Tentatively excited

Today's one of those days you should spend curled up on the couch with someone, watching a decent movie. It's overcast and cool, but not cold....it's inside weather. I'm inside. I have good movies to watch. All that's missing is someone good to watch them with...

I got up early this morning to go check out a new gym. I haven't been to the gym for ages and I'm finding I really need something/someone to hold me accountable.

At the supermarket a couple of weeks ago, a car pulled up with a sign on the side for personal training, so I checked out the website. It looked good, and close to home, so I sent the guy an email. Since then, Travis (my new part time offsider) and I discussed getting a trainer two days a week after work, to get us fit. After a couple of email exchanges with the trainer, I decided to drop in and see what they were all about.

The gym is tiny and only 6 months old, but it's part of a bigger chain. When I arrived, the guy was jogging up the street with 3 gym members and he greeted me at the door as the rest of them got back onto the equipment. He explained that he will often break up the routines by taking everyone out for a run during their session. He also said their exercise routines change every day. Basically, everyone follows the same routine (for the most part), but it's different every day, so you don't get bored with a repetitive program. On some days, he takes the group outside and does a boot camp style session instead. The gym is run as if he's each person's personal coach. It's interactive and with only a handful of people there at a time (he only has 40 members), you're getting one month's worth of personal training for not much more than you'd pay for an hour for a personal trainer outside a regular gym. And you only pay month to month, so you don't pay for a long contract you're not going to stick with.

They have one training routine that you can do over about a week period. Once you complete it, you get to 'train the trainer' for 15 minutes - basically make him do whatever you want. They also have events they hold outside regular hours - social stuff, like team sports, against other clubs in the chain.

The thing I was most impressed with is that he will contact you if you don't show up, or if you start to go less often, to encourage you to keep up. Most gyms will just take your money and not care if you do the work, or not. I like that he will go to that effort to ring or email. I can see I might need that from time to time.

So.... I'm going for a free trial all of next week. My first session is 6.15am on Monday morning and I'm sure I'm going to die, if not from how cold it will be at that time of morning, then from my body going into shock from having to do things it hasn't done in a while (not the least of which is being up that early and out of the house to begin with).

I know it's going to hurt and I know it's going to make me tired, but I think it'll be worth it.

I've just given my niece just about all the spare money I had, to help her move out (and thank you to the couple of people who have been unbelievably generous - I don't have enough words...), so signing up for this is going to mean other things get cut back pretty sharply. It's something I need to do, to feel better about myself, though, so I am excited....in that "I know it's going to hurt, but I'll do it anyway" kind of way.