Eric: I find I act differently if other people are obviously doing the contortionist thing too because I don’t want them to feel uncomfortable, although I draw the line at putting my knickers and bra on under the towel, then they just have to accept that I’m not going to put my top and trousers on under a wet towel.

Mark: It was disconcerting – only had to do it once because we only made it into the town once (first time the guys and I went to visit someone we knew who was training in a school down the road; he had an ensuite). I got annoyed with the staring after a while and started meeting the eyes of the other women and frowning; about 10 minutes later they were all trying to look everywhere but at me. If it hadn’t been a case of such overt scrutiny I probably wouldn’t have reacted in quite the same way.

Ali: Ok, but that woman was kinda crossing the line (it’s not something I’d think it was acceptable to do). I was really getting at the fact that if you’re just drying and changing then often you’re concentrating on that so being aware of other people doing the same thing in the communal space shouldn’t involve a stare-fest (because, you know, it’s not like we haven’t seen everything on our own bodies, right?) and therefore shouldn’t really be that much of a problem. Sometimes I think people are prudish for the sake of being prudish and because it’s the ‘British Way’ rather than there being a real reason for it.

“At at the gym. Fifty-plus woman blowdrying her minge. It looks like Gandalf in a hurricane. Help me.”

On topic, tho, my gym has the usual rush-and-crush of people before and after classes, but not very many wet-towel contortionists. Come to think of it, there are alarmingly few cubicles in the women’s changing room…

China sounds mightily disconcerting, how long did that take to get used to?

I was probably just as proficient as everyone else at the “putting underwear on underneath your towel” game as a kid, but I assumed that was a puberty thing that people gave up on once they became adults — certainly after you have kids of your own who you have to help use the toilet on a daily basis, the whole thing seems kind of ridiculous!

I think what I was getting at is the fact that most people who have to use a computer for work don’t really create stuff in the same way a programmer does. What they do with the computer is not really crafting and that, along with a lack of tangibility, can make people frustrated and end up with them feeling as though what they do lacks substance. At least that can sometimes be the case with me.

Also, REMOVE THE BAY LEAVES <– sound advice for dinner times without nasty surprises!

And no probs about the negative comment – it’s sadly very true. I was angry at the people who actually say those things, not you *hugs*.