Hey Al. You know when we went to the boxing circuit a few weeks ago and there was a man there who broke the sound barrier he was hitting so hard? Well, guess who was partnered with him today?

We were the only 2 men there so we were put together. His name is Darryl, but I prefer to call him Barrel, because he looked like a wine keg with pipe cleaner legs. He had the arms of Arnold Schwarzenegger and the legs of Pee-Wee Herman.

I was actually looking forward to getting a good workout so was a bit excited about it. That excitement lasted exactly 4 seconds though, once we started. I was boxing and he was catching and he slammed the mits so hard against my gloves that it was jarring my whole head. I swear I dislocated my jaw, which must have been flopping around like a fish on a pier. I actually know what the back of my head looks like now since my eyeballs were bouncing around like superballs. He kept yelling at me to go faster and he was slamming the mits into my gloves at 100 miles an hour. By the end of the first round I no longer had control of my arms, which were like panty hose with tennis balls in them attached to my shoulders.

By this stage, it was my turn to hold the mits and Barrels turn to box. I welcomed the reprieve from boxing and thought “This will be much easier. I can have a rest while I just hold the mits in front of him.” Oh, how wrong I was.

Barrel hit so hard it was like a jack-hammer going through pudding. I swear my shoulder blades broke away from my spine. With no word of a lie, he hit me so hard at one stage, the sound actually hurt my ears. It was all I could do just to stand in one place while he continually slammed his meaty fists into my hands, which I am sure now have broken bones rattling around in them like a bag of toothpicks. I’m having difficulty typing now because my hands are literally shaking. Give me a set of maracas and I could give any Latin percussionist a run for his money without even trying.

By the time the class was over I was completely and utterly wrecked. I had to steer with my tongue on the way home because I couldn’t lift my arms onto the steering wheel. I still have soap under my armpits from my shower, and in order to write this blog I had to swing my torso around to get enough momentum to flop my arms up to the keyboard.

Excuse me, I’m going to cry in a corner. Can’t wait for next week!