Didn’t make it three miles

Also didn’t factor in time to get ready for rehearsal. Hello, shower!

I’m just starting hour 4 of a 4.5-hour Hello, Dolly! choreo rehearsal that leads straight into an Aurora performance

I packed a snack to keep my vim and vigor up and a package of baby wipes to keep my Sturm und Drang down as I transition from exhausted, sweaty dancer to focused, pleasant-smelling actor. Wish me luck.

Ablutions

If you’ve wondered why I’ve been smelling like a LiveLaughLove candle shop and looking like the very dew of insouciant youth lately, my Ponce de León elixirs are as close to all of us at the Target/CVS aisles.

Goodbye, delicate-effluvium-of-the-tropics-scented lotions that I purloined from my Disney hotel room in November!

I’ve meted out your blossomy, breezy, not-really-masculiney deliciousness with Herculean restraint over the last seven months, but just like the flora you’re named for, you’ve finally dropped your last petals and drifted away into nothing but fond memories.

LAST CHANCE, PEOPLE! SNIFF ME TODAY OR FOREVER WONDER WHAT THE HELL GRAPEFRUIT BERGAMOT OCEANSIDE SCENT SMELLS LIKE.

My ablution station may or may not on purpose be assembled in coordinated spectrums of blues and whites

I just opened the first bar of a four pack of "refreshingly clean" Lever 2000 Aloe & Cucumber Bar Soap this morning

It smelled vaguely as fresh as a frolicsome summer's morn when I tried to sniff it through the packaging at Target, but when it finally actually touched my skin it unleashed a disquietingly chemical effluvium of neither aloe nor cucumber nor fresh nor frolicsome nor summer.

I apologize in advance if I smell like plastic salad for the foreseeable future.

I have more Extra Strength Tylenol in me than is probably healthy for my kidneys and liver

and my lingering deep headache makes me afraid to lie down for fear the pain will recalibrate its spatial orientation and intensify all over again, but I survived my first visit with a hot shower and a bottle of shampoo and I managed to keep my hair on point with only a fraction of product on only a fraction of my not-throbbing scalp, so I’m still a big boy.

Think of it as thrift ... as a gift ...

40 years ago tonight, Broadway theater audiences first attended the tale of a vindictive, murderous barber, learned the words lavabo and reticule, realized that nothing rhymes with locksmith, split both literal and figurative hairs between flaxen and blonde, discovered that coriander makes the gravy grander, agreed that poppin' pussies into pies is perhaps the very definition of enterprise, and didn't feel one bit sorry for that crazy hag Lucy because it was Mrs. Lovett who had made his arm complete again after all those years.

Happy anniversary, Sweeney Todd! I can’t come to your party tonight, but I’ll come again when you have judge on the menu.

When you’re rubbing your hair goo between your hands to soften it before you put it in your hair like a thinking person

but in a brief and profoundly regrettable moment of not paying attention you accidentally rub it all over your face as if it were lotion, you know that at least the viciously dirty and vengeful Michael Cohen isn’t telling the nation what a corrupt, evil, entitled, cognitively inept psychopath you are so you know you’re still going to have a good day. Even though after three scrubbings your face still feels a tad waxy and smells vaguely of bergamot and citrus.

Clearance-Price Deodorant: A Review

As a longtime wearer of Cool Wave flavored Gillette Endurance 48 Hours of Protection Clear Gel, I was apprehensive about trying Undefeated flavored Gillette Scent Xtend Technology when I saw it wearing a clearance sticker at Target, but 75¢ SAVINGS, PEOPLE!

My verdict: It smells pretty much the same, except with generic-truck-stop-bathroom-cleanser topnotes. As far as efficacy: It’s too cold here to test its performance in a truly sweaty context, but using the word Undefeated in the world of sweaty, grungy odors probably should have been focus-grouped just a LITTLE bit more.

Throwback Tuesday: Close Shave Edition

I'm in The Full Monty now ... then 9 to 5 ... then my 15th year in Cedar Rapids' annual Follies song-and-dance extravaganza. I've spread myself a bit too thin this spring as far as rehearsal availability goes though, so I'll be a pit singer in this year's Follies--where I won't have to wear costumes, worry about my hair or even shave. But Facebook just reminded me there was a time when I not only had to worry about shaving for the show BUT I HAD TO DO IT ONSTAGE. I can't quite remember why, though.

There’s a social-media story currently making the rounds about three people laughing at an obese person at a gym

and the narrator of the story heroically stepping in to boost the sobbing victim’s self-esteem plus get the three people banned from the gym. The narrative in this particular story is too clumsily and implausibly detailed for it to be remotely true, but the message behind it is certainly something that haunts the minds of everyone new to working out at a gym.

Allow me to offer my personal insights:

I’ve worked out almost daily for 30 years, in that time belonging to nine gyms and using guest passes at countless more. The gyms ranged from high-end fitness clubs to trendy name-brand gyms to grungy, metal-banger gyms. I’ve worked out with trainers, I’ve had lifting buddies and I’ve worked out on my own among a crowd of regulars I’ve gotten to know. I’ve observed the full continuum of gym members from hardcore bodybuilders to stand-and-model stereotypes to the out-of-shape first-timers from the social-media story … and I have never once seen or heard anyone making fun of a gym member for showing up and trying to get fit. Ever.

