We aren’t jealous, even though we can lose things in our own fat rolls. This too goes for those who are extremely overweight. We are glad you are okay with your body, and you want to put lotion on every inch of it. But both of you are putting on a show that in some countries would get you arrested under laws pertaining to exhibitionism.

2)  DO NOT HAWWARK LOOGIES IN THE SHOWER.

This should be self explanatory. You would think this might just be in the men’s locker room. Oh no,  women also suck back  snot only to expel it with a ghastly splat. Where does it go? Do I have to step in it? Is it sliding down the tile somewhere? Eww. No. Don’t.

3)  REMEMBER, THE SHOWER IS FOR EVERYONE.

This goes along with rule #2. When one walks into the shower and it looks like a small dog has been shaved in there, it is alarming. There are no dogs allowed in the shower. We all know that. Rinse it out, please.

Also, people are waiting for you to come out. ( i.e. me, shivering in the crappy hand-towel I have grabbed by accident.) We are trying to have patience while you exfoliate, loofah, shave, pluck, tweeze, squeeze, masturbate or whatever the hell you are doing in there that is taking so long. Unless you are homeless or having your plumbing re-done, you should keep it brief.

4)  NO STARING AT OTHER PEOPLE’S BITS.

This too should be common sense. Guys, no comparing. We’re getting old now so it doesn’t matter anyway. And Ladies? Not all of us want to look like we’ve stepped out of a porno. Stop staring at mine just because it resembles a wooly mammoth, and I won’t mention your pubic mo-hawk to anyone. I wasn’t looking, by the way, you just forgot to put your clothes on, Rule #1.

I’m sure there are more rules that could be added, but I find these to be the most unmentioned. Feel free to add any of your own below. Stay tuned for more Public Service Announcements!

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Damn these Pillows!

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In a fit of desperation, our hero decides he has had enough. It’s three a.m. and he cannot sleep. The F%@#ing   hotel pillows are driving him insane!! Why are they like this! He thinks, becoming more agitated by the minute. He begins to pant, and sweat, like Animal from the Muppets.

“MUST STOP…PILLOWWWWW” He yells.

Taking a knife from the room service leftovers, he rips into the seam of his gigantically huge, overstuffed neck breaker, chucking half of its feathery bits into the wastebasket. His panting lessens as he places a new pillowcase over the new, normal-sized pillow. He smiles, realizing his gutting job will suffice. He climbs back into the sagging pit of a bed, drifting off into spine-twisting slumber.

This is a (mostly) true story. My mom’s friend attacked a pillow, after years of putting up with hotel hell. The pillows are just one of the many ways hotels have of driving you insane. This is why there is a mini-bar. Hotels are hoping you will be so annoyed with multiples of niggling, not-quite horrible offences, that you will pay the outrageously overpriced fee for two swallows of cheap whiskey.

Sure, staying at a hotel seems like a good idea. In theory, you will have a bed, a bathroom, and a place to store your stuff. But surely, hotels must have access to normal pillows? I’m sure they could get a deal at Costco if they ordered in bulk.

I recently discovered (i.e. last night) that some hotels prefer to pepper the inside of their bathtubs with sand-like grains, rather than add a bathmat. It may prevent lawsuits, but who thought making the inside of a tub painfully rough was a good idea? I like to take baths; they relax me. But bathing in this bathtub would have meant the exfoliation of my entire backside, which happens to be a tender area. I don’t want to scratch the shit out of it.

So, no bath then. Okay, I will turn off the lights at 9, as my kids can’t sleep with any of the ultra bright wall scones on. I will lay in the dark listening to the air conditioning, which is taking off in intervals of three and a half minutes. It makes a sound like a Volkswagen beetle’s clutch giving out at a high speed.

KACHUNNNNGG! It kicks on. It delivers a blast of freezing cold air, until it decides the room is now at my desired temperature, and then dies. WHHummPP!

Just a gentle whirr of the fan now, as I listen to the creaking of the bed next to me, the little snores of blissfully unaware kids. I hear someone in the hallway go to the ice machine. I listen as they place heavy footsteps in a stagger back to their room. They are having more fun than me. But I don’t feel jealousy, only the desire to sleep or be hit over the head, rendering me unconscious. This is when the mini bar comes in handy, except I am no where near it and it’s pitch black, as the heavy curtains block out the streetlight outside and all light inside.

KACHUUNNNGGGG!

WHHummppp!

This is what it feels like to be inside one’s conscious mind. It’s pitch black, and there are disturbing noises.  KACHUUNNGGGG! WHHummpp……I somehow find sleep.

…only to awaken with a searing pain in my heel, OUCH! What the hell? I think, still encased in blackness. Then I realize I am using my foot much as a hiker would use an ice-pick, attempting not to slide into the black hole in the middle of the bed. I know this won’t help and give in, sliding deeply into the nesting hole, letting go of my grip on the edge. I curl into the fetal position, hugging a gargantuan pillow.  KACHUUNNGGGG.

Anger finds it’s way into my tired body as I throw the boiling hot blankets off. I find my way to the AC, cranking it to a place it can’t possibly get to in the next few hours.

We awake to a chilly room, but no matter, I have a boiling hot cup of mud waiting for me! If I stir in three packets of sweetener, my brain will be fooled into thinking I’ve just had something like coffee and may now start working. I feel like a sweaty, mashed potato, but I’ve made it. I vow to avoid another hotel for at least a year, even if it seems like a good idea.