My name’s Dave, I’m a moth. Well, technically that’s not correct, I *used* to be a moth but now I am somewhat deceased. For the last few months I have lived, well, not lived…existed…er, been lying on the floor of…a gym in the delightful town of Milton Keynes. That was until yesterday anyway. Now I, er, don’t live (if you see what I mean) inside a Dyson. They finally sucked me up. And my mate Graham from under the lat pull down. He wasn’t very chatty, Graham. Still isn’t.

Over the course of the last few months I’ve seen some things, let me tell you. A heck of a lot of people come to this gym, of all shapes and sizes and it’s great to see so many people taking care of themselves and trying to getting fit. But, I could be wrong, some of them seem to come a few times and never return. I’m pretty sure from one month to the next I only occasionally saw a face I recognised from before. It could be my fading eyesight though, yes, that’ll be it. Apart from that curly haired woman who’s always on the stepper that is. And the frowny runner. I think they might be married, they’re never at the gym at the same time but always have the same water bottle and similar towels. Oh yes, and that bloke who occasionally gets a bouffant bonce and secretly checks out all the men’s bottoms. He thinks I didn’t notice, but I did.

I did notice a few specific groups of people while I was lying by the wall for all that time. You’d think the view was rubbish from down there, but you’d be wrong, I saw EVERYTHING. For example those “mememe” steppers. Say it with a high pitched voice. I know they really annoy curly-haired-woman who steps like a mad woman and makes the machine inch forward. The mememes take such tiny steps they surely can’t be doing anything? They certainly don’t have a bead of sweat on them when they get off. CHW always looks like she’s just run a marathon, all tomatoey faced and drenched in sweat (not a good look). I heard a rumour she’s training for a marathon. She doesn’t look very happy about it. And what about the uphill treadmillers? Walking up a hill so steep it can’t exist in nature but hanging on for dear life. I’d rather go for a walk in the fresh air, blow out the cobwebs a bit. If I had legs. And wasn’t an ex-moth obviously.

Of course there are the typical blokes you probably get in all gyms too, meatheads who like nothing more than pumping iron, pump, pump, pump until they get those comedy muscles so big they can’t put their arms down by their sides properly. There are plenty of show offs, too, the other day I say a bloke hanging upside down and doing sit ups. Madness! Don’t tell anyone but I thought it was quite cool. Shhhh. I personally loved the weedy guys, lifting way above their maximum and probably getting stuck under the bench press needing help from a sniggering meathead. In fact I heard that happened to CHW once in the prison gym under one of those smith machines. There weren’t even any weights on it, what a muppet! There are a few scary ladies too who do a lot of resistance and have strong looking muscles. You wouldn’t pick a fight with them, no siree.

There are lots of women too, not just curly-haired ones and mememe steppers. Someone really needs to tell some of them that just sitting on a vibration plate probably isn’t doing much. Apart from making the wobbly bits jiggle. And at the other end of the spectrum while you’re obviously very proud of your washboard abs, some of you, no one really wants to see them on display. Did you forget to put your t-shirt on? There are a few that seem to come in pairs or little groups of three, I’ve always suspected these ones of being on the hunt for lurve.  There are similar groups of young blokes too. On my imaginary Venn diagram of the gym the girly ones also fit comfortably into the group that “make eyes at the personal trainers”, all giggly and pink of face while they chat about who knows what and protest that they can’t possibly lift up that kettle bell or run an extra mile per hour. They do it anyway though…hilarious.