Let's Get Lumpy!

All right, you big lugs!  It’s time to get up and exercise!  Come on!  Get your butt out of that chair and start doing, er, exercise…things…

Okay, okay.  I’ll be honest.  As I write this, I’m sitting in a chair, my feet up, and a “Simpsons” DVD running in the background.  (It’s the episode where Springfield holds a film festival, and Jay Sherman from “The Critic” makes an appearance.  Funny stuff.)  Not exactly the best way to get the heart rate up, but it works for me.

The truth is, I just lack the motivation to get up and do any strenuous exercise.  Well, any exercise, to be honest.  But let’s be honest: there’s not a lot out there to get me that motivated.  Oh, sure, I could go to the gym down the street, but the fact is that I haven’t worked out in so long that showing up at a real gym would be like showing up to work in my underwear: kind of amusing at first, but downright embarrassing once the day gets started.  So, the gym is out of the question.

I could go to the YMCA.  The people there aren’t exactly Gold’s Gym-types, if you catch my drift, so there wouldn’t be the intimidation of going to a real gym.  However, there’s also the possibility of picking up some sort of communicable disease in the showers, which are also used by the inhabitants of the $5.00-a-day rooms that the YMCA rents to some of the homeless folks around town.  It’s nothing personal against those folks – everyone hits the hard times – but I’d prefer not to bathe in the same place where someone who did it with a dead guy for a few bucks allows his soupy gray runoff to sluice around.  Take the “Y” off the list.

There’s the local “fit club”, which is little more than a meat market.  If I wanted to pick up vacant, glassy-eyed women who are as shallow as a teaspoon, I’d give up on the idea of exercising and just hit the bars.  I want to get healthy, dammit!  Then I want to pick up vacant, glassy-eyed women who are as shallow as a teaspoon.  Scratch the fit club.  For now.

So what’s left?  Exercising at home?  No dice.  If it were that easy, I wouldn’t be sitting on my butt in front of a computer, bitching about how hard it is to exercise, now would I?

A few days ago, I was discussing this with a friend of mine, and she mentioned a place called Curves For Women.  If you don’t know what it is, Curves is pseudo-gym for women that has a bunch of different workout machines, and the members go in, spend a few minutes on each machine, and then leave.  That’s it.  It takes about thirty minutes.  Doing this three or four times a week, along with a fairly healthy diet, will allow women to shape up a little at a time, so as not to overstress the body, or lose weight, if they wish.  I thought it was a pretty neat idea.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a Curves equivalent for men.  So I’ve decided to design one myself.  I call it:



Think about it: Curves For Women allows women to work on the curves that make them, well, woman-y.  Men, being inherently lumpy, will obviously want to work on defining their lumpiness.  It makes complete sense.  Trust me on this.

And so, because it’s designed for men, but will still attempt to help us shape up without overstressing our bodies, the regimen will be thirty minutes long, like its female counterpart, but will focus on our overall guy-ness.  Here’s how it will work:

Step 1: Upon entering Lumps For Men, the customer will be taken to a specially-designed, heavily-padded La-Z-Boy recliner with two handles and spend three minutes reclining and straightening up on each side.  This will build forearm strength, as well as stretch the leg muscles when the footrest lifts.

Step 2: Weight machines are next, set up for 16-, 20-, 24-, and 39-ounce curls.  (The 39-ounce curls are actually 40-ounce curls, but with one ounce poured out for your dead homies.  Word.)  Three minutes on each of these weight settings will slowly build up the upper arm muscles.

Step 3: Here, you will have six minutes to remove a blown engine from an old, rusty Camaro.  First, use your legs to push the crawler around under the car so you can remove the engine mount bolts, and then put those arms into it as you use a chain lift to pull the engine.  Better hurry!  The owner (one of our professional trainers who will dress up as a crotchety old man and complain that you’re going to scratch the paint) is getting irritated.

Step 4: Let’s work on those flabby, hairy legs of yours!  Our patented Lumps For Men stair stepper features video screens on four sides that allow you to actually live the experience of having to walk up eight flights of stairs in three minutes because of a broken elevator at your office!  Better hurry!  You’re going to be late for work!

Step 5: The final step will help build up those pectoral and abdominal muscles.  One of our professional trainers will pretend to be a guy you know from college who needs help moving his couch.  (For realism, we’ll even put him in a filthy Led Zeppelin shirt and ripped jeans, and drench him in patchouli oil!)  Repeatedly lifting and lowering the couch as our trainer says, “No, let’s put it over here,” will really get those abs tightened!  Remember to lift with the legs, not the back.

And now, cool down.  For an extra $20.00 per month, you can even use our steam room, which is thoroughly sandblasted and bleached each and every day to ensure proper sanitation.

So there you have it.  I’ve already sent a letter to the folks at Curves, outlining my program ideas, and asking that they consider the idea.  I’ll post any reply I get here.  Who knows?  There could be Lumps For Men coming to your town soon!

All the best,
Derek
(DCF)