Fattest

This is always a proud time of year for me. Come the end of January, I’m at my yearly peak weight. Not outlandish Biggest Loser reward-me-with-a-chance-for-fabulous-prizes-for-my-total-lack-of-self-control fat but “spongy”, I guess, is the term I’ll go with.

Since I’m not going to blame myself, I’ll blame winter. And you. Winter, obviously, creates a situation where I’m simply indoors more. It’s dark at 5 o’clock PM. It’s cold when it’s not dark. No win scenario. Who wants to trudge around in the snow and/or muddy lawn and kick around a soccer ball? No? Who wants to watch Biggest Loser, eat chips, and laugh at the struggling fatties while brushing splintered Pringles off your chest and lap into the eager mouth of your obese dog? Yeah, that sounds better. Hand me the pizza sauce encrusted remote and whatever chips you can scrape together from the recliner fabric. We have a regular upholstery garden in full bloom.

Winter sucks. But you might be the bigger problem. Guess how many cards, letters, comments and emails of encouragement I’ve received from you? You’ll notice there was no ellipses before this sentence to simulate time spent counting. Zero. Pretty fucking self-involved aren’t you? I like to remain humble even in the face of your rudeness. In fact, I’m better at being modest than all of the rest of you combined. But thanks a lot. How much time do I spend commenting on your blogs? Again, you’ll notice no ellipses before that sentences and Ithankyoufornotcounting.

No, I’m at my yearly Fattest right now. BUT it can only go down from here! (Weight, that is.)
My normal, rippled six pack abs are more like a 4 ½ pack.
My food pyramid is comprised of pie, beer, fudge stripe cookies, and whatever that crumb was stuck to my cheek for an hour that I pushed into my hole. No good?
When ordering at a restaurant, I say, “What do you have in a crust? And I’ll have two of those.”

I think I’ve identified the source of the problem. It’s post-holiday hangover. If running is a habit, so is eating sugary treats and drinking away your post-Christmas financial woes.

Oh, I’m still running. Don’t worry about that. I just need to turn up the music to drown out my fat guy wheeze. I’m pregnant with laziness. I don’t think I’m in danger of turning up on the list of hottest Olympic athletes any time soon. A good dose of pro-biotics will solve some of the problem but, if I’m being honest, there’s still a little wiggle left.

When are you at your fattest? And gross. Slob.

February 1st begins my quest to redefine my figure for the upcoming bikini season.  I probably should mix in a nice waxing at some point too.  The phrase "unsightly curly ass hair" is a real turn off to Mrs. Nitmos.

No worries. By spring, I’ll be toned and ripped out and exceedingly modest. Handsome? Yes, to all Get Out!

Heck, I might even start ordering those little green things….what are they called….vegetables! I might even pair it with a fruit if I’m feeling a little wild and crazy. Hell, I might even stop asking them to cover my entire plate in fried dough “like a giant Elephant Ear.”

But the calendar says January 29th. That gives me two more days of nom nom nom nom nom nom….

Happy trails.
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One of Mrs. Nitmos and I’s favorite weekends of the year approaches! No not Valentine’s Day. That’s for teenagers and cartoonish romantics. Purely coincidental that it shares the V-Day weekend. It’s my hometown’s winter Comedy Festival and outdoor winter festival! It’s wine. It’s laughter. It's soup and chili. It’s hot tubs. It’s wine again. It’s kids at grandparents and not our problem! It's local craft beer.  It's a frickin' winter ferris wheel on the downtown streets! There’s no soccer! Along with some friends (yes, we have them), we’ll be creating little embarrassing scenes at bars, restaurants, and theatres all over the area before waking up in an amnesiastic* fog the next morning that allows us to go on with our normal Responsible Citizen lives.

View the fabulous video about my ancestral homeland.  That's totally how we lived every single day.  Believe it.

Once again, I haven’t been asked to do my “act” on stage for the comedy festival. This seems to be a yearly oversight now. If it keeps happening, I’m going to start considering that it is not accidental. So, I guess I’ll attend and take notes to give to the performers. I’m sure they’ll appreciate the critique.

