The Boston Sports Club in Davis Square finally opened last Friday, but since it was so close to the end of the year, I decided not to go until the new year.  I have seriously slacked off the last two months, so might as well make it a resolution.  I decided to cancel my membership at Boston Young Men's Christian Union back in November.  I was a member there for four years, and I liked it all right, but I was no longer working in Back Bay, and the new gym is about two blocks away, and only twenty bucks more a month.  I'll get a lot more use out of it. 

That was the idea anyway.  Turns out I'll be in Back Bay most days, after all.  I got a gig teaching at a little college in the old neighborhood starting mid-January.  Still, all my favorite trainers had left BYMCU and, frankly, I was in bad need of some new eye-candy.  It was definitely time for a change.

There's a trade-off.  The old gym was pretty scrappy, a real guy's gym.  And that's nice, in a way.  The members at the new place are definitely a different breed.  I can't quite put my finger on it, but it does seem like any minute one of them might point at you and let out some ungodly shriek like in the late-seventies version of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  I am well-reconciled to them living among us by now (in fact, more and more it feels like we're the ones living among them).  Truth is, they're here, and their gyms are nicer than ours.  Like I said, adapt or die.  Just don't fall asleep on the weight bench.

The locker room at the new BSC is gorgeous, though.  It seems slightly sacrilegious to even call it a locker room, it's so evolved.  They provide all sorts of amenities my old gym couldn't dream of.  From courtesy towels that are just skimpy enough, to courtesy soap, shampoo, and conditioner.  They even have a couple of blow-dryers at their own little stations.  It's all very first-world.

Best of all is a very spacious brand spanking new dry sauna.  I prefer steam saunas—for the mystery, I guess—but, like I said, I can adapt.  After a little workout, nothing beats a nice, long sauna, steamy or otherwise.  Especially when it's colder than the balls on a brass monkey outside. 

The gym itself is spacious and light, and overlooks the square.  The equipment is all new, of course, and much of it is newfangled, too.   I don't do much cardio in the gym—no spinning or running on the treadmill.  I consider the super-circuit adequate cardio, and supplement my gym-time with plenty of physical activity out in the real world.  If I did do the treadmill, I'd have my own little flat-screen TV, so I'd never miss my soaps.  I know that doesn't sound all that ultra-modern, but my old gym was a little behind the times as for in-flight entertainment options.

I didn't overdo it today—I had an abbreviated workout and a short sauna.  I just wanted to sample the place.  Get a sense of the space.  It being ironic Davis Square, they were blaring eighties music videos when I got there.  It's all good.  I can work out to almost anything, and I have to admit, Billie Jean is not bad for working out to.  I'd rather eighties pop, in fact, than pop from the nineties or noughties. 

There wasn't much as for eye-candy.  There were some young schlubs there.  I have to say it's heartening to see kids half your age in much worse shape than you are.  But when I think back to twenty, I was in a lot worse shape than I am nowadays, too.  I was a pack-a-day smoker in college, a social drunk, and survived on junk food and three hours of sleep a night, like everybody else.  Still, I was a skinny kid.  Is there such a thing nowadays?

Towards the end of my workout a couple of guys more my age came in and both were worth a doubletake.  I know it'll sound a little unlikely, but I really don't go to the gym to ogle.  But there are, of course, times when it can't be helped. 

All in all, I'm pleased with the move, and looking forward to getting back shortly to bench-pressing what I could at the end of summer.