December 14, 2007

Ask Cranky Fitness

[Written by Mary (mostly) and Crabby.]



Welcome to the second installment of Ask Cranky Fitness. And guess what--this time, we actually received a real reader question!

Oh, wait... um, those other questions? Sure, they're real too! But in a different, more virtual sort of way. Let's just say this first question is even realer than real. It's a follow-up from last week's discussion about exercising in winter.

(Note: some editing of reader questions may occur, and hard questions or those requiring serious answers may be ignored entirely. However, it is not the policy of Cranky Fitness to be malicious about editing your questions for our own amusement. If you write "what can I do about my skin itching when it's too dry?" it will not appear as "my ass itches all the time, help!" That just wouldn't be nice).

Anyway, first (really real) question:

Dear Cranky Fitness,
I live in Minnesota where it is very, very cold. My problem is with my iPod. It is my best friend and closest companion when it comes to exercise, and it just can't take the cold! If I do not put it in an internal pocket, or inside my mitten, it freezes.

The obvious solution is to just put it in the pocket of my long underwear, but then I can't fiddle with it, and I can't keep the stopwatch function visible. Also, I wear mittens while running, and I don't want to have to stop running, take off my mittens, and fiddle in my underwear every time I want to change music or check the time! What do I do?

Oh, and I have tried using my watch for its timing function, but that's also a pain, because then I have to slide up my jacket and down my mitten and hit the indiglo button with my other mittened hand, and the whole process just annoys the heck out of me!
- Musicless in Minnesota

Dear Musicless,
What a dilemma! Flinging off your mittens and digging your hands down into your underwear while running could indeed be awkward--and could subject you to the snickering of uncouth bystanders!

Crabby hopes there are Smart Readers around who have dealt with this problem, or that Mary has a solution, because she has never had to personally deal with a Tunesicle. She can offer one high tech solution to seeing your time displayed more easily while running--problem is, you have to wait until 2009 and pay a lot of Euros for it. Perhaps you could tweak your playlists enough that your iPod could be listened to from the warm cozy comfort of your underwear without any additional fiddling. And then you could buy an ugly sports watch made for a Humongous Male Wrists that you could strap outside your jacket to clock yourself.
Good luck! (brrr)
-Crabby

Dear Musicless,
I think you're in an excellent position to start a whole new fashion trend: transparent running clothes.* If you had a windproof see-through jacket, you wouldn't need to slide the sleeve up to see your watch. I tried to include some useful links to transparent clothing, but apparently the people out there in Blog Land had a whole different idea about which articles of clothing should be see-through.

Also, I've got the tireless unpaid grad students research workers at CF testing ways of keeping iPods in plastic baggies and manipulating them with Q-Tips punched through a very small hole in the baggy.

Ditto on the good luck!
- Mary

*Except, of course, in places such as Providence, Rhode Island, where transparent clothing is illegal.
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Dear Cranky Fitness,
I know I should go to the gym to work out, but I hate having people look at me while I’m exercising. I’m hot, sweating, red-faced… it’s not pretty. It feels like everyone is looking at me. Do you have to be a Muslim to wear those full-body-scarf things? For that matter, do you have to be female?
- Man with a paper bag over his head

Dear Man,
You think people at the gym are going to notice if you’re red-faced and sweaty? What do you think they look like? And there are more embarrassing things than being sweaty at a gym.
- Mary

Dear Man,
Crabby would just like to add that a man who is too self-conscious about his own appearance to be staring at the breasts of the women jogging on the treadmills or flying around on the ellipticals would be quite welcome at most local gyms.
- Crabby
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Dear Cranky Fitness,
I really want to be fit, but I also want to keep out of the unemployment line. My job requires me to sit at a computer 10 or 12 hours a day. What can I do?
- Grammar Geek


Dear GG,
Do you have high cubicle walls at your work? Or do you want to entertain your co-workers? If so, you could try taking 10 minute breaks every couple of hours to stretch and do lunges or situps. You need to take a lunch break, you know that, so why not spend 15 minutes or so taking a quick walk around the block? Cranky Fitness can enthusiastically recommend investing in an iPod, to make this more fun. (Note: authors do not have any stock in Apple, Inc., much to their regret.) Best advice of all, find a like-minded friend who would walk with you at lunch. What, you don’t have any friends at work? Then go for the iPod -- it's very friendly.
- Mary

Dear GG,
Imaginary friends are good too! If you exercise with them and shout out encouragement and all laugh together your walk or jumping jacks or whatever, your workout time will go by so quickly you'll hardly mind. Plus, then you will have fewer "real" friends stopping by your cube and bothering you during work and you can go home earlier.
- Crabby

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Dear Cranky Fitness,
My boyfriend wants me to go bicycling with him. The trouble is, we live in a very hilly area, and he’s so fit that he regularly cycles 500 miles a week. My idea of a good bicycle ride is one that’s all downhill. What shall I do?
- Worried in Woodside

Dear WinW,
Have you considered one of these bicycles? You can pretend to pedal, and keep up a cheery conversation to cover the sound of the motor. Or, you could load the bikes into his car, drive to the top of the ridge, and cruise downhill to your car at the base of the ridge.

