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Age is just a number

“You can’t beat death But you can beat death in life, sometimes…” Charles Bukowski – The Laughing Heart Being in your mid-50s is sort of a weird, transitory period. You’re not young, you’re not even middle-aged, to be honest, unless you think you’ll live to 110 years old. But you’re not old-old yet, if you […]

Globo gyms – a guilty pleasure?

If you read any of my strength training posts, you’ll know that I often sing the praises of specialized strength training gyms – excellent equipment, like minded individuals, positive attitudes, blah, blah, blah. It’s true, all of it. If you are seriously interested in strength-training and you’re lucky enough to have specialized gym in your […]

POWERLIFTERSvs. BODYBUILDERS – CAN’T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG?

Bodybuilders are the low hanging fruit of the weightlifting world. So visible, so easily parodied…And the sport is so incredibly weird, at least in it’s current form. To win a bodybuilding competition you must look completely unnatural on the stage – roll-on tan, dangerously dehydrated, the works. Let’s acknowledge the elephant the room, i.e. the […]

Dumb Luck

The other day a thought occurred to me as I drove down the road. It hit me just how many times in my life I’ve avoided literal serious injury or death by sheer, dumb luck. These were instances in which no common sense was yet available or, if it was, was studiously ignored. Broadly speaking, […]

Redemption Song

Recently, for a number of reasons, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about redemption. To be clear, what I mean is the restoration of one’s reputation and credibility as a person in general or even in a specific circumstance such as work or with a particular loved one. Reputation, as they say, takes a […]

“the tarry shingle of the morning…”

This morning I got up early, made my coffee, checked the news (yikes) and, for some reason, thought about gratitude. I mean, there is the war in Ukraine and gas has reached prices that make really make one contemplate how badly one needs to use their car. Inflation is ramping up and set to snowball. […]

Gym Fouls – Don’t be that guy

Mirror, mirror, on the wall: OK, I get it that some people are serious about their bodybuilding and I get that you need to check the status of your “canvas” from time time but nonstop checking yourself out in the mirror is well creepy in my book. Hey, Abs guy, kudos on your diet progress but gazing longingly at your abs whilst holding your tank top up in your teeth? Get a room.

Gym Bullies

A few weeks ago there were a spate of articles in the UK press regarding the prevelance of sexual harassment in Globo (aka commercial) gyms and the Netflix documentary on the Bikram yoga guru that really opened my eyes to what women endure on the daily. Also, not so long ago, I witnessed another type […]

Why Powerlifting does not = Chick Magnet: a Primer

In past posts I have expounded at length about the many benefits of powerlifting. We’ve also examined the “why” of powerlifting; namely, it’s insanely fun to be able to lift heavy shit. However, nobody every tells you the shameful truth underlying this otherwise laudable sport. Sit back, gentle reader, and clutch your emotional support pillow […]

What not going to the gym feels like.

We are 2 months into this pandemic and gym rats the world over are agonizingly jonesing for an “iron fix”. Yes, not being able to train really, truly sucks. Some of the ways it blows are obvious and there is also some unexpected “suckage” which I will outline shortly. Surprisingly, though, there a few silver […]