I sat down to write this year’s summary of the year and I thought “I’ll just have a quick read of last year’s”. I kind of wish I hadn’t.
I quote “2020, the year that must not be named!”, “now we’re at the end of all this madness” and “Bring on 2021”… it was like those viral videos of the future-self girl going back in time to tell herself to buy zoom shares. I wanted to yell “STOOOOOOP, STOP TALKING” at myself.
Little did we know that at the very moment I was giving out the 2020 awards in the Manly bowlo, some bloke was out super spreading his coughs around the wharf, the Steyne and BBQs galore (or was that another cluster, they all merge into one big COVID splutter). How on earth we swerved ‘Manly Bowlo’ being on any list I don’t know.
Then, out of nowhere, less than a week after I was congratulating us all for surviving lockdown in April 2020, we were back on zoom as the Northern Beaches entered lockdown 2.0 over Christmas. When we emerged relatively unscathed from that one, no-one could have predicted we’d be back there for 3 MONTHS come Winter.
I’m therefore reluctant to make any reference to Covid, lockdowns, shhh Omicron or any other random Greek letter for that matter, in the end of year speech this year- because frankly if we’ve learnt anything in the last two years – it’s to shut the fuck up when talking about what might be around the corner!
Having said that, again some of my favourite memories of the year were during lockdown. In the really weird timewarp also known as 2021, 13 weeks on zoom for lockdown 3.0 now doesn’t seem like it was all that long. Or that bad.
Lynsay learnt to deal with any random loss of internet connection like a pro, getting straight back onto the connection via her phone and then lying on her belly to deliver the session 😉. However if I got a call from Lyns at 7.46am after she had been on zoom and instead of hello she said “Fucking hell, fucketty fuck, I fucking hate technology”, then I knew that NBN were in her bad books.
We swiftly abandoned the initially entertaining Gladys sweepstake when we realised we were actually in deep shit, in this for the long haul and you know, people were dying. Do you remember when we were making bets on the number of cases and thinking 47 was scarily high? Ah how innocent we were.
I don’t even have any zoom fails to report – no nudity, no unmuted conversations we shouldn’t be hearing, no lamps falling on heads (this year). It seems we’ve all learnt how to turn the camera and microphones on and off dammit.
Zoom became the norm. All we had to do was roll out of bed (some of you looking more like this than others – Cookie always appeared on camera brushing her teeth). Once we’d rolled out of bed, we logged in, did burpees for 45 minutes, job done. I intended to make a montage of screenshots of Lynsay’s and mine hair at the end of a zoom (but who has time for that?) – I do want to know if we look like that bloody scruffy at the end of a session outdoors?!
Again, thank you for sticking with it – zoom attendance numbers stayed high for the duration and we only lost a couple of members during the whole damn thing (which is awesome, thank you). Those 2 ex-members can go f*ck themselves 😉
In fact, the worst thing about lockdown was re-emerging outside for face to face bootcamps for that first week in the pouring rain whilst maintaining a “isn’t it great to be back all together” enthusiastic face. When really all I was thinking was ‘Fuck this shit, I want to be in bed until 6.50am”. Could you tell?!
Lockdown saw the return of ‘Gym and Tonic’ and I think we had the most raucous one yet courtesy mainly of the Buggy Bootcamp contingent on them – do NOT let a load of mums all fight for the mic to give a trivia answer first after drinking gin.
Another lockdown highlight was the step challenge. Admittedly again, the Buggy Bootcamp lot got a bit more into it than you guys, I know, I know you have jobs AND some of you were home schooling. However, the WhatsApp chat was strong 1. When Kate asked where she could get emergency takeaway margaritas and 2. When we got hacked and spammed with photos of a ‘lady’s’ ars*hole.
Either side of all the lockdown shite, we’ve done the usual range of extra stuff – played SUPball, ran the Sun Run (entries open for 2022 btw), eventually ran the COVID postponed Bouddi race, ticked off the North Head Tri, gone on a North Head Night Hike – via the quarantine cemetery and everything. SWIMtember was a great success and may become a permanent fixture – Tim’s rule of only above nipple shot selfies will definitely remain – no-one needs that over their weetbix.
We’ve had an altercation with the angry gardener (hey give the guy a break, mowing the lawn IS a very stressful job 😉 ). The rangers finally actually asked to see our license and I immediately felt inexplicably guilty, blurting out “they don’t have one” whilst pointing at the rogue group down the other end to divert attention.
There seems to be more dog poo incidents, including one dog who shat right next to Charlie last week, so close she could taste it (hey new members, come join us!) and there has also been 2 ambulances called to sessions. Typical, we go 8 years without a single incident and then we get two at once. To be fair, one was actually at the end of last year but Lynsay was so traumatised by a client’s broken ankle after falling backwards in a step up, it I didn’t feel like I could refer to it in jest yet last year for fear of PTSD kicking in.
We’ve had one wedding from Simon and Jess – but we STILL haven’t managed to hook up any clients. There’s been more babies than we can shake a rattle at with 8 littlies arriving and another 5 on the way. Many 30th birthdays, even more 40ths. 😉
And finally, the bit you’ve all been waiting for – the take the piss out of Lynsay bit of the speech. Feel free to chip in whenever you like with any Lynsay gems.
This year Lynsay has
- Looked frantically for her phone. Whilst talking to me on it.
- Not issued a single step up. She’s still scarred. Hint, if you never want to have to do burpees again, you just have to injure yourself so much doing one that you need an ambulance.
- Asked “what’s 4 x 10?”. More than once I think. Meg and Mel are her go to calculators in sessions, lucky them!
- Rocked an empty pram for a good few minutes
- Thought that she had lost someone at a session/missed someone on the roll call, but really she only put out 8 cones instead of 9 during the COVID 9 person plus instructor limit. This also meant that I had to instruct a session for the ‘extra’ bloody person!
- And perhaps my favourite. When a BB client told us she was having identical twins and we were discussing what sex they might be. Lynsay says “I reckon one girl and one boy.” And then carried on saying “I know they’ll be different down here, but they might be identical everywhere else.”
Next year marks 10 years of OzSquad which makes me feel very, very old. Prepare for a big piss up and for me to nag you to join in with Oxfam trailwalker to mark a decade in business.
I’ll leave you with a quote that has resonated with me during 2021 and it may help you lot too.
Accept what you can’t control, or suffer.
It can be applied to life. And OzSquad burpees.
