So, a couple of weeks ago I received, randomly, an invitation on Linked In to connect with some guy who I had never heard of, who was apparently a personal trainer. Me being me, a personal trainer doesn't even figure on the list of the top 1,000,000 presents I would like to be given on my 60th birthday. I posted a quip about it on social media, had a laugh, and promptly forgot all about it.

But what if...what if, in an alternate universe, I actually accepted the invitation? So in that parallel universe, I would have connected with that guy (never saw his photo, I suppose if he had sent it along, that might have been another story). And being connected, he would then inundate me with invitations to attend personal training sessions, which I would mostly ignore. But one day, one momentous day, he offers me a package of 10 personal training sessions for the price of 8. Bargain!  Bargain! Being Asian, I clearly can't resist a bargain (think of all the money I'm saving! I could buy a pair of shoes!). So I sign up for this package, and start going to the gym again for the first time in what, oh, five years. But first things first - first, I go out and buy myself some fancy gym gear, and then join a gym, and bob's your uncle.

Ouch, it hurts. And oh, my sweat glands are totally blocked from not having been operational for the last five years. But you know what? It's starting to work. And by the fifth session I start feeling a lot better - look! are those - are those really abs? Good God. So I keep going, I finish the package of 10, sign up for 10 more, and suddenly I'm a gym bunny. I'm happier, healthier, fitter - I feel great, I don't have to do the wriggle-dance into my jeans any more, in fact, screw that, I go out and buy some skinny jeans, like all these goddamn hipster twenty-somethings who hang out in Shoreditch all the time.

And then it suddenly strikes me that I should run a half-marathon. And so I start training for it, sign up with a charity, and  then all of you start getting invitations to sponsor me to run one half-marathon after another. And suddenly I have become just like every other single person in your office who turns ssh! 4 -ahem!-0 and decides that I need to get my fitness kick on...so, mostly, when you get an e-mail from me in the future, dig deep into those pockets, folks - there's some deserving cause out there that will get your cash each time I pull on my trainers.