If you really don’t want to go cycling with him at all, but don’t want to hurt his feelings by a direct refusal, why not take the opportunity of a bike ride to talk about your relationship? It’s a safe bet his enthusiasm for doing sports with you will find another outlet.
- Mary

Dear Worried,
Crabby wholeheartedly seconds Mary's last suggestion. A five minute warm-up followed by a simple "honey, we need to talk," repeated for one or two sessions should do the trick.
- Crabby


Clever readers, of course, may have much more helpful advice on all these questions!

17 comments:

  1. Man, Musicless is hardcore. If it was so cold outside that my iPod was freezing, my butt would be at home eating hot soup, or nestled inside a trendy slanket from the gift guide.

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  2. Pasta Queen, I'm SO with you on that. And thanks for stopping by! We Cranky Fitness readers are big fans of your blog.

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  3. Dear Cranky Fitness:
    I need to lose 20 lbs before tomorrow. Any suggestions?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Um, Crabby? You want to handle that question? ;)

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  5. Well, you could cut off a limb, but I don't recommend it!

    (And happy bday a bit early, just in case you have better things to do this weekend...)

    ReplyDelete
  6. At least man with a paper bag gets red & sweaty working out! Better than having the world know you are having a hot flash! In the middle of winter, sitting doing nothing in a cool room.

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  7. Sheesh, the Bag Lady thought you would have all kinds of brilliant suggestions! :)
    Thanks for the good wishes, Crabby! The Bag Lady just might be busy this weekend. If nothing else, she is going to be drinking pomegranate juice and champagne...sounds so yummy!
    (um...BTW...which limb do you think...?)

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  8. Reb, I am so NOT looking forward to hot flashes, and I'm due before too long. I whine enough when it's warm out and everyone's sweating!

    And bag lady, have a great birthday! Can't wait to hear the update. And you know I can't go out on a limb and suggest a particular appendage, that wouldn't be right!

    ReplyDelete
  9. This may not answer the question about the frozen iPod, but what I do when I don't want to look at the stopwatch feature is just use the songs as timers. You can program the order the songs play, first two are warm ups or whatever. I particulary use songs for interval training. It's not perfect but I do fast for choruses and recovery for verses. If you planned your songs well it might workout. (haha workout...)

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  10. pastaqueen's here?
    color me jealous!

    Ok, frozen iPod: is it a nano? Does it still freeze enclosed in a protective arm band thingy? If not, you can pick one up for like $15. If you already have one and it still freezes, maybe you could stick it in the dryer before you go for a run. THe one I have is mostly cloth, except for the plastic vinyl enclosure. Maybe it wouldn't work, but maybe it's worth a try?

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  11. Randi and katieo,
    Wow, actual good advice! Thanks for helping out. If we had the budget for it, we'd pay you--in Slankets! (Perhaps special custom Slankets with iPod holders).

    ReplyDelete
  12. Actually, all of the questions were drawn from real situations experienced by real people... they just don't know I wrote up their dilemmas on this blog.
    The woman in Woodside? Her boyfriend no longer asks her to cycle up steep hills with him. He goes running with their dog while she takes care of the newborn baby. Problem solved :)

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  13. Sadly, Man with a paper bag over his head stopped going to the gym at all, and the woman who works in the office now spends her lunchtimes chowing down on cheeseburgers and gossiping with co-workers. So not everybody has a happy ending :(
    Unless... maybe... they might happen across this blog and read our inspiring suggestions and be inspired to go get back into the swing of things? Stranger things have happened.

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  14. They have a watches theat will control your iPod. There is one at Target for $90.
    (Timex Ironman iControl Watch with iPod Control) You would still have mitten problems, but ast least would not need to disrobe to change songs.

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  15. Wow, I need more coffee! I just proofread my previous post. Sorry I did that after posting it, not before!

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  16. Great idea Holly!

    And given how many posts I find that I've written with typos in them, I prefer that the comments have a few too. So wee try to keep Cranky Fitnesss a typo-friedly site. Thans for helpping out!

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  17. I keep thinking that I will get myself one of those under-the-desk bicycle things. Skwigg talks about one like this:

    http://www.amazon.com/Isokinetics-Magnetic-Pedal-Exerciser-Black/dp/B000KE8ASK/ref=pd_sim_dbs_hpc?ie=UTF8&qid=1198025271&sr=1-4

    ReplyDelete

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