I hate the gym
After 26 years of denial I am finally ready to admit the sad truth underlying my relative lack of physical fitness: I hate the gym. Everything about the gym is repulsive from the nasty carpet gyms insist upon installing in the locker room to the water fountain polluted by a gallon of some stupid fuck’s steroid-laced spit. I hate the tiny little towels that are only purchased by gyms and hobbits, and I hate the junk bond terms imposed by most gym’s contracts. Most of all, I hate “let’s get physical” by Olivia Newton John. The song is not about exercise, people, it is about SEX!. SHE DOESN’T WANT TO DO PILATES, SHE WANTS TO SCREW. SO PLEASE, FOR GOD’S SAKE, STOP PLAYING IT OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN IN THE AEROBICS STUDIO UNTIL THAT SICKNINGLY SWEET CHORUS GETS STUCK IN MY HEAD AND MAKES ME PRAY FOR DEATH WHILE I AM LYING IN BED KEPT FROM SLEEP BY THAT STUPID FUCKING SONG!
Ah, much better. I needed to vent. Seriously, though, I really find the gym obnoxious. I don’t think my reaction is caused only by the petty annoyances encountered in the gym but rather stems from a philosophical difference. The gym is a temple for those who find health fun. I do not find health fun. In fact I think there is a linear association between the amount of fun you can have doing something and its potential to cause you harm. For example, sharing some carrot sticks and protein drinks with a good friend is precious little fun. Make that some pizza and a bottle of Chianti and now we are talking fun. Transplant this action to some dive pizza restaurant located close to a survivalist compound in Michigan and throw in a half-breed wolf with a taste for cheese and you’ll have something to tell you grandkids about.
While fun and exercise are not necessarily mutually exclusive for me (hiking, rafting, and skydiving would all serve as both fun and exercise) I am largely denied any opportunity to engaging in potentially unhealthy exercise because I live in the frozen tundra known as Chicago. Thus, I am stuck with going to the gym or turning into one of those people who has to call the fire department to free himself from his house. The problem is that I clearly don’t belong in a gym. I am an obvious interloper in the world of the “runners’ high” and everyone knows it. My presence is disconcerting to both myself and the group who rightfully claims the gym as their natural environment. There needs to be an alternative gym, one with a coffee bar and desert selection, that is dedicated to those who only go to the gym because they have to. Smoking and drinking would both be encouraged as a way to keep the real gym people away, and there could be classes more relevant for the anti-gymrat like “smash the state cardioboxing” and “fleeing the fascists crosstraining.” Until such an anti-health utopia comes into creation, I guess I am stuck with my treadmill and that VILE PIECE OF SHIT C + C MUSIC FACTORY SONG. NOBODY WANTS TO SWEAT TILL THEY BLEED DUMBASS! THAT’S IS WHAT WE CALL HEMORAGING!
Sorry.
Ah, much better. I needed to vent. Seriously, though, I really find the gym obnoxious. I don’t think my reaction is caused only by the petty annoyances encountered in the gym but rather stems from a philosophical difference. The gym is a temple for those who find health fun. I do not find health fun. In fact I think there is a linear association between the amount of fun you can have doing something and its potential to cause you harm. For example, sharing some carrot sticks and protein drinks with a good friend is precious little fun. Make that some pizza and a bottle of Chianti and now we are talking fun. Transplant this action to some dive pizza restaurant located close to a survivalist compound in Michigan and throw in a half-breed wolf with a taste for cheese and you’ll have something to tell you grandkids about.
While fun and exercise are not necessarily mutually exclusive for me (hiking, rafting, and skydiving would all serve as both fun and exercise) I am largely denied any opportunity to engaging in potentially unhealthy exercise because I live in the frozen tundra known as Chicago. Thus, I am stuck with going to the gym or turning into one of those people who has to call the fire department to free himself from his house. The problem is that I clearly don’t belong in a gym. I am an obvious interloper in the world of the “runners’ high” and everyone knows it. My presence is disconcerting to both myself and the group who rightfully claims the gym as their natural environment. There needs to be an alternative gym, one with a coffee bar and desert selection, that is dedicated to those who only go to the gym because they have to. Smoking and drinking would both be encouraged as a way to keep the real gym people away, and there could be classes more relevant for the anti-gymrat like “smash the state cardioboxing” and “fleeing the fascists crosstraining.” Until such an anti-health utopia comes into creation, I guess I am stuck with my treadmill and that VILE PIECE OF SHIT C + C MUSIC FACTORY SONG. NOBODY WANTS TO SWEAT TILL THEY BLEED DUMBASS! THAT’S IS WHAT WE CALL HEMORAGING!
Sorry.
posted by Bartleby the Student at 1:30 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home