Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Having No Idea IS the New "Cool".


“Please keep your arms and hands inside this contraption at all times!”

That’s what the treadmill machines at my gym should put as a disclaimer – right across the front so you can’t miss it. 

You know that I’m good at performing “hard to look cool” stunts, on a daily basis.  I don’t know why I do these things.  It must be hard-wired in me somewhere because as hard as I try to be careful and not fart around too much, I inevitably either end up getting hurt – physically, or I succumb to total embarrassment. 

I vowed to myself yesterday that I was going to cardio it up at my gym.  No more ‘Lazy Lucy’ activity.  I was going to hit it and hit it hard.  There was a group of ‘gym pros’ standing at the front counter when I walked in, I acknowledge them and smiled as I swiped my membership card and tossed my keys into the key bucket. 

“Hi there!” says Mr. Brick Shithouse.

“Hi.” I said back, thinking please don’t look at me.

“Have a good workout.” He says back to me.

“Thanks, I think these stairs are going to be my first challenge.” I said back half-jokingly.

I tripped on them half way up.

After I recovered from the “Oh god I hope he didn’t see that” moment I scoped out the upper level to make sure no other witnesses saw my flub. 

I jumped on the elliptical machine and decided that my tooshy needed some serious one on one time with this bad boy.  I selected my weight, duration of time I wanted to interact with the elliptical, and the desired program – which was the “Glute Blaster” workout.  Yay! I am going to have one fine ass once this all said and done.

Level 1.  That’s a good start.  Set my iPod on shuffle and started grooving to my music.  All of sudden my screen starts doing this blinking thing and this little light is going in a clockwise pattern.  I’m looking at this and thinking “Oh this is fun, a light show while I workout”.   It stopped at ‘REVERSE’.  Shit. Already?  I just barely was starting to go forward.  I stopped going forward and shifted my legs to start carrying me backwards.  Again, getting into the backwards groove and my timer says “10,9,8, … 1” and the light show began again.  “Round and round and round we go, where we stop, no one kno-“ Shit. Forward.  Are you kidding me?  I did this for about 5 minutes and de-selected the “Glute Blaster” button.  Stupid machine. 

I completed 30 minutes on the elliptical and jumped off to head to the bicycles.  I’m not positive, but I’m pretty sure if your legs are numb, that’s not a good thing. 

I sat down on the machine and, again, having no clue what I’m supposed to be doing, I selected the “Fat Burn” button.  I like buttons.

I de-selected the “Fat Burn” button about 10 minutes in. 

I can’t be climbing hills.  I just wanted a leisurely ride. 

I finished my bike ride (5 miles) and headed towards the treadmills.  I selected the last treadmill up against the window – away from all the other gym-goers.  Again, not knowing what these buttons do I selected “Quick start” this time.  I’ll manually select my speed and incline as the last 2 machines did me no favors.   I set my Nike® Coach on my iPod up and decided a 3-mile walk/run was going to be all that my pillars for legs could take.

I struggled, immensely with trying to walk a straight line.  My legs were still numb from the elliptical and without even trying I kept walking into the handlebars (that were obviously designed for morons like me). 

I held on the remaining time.

In addition to handlebars, the treadmills also had a T.V. attached to them so that you could watch your favorite show while walking.  I say that because apparently my favorite show is Dharma & Greg since I couldn’t figure out how to work the damn thing nor could I figure out how to change the channel.  I left the T.V. alone and opted for my iPod music instead. 

I would randomly select the “+” button to increase my incline throughout my work out, feeling a bit egotistic because every time I adjusted it, it didn’t seem to get any harder.  I chalked that up to my superb walking skills. 

My 3 miles ended and I felt great!  2 miles on the elliptical, 5 on the bike and 3 on the treadmill.  So proud! 

I stopped the machine and took my earplugs out and this insanely loud obnoxious noise was coming from my machine.  I looked around the gym to see if anyone else was noticing this and took note of the glances I was getting.  OH MY GOD!  The volume was insanely loud!  I gave the machine the once-over and figured out how to turn the volume down.  How in the hell did that happen?  I wasn’t even watching T.V.

Never mind. 

It’s no wander I did so great on my damn workout.  This whole time I was selecting the volume button in the attempt to up my incline.  Are you serious?

It’s one of the moments that you WISH you could take back.  I could just hear people now “Hey lady, you mind turning that shit down?” 

I did an about-face and forced my jello-y legs to carry me down the stairs.  Grabbed my keys out of the key bucket and bailed out of there.  Once I was in my safe zone (my car, with the doors locked) I started giggling.  I cannot go anywhere or do anything without making an ass out of myself.  It’s this large black cloud that looms over me. 

So that’s it in a nutshell.  I cardio blasted my thighs yesterday and I now have to hold onto my towel bar when sitting down in my bathroom. 

Today’s word of the day is: Moderation.  

2 comments:

  1. I have to commend you for even showing up at the gym. My last attempt at working out was an aerobics class at the Y. I was the one in the back row going the opposite direction of everyone else. On one routine I actually ran into the wall. It's okay, I'm old, the rest of the group seemed to understand and respect the fact that I even showed up.
    Let's just say that Baptists who aren't allowed to dance when they are young have a steep learning curve when it comes to rhythm and coordination.
    Currently, I am trying an experiment with Yoga at home while watching a DVD. I'm at the place in my routine where you load the DVD into the player. Maybe sometime this week I will take the yoga mat down from the shelf it lives on in my hall closet. baby steps…

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  2. I love it! I too am part of that learning curve...my cats have more rhythm than I do...

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