I Got Punched in the Face Today, Really...

...by an old man at the gym. I'm not really sure why I am a shit storm magnet, but regrettably, I unintentionally drug my husband into Hurricane Sheila.

If only it was a kitten who hit me.

John and I were riding stationary bikes and the tv was on Fox News. When I'm riding, I like to watch a movie or an HGTV show- something entertaining and innocuous to pass the time. News, especially Fox News, is not conducive to fun, in any manner. I asked the man next to me if he was watching the tv and he said he wasn't. I asked the other man in the room and he said, 'Sort of. Why?' I said that I was wanting to change the channel. He said, 'This is a great station. You need to get used to it.' I replied, 'No, actually I don't', and returned to my cycle.

About ten minutes later, after the man on the treadmill had gone, John said to me, 'is anyone watching that anymore?' The man next to me said, 'I am. If you don't like it, close your eyes.' Now, I understand that all those exciting graphics and big chested blondes may be enough for old men, but I can actually hear what they are saying. Also, he said it to ME, not John. I told him that it wasn't his place to speak to me that way, at the same time John was asking him not to be so rude. The man then left, after 30 minutes of his ball sac sweat permeating his bicycle seat and him refusing the cleaning spray another woman had offered him.

No one wants your scrotum juice on them, dude.

After we finished there, we went to lift some weights. Self-proclaimed sterile dude was using all the equipment and leaving his special sauce all over them. He had just finished on a machine that I wanted to use so I held out a rag and the spray cleaner and asked him to clean the equipment. His reply- 'Get away from me.' I told him he was disgusting as I walked toward the front desk to ask management if they could intervene with this grossness. He said, 'You're an idiot.' I turned around, walked up to him and said, 'What did you just say?' He pushed me in my chest and said, 'You're an idiot.' Dude, call me an idiot and touch my chest?! I slapped him and he punched me, closed fist in the face.

If only this was the end of the story.

I probably don't need to tell you what happened next. From the fog of incredulity I had entered, I heard John yell, "Did you just punch my wife?!'-and saw him coming toward me at the same time I saw the man put up his fists. I saw John hit the man once and I heard a couple people who work there yelling for them to stop and running into the fray. The man swung at John a few times, but John is swift like a ninja.

John's silhouette.

I touched my face and had blood on my hand. I now have a cut and welt on the right side of my nose and a black eye, but that was nothing compared to what John did to Mr. Clean's face. With two hits, the man's face looked like roadkill. I wanted to press charges, but didn't want to deal with it at that point, and needed to ice my face because it was throbbing. We left and I got in the car and ugly cried.

A cut, a welt, a black eye, and no makeup. Yikes!

Next up, a policeman came to our house. We told him what happened; he said that our version was very similar to the others involved, which he was pleasantly surprised about. He couldn't tell us what the man was going to do, but we were pretty sure that he was going to press charges against John, which meant that I would need to press charges against him.

The gym called later to inform me and John that we were suspended until further investigation could be done. John went to the gym to apologize for putting them in this situation and they told him that the man had called an ambulance and went to the hospital after we left. Although he looked like a face full of dog food, he was yelling at us and demanding the gym employees call the police. I'm thinking he is going to use this incident to make things extraordinarily bad for John. Because he came to my defense.

Whatever happens, I love that John wanted to protect me. I just love him, period. You are my hero, baby.