Bench pressing Diet Pepsi

When I’m doing Pilates, I sometimes feel like a mime enacting a visit to the gynecologist’s office. The official name for the pose I’m thinking of is “The Open Leg Rocker,” but I secretly call it “Visiting the OB/GYN” because I feel like I have my feet up in invisible stirrups. Anyway, all these imaginary trips to the vagina doctor may not be reducing my risk of cervical cancer, but I think they are helping my abs. It’s hard to see any visual changes under all this fat, but the exercises are getting easier to do. I can almost, sort of, do “The Teaser” now, which is a truly evil pose in which you position your body like the letter V, which stands for “very hard.”

The strength training is going pretty well too. I think my arms might be looking better, but that might just be the placebo effect talking. I considered measuring my arms before and after, but I don’t think I can get very accurate measurements with all the flab hanging around. I haven’t noticed any increased strength. Those 24-packs of diet soda seemed just as heavy as I lifted them into the trunk last weekend. Maybe in another month or so I’ll be bench pressing Diet Pepsi’s.