Workin' Out Wid' Weights!

In my last post, I mentioned that I have been working out with weights for the last few months. Lest some of you begin to visualise me as rapidly growing in resemblance to Governor Schwarzenegger during his Pumping Iron/Hercules in New York/I do not speak the English so vell era, I've decided to elaborate on this intense routine. I felt this was appropriate not only because I don't want people to think I'm degenerating into a vapid musclehead (as opposed to the numerous intellectual muscleheads who regularly read this blog), but because it's been a fairly slow news week.

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Day 1 - Upper Body (Arms, shoulders, back, chest, noggin)

• 45-50 presses with 2 30 lb. dumbbells (named "Donald" and "Rosie")
• Recover - watch Fox Soccer Channel and complain about Arsenal's season
• 200 leg lifts (not necessarily in a row) and 40 low-impact crunches (the equivalent of raising up to see the Champions League highlights)
• 70-80 presses with 2 20 lb. dumbbells (named "Tom" and "Kat")
• Recover - read P.G. Wodehouse story about how Jeeves saves Bertie Wooster from marriage to a shrill upper-class woman who wants Bertie to go into diplomacy and become a vegetarian monk
• 150 leg lifts (see above) and the 40 odd crunches. Maybe a candy bar between the two (for energy!)
• 25 "flys" with the 30 lb. dumbbells. Grunt frequently to mask pain and weeping.
• Recover - short nap and bowl of hot cream of bacon soup
• 150 leg lifts (etc.) and 40 more crunches. Thus ends the stomach work, if you don't count the bag of crisps.
• 50 flys with the 20 lb. dumbbells. Say the words, "Oh yeah!" frequently to create the impression that I'm relaxed instead of feeling as though Abu Gharib would be a relaxing change.
• Recover - breath deeply, if at all, and curse "Tom" and "Kat" (The dumbbells... well, the weights.)
• 10-15 drop lifts from over my head from a laying position with the 30 lb. dumbbells
• Recover - Go limp in easy chair and channel surf sport networks
• 25 "drops" with the 20 lb. weights
• Recover - Read Golf Magazine to see how much Tiger made last month
• 10 "drops" from behind my head from a sitting position with one 30 lb. weight
• Recover - Return to magazine, read 12 articles on how Phil Mickelson is still in denial about his U.S Open collapse, all written by writers with 15+ handicaps
• 15 lifts over my head with the 30 lb. weights.
• Recover - Try to keep eyes from rolling up in head
• 15 more with the 30 lb weights.
• Recover - Get feeling back in shoulders
• 30 more with 20 lb. weights
• Recover - Short coma
• 30 lifts from a bending position, the 30 lb. weights at my sides, lifting striaght up. No idea what they're called I'm afraid.
• Recover - Several Hostess Ho-Ho's (No Don Imus jokes, please) and Ding-Dongs (No Howard Stern jokes, please).
• 25-30 lifts from a bending position taking the 30 lb. weights away from my body to the sides
• Recover - Short time in hammock, then an ice bath.
• 10 lifts standing straight up, taking the 30 lb. weights away from my body at the sides (sort of an inverted Iron Cross move)
• Recover - Howl in pain
• 15 more with the 20 lb. weights
• Recover - Priest comes in and attempts to give last rites. Stops when I explain to him that I'm not Catholic.
• 15 curls with one 30 lb. weight, right arm; repeat with left arm
• Recover - Slap biceps repeatedly until they stop aching
• 25 curls with one 20 lb weight as before
• Recover - Collapse into a fetal ball until awoken by missus the following morning.

Day Two - Lower Body (everything below the naughty bits, excepting the glutes and belly)

• Similar to Day One except with the legs and less so. the usual leg lifts and crunches and Crunchies.

What's All This Then?

Many people have asked why there's been such a dearth of posts on the blog lately.

Well, people haven't actually asked, but I have noticed a general sense of alarm in the Internet community recently that coincides with the dearth of posts on this blog.

All right, it also coincides with announcements of Iranian nuclear ambitions and the depressing news that the late Anna Nicole Smith's child is likely the progeny of her overpriced lawyer. Personally, I was hoping the kid was Charlie Sheen's, just for the comedy blogging potential.

Nonetheless, people would ask, if they read the blog more regularly and gave a damn, just what is going on here.

