Yet Another Swimming and Old Man Story

Swimming at the YMCA: Sunday afternoon.

I was a little pumped at first, because I was the only one in the large pool. I didn't have to have awkward conversations with the old men swimming next to me or to look sad and slow next to the young high school students that are training for their school swim team's season. But of course, this doesn't last too long.

After I finished with my first 500 meters (20 laps of a standard sized pool), I took a breather. I saw that their was an older man in the next lane to me, who wasn't so much swimming, as he was floating and letting the current of the swimmers in the other lanes carry him a long. He stopped at my end of the pool and starting talking to me. The conversation went something like this:

Old Man: Hello
Me: Hi
Old Man: You were swimming pretty fast there
Me: Hmm, that wasn't too fast for me. Well, at least it used to be not that fast, I've gotten a little out of shape.
Old Man: [Something about being old and being slower all together]
Me: [Gives him a weird look, but a little covered up for the sake of politeness.]
Old Man: Where do you get glasses?
Me: Excuse me?
Old Man: Those glasses on your head.
Me: Oh, goggles?
Old Man: Yeah, those things.
Me: Well, you can get them just about anywhere. You can get a really good pair at a sporting goods store.
Old Man: [giving me a weird look]
Me: Or, I guess you can get them at Wal-Mart of something. [inside going *blech*]
Old Man: [getting all cheery and happy] Yeah. The low price leader!
Me: Eh, yeah.
Old Man: Thanks. No really. Thanks a lot.
Me: [can't hold in my weird'ed out look any longer, so I put on my "glasses"] Yep, no problem. [swim off to do another 20 laps].

One thing I hate about working out and being competitive by nature, is that I always feel the need to outdo or at least keep up with whoever is next to me. And because I am so out of shape, this usually makes me dead tired by the end of the workout session.