Fat Woman and the giant bungee rope

Fat Woman's trip to the gym was full of surprises. First, Personal Trainer was waiting for her, a full seven minutes early. Fat Woman wonders if their last conversation on the topic of timeliness had some impact. Personal Trainer had been a full fourteen minutes late due to traffic and bad planning but hadn't been able to reach Fat Woman on her mobile phone to let her know. When Personal Trainer did arrive Fat Woman told him that she waits until he is 15 minutes late before she goes for her phone now. Personal Trainer seemed a little abashed (as Fat Woman thinks he should be!) but recovered a millisecond later. Personal Trainer made a flip remark about how he may sometimes be late but he gets punished for it. Fat Woman gravely informed Personal Trainer that when he is late, she is the one who gets punished.

Fat Woman doesn't indulge in guilt-tripping very often, but that one produced a satisfactory awkward silence. Fat Woman is sure that the very, very heavy weights she was pulling a minute later were a complete coincidence.

Personal Trainer pointed out to Fat Woman that Sparky had a new toy. Sparky has all the best toys in the gym and Personal Trainer gets to borrow them.

Sparky's latest purchase was a bright blue bungee rope with harness. Personal Trainer told Fat Woman that Sparky had suggested that Personal Trainer should make Fat Woman use it as part of their session. Fat Woman instantly suspected comedy seeking. Personal Trainer swore not, but Fat Woman has a very well honed radar for mocking.

The subject was raised again when Fat Woman was struggled to do ball-supported reverse lunges. Fat Woman's left knee is simply unable to support all her weight. This has become a bugbear of Personal Trainer's who keeps on pushing Fat Woman to do more with it. Fat Woman wishes he would lay off, at least until she's lost another 30lb, because she keeps having to go back to the osteopath. The lunges were not going well and Fat Woman actually took Personal Trainer's proffered hands for support. Fat Woman hates using another person for support. Reverse lunges, even ball-supported ones, made bungee running seem slightly more attractive.

Desperate for some distraction (or perhaps that was simply Fat Woman projecting) Personal Trainer asked Sparky to give Fat Woman a good reason why she should allow them to harness her to a giant elastic band. Sparky wasn't coming up with anything compelling at first, with the usual "it's good cardio" at the top of the list. Fat Woman hears that sex is great cardio but that's not a good reason to do it in the middle of the gym.

Sparky said Fat Woman should do it for "the banter" AKA comedy value. This plus Personal Trainer's groan  of despair confirmed Fat Woman's theory of comedy seeking.

Fat Woman really, really didn't want to do any more lunges.

Personal Trainer said he could stand at the end of the bungee rope with the boxing pads so Fat Woman could do interval boxing.

Fat Woman spied a way out of lunges.

Fat Woman said she'd let the boys tie her to a giant bungee rope if Personal Trainer put on the belt and let her punch him rather than the pads. Fat Woman hasn't seen Personal Trainer that happy since she last brought him cake.

Lunges were abandoned. Personal Trainer wore the boxing belt and Fat Woman wore the harness attached to the bungee rope. Fat Woman got very out of breath and actually enjoyed herself, even though she doesn't really like punching Personal Trainer.

Fat Woman was very sad to hear that the bungee rope didn't last more than another week.