I broke my taint today

I finally got to ride my new bike today. A fixed gear, for anyone who's interested in such information. I hadn't actually "ridden" a bike in probably 4 years or so, but I bought a new one so that I could add another dimension to the slimmer, more active, "now with more sexy!" me that I've been working on and I've been looking forward to a day that was dry/warm/free enough to give it a spin. Today was that day.

The actual ride number one went pretty well. There will be an adjustment period to get used to actually riding again, but I expected that, and I wound up making the ride from my gym to my apartment--about 45 blocks--in right around 20 minutes. The ride TO the gym will probably be a different story, as it's mostly uphill, but today I felt pretty good. I got home, whipped up a bowl of oatmeal and sat down to watch the first 140 hours or so of Ken Burns' "The Civil War" (oh, General McClellan. You're so gosh darned lovable with your borderline treasonous rhetoric and crippling military ineptitude!). All was well.

Well, that is, until about 4:00, when I got up to get ready to join a friend for a bite to eat. Lying down on my living room floor, surrounded by oatmeal and kittens, everything was sunshine and lolly pops. Standing up and trying to walk around, however, was all screaming pain and flaming taint*. Seriously, I know I was concentrating on not getting hit by cars and everything, but I still figured I would remember having the bicycle seat actually plunge into my ass. Especially if, as it seems to feel like, it had gone up there sideways. I mean, what the fuck?

I've never had this problem before. I don't mean to brag or anything, but there was a time when I was the 10th or 12th best horse rider at the Dubuque, Iowa YMCA Day Camp. And I never remember getting particularly saddle sore. It's true that I haven't ridden a bike in a while, and not regularly since I was in Junior High, but when I think back to those times, I never once remember wanting to rub Icy Hot on the underside of my coin purse.

And while we're on THAT topic, let me just say for anyone who's thinking that possibly sounds like a good idea that it totally is not. Icy Hot is great on shoulders. Arms, chests, thighs and calves are all fine, too. But don't go anywhere NEAR that whole butt/taint/dangles and orbs area. Sweet Jesus, it's like someone hit my dusty runway with a tazer. While kicking me in the sack. With another tazer. Made of Icy Hot.

I've been looking at different seats for my bike. It's something I was probably going to do anyway, since I'd planned on customizing it a bit when I had the cash. But now that I know that my current seat is made of granite and the fiery tongue of Satan himself, I think the seat issue has been upgraded to "necessity". I am, however, happy to say that it hasn't dimmed my love for my new bike. Gritting through the pain (and the residual burning of my pelvis's version of Dresden), I actually managed to mount up again when I got back from dinner and take a dying light spin around the block. I won't have time to ride it tomorrow, but you can bet that I'll be back out there again Saturday. But that's one of the wonderful things about getting involved in a regular workout program; once you get beyond the starting aches and pains, not only do you start looking forward to your regular workouts, but you start looking for other ways to start being a healthier, more fit person. And enjoying them.

So I'm a bike rider now, or at least I will be, once I either toughen up my ass crack or find a seat made out of cotton and baby seal eyes.










*"Flaming Taint" is currently sitting at #5 on my list of "greatest band name ideas", and I've officially called "dibs". So any of you out there who have been reading my blog in search of the perfect name for your punk band: move along. There's nothing to see here, bitches.