I know that my experience does not represent the entirety of gym experiences everywhere--and I also know that some people in any setting are just truly horrible and judgmental and cruel--but if you’re reading this and feeling afraid to join a gym to improve your fitness and health and even your personal vanity because you want to be hotter (and I’m saying this as someone who very openly works out for all three of these reasons), please know that you are way--WAY!--more likely to encounter people who will applaud and encourage and respect you than make fun of you.

Caveat: If they even notice you at all. Many people who go to gyms are there to focus on their own workouts or to socialize with their friends as they work out together, and you--like the rest of the people in the gym--will barely even register on their radar.

So please. If you’re wanting to join a gym, do it!

Some unsolicited DO pointers from me:
* Pick a gym that’s geographically convenient--near your house or work or on your daily route through town.
* Talk to the staff to tell them what you’re interested in doing and accomplishing when you join. Usually there are tiered membership packages so you won’t have to pay for facilities and services--like pool access and group classes--you don’t have any interest in using.
* If there are showers and you plan on using them, ask if there is towel service. It’s best to find this out up-front than when you’re standing naked and wet in the locker room wondering how you’re going to dry off.
* Ask for instructions and help using the equipment if you don’t know how. Gyms are VERY interested in you not injuring yourself, and the staff will usually be very helpful in making sure you know what you’re doing--and that you’re doing it correctly and safely.
* Within reason, ask other members if they can help you figure out how to use unfamiliar equipment. Remember that other members are not employees there to do your bidding, but usually people will be happy--and non-judgmental--about showing you how something works.
* If you have the money, hire a trainer. I had one (a big, hot, mean bodybuilder hell-bent on making me weep for mercy) for five years in Chicago. It cost a zillion dollars, but I budgeted for it and I let him beat the living hell out of me three times a week … and I got results I wanted and I never once regretted the expense. Plus he taught me correct form and showed me how to lift and use everything properly, and now that I don’t have him I know how to kick my own ass at the gym.
* When you get more experienced and start lifting higher weights, ask me now to navigate the social hierarchy of the Dudebro Spotters Network(R) for assistance.
* Actually, you may have to show ME how to do this; I break out in cold flopsweat whenever I have to ask someone to spot me.

Some unsolicited DON’T pointers from me:
* Don’t sit around on the equipment playing on your phone or chatting with your friends. Do that somewhere else where you won’t be in people’s way and impeding their workouts and frankly pissing them off.
* Don’t pick up your dumbbells and then use them right in front of the dumbbell rack so you’re blocking access to the other dumbbells. If I see you doing this, I *will* elbow my way in front of you in the middle of your workout to get whatever dumbbells you’re blocking even if I don’t need them. I will also give you a withering stare.
* Don’t FOR THE LOVE OF GOD wear heavy perfume or cologne--or, on the other end of the spectrum, show up stinking like sour ass--when you work out. The more you sweat, the more your stink spreads throughout the gym, and it can cause a legitimate safety issue if it makes people cough when they’re breathing hard and lifting heavy weights.
* Don’t leave your gross sweat all over everything. If your gym doesn’t have spray bottles and paper towels--and I’ve never seen a gym that doesn’t--bring a towel of your own to wipe up after yourself if you know you’re a chronic sweater.
* Don’t stand and pose and admire yourself in the mirrors. You’ll look like an idiot, you’ll no doubt be in someone’s way … and this is the one exception where people WILL mock you behind your back. Mercilessly.

If you heed only one of my unsolicited pointers, make it be this:
* If you have any doubt how to use a piece of equipment or if you think you might need help managing some heavy weights, ASK SOMEONE. Putting yourself in danger is not only a danger to you, but it forces everyone around you to have to keep an eye on you in case they have to jump in and save you if a barbell drops on your chest or a cable might rip your shoulder out of its socket. What’s more, you’re potentially putting everyone around you at a legal risk for not helping you or for inadvertently injuring you if they do help you.

SO GO! Make a commitment. Find a gym. Ask a friend to join you. Wear clothes that you feel comfortable and not self-conscious in (but that aren’t so loose that they could get caught in the equipment). SHOW UP. THEN KEEP SHOWING UP. Talk about it on social media to keep yourself accountable.

Everyone around you at every level of fitness has walked into a gym for the first time not knowing what to do. So you’re always among friends.

The n is for no-shave Tuesday. It’s lowercase because you can barely tell.

Thorry

I was gonna GET STUFF DONE today after our mega-hella run

So far I’ve showered and fed Bitch Kitty and started the dishwasher and put my week’s worth of gross running clothes in the wash ... and now I think I’m gonna get a nap done.

Please use your inside voices.

I hate to brag ...

(oh, let’s not kid ourselves; I LOVE to brag) but I’ve been upping my flossing game in the last few months and I just left the dentist’s office and the hygienist told me that my teeth were so awesome that they were by far the best she’s seen all day. ALL. DAY.

Never shave in a hot shower with an old razor, kids

#TheMoreYouKnow (sparklystar!)

I’m sorry ...

but they smelled the best of all the brands and all the scent options at Target and I refuse to apologize for using age- and demographic-inappropriate products to smell irresistibly delicious.

Oh, wait. I might have prefaced that with an apology. Don’t scroll up to check.

Axe me why I smell so fine today

Somebody left this in the gym shower so now I smell like a feral man-beast and LADIES, PLEASE. THERE IS ENOUGH OF ME TO GO AROUND.

Apollo!

Somebody ahead of me left this in the gym shower. I just helped myself to a dollop after my workout.

Consider yourselves warned, foxy ladies. Consider yourselves warned.