Exercise

Thursday afternoon, I took up running. Well, OK, I have made an attempt to take up running. It's too early to tell if it will stick. And, to be more forthright with my terminology, "jogging" is more descriptive. Anyhow, I managed to run 2 miles on Thursday afternoon, and felt pretty good about myself at the end. Definitely winded, with my chest feeling strained and my legs wobbly, but that was the point. I bought my Dell DJ along, clutching the 7 ounce metal box feverishly in my right hand for fear of letting it tumble to the ground accidentally, and blasting the Buzzcocks Operators Manual into my ears - an appropriately galvanic selection of songs to keep me going at a propulsive pace.

Reality's a dream
A game in which I seem
To never find out just what I am
I don't know if
I'm an actor or ham
A shaman or sham
But if you don't mind
I don't mind...

I want to back up for a second and talk about why I am running: Because my wife won a free iPod Shuffle at work. No, really. That's the reason. She already has an iPod Mini which she got for Christmas, and I have the aforementioned Dell DJ - which I bought for its superior battery power and cost when compared with an iPod - but I cannot deny the portability benefits, let alone the sheer gee-whiz factor embodied by the iPod Shuffle. It's slightly smaller than a regular USB mini-drive, yet it holds some 500 minutes of music (175 songs, in my case) and has a headphone jack built-in. It gets its entire charge from the USB port of my PC. It's ideal for physical activity because it is so small and light. It weighs less than a disposable lighter. And before you accuse me of shilling for Apple, I still think a DJ is a better buy than a traditional iPod. But I don't see any real competitors for Apple on the Shuffle front - and of course, mine was free, making it unusually attractive.

Like a lot of people, I can tolerate many more things when I have a diversion like a book or a magazine. When it comes to running, I'm already hauling around my own frame, so having such a small load to add for portative music removed my last excuse for not running.

Ironically, the Shuffle was a dud. After painstakingly picking out 500 MB of music to load, I couldn't get my computer to recognize it. I called Apple and found them surprisingly helpful; after 15 minutes on the phone they set me up to receive a replacement (which arrived the next morning). But by then, I had already psyched myself up for running, and I knew I couldn't back out to wait for a working Shuffle. Which is why you find me, in the first paragraph, grasping my DJ on my maiden run.

Back to the story: I'd been thinking of taking up running for years, because (A) it's a lot cheaper than joining a gym, (B) I can do it without walking to a gym, and (C) I don't have to see people at the gym. Are you detecting a theme in my thinking? I did belong to a gym and attend regularly, back when I lived in Beacon Hill, Boston, c. 1999, but my regular attendance was greatly aided by a roommate who went with me. It also helped that he nicknamed me "fatty", and that we had a third roommate who was locally famous for his determined inactivity - most notably weekend-long stints on our couch, dressed in his boxers and a t-shirt, and only broken around 8 PM on Saturday night so he could begin a night of carousing and consequently justify a second day on the couch - and if I didn't want to be grouped with him, gym attendance was mandatory. In the end, I went to the gym regularly for about six months before a job change made it impossible to get there regularly (I was suddenly waking up in the wrong state four days a week - and I don't mean I was hungover, I mean I was literally in Iowa). But I didn't really miss it. Gym equipment feels so industrial and unnatural (and, in a way, unsanitary) that I hated interacting with it. Plus, the scenery never changes - another thing running solves. While it was gratifying to see my arms and chest build-up (relative to my usual pasty self) I didn't think my overall health or energy was improved, Stairmaster or not, at a gym.

So, I ran on Thursday afternoon. By the time I tried to repeat the feat, roughly 15 hours later on Friday morning, the tendons running up and down the sides of my knees felt like knitting needles being pushed into my quads every time I bent my knees. I couldn't even walk down stairs or get up from a chair without wincing. I figured I could work this out by running, but no such luck. I made it about 3 blocks and quit.

My parents came to town that afternoon, in their first trip to New York in a year, and as it turned out, I got a decent workout walking all over Manhattan and Brooklyn with them over the next 48 hours. It probably helped to stretch out my legs, and the knitting needles seemed to have worked themselves substantially out by Saturday afternoon.

So, today, a few hours after my parents headed out, I made another attempt at repeating Thursday's efforts... this time, successfully. It felt good, and the weather (sunny, 70s) couldn't have been more cooperative. Despite getting my new iPod Shuffle working, I didn't bother to bring it with me, but instead enjoyed hearing bits of conversation as I ran past people standing or walking on the sidewalks I traveled, my favorite being two guys covered in plaster dust who (from the brief snippet of conversation I overheard) seemed to be heading to a bar to catch the tail end of happy hour because "she pours so much wine into the glasses". Next time, I'll see if I can figure out which bar they're talking about.