How I Feel About Exercise

**Check out Drew's other comics at www.toothpastefordinner.com.

You don't have to exercise to lose weight. I proved that when I threw my back out in October and stayed pretty much horizontal for a month. I was so scared I'd gain a bunch of weight back, but all I did was drop my calories a bit and I still lost about 2 lbs. per week.

Even so, I didn't feel good that whole month. I had headaches almost every day, and all the muscle I had built up was turning back to mush. I felt just like I did before I started this whole thing. When I got the "all clear" from my doctor to start moving again, I can't say I was looking forward to it, but I knew I needed to be working out. It only took about a week for me to feel better again. The headaches went away, and I could already feel some of the muscle tone returning. Oh yeah, baby. I have a six pack. It's just covered by a layer of fat.

These days, I exercise about 5 days per week. I do running intervals on the treadmill, and on Tuesdays I do an endurance run, where I see how long I can go before crapping out. Last week it was 50 minutes of continuous jogging. Tonight I'll try for 51 minutes and see what happens. I also do some weight training here and there, but I need to do it more often.

Do I like doing all this stuff? Um, no. Not one bit. While I'm on the treadmill, I'll be jogging away, perfectly convinced that I've been on the damn thing for 20 minutes. Then I look down and it'll be like 4 minutes. It's infuriating. I'm really not a fan of it. But the moment I finish the workout, it's a great feeling, and I'm glad I did it. It makes me feel better about myself to know I can possibly outrun a burglar, or a bear, or the police. Oh yeah, and it makes me healthier too, I guess.