Words For Your Enjoyment: Your Fitness Equipment
November 4th, 2005
You’ve had a tough week.
Trust me when I tell you I know that you have. All that work and all that drama and all the politics swirling around you at your job? It’s enough to drive you crazy, let alone enough to keep you from doing the one thing that’s most important to you: keeping in shape.
That’s why, it’s nice to know that some uncontrollable laughter here on Friday is the equivalent of ordering one of those stomach-electrode six-pack makers, which…in the end probably doesn’t do much more than fry the hair off your chest (if you have any, that is).
But ironically, today’s edition of “Words For Your Enjoyment” is about just that…fitness.
Long time WFME reader and Treasurer of the WFME Fan Club, Amy writes: “Explain the rationale behind buying that ridiculously expensive piece of fitness equipment and only using it as a coat rack…”
Well, doesn’t it really all come down to one thing and one thing only, Amy? Doesn’t it all come down to the advertising, marketing and excited, frenetic, crazy pitch men and women in leotards on the TV screen? Doesn’t the fact that for less than the price of a cup of coffee per day, you can have the body that you’ve always wanted? Isn’t it awesome that by only spending 4 minutes a day working out with this brand new piece of fitness equipment your entire life will change for the better? Isn’t it great to know that by having the Ab Rockalizer or the Cheetah Curl Machine in your upstairs guest room it will save you all that time it takes you to get to the gym and instead allow you to concentrate on the real exercising that matters?
Isn’t it all a crock of you-know-what?
There’s a reason there are gyms, people. There’s a reason there are parks and 10k runs and beaches with boardwalks. There are reasons for outdoor volleyball courts and bicycles and planes with little doors that open up at 50,000 feet. Exercise is meant to be outside of your home or apartment.
There are just too many distractions (and laundry) in the privacy of your own home.
I have, in my past, attempted to do just this very thing. I found myself at the local supermall where I purchased huge 40 lb. dumbells for curling purposes, a chin up bar and a few other devices that would allow me to completely side-step the gym altogether. Of course, the people at the fitness stores don’t tell you that carrying said forty pound dumbells (one in each arm) all the way to the elevator, waiting in the elevator as it stops on each floor, then down to the parking garage can quickly cause your arms to scream out in pain. Then, once you arrive to the floor you think you’ve parked your car on, and realize that it’s not on that floor at all and that there’s another three floors to check out, but you can’t move because you can’t carry the dumbells anymore and you don’t want to leave them for fear of someone stealing them…
Well, the gym starts to sound like a much easier solution to the problem at hand.
And when you have to end up calling for assistance so one of the parking lot guys in their trucks can drive you around with your dumbells that you can’t lift anymore, just so you can find your missing car, and then when he finally does help you find your car he says, “Hey, good luck with that working out thing.”…
Let’s just say that the gym sounds like an even better alternative.
But if you haven’t had the humiliating experience of losing your car, your strength and your will to live in the massive parking structure of a huge Los Angeles mall — you may still very well be considering the purchasing of a Nordic Track, a Swan Swinger, the infamous Phantazmo Pilates Program or the extremely cost efficient Muscle Mega-Maker (3 payments of $4.99, with nothing additional to purchase except for 45 more payments of $9.99). You may desperately want a stair stepper or a treadmill for that upstairs bedroom. You may promise yourself that if it’s right outside your bedroom that it will be just too easy to ignore…
Enter the laundry.
As Amy has very well explained — home fitness equipment is the best place to hang laundry (clean or dirty) as well as a perfect place for storing holiday presents you plan on wrapping, unwrapping or returning in the next six to twelve months. Stair steppers in the home are perfect for storing spices. Treadmills are great for putting dog beds on. Those monstrosities with long cables and wires are perfect for holding open doors on spring-loaded hinges to tying up and securing a variety of filing cabinet doors and/or being used (after being affixed with sandpaper) as an alternative to doing that messy sanding work in the garage. Freeweights? Great for doorstops. Chin up bars? Perfect for Grandpa, who wants the bling-bling in a cane, but can’t find a nice long metallic one. Electric stomach muscle enhancers? Just the thing you need to heat up that tea without having to leave the comfort of your couch.
