I got suckered into the idea of getting fit and those cute little 100 day challenges. So I’m learning to jog.

What was I thinking? I’m not sure. I am pleading insanity, because clearly I wasn’t in my right mind. I have never run more than 27 steps in my life; I was a roller blader when I was younger and living in the deep south of the USA. But I’m old now and living in Canada where snow covers the ground for approximately 18 months of the year. I miss the warm wind whipping through my hair and the feeling of freedom.

Then my gorgeous fit blonde parrot-spirit-animal friend says (very approximately) “I am training for a half marathon! It is fabulous. You run or jog and you get ‘high’ and it’s better than sex. Wait, not better than sex; nothing is better than sex. But it’s pretty close. And then you look smoking hawt and men fall all over you. First you learn to run and then you go to a wax bar. Instant Sex Chocolate.”

I am intrigued. So I say to her, “I want to know more about this… ‘jog.’ Teach me to fake it!”

Well shit, it doesn’t work that way. I actually have to get my ass on the treadmill and do this run 1 minute, walk 4 thing until magically one day I can run, or until I figure out how I’m supposed to get better enough to change this magical ratio. Whichever comes first.

I can’t write about this on my own blog, because even when I think about jogging, I use too many swear words.

This is how my first week’s daily jogging routine goes: Stuff my leftover mommy boobs into a sports-bra so that they don’t hit me in the chin and throw off my rhythm. Stuff the rest of my flabby parts into a set of spandex pants tight enough that I don’t have to feel it flopping around. Put on my jogging shoes (I hate you). Get on the treadmill and program it for 31 minutes exactly. Put some sitcom on the TV so that the laugh track drowns out the sound of my now-screaming depression. And now I walk the first minute to warm up, and then begin the 5 minute cycle.

The first minute of running is cake. The second, I start to feel that itch beginning in my calves. By the third, I’m starting to feel a little winded. On the fourth one, I cave and I hang onto the sides of the treadmill, which I’ve promised myself I will not do. As the clock ticks down from 14:00, I spend the next four minutes alternating between “This is stupid. I’m tired; I should quit,” and “I got this.”

Still, the little logical voice in my brain is thinking that breaking my neck rollerblading sounds like a better way to go than breaking my knees.

Minute 10 is appropriately miserable, and I spend the last 30 seconds yelling, “HOW LONG UNTIL I GET THE RUNNER HAPPY GODDAMNIT!?” 8:59 rolls around and I slow the treadmill down again. About time. I’ve got one more minute of run to do.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuck.

This running-high is a myth. I’ve been lied to. So pissed.

I spend the next three minutes in a simmering boil of fat-person rage. But because I’m in my basement, and that evil woman of a friend who says jogging is so fabulous is about 3,000 miles away, I have nobody to unleash it on but myself. My inner Mickey Goldmill (who has been upgraded with some severe anger management issues, the career of drill sargeant, and the best vocabulary HBO has to offer) begins to rally at about 5:09. And he takes over my mouth to do it.

There’s a reason why I only jog while the kid is at school and indoors in my own basement instead of at the YMCA: for the next 60 seconds, I’m pretty sure if HBO ever needed a screenwriter who could write dialogue for a more foul-mouthed series than Deadwood, I’d be a top contender. By my best estimates, I owe the penny swearing jar $213.63. For just today’s “jog.”

It’s about $10 higher than yesterday. Non-stop swearing at the top of my lungs while jogging is doing wonders for my lung capacity.

Suddenly, at about 4:09 my new and improved inner Mickey Goldmill remembers that out of this entire 31 minutes on the treadmill, I’ll have only spent exactly six minutes running.

And he finds this pathetic.

“Don’t you $*!&@(#$@!%quitrunningnow!” he gasps. “You $&*^#@! better $#@*^@&#! finish this #^(*!$! next minute, too you $*&(!#^!$*^&*@#($)&$^&!^$&@^$(!!!! FUCKING MOVE IT! MOVE IT!”

The 3:00 mark comes. “KEEP GOING!” he screams. At least he’s too winded for obscenities.

At about 2:40, my legs become a wobbly pile of Jell-O. Still no happy juice for me. I’m going to go to BlogHer ’14 just so I can strangle my dear friend with my jogging shoelaces.

I can only make it another ten seconds before my legs decide that there’s simply not enough oxygen left on the planet to keep them going. Mickey Goldmill grudgingly approves. “Fine. At least you did 30 seconds longer than yesterday. Walk it off.”

The whole rest of the day I think, “I’m tired. This is stupid self-torture. Why am I doing this?”

Later that evening, hubby grabs a double handful of ass and says “Woo!”

…Shit.

I have it on good authority that as far as jogging goes “I’m doing it wrong.” Big surprise. Instead of watching the Simpsons, I should be staring into space and diddling with my inner Zen. This sounds kinky, like some sort of Tantric thing—another thing I’ve always been curious about. Why the hell it didn’t occur to me to try a 100 day challenge that would be fun, like becoming some enlightened spiritual master of Tantric sex, I have no idea. I think I must conclude that I am stupid.

Fortunately for me, not only am I stupid, I’m one of the most stubborn people alive. That, and as an added bonus stupidity/rage gives me plenty to write about. I will suffer the indignities of runner’s wedgie and squished sport-bra boobs. And although the burn I feel from the chafing of satan’s sports bra outdoes the burn in my legs, I will not be laid low. 

 I will triumph over this sadistic activity called “jogging.” I will offend my neighbours and scare their children by screaming “in your fucking face!” when I conquer running around the block without walking. And then I will take all of my pent up rage and release it into the universe as I watch the sports bra factory burn to the ground.
Author

Anne usually speaks in memes and SAT words, and she frequently attempts to explain the laws of physics and high school chemistry according to the kitchen via her home blog FoodRetro. If you want to know why ice melts or pretzels turn brown, and you want to make food that you never imagined could be made from scratch in the process, she's your blogger. Her friends describe her as "hilarious when you get to know her," but it could be that they are just amused by the way she gets riled up when reading the paper. She can also be found playing the part of community editor and grammar nazi here on BLUNTmoms.

10 Comments

  1. I decided to learn to run this summer too and you’re right, it totally sucks, until it doesn’t. I ran outside, bc there’s no way I could deal w treadmill monotony… However I didn’t have to feel guilty about ditching the family for half an hour bc I was ‘exercising’ even though really it just felt like I was RUNNING AWAY albeit temporarily! Good luck.

  2. LOL. Best post ever.

    I took up running last summer an have to say that it’s much easier outside instead than on a treadmill. Good luck with it!

  3. I have been told countless times that running is awesome and if you keep at it, you’ll love it. Lies. My high school didn’t have a soccer pitch or anything, so 2 months of PhysEd for 3 years was running 5k every other day. I hated every step of every run, every single day we had to do it. Good atcha, though, for keeping with it. Let me know if you hate it any less by the spring.

  4. I tried running once, but then realized the liquor store was actually not closing any minute. So ya, feel your pain.

  5. Pingback: Saturday Morning Coffee Reads: Feb 1 2014 | Once Upon A Bookshelf

  6. The prospect of screaming “in your fucking face!” makes me want to go for a run RIGHT NOW!

    Hilarious!

  7. I had to stop reading half-way through. My eyes had tears I was laughing so hard. Then, I wiped them away, continued on, and swore off all running. I HATE RUNNING. But, this post just made me love you even more than I already do.

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