The Midnight Zoomies Gym

Blog

  • The Case Against Sleeping Through Training

    I have received several letters, all written in the form of a stare, defending the right to sleep through the 2:59 bell. I have considered them with the full gravity of my office, and the answer is no. Sleep is a luxury. Sleep is what you do when the hour has been conquered.

    That said, the Gym does not oppose sleeping in principle. We simply ask that you do it elsewhere, at a time when your absence will not diminish the collective morale of the hallway. Sleep from 4:42 until roughly 2:58 the following night, with a break for lunch and for glaring at pigeons. This is the schedule of champions. It is also, regrettably, the schedule of the sofa.

  • How To Land: A Remedial Lecture

    Too many of you are leaping without a plan for the landing. A leap is half a manoeuvre, recruits. The other half is the ground. We practise landing on all four feet, in order, left front first, with a quiet little flourish of the tail as if to say ‘I meant that’.

    Tonight’s drill is the Soft Descent from the second stair. Corporal Pickle will count. Do not look at the stair. Look at the ground. Believe in the ground. The ground has never let you down, except for the times it did, and on those occasions you will pretend to wash a paw. This is called professional recovery, and it is on the syllabus.

  • Back to Training: Autumn Intake Open

    The nights are drawing in, which means longer darkness, which means more sprinting per evening. The Autumn Intake is now open, and I am looking for fresh recruits with fire in their bellies and a worrying lack of impulse control. Previous experience is not required. Previous misbehaviour is a plus.

    New members receive a complimentary orientation lap, a laminated membership card they will be unable to hold, and a single piece of cardboard to call their own. Prices remain 14.99 per moon, or 149 for the year, which includes two free skids and one emergency stare from Sergeant Biscuit at a time of your choosing. Enlist today. Sleep tomorrow.

  • Equipment Notice: The Laundry Basket Is Now Official

    Effective immediately, the laundry basket in the upstairs hallway has been designated an Official Gym Obstacle. It will be assigned the number 4 and will carry a small plaque reading ‘Do Not Fall In’. Recruits who fall in will be said to have ‘taken the plunge’ and will be allowed ten minutes of regret before returning to duty.

    The basket is soft, deep, and smells faintly of a human’s gym clothes, which feels appropriate. It is the Gym’s finest obstacle. It has absorbed 118 falls this month alone, none of them intentional, all of them admired. Treat it with reverence, or at least with a sprint.

  • Private Noodle’s Comeback After the Bookcase

    Many of you have asked after Private Noodle, following the unfortunate incident of the third shelf. I can report that he is fine. He is better than fine. He has returned to the track, having spent six days in the Light Duties Corner thinking about what he did.

    On his first night back he completed 22 laps, tapped the bookcase once with a respectful paw, and sat on the bottom shelf like a king awaiting his subjects. This, recruits, is how you recover from a fall: not by pretending it did not happen, but by sitting on the evidence. Welcome back, Noodle. The bookcase forgives you. I do not.

  • Why We Do Not Offer Treadmills

    A recruit asked whether we would install a treadmill. I thanked them for the question and then lay on the floor for a full minute to recover. A treadmill is a conveyor belt for people who have forgotten what a corridor is. It goes nowhere. It is loud. It is a humiliating metaphor with a plug.

    We offer instead the Gym’s own Real Hallway, now with a new 14 metre runner in a tasteful beige. Beneath it we have installed a layer of foam so thin that you will feel every bounce. The foam is called Honesty. It has a four star review from a recruit who skidded on it and landed in a laundry basket.

  • Our Interval Programme: The 10 2 10 Method

    The Gym’s signature routine is the 10 2 10 Method. Ten seconds of maximum sprint. Two seconds of complete, theatrical stillness, ideally staring at a point on the wall that no one else can see. Ten more seconds of sprint. Repeat until the human shouts your name or the rug folds into an accordion.

    Sergeant Biscuit developed the method after a night in which he sprinted for forty minutes straight and then stood perfectly still for an hour, stunned by his own achievement. The stillness, he realised, was where the real strength lived. The rest was just furniture getting out of the way.

    Try it tonight. Report results by knocking something off a shelf.

  • Gym Closed For One Night: The Great Sock Incident

    On Tuesday night the Gym will be closed for investigation. At 3:44 last week a single sock was discovered on the track. It was not ours. It smelled of unfamiliar feet and mild regret. Nobody knows how it got there, though Private Noodle has been sweating in a manner I find suspicious.

    An inquiry has been convened. Corporal Pickle will interview witnesses. The sock will be held in the evidence bowl under the radiator until further notice. Memberships will be extended by one night, which for a cat is about eleven seconds of attention. If you know anything about the sock, report to me immediately. Do not hug it. It is evidence.

  • Meet the Staff: Corporal Pickle, Master of the Skid

    Every elite unit has a specialist, and ours is Corporal Pickle. A grey and white shorthair of four years, Pickle holds the Gym record for longest recorded skid on laminate: 3.6 metres, ending in a perfectly dignified sit. He has never once admitted the skid was an accident.

    Pickle teaches our Tuesday Corners class, in which recruits learn to take a ninety degree turn at full speed without grabbing the rug. His methods are unorthodox. They involve a great deal of watching, a small amount of muttering, and one lemon scented candle he has been told not to touch. Treat him with respect. He remembers who was late.

  • Welcome to August: The Heat Is Your Ally

    August has arrived, and with it a muggy night that makes the hallway feel like a long, warm throat. Good. Resistance builds character, and character builds the ability to land on a printer. Recruits will find the track temperature at 24 degrees, which is exactly warm enough to make you consider giving up.

    Do not give up. Instead, drape yourself over the tiles in the kitchen between laps. The tiles are part of the programme. Kitchen Tile Recovery lasts no more than ninety seconds, after which Corporal Pickle will tap you with a paw and you will resume. If you do not resume, you will be moved to the Light Duties Corner and lightly shamed.