(no subject)

[sanpaku_backup]

One of the things we were always down about here was not finding a nearby indoor pool. I would blame my lack of exercise on the lack of said pool, since I decided a few years ago, once it was clear that It's About Time I Should Be Doing This Sort of Thing, that the only exercise I could bear on a regular basis was swimming. Running makes my knees hurt and weights are just too damn mindless. I can't make myself do them, and that's how I need to approach this.

So S. actually found a pool about 10 minutes away. (The whole discussion about being in RI and things you do or don't get in a place just shifted again.) Another major limiting factor for any exercise scheme is my need to be in the house both before and after work, when Jo is at her most exuberant, so it has to be the early morning, and I'm not a morning person. But now that we have a tiny person who screams every morning sometime between 5 and 7... this is more doable.

It was like anything else early in the morning: not much fun as you do it, but you're glad you did it afterwards. There's the depressingly familiar sensation of, "boy, am I ever out of shape." Just panting like crazy after a few laps; most of my time in the water was spent waiting for my heart to stop pounding. But the water is warm and I need to find the "hot pool" there to induce myself to do this, or it will be something I only get around to once every few months, like most things. But it's a start.

***********************

This Colbert thing has my head spinning. The show is great but not one I can make myself watch -- it's depressing that our society actually needs someone to point out what an ass Bill O'Reilly is via satire. But the routine is one of the most devastating things I've come across lately; it makes you think again about what a depressing gruel serves as satire in this country most of the time -- Darrell Hammond and all that. And of course since he called the press a bunch of pussies, they didn't laugh and they didn't report on it until the blogosphere made 'em. (The Times got around to it today, so it's official.) Then they say it was because of what you do and don't do at a White House Correspondents Dinner, like we're in Japan and no one laughed because he had a black line out of place on his face makeup. It's all pretty damn interesting.

So, thank you, Stephen Colbert. (Although that Web site really needs someone to buy them a comma.)

Comments

[sethg]

One of the characteristics of modern dictatorships is that comedians can get away with more criticism of the government than other dissidents.

(Not that the US is a dictatorship...although given the President's oft-stated claim that he can ignore whatever part of a law he thinks is interfering with The Inherent Powers Of The Commander-In-Chief, the Spanish term democradura might be appropriate...)

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

It wasn't the government but the press that Colbert destroyed. Somone posted on Kos (in respect to Richard Cohen's stupid diatribe in the Post today), the quote from Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand a thing when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

[genme.livejournal.com]

Yay for swimming! (I say as I sit here in my house on a day when I should be swimming ... but it's an outdoor pool, and it's 63 degrees, and I should find an indoor pool too, lazy me). Anyway, we are probably going to use my book money to build a lap pool in our backyard (as I share your opinion on swimming being the only tolerable exercise). Maybe someday you can all come swim in it!! BTW, give me a call when you can. I have put off calling you because I don't want to call at a bad time for the baby.

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

As a result of the swimming, my right ear waxed up yesterday and I couldn't hear a damn. Today as well until I did the treatment. I should also find nose clips. It's great, but it does a real number on my otolaryngeawhatever system.

Build the pool... and fill it with hundred dollar bills! Then you will have really arrived.

It is always a bad time for the baby, so you should call anyway!

[msmidge.livejournal.com]

I applaud you for swimming; it's too hard and embarrassing for me. I was going to suggest that with how annoying your job sounds sometimes, maybe you should take up karate. It got me through a year of teaching in a public high school. I always thought of the punching-dummy as the English Language Arts Coordinator...so smug...WHACK!

[sanpaku.livejournal.com]

That does sound tempting. I could certainly have used it when I was teaching HS.