Because the bottom line is — if you don’t want to work out and you have the fitness equipment in your house and you can find a much more creative alternative use for it in the privacy of your own home… Well, you won’t have to work out.
“Well, I’d use the treadmill if I wasn’t using it to make taffy right now…”
“Well, I do want to use my dumbells, but they’re keeping the mobile home from rolling down the hill…”
“Sure I want to use that big blown up red ball for stomach exercises, but we gave it to the clowns for the party next week…”
There’s only two real reasons for home fitness equipment: one, that some company with a stupid idea for a piece of equipment can make money… And two, so that you can feel better about not going to the gym.
It’s a sad, sad state of affairs.
And while you think about that, I’m going to eat some ice cream and watch Maury from the privacy of my own couch.
—
In other news, it seems as though the Mr. T story here at WFME has garnered national media blog attention. Thanks to USA Today, TV Squad and A Socialite’s Life for their kind “pitying the fool” linkage.
Pauly is right. I purchased some home exercise stuff, and I go to the gym 4 times a week and never touch the stuff at home. too many distractions…like a computer…with access to a blog…that is funny. and the laundry!
Comment by Kathleen — November 4, 2005 @ 10:23 am
Not to sidestep the exercise equipment (damn that treadmill in the garage that has toilet paper piled up on it), but those Pity The Fool linkages are great! Do you see what an influence you have on people? Maybe it’s time for the “I saw Osama Bin Ladin at the laundry-mat and he uses color-safe bleach” post, or something along those lines. Time to move out of the 80’s and get current, because your words are precious and they could do some serious work for world betterment.
Comment by monkeyinabox — November 4, 2005 @ 10:47 am
Well, monkey — if only I washed clothes at public laundry locale that just happened to be frequented by Osama.
I can only write about who I bump into.
As for sidestepping the exercise equipment, there you go again! Finding an alternative to getting healthy — commenting on other subject matter altogether.
Pretty sneaky, sis.
Comment by Pauly D — November 4, 2005 @ 10:54 am
how did you know I was making taffy (banana) with my treadmill….and yes I now know how to spell banana. Thanks Gwen!
Comment by sarah — November 4, 2005 @ 10:59 am
Ah, my parents owned boatloads of fitness equipment that became coat racks or cat toys (the foam padding on an Ab Cruncher is a cat’s best friend). Never understood why they bought that crap.
Katie and I have one piece of equipment that actually does get used every once in a while. In it’s heyday, we used it 3-4 times a week and that last about six months until we got gym memberships.
Yes, we do go to the gym or go for walks or bike rides.
Comment by Kevin — November 4, 2005 @ 11:24 am
Pauly, I’ll start the entry for you….
Dear WFME readers, you won’t believe what happened, because stuff like this only happens in the movies and I am not one who frequents the Silver Screen. On the same day I returned from the mall with the huge 40 lb. dumbbells I purchased for curling purposes, I eventually got them into my house after blowing out my arms from having to carry them in that parking garage, where I swear I saw Mr T. crouching behind an old K-car, sipping his double-shot expresso and trying to avoid me after I forced the ‘pitty the fool’ comment out of him earlier in the week.
While transporting these cumbersome dumbbells that were actually heavier to pick up than the time I found Paris Hilton passed out on the street corner and had to carry her to the local ER (where you wouldn’t believe it: George Clooney was filling in). After lugging those 40 lb. dumbells inside I began to climb the stairs to the upstairs bedroom where I keep the Stair Climbing exercise machine which sits next to my personal vending machine that holds nothing buy Spicy Cheese Cheetos (which I hear is what people who have Stair Climbing exercise machines like).
Dear reader, at this point you might think that the excitement in my day way about to be fixated on doing some curling with those 40 lb. dumbbells I had purchased, but fate has a funny way to throwing you the curve ball (like the one you see from ex-Presidents when they get to toss out the ceremonial first pitch at baseball games), and this day was no different.