Also, yeah, I know I said getting un-Fattened starts February 1st but I’m allowed this one weekend of debauchery. I’m not a Quaker. Believe thee that.

* Should be a word. Screw you, red squiggly line.

Vicious Cycle

Around around I go, where it stops nobody knows. Well, I know. It’s going to stop at five miles. That’s my limit on the treadmill.

Despite my last post, it turns out that I have one other thing to confess: I’ve been using the treadmill a lot lately. Normally, I can count on one hand the number of times I use a treadmill in a year. I still need only one hand for this year…as long as that hand has eight fingers.

It’s a Vicious Cycle. (Lance, you may use this title for your next autobiography with my blessing.*)

I’ve definitely been tougher in years past. It would have taken a frigid one-digit Fahrenheit day or several inches of snow or an engrossing episode of Cougar Town to keep me inside and resigned to the mill. Oh, I hate it so. But, this winter, I’ve stepped outside to test the temperature and, frankly, haven’t liked the cock-eyed look that oak tree was giving me and decided to head to the mill. Thirty degrees? Yeah, but it’s WINDY so it feels like negative twenty. One time I even convinced myself that it was National Nipple Day and that it would be wrong to have them sticking out and getting all scraped up from the cold on NND.

You know what you don’t watch while on the treadmill? TBS. The Superstation. They play all of those mind numbingly bland sitcoms from the 90’s. The commercials breaks last nearly five minutes giving you plenty of time to keep consulting the distance and count the hundredths of a mile one.digit.at.a.time. Everybody Loves Commercials! I’ve also become familiar with every nook and cranny of the basement within my sight line from the deck of the mill. Guess who has eight fingers and doesn’t dust much?

It’s Tuesday and I have five miles scheduled. I won’t feel guilty getting on the mill today though. It was -2 degrees Fahrenheit when I drove my filly to school. Negative two? That’s a solid, completely legit reason right there.

If yer nose hairs crystallize when inhaling, you might be a treadmiller.
If yer penis becomes a scared turtle, you might be a treadmiller.
If winter comes inside and slams the door saying It’s too cold out there, you might be a treadmiller.
If yer goosebumps develop goosebumps and those goosebumps’ teeth are chattering, you might be a treadmiller.
If yer….you get the point.

That was surprisingly easy. Hey Foxworthy, give me several million please.

You can all leave your I would never run on a treadmill. That’s not real running hur hur comments if you want. I’ve made a few myself over the years. And no, it’s not “real” running. It’s near running. As Zima is to beer, the treadmill is to running. But it’s good enough for this genetically finger deformed circus freak this winter. Let the vicious cycle loop de loop begin! The gentle whir of the mill is the sound of my running manliness escaping like air from a balloon.

Ever see a guy with 23 fingers on one hand? I think you are about too.

Happy trails.
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* I was recently sent an article that seemed to be suggesting that you morning coffee drinkers (myself included) are perpetrating the same body altering fraud as Armstrong’s purposeful hundreds of million dollar earning, Tour winning, doping scam. And your milk hormone drinking kids too! I would link it here but I can’t stop laughing and, also, don’t want to spread this Looney Tunes. False equivalent much? Obfuscate much? Oh, my. At first I thought it was one of those sly witty articles from The Onion or something but, sadly, no luck. I’ve always been an Armstrong fan too but this…this…was way too much. Maybe at a future date I’ll share with you. Armstrong fans (again, myself included), get over it.  Dude cheated.  Don't try to pretend that my lying about the size of my penis height is the same thing.

On a side note, I stepped on a spider in my house the other day. It dawned on me: I’m doing the same thing as people who slaughter defenseless elephants for their tusks. The madness must stop.

While We Are in the Mood to Confess...

