When ACWGF moved, I got some of the stuff that wouldn’t fit in her new place. One of the things I got was “The Firm” VHS tapes, weights, and the fanny lifter.
After waking Monday morning to the realization that I was getting little to no excercise now that kickball was over, I decided I needed to do something about it. My initial idea was to go to the gym, but then I looked at the blue and purple step stools in the corner of my room, and I knew what I was going to do.
I remember when I was back in high school, my religion teacher was a former marine. He is not to be confused with my other religion teacher who was a former Army ranger and sargeant. Weird right? Apparently the armed forces passes out pamphlets to its members saying things like, “Enjoy the lazy life of teaching at an all boys Catholic high school! Bring young men the discipline that would have public schools sued! Teach them what a combat roll is to demonstrate how David may have slain Goliath!” I guess the armed forces figured that if some of these guys were silly enough to sign up for all the great “benefits” they offered, they would be silly to sign up for all the benefits of teaching at a Catholic high school. Benefits like: not getting paid very much, the constant ridicule of rich kids, and having the brats ask if they can see pictures of your wife every day.
Of all the things mentioned above, the only thing I can say for sure is true is the combat roll thing. My religion teacher did a combat roll off of his desk to demonstrate some point or another about religion. Seriously. He was insane. He looked like Henry Rollins, but with balding/blond hair, and no tattoos.
So when he told us he did Buns of Steel, we thought he was joking, and then we laughed at him.
He insisted that it was harder than certain drills in boot camp, and that if we would just get over ourselves and try it, he would bet that none of us would be able to finish it.
I had forgotten about that story until last night when I was half way through the Firm and it was kicking my ass.
At first I felt silly doing the aerobic stretches and rythm coordinated excercises at the beginning of the tape. I also felt silly because Kmart insisted on watching me. He said I looked like a weirdo, but I wasn’t the one who kept going into my roommate’s room to watch him excercise.
After a while he stopped coming in, and that’s when the tape started to get hard. The tape that I was watching mostly focused on lower body stuff. I thought I could handle it because I’ve always had a strong lower body. My legs are much stronger than my scarecrow-meets-sparrow upper body. This morning, however, tells a different story. I have aching muscles in my butt that I didn’t know existed. I honestly think that I’ve never excercised these muscles before in my life. Never. How the hell could the side of my butt hurt? Is there a muscle there? I guess there is now.
Anyway, I encourage both readers of this blog to take the time to excercise to a tape if you haven’t already. You’ll be right up there with me and a crazy ex-marine religion teacher.