I'd use the excuse of a vacation, but as we're all a bit old for Spring Break that's not apt to fly very far as an excuse. Sleeping more regularly might be closer to the mark, were that actually happening.

I had lunch with Stew today and the subject of this blog did not come up once. However, I think that was mostly because I dozed off into my carne asada.

So what follows is my best guess as to why there has been a dearth of posting. I hope these complete fabrications will not only serve as an explanation for the relative inactivity on this blog, but will also mercilessly shame the members into resuming their fortnightly contributions.

• Stew Miller - Stew, as faithful readers of the blog know, is heavily into golf. I know this because of his elaborate collection of golf clubs, and the massive poster of Tiger Woods in a muscle shirt in his living room. Stew is also hitting the ball at absurdly massive distances. During one round last year he was without a regular driver, so he teed off with his 4-wood at each hole. He consistently bombed this club 260-265 yards...straight down the middle. I hit my 3-wood about 220 yards. I'm like the Wright Bros. trying to keep pace with a Lear Jet.
  
  Just last week I played in a foursome with Stew and he hit his opening drive... get ready... 350 yards. That's three and one-half gridiron pitches, not counting the endzones and goalposts. The hole was downhill a bit but that is simply sick. His approach shot was a 30 yard lob wedge. Actually, he has a combo sand and lob wedge which we all affectionately refer to as the "slob wedge."
  
  So naturally, Stew must not be posting regularly because he is somewhere smashing titanium-carbon-polymer blended clubfaces into three-piece Pro-V1's and basking in the absolute chaos that the impacts are creating in the space-time continuum. (I could have sworn I heard Einstein's voice during one shot, saying, "This is ridiculous.") If I were a shade under 40 and could bash a golf ball 350 yards, I'd be golfing 18 hours a day. My best was 340 on a parched day with a gale force breeze behind me.
  
• Nuffy Noe - Nuffy is a free-spirited sort, prone to fits of frenzied creativity followed by lengthy absences in which he is frequently spotted in the fringes of National Geographic travelogue documentaries. Nuffy has a fascination with personal improvement regimens. (Remember Five Times Better? Of course you do!) This frequently results in long periods of tranquil introspection, usually at the peak of some insurmountable mountain, clothed in sackcloth, yak's leather, and his trusty "Five Times Better" logo-print t-shirt.
  
  Nuffy also has a consistent fascination with short people. We think it has to do with the fact that he was read Gulliver's Travels over 1,400 times by the town hobo when he was a wee bairn, but it also may have to do with the fact that Nuffy once lost out on a chance to portray the Jolly Green Giant in a frozen peas commerical. To this day his eyes still get misty when he sees one of those "Visualise Whirled Peas" bumper stickers.
  
  None of this really explains why he hasn't posted lately except to say that he really is an unpredictable sort. One moment, he's posting away about Star Trek remakes starring Warwick Davis as Spock's Torso, and the next minute he's scaling Mount Kilimanjaro with a package of frozen limas, weeping like Donald Trump at a casino demolition.
  
• Jorge Carlito Viejo - Last we heard he is still imprisoned, though he gets access to the Internet for good-behaviour, which consists of not writing 4,500 page screenplays about Danny DeVito and Rhea Perlman traveling the country on a tiny Harley.
  
• Zimpter Fiforg - Still tramping the fetid fields of television the last we heard. Given that television involves a full day's work, unless you're Vanna White, we imagine he's up to his scapula in rewrites, production meetings, and dodgy catering fare.
  
• Linus Coconut - As he is an enigma, a confusing conflagration of complex contradictions, and a stickler for alliteration, he could be anywhere, doing anything right now. Look, there he is behind you in your room. Listen, I wouldn't be surprised... that's all I'm saying.
  
• Earl Fando - Well, I'm sitting here typing this rot, aren't I? Actually, I have been engaged in a rather taxig weight-lifting regimen lately that's stressed the old schedule. Still, the arms are like steel. Well, steel if steel came wrapped in a thin layer of Mexican-food inspired fat tissue. I still play a bit of footy now and then to keep the aerobic capacity above incapacitated. I've also been reading a bit of Wodehouse these days, just to elevate myself and provide some verbal inspiration for these bits.
  
  Hopefully, this will happen at some point.