Turdman & Tandoori Man

So after a brief brush with enthusiasm, I've temporarily put it down in a can of turps and left it there to soak. It all started with Turdman. Let me tell you about Turdman.

About a week or so ago I was at the gym feeling energetic and happy to be the blob that every bimbo is grateful that they're not. I overhear part of a conversation as I approach: "OMFG I so like have half a kilo to lose so I can like look hawt in my new $5 designer spaghetti singlet from the Brand Depot, it was like totally a fully-designer bargain"...{pause}...then..."farrrrrrk".

Being a bit sensitive I think the "farrrrrrk" is something to do with me, and look back at them. They're not looking at me. They're looking at Turdman. He's on the other side of the gym.

Now, my gym is McMassive, with no less than 50 treadmills - if that puts it into some kind of perspective, with masses of spin bikes, pin-loaded weights, three large class studios, boxing...the whole thing. Bimbo and beefcake central. Additionally, there's a very pink, very freaky womens gym downstairs, but frankly, that's for the modern breed of femme separatists - and I'm hardly one of those.

I take my place on the uber-awesome treadmill with built in LCD tv and crank the whole thing up to a massive 5.5km/hr. I have short legs. For me this is almost a run. Next to me is an athletic being, running in all her lean splendour at 8km/hr with a gradient of level 7. Mine is level 3. I figure that on a size:effort ratio, what I'm doing is way harder. It makes me feel better to have decided that, anyway. Then I notice the offensive odour.

I can't place it. It's mouldy old kitchen sponge. It's wet dog. It's burning rags. It's not something I can identify, but it's truly foul. I look to the athletic being, but she looks in pristine shape. She's checking me out too. I begin to wonder if it's something about me...but I know it aint me. She's obviously feeling a bit paranoid too. But then I look across to my right. Six treadmills over, walking at a snails pace, is Turdman.

So I check him out. He's an unfortunate being. Brylcreem'd hair, 40 something, skin the pallor of a RPG addict, evidently becomes allergenic and bubbles up in blisters when exposed to bright lights and fresh pumped-in air. Turdman is maybe 160+kg, is wearing chocolate brown fleece track pants, a chocolate brown Bonds raglan t-shirt that only emphasises his overall...roundness. He has an iPod plugged in, and I guess that he's listening to Abba. He appears to be pretty pleased with himself.

He scratches and jiggles his genitals. A lot. I feel ill. Then I notice his feet. Black dimensional objects with no particular shape, but with the soles flapping along on the treadmill in a hazardous manner. My god, they used to be skate shoes. My god, now I know from whence the stench comes. My god...he's big, he's brown, he smells bad...he's Turdman.

He notices me looking and smiles at me. Oh sweet jebus, what to do??? I give him a very half-hearted nod, and look away. I know Turdman's type. They live on sausages and chips and sweat it out trying to get into the top 100 on MMORPG's everyday while they wait for the next edition of Military Monthly just to see if their article on the amazing Taliban-busting super-duper multi missile blastertron has been published and might get them a personal invitation to present it at the Pentagon. Blecccccch. Vile.

So I make a run for it. Not on the treadmill. To the other side of the gym. I get rowing instead.

I don't see Turdman on my next few visits. In fact, he's so entirely forgettable that I forget he exists. That was, until Monday this week.

Bravely baring my white legs, I pull on shorts, a tshirt; gym gear. Jump on the treadmill. Instantly notice that 1) the treadmill has issues, and 2) I'm next to Tandoori man. Tandoori man evidently enjoys a good curry, and while I've not actually seen this, I gotta say that having been next to him once or twice before, he generally finds it appropriate to share the experience inappropriately. Hell. Why are people lacking in social graces these days?? Time to move.

I walk up to treadmill #45, climb aboard and get moving. Ten minutes into what's feeling pretty good, I'm stopped dead in my tracks. Shock. Stink. Vomit. Turdman stakes his claim on the tready next to me. I don't look at him.

Not wanting to be impolite or tactless, I endure another 5 minutes, sucking breath in from the other corner of my mouth. I feel my lungs shrivelling. I feel the cancer of his stench engulf my entire being. 15 minutes in, I again make a run for it. SO out of there. SO gone to the far corner of the downstairs 'free weights' gym area. There might be men down there, and men can be smelly, but these guys have some sense of pride and dignity. They strut, they pout and they pose. They flex their muscles to impress each other. But they don't stink, and that's my point.

And somehow, deep among the eye-jerky, I decide that maybe those separatists tucked away among the pink bits really are onto something. Women tend not to stink. Women buy new gym shoes the moment the old ones get a hint of mank about them. Women simply are pretty bloody amazing when it comes to personal hygiene. I suddenly appreciate this. Very much.

No more will I pour scorn upon the seperatist sellout femmes in Club Pink.

No more will I venture heartily and healthfully to the gym on a Monday night, lest Turdman appears like a malevolent apparition intent on olfactory offence of the kind that chills me to the bone.

Hell, no.