Upon reaching the top step of the stairs, those brand new 40 lb. dumbbells slipped from my hands. Most people will not know this, but 40 lb. dumbbells are heavy and when dropped they are even heavier, especially when you consider factors such as the force of gravity. When a 40 lb. dumbbell is dropped from 3.5 feet above ground, it becomes equal to 450 lbs. when it strikes the floor, or even worse your foot. On this day, I dropped the dumbbell 4.5 feet, because as I reached the top step I wonder ‘what would Mr T do on the top set with a new 40 lb. dumbbell’, and I responded the same way he would: by thrusting the dumbbell in the air and screaming ‘I pitty the 40 lb. dumbbell that I have to carry up stairs!’
Well, when you do things as impulsive as that, sometimes bad things happen. Just like how Mr T, fell from his high pedestal, the dumbbell feel from the sky, and not like a feather, it plummeted to the stairs below. With the force previously mentioned, it crashed through the stairs. Not a glancing blow, but like you used to see in the old Tom & Jerry cartoons. But unlike the times where Tom would run down below and catch the dumbbell on his head, I was unable to summon the speed I’d recently observed when watching my Greatest American Hero DVD, which was DVD #985 in my massive collection. Thankfully my head was not below the stairs the dumbbell easily crashed through, but my front loading Maytag washing machine was.
As durable as Maytag washing machines are, they are not durable enough to stop 1500 lbs. of dumbbell force (remember this was now more than 15 feet of falling distance). Now dear WFME reader, this is where you might think the story ends, but prior to purchasing my new 40 lb. dumbbell set, I had cleared all the dirty laundry off stand that was going to hold these new workout wonders of arm curling that previously I could only attain by visiting the gym. My washer was needed to wash those dirty clothes, but with a hole in the washer from 2000 lbs. of dumbbell force (they get heavier when wet), I was left with only one choice: visiting the Laundromat down the street.
Being someone who does not normally visit public Laundromats, I was unsure if I would see Jessica Simpson watching clothes spin around dryers, or Tom Cruise shaking the change machine. I headed inside with my dirty clothes, my box of Tide Color Safe Bleach (which I had recently purchased with a coupon I recently received in the mail, because that stuff is expensive), and pocket full of quarters. You would think stuff like this only happens in the movies (which I don’t frequent the screen of), but a few moments later after starting my machine to wash my clothes, Osama Bin Ladin walked around the corner and blurted out the only thing an Al Qaeda Terrorist knows:
“I have run out of Color Safe Bleach, may I use some of yours?”
That was day I found out two truths in the world: 40 lb. dumbbells are heavier than you think AND Osama Bin Ladin only uses Color Safe Bleach.
Comment by monkeyinabox — November 4, 2005 @ 12:27 pm
In high school, I had this whole bench press thing in my bedroom. But my scrawny ass just used it for a stand to prop my guitar amp on. Probably goes a long way in explaining why now, years later, I’m still scrawny and have way too many guitars.
Comment by kingbenny — November 4, 2005 @ 1:28 pm
Monkey…that. was. awesome.
Comment by Kathleen — November 4, 2005 @ 2:17 pm
But Paul, what are your thoughts on exercise videos/DVDs? I use mine as coasters and ashtrays.
Comment by Hope — November 4, 2005 @ 2:23 pm
Thank you so much, Pauly, for clearing that up for me. I should’ve known it was the infomercials…
Comment by Amy — November 4, 2005 @ 3:38 pm
Oh, yeah. Before I forget, I thanked you on my blog for using one of my ideas for WFYE. You might want to check out that post.
Comment by Amy — November 4, 2005 @ 4:04 pm
Yes, equipment is meant to help with a mindset/lifestyle a person is already in. Otherwise it’s jsut clutter. It can no more make for a better than than buying a Bible makes someone holy.
Loved your story of the carrying the bought weights. Been there.
But breaking a hole in a washing machine with ones. *laugh* TG, haven’t had the experience.
Comment by Pearl — November 5, 2005 @ 10:14 am
What about the stripper pole I recently purchased to install in the extra bedroom so I can do my S Factor workouts at home on the days when I don’t have classes at the studio?
Comment by Nicole — August 10, 2006 @ 10:08 am