Holy BALLS, I'm out of shape.

"Gime? What's a gime?"

While it isn't much of a surprise, I realized just how crappy I've treated myself the past few years (2 pints of Haagen-Dazs in a weekend...often). Last Sunday, my roommate asked me to go to the gym with her. I figured since I had joined over a month ago, it'd be nice to actually GO THERE. We hopped onto a couple of elliptical machines and went at it. I walk at a fairly brisk pace, and assumed that this would be no sweat.

WRONG, DUMBASS!

Five minutes into it, and my legs were extremely tense. After 20 minutes of start, stop, start stop, roommate suggested that maybe the hardest setting isn't the way to go on the first day.

Ya think?

I felt fine afterwards, but when I woke up Monday morning, someone drove an 18 wheeler over my legs. Walking was...interesting, because I wasn't sure where my foot was going to land, and painful. Can't EVER forget about the pain, because it didn't go away.

Not until I went back to the gym Wednesday morning after work. The beauty of working the late shift is that by the time you get to the gym at 2 AM, NO ONE IS THERE. I got back onto the elliptical machine, put it on the easiest setting, and lasted five minutes before my legs were ready to commit mutiny again. I coerced another five minutes out of them, and then moved on.

With the whole place virtually empty, I got to play with all the weight machines. As I did so, I looked over to my left and spotted the rock climbing wall.

I went back again this Sunday, and will go every day. I bring along a little notebook to keep track of what exercises I'm doing, and at what settings. I've spent two hours there each time, and felt great afterwards (except for waking up the next day, but even that's getting better).

Today I did MUCH better on the elliptical machine, because I went on the treadmill first to warm up. I saw someone using the rock climbing wall, too. This middle-aged guy scrambled up the wall pretty quickly, and then slid down on the safety rope.

It makes me want to get a grappling gun.

(Heh.)

Maybe I'll give that a whirl in August, when I've made a considerable amount of progress.

Oh, and Lynne? You're right. I did break down and create a playlist for my mp3 player. I thought I wouldn't need one; I figured putting Molossus on repeat forever & ever would do it, but that got a little boring after a while.