The Exit of Doom

I was driving home today, heading toward what I decided was THE EXIT OF DOOM. You have to say that in a really deep voice with lots of reverberation. Every day when I drive home from work I pass a perfectly respectable gym where people go to hold back the rapid expansion common to couch potatoes such as myself. I'm sedentary. I just am. I am not an athlete. It's not fair that by being true to my basic nature I am expanding past a point that is acceptable.

So at 5:30 today I found myself heading toward that exit of doom, where Mark was waiting to escort me into the gym against my will. Or at least against my nature. Yes. We had agreed to meet there. Yes. I want to be healthy. But it takes all of the minuscule amount of discipline I have after a long day of work not to run home to my couch and television.

I'm not a fan of large groups of people. I'm not a fan of sweating. I'm not a fan of trying to figure out how to work all those machines while attempting to look cool as I lower the weights to the lowest possible settings. I'm not a fan of boredom. So really, going to the gym is a little like my own personal hell.

We got passes for five free visits. That should be enough to get in shape and lose all the weight I need to. Right? Truthfully, if we actually use all five free passes we will be exponentially further along than we usually are when deciding to "get healthy". I'm not running out to buy cute gym clothes though. I'm nothing if not a pessimistic realist.