Research Intensive - Wednesday January 18

First visit

When I say I joined the gym I actually mean that I joined the Swiss Cottage Leisure Centre, of which the gym is a part. But who wants to say they've joined the Swiss Cottage Leisure Centre? To speak of 'joining the gym' imparts more meaning somehow. It speaks more of resolution. And manliness. If you're a man that is. On this my first solo visit to the gym I ran one kilometer on a treadmill in ten minutes. Nothing to boast about there. I did a bit better on a rowing machine and rowed one thousand metres in five minutes. At least, that's what the dials seemed to be saying. That would be quite something - to row one thousand metres in five minutes, I thought, and I imagine myself rowing along a river with a tow-path, another figure, also me, running along in parallel - also me.

Introduction

All this started because Sophie de Somere was coming to London for a few days. She was coming partly to meet up with her company 'Ontroerend Goed' who were performing Audience at the Soho Theatre, partly because she'd just seen another part of the company off to Sydney with A History of Everything, and partly to do a workshop at Central we've been promising to do since October. And because Sophie was coming to do a workshop at Central on 'Sport and Performance' I joined the gym.