Did you see the BIG MAJOR NEWS event last night?  Oprah, the Jerry Springer of celebrity interview journalism, sat down with Lance Armstrong and discovered that yes, indeed, a world class cyclist took performance enhancing drugs!?!? WHAT?!?! The Earth shook; my bowels moved.  Only one of these things normally happen during a typical evening. 

Of course, Lance was the last one in on it.  Everyone else in the world - cycling, baseball, Vernon Gholston, whatever - already reconciled that PED's were everywhere and everyone was using them.  I'm glad he got the opportunity to catch up with common knowledge.

You juxtapose the interview, where a seemingly contrite Armstrong seems to be fully admitting his involvement, versus the Manti Te'o dead girlfriend hoax where, allegedly, "someone" still just might not be telling the whole truth and nothing but.  (Your stock is dropping Manti with every fib.  Do yourself a favor and save millions.)

In the spirit of these current (and soon to be) confessions, a lot of folks (and inanimate objects) are taking the opportunity to confess under the protection of Armstrong's more newsworthy announcement.  Heck, I'm going to take advantage of the spitirt of the moment and come clean myself.  I've compiled a list here:

• The sky is not blue.  It has to do with the atmosphere and how light scattering makes the sky look blue.  The sky would like to apologize for the confusion.
• Cap'n Crunch hasn't done a single crunch his entire life.  That's why he wears the big coat.
• Pop singer by day; talk show host by night.  Now's the time JB.
• The Delorean never needed a flux capacitor.  There's no such thing.  It didn't work.  It was just lights and blinky parts.  Doc Brown and Marty McFly send their regrets.
• I took a drug cocktail of laxatives, Tylenol, salt tabs, potassium, and, post-race, Advil in the week leading up to and during the 2006 Chicago Marathon.  I finished 5,532nd and would probably have done no better than 5,857th without it.  To those 325 people that I defrauded, I apologize.
• Orphans.  They know where their parents are.
• Carly Rae Jepsen doesn't want you to call. Definitely.
• The NRA hated The Expendables 2. 
• OJ's glove did fit.  We shouldn't have acquitted. /ReverseCochran'd

It's never easy to confess but it sure does feel liberating.  Almost as liberating as wearing frilly panties around the house when no one's home.  I just hope everyone can find their way to forgive and forget (maybe not in the OJ situation but the rest, I think, we can move past). 

If you have any secrets to confess, now would be the time.  It's the Age of Liars.  Get in while the gettin's good.

By the way, we know that runners are certainly not taking any PED's to win these marathons right?  Right?!?  I call bullshit.  Ever try to run a five minute mile - let alone twenty-six of them in a row?  Based on my experience, it can't be done naturally.

Happy trails.

Thomas Gibson Hates Half Marathons

Apparently the star of one of those TV detective shows wandered onto the course of a nighttime half-marathon in Los Angeles the other night.  The star, Thomas Gibson (previously on a show called "Dharma & Greg" as, one assumes, either "Dharma" or "Greg") brought his Audi SUV with him which was a clear violation of race rules.  Audi's are not allowed as an authorized mode of transportation for this particular half-marathon.

He was also drunk according to the "police" and the "law" and "social customs".

I know celebrities get special breaks and all but now they are allowed to drive to the finish line of a half-marathon?  With adult beverages?

Or was this some sort of Rosie Ruiz style attempt to win that blew up in his face by (a) plowing through a race course barricade and (b) reeking of non-Gatorade based alcohol?

He was later released on a $15,000 bond which was approximately $14,925 more than had he just paid the race entry fee and wore a bib.

Actors aren't the brightest bulb in the carnival, we know, but I'm sure we'll enjoy his future work on Law & Order: Marathon Edition.

Happy trailers.
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The New Year brings you a NEW chance to get back into Bottle Fed Parents!  Yes, there's a new posting.  I explore the nightmare every parent faces Christmas morning.  I also do things with glue guns.  Check it out.

The Cleanse

Well, it’s a New Year. Again. It just never stops. Every tick of the clock is like the flick of an ole coot’s pocketknife whittling away at my youth. Sigh.

