8 Swim Catch-up: Last Monday thru this Monday

So I swam every day since the last post. It's been great! I swim 50 lengths, 75 feet per length. 70 lengths equals a mile. I'm so delighted that nothing has interrupted my swimming. No colds or necessary engagements.

Swim Myth: In my opinion, it is a myth that you cannot swim if you highlight or otherwise dye your hair. I'm a brunette who highlights blond, and I don't have a problem. Of course, I wear a swim cap every day but water gets inside it. Also I use the shampoo and conditioner provided by Equinox, no special product for colored hair.

Swim conversation:
A man joins another woman and me in the pool. We start circling. Then I start stretching at one end of the pool. The woman swims up next to me. She looks around and says, "Where'd he go?" Her eyes dart around the water. I answer with a swim cliche: "Oh, well, let's just be glad he's gone!" She giggles.

4 Swim Catch Up: Tu, Wed, Fri, Sun

I had a great swim today in the Village. I have a new routine in which I swim the first thirty laps underwater. Then I swim ten difficult back strokes, then ten easy backstrokes. It adds up to 50 lengths and takes me thirty-five minutes with five minutes of stretching afterwards. It's a fun routine because it gets progressively easier. I had a funny encounter in the locker room today:

Scene: I am in the locker room getting dressed, and a petite, fit, tan thirty-something woman walks in to the locker room in her work-out clothes (s/p her workout) and looks on the bench at another woman's wet swim suit. I am at the other end of the bench and quickly want to clarify that the suit is not mine, because the woman has a look on her face that's angry at that wet suit on the bench.

Me: "That's not mine! I don't know whose it is!" This is a lie because I just swam with the girl whose suit it is.

The lady shakes her head like it is just awful, that wet suit directly on the bench.

I want to exchange some locker room banter, so I say, "I don't know why people do that!" The truth is that I don't mind the wet suit at all.

The girl whose suit it is gets back, and I get excited about the possible upcoming confrontation which I plan to stay out of entirely.

The angry lady says in a sarcastic tone, "That's really considerate of you to put your wet suit there so that no one can sit down."

The girl wipes the bench with her towel and stammers a quiet apology. She's a great swimmer. She goes off to change in a changing area instead of with us.

Then the angry lady gets on her cell phone even though it's a cell free zone in the locker room. I am all about gym rules, so I'm thinking over and over, "She's breaking a rule! Someone should call her on it!" (No pun intended).

She connects to a hotel employee on her phone and says, "Put Liz on in Room 421." Then there is a pause and says, "We were just talking. She knows who this is." Then she says, "Liz, I want you to meet me in fifteen minutes at the corner of Washington and Horatio. WASHINGTON AND HORATIO. I'm want to photograph you with some grafitti that I found." Then she pauses and says, "Wear those gym shoes. I like those gym shoes." She pauses and then asks me for a pen. I am quick to give her one, and she is thankful. I love it when mean people are nice to me!