Exercise, sports a major boost for healthy lifestyle

I can vividly remember the last time I went out for a jog. It was my first year of college, a Sunday night in December, so there was a nip in the air, or at least as much of a nip as is possible for Los Angeles. I pounded my way around the track three or four times before I realized my knees hurt. By hurt, I don't mean some niggling pain but a piercing, someone-stuck-me-with-a- knife pain. Then I woke up the next day and experienced true suffering. I believe I was unable to attend classes that day because I could not hobble all the way from the dorm to campus. It was the only time I missed class because of physical injury, unless hangovers count.

When again able to walk, I went to the university's medical center, which was clearly understaffed and overworked. There I was examined by what clearly was a mere medical student. I don't want to be mean when I say mere, I'm just saying he hadn't graduated yet, making him, in my book, not a doctor. But hey, it cost me about five bucks, which I guess is about what you would expect to pay when you get medical treatment from someone who's not really a doctor.

He grabbed my leg and stretched and poked it, asking "Does this hurt, does this hurt?" The answer, to his apparent disappointment, was no. It hurt three days ago, but now nothing. He told me what all doctors tell you when they have no idea: "Ice it."

And I haven't been running since. Probably, after so many years, I could go for a jog and not risk doing permanent damage to my beautiful knees, but why risk it. The view from the couch is so much sweeter, and my knees now serve a purpose much different from than in my youth. Way back when, me and my knees would spend entire summer days running back and forth in the street playing two-hand touch football, or in the park playing baseball. Me and my knees rode my bicycle, shot hoops and climbed trees.

Why, once in high school my knees took me dancing, but we both died of embarrassment and gave that up, preferring instead to lean up against the bar with an air of disaffected cool. Oh yeah, I never got much play, but you could probably already tell that.

These days, my knees simply serve as an excuse not to exercise. When my girlfriend calls me fat, which, rather cruelly, she does often, I just say, "But babe, I've got bad knees, I can't exercise." Because she is my girlfriend and loves me, or at least tolerates me, she always restrains herself from answering, "Even if you can't exercise it doesn't mean you have to eat so much, you pig." She's really very sweet.

She could also point out a number of things which are obvious, which I, in my slothfulness, choose to ignore. One such point is that back when I used to run, I was just wearing regular shoes. I mean, they weren't loafers or anything, I'm not quite that dumb, but they weren't running shoes. And they certainly weren't Reebok DMX running shoes, which would have been impossible since these are the latest and best in athletic footwear technology. If I had been wearing shoes like these, with their advanced air-pod transfer-system cushioning my every step, my knees would never have taken a pounding, implanting in me a deep-seated psychological fear of permanent physical disability. Wearing these shoes, its more floating than running.

So, true, I could take up running again, making sure I've got the proper shoes. I could even start swimming, which is certainly easy on the knees. The main impediment to that plan is the fact that I have spent the past few years on my couch snacking and sucking back the brews, meaning I don't think me in swim trunks would be a sight appreciated by anyone.

In fact, I still wake up screaming in the middle of the night at the remembrance of a swim party my school hosted one year to raise money for buying books or some other ridiculous reason. Invite your family, have fun by the pool. Lucky for me, grandpa happened to be visiting, so he came along to the party. When he walked out of the changing room, an unnatural silence descended over the pool, which was followed, some stunned seconds later, by a general giggle and a gasp or two. There stood my grandpa, stuffed into the skimpiest pair of swimmers any of us had ever seen, in all his fish-belly glory. His stomach, cultivated over the years, hung down over the trunks, which seemed on the verge of giving out under the terrible strain placed on them by that girth. And some smart aleck kid said, "Dude, it's not Christmas, put your package away."

Back on the topic of exercise, I personally go for lifting weights. I find myself fascinated by my muscles after pumping iron, standing in front of the mirror watching my muscles veritably jump out of my body. Oh yeah, baby, you the man, I find myself mumbling as I gaze at myself in narcissistic wonder. I am obviously rather easily impressed.

Lifting weights is good for the body and the ego, but still you need some cardiovascular exercise to burn the fat. Surprisingly, tennis fits the bill. I say surprisingly because I remember back in high school we used to make fun of people on the tennis team, seeing them in the same light as those on the academic bowl team or the school newspaper. Basically, we thought tennis was for wimps. Now that I have taken up the sport, I see how young and foolish I was back then. A good game of tennis will have you panting for breath and begging for mercy. Just remember, though, get a good tennis racquet. I suggest Wilson, which has a vast array of racquets styled in the latest technology, and in this sun you really should get a pair of sports sunglasses which can cut the glare and let you see the ball, so you don't take one in the dome. Reebok Eyewear are the most technologically advanced sports sunglasses and will fill your every need, and they will make you look pretty cool on the courts.

If none of these sports appeal to you, I implore you to find one that does, so you can get off the couch and into the game of life. Exercise, no matter in what form it takes, has that effect of making you love yourself, and if you don't love yourself you can't love anyone else, as my ex-girlfriend used to say. Of course, she loved other people a little too much, resulting in a rather bitter break up.

Seriously though, exercise has that wonderful effect of making you feel invincible. You get yourself in shape and you will feel like there is nothing in life which you can't achieve, no goal you can't reach, on the playing field as well as in the boardroom.

Some people think a nice-sized belly is a sign of success, but really it is a sign of laziness. Nothing says success like a lean and muscular body. These are the people who inspire confidence and admiration; the people who find themselves at the top of the game, no matter what game they choose to play.

So go out and get the proper gear and start sweating yourself to the top. (David Eyerly)