I did 'body pump' tonight. No, it's not a different kind of Western Kamasutra (if that's how you spell it). It's a 'class' one does at the gym if one is silly and determined enough.

It involves lifting weights to music, and exercises all muscle groups.

I have been doing it for a while, and I am pleased to report that I can lift a rather large amount of weight without showing any rippling muscles and looking like I am on steroids. It also makes me feel good.

Tonight, though, there were some new boys in the class. And they were not lifting a lot. I sneered at their puny efforts (they must have been using about 10kg), and whacked 25kg on to my bar proudly.

This class brings the worst out of people. We are all watching how much the others are adding to their bars, and competition is high.

Clean press-ups and squats, then. I lift the bar and whirl it up and over my shoulders.

I wear a thin golden chain round my neck, with a pendant in the shape of a cross.

Unfortunately, the pendant had travelled all the way round my neck and was sitting at the very back, between my shoulders. When I rested the bar on them, the weight of 25kg AND the bar itself landed on the cross, squashing it against my flesh.

The new boys were looking.

I had to make a choice. Either remove the bar and look weak and defeated (I had, by now, taunted them about their performance, diet and body structure) or... do the exercise.

I did the exercise. I lifted more weights than anybody else in the room. Including the sissies.

I have a deep carving in my flesh at the back of my neck now, in the shape of a cross. It looks like the exorcist has come to visit me.