December 9, 2008
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Grapevine left, people.
It snows in Chicago. It rains ice. It is bitter and freezing in a way that threatens to snap your bones in half. Chicago’s kind of cold can stop the entire city. Giant fat snowflakes fall en-masse on desolate streets, lined with closed-early businesses. No one is out. Those of us lucky enough to have homes are in them, cuddled up. I wait patiently for the bus in snow up to my knees. I listen to the whispering shuffle of snowfall and air.
My only complaint about the winter is that it’s pretty much a forced to take a hiatus from running. While the downtown sidewalks are often brushed up and clean, the neighborhood walkways are not. Ice lurks beneath layers of trampled snow, threatening to snap a runner’s ankles in two.
To avoid injury December-February, I’ve always done lame aerobics tapes in the house. Let me stress to you this: I hate them. They are a chore I do 4 times a week so that when March comes around, I can pick up with running again without the misery of re-conditioning. Last Friday, I dusted off my collection of workout DVDs and wearily popped in Burn & Firm with Karen Voight.
I’ve always exercised before work; around 5:30am. But I knew that Downstairs Neighbor probably wouldn’t love that, so I was careful in my planning. I figured I could do my tapes on my weekend (Fridays & Saturdays) as well as Tuesdays (when I work 12:30-8:30); that way, I could wait until a more reasonable hour–an hour when everyone is up and at ‘em–until I started jumping around on Downstairs Neighbor’s ceiling.
Little did I know that Downstairs Neighbor works nights. He doesn’t get in until 5am and when I jump around like a maniac at 9:30 in the morning, I’m seriously disrupting his sleep cycle. I found this out today, when he knocked on our door in his bathrobe to tell me.
I’ve never craved my own house before. I get it now. I really get it. Because he wasn’t wrong to tell me. We share a space. I understand the importance of sleep. That said, what am I supposed to do? I’m considering my options:
Option 1: Exercise After Work
Exercise after work has rarely been a viable option for me; my evenings are already spoken for. Not only does my job require me to sometimes assist with special evening events, but I also have a healthy social life and a husband who would rather drink a steamy glass of lava than do anything as insane as run 5 miles with me in the evenings. Not that I need a running buddy, but I’d like to kick it with him at some point in the day. If I go this route, I predict a low success rate. I’ll probably complete the tape 1-out-of-2 scheduled times.Option 2: Gym
Not really an option. I can’t afford a gym. I looked into it. Sure, you ca go to cheap gyms, but the only ones in my ‘hood are Cheetah Gyms, and those are $90/month. Remember, I don’t have a car to get into and drive to another gym. If I work out out-width my hood, I’m riding the subway or bus to do so. Which gets annoying and is totally inconvenient. So, as far as I can tell, the gym is just not an option unless I want to give something else up. But I don’t do anything but pay rent, pay bills, pay for healthcare, and pay for food. I could stop paying for the Internet and Netflicks, as that is the only entertainment expenditures allowed on the table at the moment. I think I’d rather be fat.Option 3: Low-Impact Tapes
Perhaps I can keep my muscles conditioned with a non-aerobic style tape like Yoga or Pilates. These won’t help me with aerobic fitness, though, and as a runner/biker person, that is pretty much the goal. But at least its something.Option 4: Buy a House
HA! Hahahahaha! Just kidding.
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How do you keep fit when the weather outside is frightful? Any good Yoga/Pilates tape recommendations?
Comments (7)
Based on many of your previous posts you like to cycle. Ever consider an indoor trainer? A little pricey at first but much less expensive than a gym and relatively quiet.
I usually go after work. I can’t force myself to get my behind out of bed most mornings. I’m lucky if I’m up 10 minutes before I need to leave. If I could sleep in my clothes I’d get up later. am thinking about putting the coffee pot in the bedroom.
exercise tapes make me want to crawl out of my skin. We’ve been pretty happy playing with the Wii lately. It’s kind of expensive, but fun, active, and something to do together.
