So very regular readers will know that I enjoy documenting the idiosynchracies of my fellow patrons at the (now) Virgin gym.
Back in 2003 (can it really have been that long? Jesus my life has flashed by whilst writing this) I told you all about
the fellow applying moisturiser to his entire body. About a year ago and 1000 entries on, I realised that
I had become everything I once hated.
Today I went for a swim. The gym has one of those little spinning machines that dry your swimming trunks. According to the instructions you should hold the lid down for about 12 seconds. You can hold it down for longer if you like, but there's only so much water that this mechanical salad spinner, except for swimming trunks instead of salad, can get out.
I was in the shower, just about to turn off the taps and take my trunks to the drying machine when I heard someone else using it. So I thought I might as well stay in the shower for 10 seconds, rather than barge out in the nude and queue behind a man who was also probably in the nude. I waited.
Ten seconds went by. Then another ten seconds. Then another ten. But the man (I am presuming it was a man - since Branston has taken over it could easily have been
a small girl) was still pressing the lid down on the machine. I was now bored of waiting, but thought surely he won't keep on drying trunks that can really get no more dry. But another 10 seconds went by, then another 10. And another 10.
I was about to shout out "It's not going to get any drier, mate" but felt sure he would stop using the machine very soon. But he didn't. I don't know how long he exceeded the 12 second suggested time by, but it was well over a minute.
Finally the noise stopped and I turned off the shower. By the time I got out the man had gone. I dried my trunks for about ten seconds maximum. They were as dry as one could expect. I was satisfied with the dryness. There is no way they needed to be any drier. The gym provides plastic bags to ensure no extra moisture gets on the other stuff in your bag, but 10 seconds in the dryer makes these almost unnecessary. My bathing costume was dry. That is what I am trying to get across. Even without maybe two minutes of drying.
So I was surprised, when I got over to the bit with the hairdryers where all those years ago I saw a man applying moisturiser to his whole body, to find a man (I am presuming that it was the same man who had just been at the dryer, but I may be leaping to conclusions here) with his trunks on the counter, and a hair-dryer in each hand. The hair-dryers were both on and were both pointing towards the very dry looking swimming trunks.
Clearly this was a man unsatisfied with the drying job provided by the swimming costume dryer and who felt it was necessary to further dry his trunks with not just one, but two hairdryers. Because drying an already dry piece of cloth wasn't the kind of job that could be completed with just one hair-dryer. Two were required for maximum efficiency. Three would have been preferrable, but then the man only had two hands and he would look foolish with another hair-dryer positioned between his legs.
Clearly drying dry trunks with two hair-dryers wasn't something that embarrassed or felt strange to this man in any way. Because I passed him, looked at him and he didn't flinch or blanche or stop. He carried on with his drying work, as I used one hair-dryer for the task that some might argue it was designed for, drying my hair. My hair was pretty wet - I'd dried it a bit with a towel, but I had not, for example, put it in a specialist spin dryer for two minutes to get it extra dry - but evenso I felt I would do the drying job with just one hair-dryer. There was another one I could have used, but I didn't want the bloke to think I was taking the piss or anything. We all know what it's like to put on a slightly damp swimming costume - it is very, very moderately unpleasant for a short period of time, before you get in the pool and then it doesn't really matter any more. Now this man had just been swimming and common sense might dictate that he was unlikely to have to get into those trunks again for (if he was an Olympic athelete) at least five or six hours. He didn't look like an Olympic athelete. I felt it was extremely unlikely that he'd be getting into that costume again in the next 24 hours. If I had been him, once the costume had been in the spinner for over two minutes and had been dried with two hair-dryers for another three or four minutes, I might think, "Even though there is still the possibility that one molecule of water might be on this bathing suit, I am going to stop wasting electircity and damaging the earth's resources and take the trunks home and maybe drape them over a radiator of chair, so they dry the rest of their drying through nature."
But my dryness obsessed friend was having none of it. He carried on pointing the two dryers at the trunks for all the time it took to dry my actually wet hair and apply moisturiser to my face, hands and torso. I would have put it on my legs too, but I didn't want him thinking I was a weirdo.
I was so tempted to lean over and say to him "I think that's probably dry now," but was equally aware that he had at least one mental illness and might batter me to death with two hair-dryers and then dry up all my blood with them.
And just as I was finishing up he stopped drying his trunks, which was some kind of relief for me, until he then bent over and used the dryers to dry the skin between his toes. He had to bend over to do this. I had to ask him to excuse me so I could get by. It was embarrassing.
For me.
He didn't seem to think his behaviour was odd in any way.
I quite like encountering mad people, because I can look at them and say, "Well look, I am not that obsessive or mental, so I am all right." It's similar to being in a pub with someone who is drinking a little bit quicker than you. You can see them chugging away, look at them with a bit of pity and think, "Thank God, I am not an alcoholic like you." And thus feel better about yourself.
Of course the logic is flawed. Just because there is someone madder or drunker than you, it doesn't mean that you are not mad or drunk.
But your brain cares not for logic. It just thinks, "A-ha, look at the poor fucker who has to dry his trunks that thoroughly. I am glad I am not like him. I can't wait to get home and write about this incident in far too much detail in the weblog that I have been writing every single day for 52 months and that I would feel like a failure of some kind if I now missed a day."
There are other obsessive bloggers out there and when I read their blogs I think they all come across as dull maniacs going on about tiny insignificant details in their lives, that no-one else could be interested in and I pity them and think it's a shame they don't realise that they are insane and that people are just reading what they are writing out of compunction to see how mad their next entry will be.
It makes me feel better about myself. Because no-one could think that about me. My stuff is entertaining.