Well…Happy New Year. I guess.

Okay, truthfully, I’m just fuckin’ with you. I’m not that depressive. Actually, I’m kinda optimistic, generally speaking. I always believe that there is a chance that something good will happen even though we all know that optimists are just unevolved pessimists.

The New Year brings new hopes, new dreams, new runs, new races, and new PR’s. Unless you did some sort of New Year’s Day resolution run or the like, you haven’t yet felt the bitter, humiliating sting of disappointment this year. Your great fear of Not Being Good Enough has not yet materialized. It’s still out in front of you. By the end of this calendar, we’ll all be embarrassed and ashamed about our missed PR’s and half-assed training. But, for now, hope abounds! Foolish, ignorant, misguided hope!

It’s this time of year that I like to take stock of things. And that stock includes a half gallon of unfinished rum left over from the holidays anchoring my kitchen counter. In a non-literal sense of “taking stock”, I like to sit down, dwell reflect on my previous year’s lack of accomplishments - gulp rum – and consider the New Year’s unrealistic goals. And gulp rum. It’s important to lay out a plan for the coming year. Not only are races hard to enter these days due to demand but training for them takes so damn long. This year’s goals will become next year’s Tally of Failure at about this exact same time so it’s best to get a jump on things.

Reflect on the previous year. Drink rum. Write unfulfillable goals for this year. More rum. And then CLEANSE. Don’t forget the cleanse; it’s the most important part.

I’ve talked about it before. Long-time F.M.S. readers will remember the Empty Your Shitter directive from two years back. If you do, in fact, remember that, stop stalking me. You’re creeping me out. But it’s still great advice as only I can deliver.

Cleanse the memory banks. Purge the body thetans (for you Scientologists). Turn the page. Insert Cliche #2. It’s better to have run and lost, than to have never run at all. Insert Cliché #4. Start fresh.

(The preceding paragraph brought to you by Madlibs. Feel free to fill in the clichés at your leisure.)

I like to cleanse cliché-free. I tell myself, “Nitmos, the hay is in the barn for 2012. You don’t want to be All Talk and No Action in 2013. Am I a man or a mouse? It’s make or break it time for 2013. After all, the more things change, the more they stay the same.”

Then, after my little cliché-free pep talk, I sip more rum, take a deep breath and CLEANSE the negative thoughts from the past year. It’s a new year and I’m turning over a new leaf.

The big NEW YEAR CLEANSE is about rebooting your personal hard drive. Unburdening your soul (or sole, as the case may be) about runs missed, races lost to superstorms and missed PRs. You don’t need a tube, lubricant, and gentle warm hands and ability for distracting small talk for this cleanse. It’s more of a deep breath, meditative type thing. The other stuff is purely your choice (though recommended as you’d be surprised where a Twix bar can get lodged).

To that end, I’ve already resumed my regular stretchy-banding, crunching, and push-uping routine left dormant during the extended holidays. During the evening, my living room is again resembling a home gym. I no longer drink wine every day. I set a PR between Thanksgiving and New Year’s this year for consecutive days drinking wine. It got to be like making coffee: wake up, scratch nuts, pee, head downstairs and uncork the wine bottle, and pour it into the coffee mug or onto the Frosted Flakes. It’s okay though, I was getting up at three in the afternoon. It’s not like I was some sort of alcoholic morning drinker.

By the way, for those following me on Twitter, I apologize for my uncalled for stream of Suzy Favor-Hamilton jokes a while back. That was the wine talking.

But I’m back now and supremely average as ever! No negative thoughts! No disappointing races! No missed PR’s! Yet. I’ve got a WHOLE YEAR for that! As Eddy says, “That is the gift that keeps on giving the whole year.” My shitter is empty and ready for the reload. And if you counted how many mini-Snickers I ate, you’d know that another unload is coming….hard. Probably mushroom-headed.

Get back up on that horse. Let’s have a great, cliché-free year running.

Right after I have me another little sip of that rum….

The more things change…

Happy trails.