I have been considering a gym again myself. I don; get out of work in time to walk as much as I’d like. I do every chance I get but that’s been only about 3-4 times a week. Grrr. An indoor trainer might be a great idea. I am going to look into that. I’d rather not deal with the gym.
A friend of mine only does the yoga with walking like I do and it has served her well.
Man. I wish I had an answer to this, because I’m facing a similar problem. My options:
1) Running in the morning, in the rain: I HATE MORNINGS. Hate them. With a passion. And I’m always late in the morning anyway, I don’t think I’m ready to add another activity to my routine—not to mention one that soaks me to the core. It’s all I can do to get up (that’s truly the hardest part), make coffee, walk the pup, shower, put on clothes, and leave the house.
2) Running in the evening: it’s dark. The streets are not well lit. The last time I ran in the dark I tripped on an uneven sidewalk slab and ended up sprawled out on the cement and scraped up. I am terrified to run in the dark now.
3) Biking to/from work: This means I have to leave 2 hours earlier, in order to give me time to get there and shower before 9. This would be fine if I didn’t have a dog who is insane and goes ape shit when I leave her at home. Between the morning and evening commute, it would mean nearly 3 extra hours away from the house. And I just can’t do that to her.
4) The gym: Gym memberships are one of the benefits of working where I do, and I could sign up and commit to working out a few times a week during lunch. But then when would I eat lunch? And how would I have time to get to the gym (10 minute walk), workout, shower and get back, all within a lunch hour? Seems ridiculous. Can’t go before or after work for the same reason that biking isn’t practical.
5) Workout DVDs: I live in a small apartment with thin walls and lots of neighbors. Nobody downstairs, so that wouldn’t be an issue, but still. Plus, the dog jumps on me whenever I start making a commotion so there’d be that hurdle to overcome as well.
Ugh. Every winter I say, “I am going to stay in shape!” and every winter I don’t. Currently, I play ultimate frisbee on Sundays and occasionally go for a hike on Saturdays and that’s about it. And when the season rolls around again, I’ll moan and groan about how out of shape I am. I’ll do this all season, in fact, until the season is over and I start moaning and groaning about how “I wish I could be in shape like I was during frisbee season.” It’s an endless cycle.
Don’t follow this advice: Drink more and wait for spring, that’s what I do.
@BawlmerBoy - You read my mind!
Shaun and I tried to go on a healthy walk yesterday but it started pissing down freezing rain so “healthy walk” turned into pints. Oops.
Every year I try something different. Like My Dog is Chelsea, I am allergic to mornings, so that is not an option at all. Like Shawn, I’d rather drink hot lava than go running at 5 a.m., so there we are, two different metabolisms, two different bodies. I’m an afternoon or evening exerciser. Since I play tennis, indoors in the winter, that takes care of two days of the week, but that’s hardly enough. My doctor is carping at me to get more weight-bearing exercise, so I’d been lifting weights at the extremely low-priced park district gym that I belong to. (Is there a park district gym that’s reasonable for you?) I tried the track for a while, but even with the iPod, I got sooooooo bored, so now I’m trying to elliptical machine. It’s going to be only a matter of time before I’m bored to death on that too. The weights I’m not bored with.
But the truth of the matter is that with the weather and migraines and general sluggishness, I’ve slowed down a lot. Tennis is the only physical activity I ever found (besides tai chi) to be not boring. And it gets expensive. I’m seriously thinking of tai chi after Christmas to jump start myself back into moving again. But once again, expense. But for you, there’s no jumping if you get a CD or tape. It might not be high impact aerobics, but it’s really good exercise, much like yoga without cramping up your neck on the floor, very dancey (which I love), very martial arts (which is cool because you could go on to kung fu if you wanted to), and it is so graceful. And to me, it beats the hell out of yoga. That might be your ticket. For aerobics, I don’t know. Sprint for the El.
There’s no a damn thing we can do about the snow and the wind, and for those who don’t live here, there’s no underplaying what a bitch it is. Yesterday I didn’t even want to go out to get some food because of the wind. That’s so pathetic, but it’s true. I’d rather starve that face that Hawk down.
Good luck, Truly. Something will work out.
Lynn