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Gym Dandy

For the past few months, I've been playing volleyball once a week, and sometimes twice.

Until last week.

"At the office cafeteria, they started calling me Mr. Creosote. I couldn't buy a wafer-thin mint anywhere."

Last week was Thanksgiving week, and the volleyball leagues took a vacation. Meanwhile, the only exercise I got for two full weeks was cramming food into my gob with one hand, and waving with the other for the waiter to bring me more. The workouts stopped. The eating was relentless. At the office cafeteria, they started calling me Mr. Creosote. I couldn't buy a wafer-thin mint anywhere.

So when the time came to squeeze into a T-shirt and a pair of shorts tonight and get out on the court, you might say I was a bit rusty. Shaky. Lazy. And roly-poly.

By the end of the first game, I was sweating. By the end of the second, panting. And by the third, I was cooked completely. All I wanted was a towel and a nice soft pillow. And maybe a jelly doughnut.

Too bad we play eight games. I wasn't even halfway through the gauntlet. I'll take that doughnut now, thanks.

Luckily, I found my second wind a couple of games later. I picked it up somewhere between crawling off the court after a long rally and falling on my ass after one of my patented two-inch vertical leaps at the net. Those things don't come easy, you know. I train all the time -- jumping over matchbooks, stepping up on envelopes, hurtling over dimes, eating turkey sandwiches, that sort of thing.

(Okay, that last one isn't training, exactly. It's Thanksgiving week; we've got leftovers. All work and no tasty basted dead animals, you know how it is.)

At any rate, it was good to get out of the dining room and work up a sweat that didn't involve snorting jalapeno relish. It may be two weeks -- or two years -- before I'll be in any shape to get out there again, but at least I'm back on the exercise track. And that's a good feeling.

Now pass the mashed potatoes. And where the hell is that jelly doughnut?