Thursday, December 27, 2012

Swimming!

Months and months ago I bought a Groupon for swims at a pool not too far from my work. Well, in typical procrastinatory fashion, I waited a looooong time to redeem it. I kept meaning to go, but, well, you know how it is.

So, with an impending expiration date of January 19, I decided to go check the Juanita "Wave Aquatic Center" pool out.

Arrived to a nearly empty parking lot. No surprise, really -- school is out for the holidays, and, well, not that many people are going to get up and swim at 8am during the holidays either.

I headed in to the building and discovered that the women's locker room was locked. Oh. And the counter looked pretty locked up as well. But there was a little sign that said, "Please pay on the pool deck", so I tentatively pushed through the doors.

There were 4 or 5 people swimming, a couple of bored-looking lifeguards, dubstep coming through the speakers, and a chill in the air. To be honest, I wasn't even sure that the pool was open, but the lifeguards were friendly, set me up with a punch card, and turned me loose

The pool was pretty cold -- but also pretty refreshing. I picked up a kickboard and a pull buoy and settled in to an empty lane. The new goggles I bought yesterday were awesome -- no leaks at all. (I do think I had them fastened too tightly -- I had some killer goggle marks for a while after my swim!)

My goal wasn't to swim all that much -- the emphasis today was really just getting into the darn pool. I swam sets of four lengths each: freestyle, kickboard, arm pulls, then a little break, arm pulls, kick board, freestyle. Then four more lengths to cool down, and I was done.

On my way out the lifeguard asked if I thought the water was too cold, and told me that the school had turned the boilers off for the Christmas break. Oh. Then a little girl in the locker room told me that the showers were just as cold. Oh.

But I didn't feel like driving to work in my suit for a shower, so I just took a chilly shower there. Brrrrrrrr.

Nice to swim, nice to use a Groupon (ha ha). I've got nine more swims to do before we move to the U District in March!

No comments:

Post a Comment