The verse of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” that refers to “figgy pudding”
Everything Barry Manilow ever wrote
“Ballad of the Green Berets”
“Da Doo Ron Ron”
“My Way”
To put your tape on your ghetto blaster, lie on your back with your legs about 14 inches apart and your wallet clamped in your left armpit, raise your right arm gradually until you can insert the workout tape into the ghetto blaster device, press the “play” button, then gradually return your arm to the floor and just lie there for a while, spent.
The Actual Workout
All warmed up? Great! Let’s start getting fit! Do each of the exercises below twice on the first day, 4 times the second day, 8 times the third day, and so on, each day doubling the previous day’s number until, after just two weeks, you’re doing each exercise over 1,000 times! And hemorrhaging internally!
So let’s get started!
EXERCISE NUMBER ONE:
LEG HEFT
Lie on your back, legs slightly spread, arms resting on the floor, palms down. Have an accomplice grasp you by your ankles and lift your legs about 18 inches then attempt to guess their combined weight.
EXERCISE NUMBER TWO:
THIGH GRASP
Lie on your stomach with your face resting on a New York Times “Fall Fashion Supplement” opened to a photograph of a model who consumes fewer calories in an entire year than you do at a single wedding reception. Slowly reach your hands down and grasp yourself by the left thigh, then the right, and then close your eyes and moan quietly in despair for a count of about eight seconds.
EXERCISE NUMBER THREE:
SINCERE ANNOUNCEMENT OF INTENTION
TO CHANGE DIETARY HABITS
You and a partner stand facing each other about three feet apart, legs comfortably spread, knees slightly bent, eating from individual one-pound bags of Wise brand potato chips. You say, “First thing tomorrow I swear to God I am definitely going to go on a diet, I really mean it.” Your partner responds, “Yes, me too. I definitely will go on a diet also. I believe there is a vat of Lipton brand California-style onion dip in the refrigerator.” Then you exchange places and repeat the exercise.
EXERCISE NUMBER FOUR:
BREAST DEVELOPMENT
Originally, I was going to use this space to describe an amazing new Scientific Discovery exercise that enables any woman to develop, within minutes, two large, firm breasts such as are regularly featured on television star Loni Anderson. But then I said to myself, “Hey, isn’t it time that we, as a liberated society, got over this juvenile and demeaning fixation with breasts?” So I have decided to omit this particular amazing, risk-free, 100
percent effective exercise, although of course if you wish to obtain a copy for the purpose of scientific research, I’d be happy to send it to you just for the asking, plus $29.95 for postage and handling. If you act right now, I’ll also send several grainy before-and-after photographs of women who used to look like Olive Oyl but now, thanks to this Amazing Breast Exercise Discovery, cannot walk erect unless preceded by native bearers.
Cooling Down
As we discussed in Chapter 1, when you exercise, your muscle cells take in molecules of oxygen and give off molecules of sweat, which work their way to your armpits. For your cooling-down phase, lie on your back with your arms laced behind your head and your elbows on the floor, thus exposing a maximum of armpit area and allowing the sweat molecules to escape into the atmosphere as harmless BO vapors. This would be an excellent time to start worrying about nuclear war again.
Chapter 4. Running
An Important Safety Note about Running
In this chapter, I can give you only a cursory overview of running, which is without question the most difficult and complex form of exercise, as is evidenced by the fact that it is the subject of numerous lengthy books costing upward of $14.95. Unfortunately, many members of the general public still labor under the dangerous misconception that running is simply a matter of getting out and running. So before you attempt to do any actual running, I strongly urge you to read a minimum of several books on the subject and to take lessons from a trained running instructor. I also cannot overemphasize the importance of spending large sums of money.
What Kind of Person Should Take Up Running, and What Will Happen to This Person’s Knees
Running is the ideal form of exercise for people who sincerely wish to become middle-class urban professionals. Whereas the lower classes don’t run except when their kerosene heaters explode, today’s upwardly mobile urban professionals feel that running keeps them in the peak form they must be in if they are to handle the responsibilities of their chosen urban professions, which include reading things, signing things, talking on the telephone, and in cases of extreme upward mobility, going to lunch.
That’s why at the end of the working day, when the lower classes have passed out facedown in the Cheez Whiz, you can drive down the streets of any middle-class neighborhood in America and see dozens of professionals out running with determined facial grimaces, burning off calories, improving the efficiency of their cardiovascular systems, increasing their muscle flexibility, and ultimately staggering off into the bushes to die. Even as you read these words, thousands of designer-sportswear-clad bodies are rotting in the bushes of suburban America, and the only reason you don’t hear more about it is that the next of kin generally don’t report the disappearances, because they are quite frankly pleased that they no longer have to listen to the runner blather on and on about his or her cardiovascular development.
Of course, not all runners die in the bushes. Many fail to make it that far, because of knee injuries. To understand why, let’s look at the interior of the human knee.
What we can learn from this is that, although from the outside your knee feels like a croquet ball inserted in the middle of your leg, it is in fact a complex organ consisting of bone, muscle, thong, and mucilage, bounded on the west by Spain. The knee provides adequate support for everyday activities, such as renewing magazine subscriptions or gesturing at cretins in traffic, but it is not designed to withstand the strain placed on it by running, where each time the runner’s foot hits the pavement, the knee is subjected to 650,000 kilocycles of torque, and even more if the runner has been dropped from a helicopter. This is why it is so very important to choose the right running shoe.
Choosing the Right Running Shoe
Time was, of course, when there were no running shoes, only “sneakers,” which were bulky objects that cost $12 and said “U.S. Keds” on the side and had essentially the same size, weight, and styling characteristics as snow tires. But today’s topflight running shoe is a triumph of sophisticated, computer-designed, laser-augmented, fully integrated, infrared, user-friendly technology and space-age materials, packed with dozens of medically proven health and safety features, and all combined into a small and lightweight unit that, surprisingly, costs no more than a black-market infant.