Date: Fri, 1 Jul 2022 16:07:52 +0200
From: Charley Reed <alongweekend@gmail.com>
Subject: Reed 'em and weep: 15 May 2008

Thursday 15 May 2008

Today in history: It's another biggie -- the launch of Sputnik 3 and 4 two
years apart, the launch of the last spacecraft in the Mercury project,
Mercury-Atlas 9, the founding of Las Vegas, the sentencing to death of Anne
Boleyn.  And the opening of the first of many McDonald's, for which I as a
cheap'n'cheerful kinda guy am very grateful.

In my own world, there's not much going on, hence the 10-day gap between
the last entry and this one. However there is some fucking weird shit going
on at the gym. I was there last night, my usual Wednesday, and Next Door
Trevor was down with a 24-hour bug and didn't come along. So I did my usual
thing, a few warm-up sets on one of the circuit machines -- got into a
minor argument with a sanctimonious old twat about my using a circuit
machine without being in the circuit; I know I'm technically in the wrong,
but there's only one of those machines, it's good to warm up with, and it
wouldn't have killed him to go to the next one along and come back to this
one a minute later, but I digress -- as well as some arms, shoulders and
chest. Might have surreptitiously checked out the various cuts of beef on
display, just a glance here and there as I always do, but kept to myself as
usual.

Later, in the locker-room, the weirdness started. First, I'm pretty sure I
got the come-to-bed eyes from a dude in the showers after that. He was
directly across from me, shower doors open, and spending waaaay too much
time washing his gentleman's area. As usual, I had my shower doors closed
-- I'm old skool; so sue me -- but I could see through the frosted glass
that he was kinda checking me out too while doing it. Not a bad-looking
guy, I suppose, as I discovered when I finished my shower, but a little old
for my as-yet underdeveloped taste since I'd guess he's probably early 40s
and that's like the same as my dad.

Then, more weirdness -- Angry Chinese Dad was there along with Sad Little
Chinese Boy, his son. I've seen these two before, and there is something
just not cool going on there. ACD is around 40, I'd guess, and SLCB must be
about 14 or 15. He's not big, but he has some facial fluff and that's the
kind of age I'd put him at. ACD always seems grouchy; no surprise that I
don't speak the language so maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree entirely,
but it seems like SLCB does not want to be there and ACD drags him along
every time. I've never seen them in the pool or the aerobics area or the
free weights area, just the locker room. It seems ACD comes for a
de-stressing steam and shower, and SLCB comes along because he's told
to. As I said, I don't know what's being said, but ACD always seems to be
raising his voice, and although SLCB seems to do what he's told, you can
see the resignation and dejection in his body-language. Once or twice ACD
has said something and SLCB has replied with plaintive indignation, and ACD
sounds like he's about to tear the kid a new one. Usually they sit in
silence, except when ACD barks something to the kid, who for the most part
just nods and does whatever it is.

I've never wanted to be fluent in a foreign language as much as I have
since watching these two.

Last night took the cake, however. At some stage, I left the steam-room for
my shower. A minute or two later, these two came in and took cubicles as
well. SLCB tried to take the one on the end, next to mine, but ACD had a
meltdown and eventually after a very short argument, SLCB ended up across
from him on my other side. I was about to go for a second session in the
steam-room when I heard more shouting and turned back to see -- ACD had
charged out of his cubicle and flung the doors of his son' s cubicle
open. Seriously, the look on his face...  I feared for the kid's
safety. There was much loud talking, and the same quiet pleading from the
kid, then ACD folded his arms and stood there watching the boy shower and
barking instructions. From my vantage point at the entrance to the shower
area -- I was pretending to towel-dry my hair -- I could see that every
time the kid turned away, ACD reached in there and turned him round again
so he was always facing outwards. Seriously, it was fucking creepy - I have
no idea what was going on; I can't imagine the kid was having a wank or
something and needed adult supervision to make sure he did only what was
necessary, but I'm pretty sure that an invasion of privacy at that sort of
level must be illegal. I really wish I knew what the hell was happening,
and I really wish I could speak Chinese.

Not sure what I could have done, but I also feel really shit for not having
done something, anything, about it at all. Stereotyping, sure, but I'm
fairly sure ACD would karate-chop me in the face if I confronted him (yes
that's probably racist to say, but it's also probably true, so sue me), and
I'm not entirely sure what's going on so I might have the wrong impression
entirely, but... I dunno, the whole thing was extremely unsettling and I
don't know what to do. I wonder if Trevor being Trevor would have said
something or done something? I just stood there like a tit.

-C