CardiNO

Here we go again, right? Exercise is obviously not for me so why do I keep trying? Honestly, when I run (like for a bus or to get to Wendy's before it closes) I actually get a rash on my legs. My body is literally rejecting physical movement. But I workout for times like these so I can chronicle my misadventures for you. If you would click on more advertisements, I could afford liposuction and we could put this whole mess behind us.

Why do I hate working out? Well, first of all, sometimes people make fun of other people for exercising and that is just inexcusable. I have heard so many rude remarks made towards people who are in the gym to improve themselves. Whether you're working out for your health or to lose baby weight or to help deal with stress or because there's a really cute guy at your gym, no one should ever make you feel bad about yourself for working out. Anyways, if there's anyone we should be ostracizing in the gym isn't it the fit people? You're done. Why are you here? You look like an "after" picture.

And second of all, there's the whole actual physical exercise part. But not all workouts are created equal. Some are more enjoyable than others. For instance, getting punched in the face repeatedly is more enjoyable than running any distance. For me, I have the option of going to the gym and lifting weights with my dad or going to church and doing a group exercise session with my mom. These are 2 very different experiences, as detailed below.

Dad 
We normally use the elliptical machines for 45 minutes to an hour when we first get to the gym and my dad has exchanged pleasantries with his requisite 50 people. This is great because each machine has its own television and you can pick from plenty of channels and sometimes at my dad's gym, I don't know who their cable provider is, but sometimes, on some magical days, Jeopardy! comes on in the middle of the day for no apparent reason. So I normally plug in my headphones and watch the news or Jeopardy! or Lifetime and my dad normally pretends to watch ESPN with no headphones in for about 5 minutes until he proceeds to talk to me for the remaining 40 minutes. This is fine, I love talking to my dad, but I don't love talking while running on an elliptical (okay tbh barely jogging but still). After about 15 minutes in it's a struggle to breathe, let alone make conversation about Tom Brady and the republican debate. My dad also does this thing where he pretends the conversation is over, playing dead I call it. So we just run in silence for a few minutes and as soon as I have the earbuds securely stationed in my ears, he starts up again. If I have on a rerun of Keeping Up With the Kardashians I don't mind that much but when I'm halfway through a Criminal Minds I haven't seen this becomes nearly unbearable.

After our cardiOhNoI'mDying we either do a circuit of machines or do exercises that my dad has accumulated after over 30 years of working out every day. Plenty of tricks up his muscle tee. Though I must say, some of these exercises seem made up or at the very least ill-advised for a delicate girl such as myself. A few weeks ago we held weights while doing shoulder shrugs. I asked my dad what this was working on and he said the trapezius muscle. I immediately thought of that Uber Immortal giant beast from 300 and tried to explain that I don't need muscles there because I'm a girl. But for as much as my father talks at me, he never really listens.

He almost always wants to do an ab exercise and I keep telling him that I don't have abs so I can sit that one out. But it's not for lack of trying. One day I sat on an exercise ball for a full hour. And no 6-pack to speak of yet.

My dad also loves to do floor exercises which are literally exercises that we do on the floor. He particularly loves floor exercises done on one's side and they really hurt my hip bones. I didn't even realize that I had hip bones!

Not that there aren't perks to working out with my dad. Most of the time my aunt joins us and it's a family affair, we completely take over the gym with their physical prowess and my sarcastic comments. And although something tells me I won't be meeting my future husband while wearing no make up and struggling to lift a 50 pound bar, at least it could happen at my dad's gym. Stranger things have happened. I've held a wall sit for a minute and done 20 push ups in a row so meeting a nice man can't be that far outside the realm of possibility.

Mom
A group of women get together at my church to exercise 3 days a week and after my first day I promptly called my grandfather to inform him that what these women are doing in the Lord's house is purely satanic. God is love and love is not burpees.

At church the women use workout DVDs which I just love in theory. I told my mom that my favorite thing about workout DVDs is that you can fast forward them and get through the whole workout in triple time while not actually doing anything any faster. I just keep doing crunches at my normal pace and the 60 second ab blast is done in 20 seconds with the push of a button. What I hate about workout DVDs is the rampant false advertising. I bought the 21 Day Fix well over 3 weeks ago and I am no more svelte or toned than I was before I bought it. Maybe you have to open the DVD or watch it everyday? But 21 days is not doing the fixing, there's a secret ingredient involved somewhere.

The really fun thing about working out with my mom at church is that I also clean our church so I can always excuse myself at any point in our hour-long session by simply explaining that I would rather scrub toilets.