Ron, I am deeply touched that the incredible Gladys Dongo lives on. For your
info I still have all of the original stuff. Who can ever forget the flight
of of the famous Fitness Flyer and the incredible pile up on the bridge
across the Zambesi or the Great Kadoma Convention with Gladys and her sister
Janice. With kind presumed permission of Ron McGregor.
GLADYS and the story of the Fitnes Flyer.
It is reported that Ms Gladys Dongo, the well-known celebrity, is to sue the
manufacturers and distributors of the exercise machine known as the Fitness
Flyer.
The Fitness Flyer, along with the Health Walker and other similar devices,
is a contraption that enables the user to walk a hell of a long way without
actually going anywhere, as has been demonstrated ad nauseam on the TV. At
the end of it, users are supposed to emerge fitter, healthier, and
infinitely sexier.
The Fitness Flyer in question was installed last Wednesday at the
Nyamandhlovu hideaway which Ms Dongo shares with her friend and mentor,
Professor Isosceles Vilikazi, the well-known etc etc etc.
Initially, Ms Dongo's experience with the Fitness Flyer was trouble free.
Swinging her thighs back and forth, she was able to simulate the walking
experience, while reading out, on the electronic counter provided, the
number of steps she was taking, as well as the number of calories consumed
in the process.
The problem started as Ms Dongo got the hang of the machine and began to
increase speed. After about seven minutes, she was operating at 180 paces
per minute, and burning 327.6 calories per second.
According to her lawyers, this translates into a virtual walking speed which
they would only describe as "significant".
At this point, the Fitness Flyer, which is designed as a sedentary device,
apparently began to move.
Ms Dongo, being unfamiliar with the machine, at first presumed that this was
normal. However, when the machine, with Ms Dongo aboard, crashed through
the east wall of the residence and continued across the lawn into the bush
beyond, she began to suspect that something might be amiss.
Details of the path of the Flyer are not entirely clear. A herdsman between
Nyamandhlovu and the Victoria Falls Road reported three cows dead and the
rest stampeded, but otherwise it is not known exactly how Ms Dongo reached
the main road and turned north.
Another witness, Mr Astonished Mkizi (38), recounted that he had been dozing
outside the trading store at Lupane when he had heard the sound of what he
took to be an approaching motorcycle. Mr Mkizi, a Harley Davidson
enthusiast, stood up to take a look. However, the oncoming object turned
out not to be a motorcycle at all, but the Fitness Flyer, with Ms Dongo
still firmly attached.
Asked how fast it was going, Mr Mkizi said that the slipstream had knocked
him arse-over-tit into the bushes, so he couldn't actually say. However, he
did estimate that it was cruising at an altitude of about three feet.
The affair turned into an international incident when the Flyer reached the
border post at Victoria Falls. It crashed through the control boom,
flattened the Chief Customs Officer, and entered onto the Zambezi suspension
bridge, where it knocked an Australian bungee jumper over the parapet.
Unfortunately, his bungee cord had not yet been attached. Police are
withholding his identity until his next of kin have been informed.
At this point, however, the runaway Flyer was at last brought to a halt, by
the fortunate arrival of a southbound goods train that happened to be on the
bridge at the same time.
In the resulting head-on collision, both the Fitness Flyer and the
locomotive were totally written off, while Ms Dongo suffered shock, bruises,
impairment of dignity, two cracked ribs and a broken toe.
Ms Dongo was not able to explain why she had simply not stopped swinging her
thighs when the machine got out of control. Professor Vilikazi indicated
that he knew exactly why, but was not prepared to speak because it would
prejudice Ms Dongo's legal action against the Fitness Flyer people.
A spokesman for the distributors of Fitness Flyer was understandably
tight-lipped, but indicated that both he and the manufacturers were very
surprised at what had happened.
"Ms Dongo is an unusually strong woman," he observed.
Notwithstanding her impending legal action for damages, Ms Dongo has ordered
another Fitness Flyer, as she is planning to visit her cousin in Chirugwi in
the New Year.
And by one of the great poets of the time.
GLADYS DONGO AND HER FITNESS FLYER
Ms Gladys Dongo on her The Fitness Flyer
Takes most indignant legal action
Over her Health Walker exercise contraption
Swinging thighs and buttocks, back and forth
Made the machine move and march to the North
It wasn't the way that it worked on TV
She wanted to be very sleek and sexy
An easy way to consume calories
The device was supposed to be trouble-free!
Instead, the thing ambled and crashed down the wall
and headed straight out toward Victoria Falls-
Her Infernal Fitness Flyer, incorrectly installed!
When three cows were dead and the rest had stampeded
She found that her path down the road was impeded
Now out of control, down the road runaway
It burst through a barn and was covered with hay
With no time to think, she made quick decision
and swerved with resulting, head-on collision
Shocked and bruised, with cracked ribs in pain
in a brutal encounter with a southbound train
The exercise machine, clearly most out of order
Now cut down the Customs Officer at the border
Ms Dongo desperately pleaded, that she was most Innocent
in the now-international, Exercise-Accident Incident!
She slammed into cars and crumpled their bumpers
On the Zambezi Bridge, a bungee jumper
Unfortunately, his cord not quite attached, yet
Was knocked straight over the parapet
At 180 paces minute, 327 calories per second
A virtual walking speed, impressively significant
At least at her funeral, her next of kin
could admire her progress in her quest to be thin
When the Fitness Flyer finally came to a halt
Ms Dongo protested that it was not her fault
With multiple, broken-bone, compound fractures
She had every intention, to sue the manufacturers
However, Ms. Dongo, a strong woman, you see
wants to visit with her cousin, who lives in Chirugwi
So she's ordered a new Fitness Flyer, without fear
and will travel to see her, over the New Year