Committ to Be Fit-- or Just Do the New Yorker

            During the 36,838,783 snow days we have had lately, my roommates and I have decided to turn to exercise videos for our daily dose of activity. The gym, or “bubble” as many of you know from here it as, is still open during snow days, but it is a 20 minute walk from senior housing on a day with no snow. One of my roommates suggested we use the exercise video her and her mom use at home and, with it being a lazy snow day, we all agreed.

            First of all, I need to say that this video is not your mother’s jazzercise video from the late 80’s/early 90’s where a woman who is or looks like Paula Abdul is wearing a one piece, brightly colored spandex leotard. However, the video we used, Walking with Leslie Sansone, did claim to have “hit music,” which it did—from the 1970’s. Basically, the concept of the video is to walk three miles in place and burn a lot of calories.

            It began with two of my roommates, Daniela and Katie, and me, walking in the middle of our cramped living room with the curtains drawn. Two more of my roommates, C.C. and Ylianna, walked in to make lunch for themselves, but they also started walking with Leslie.

            Then chaos ensued.

            For one, the five of us created a new exercise position called “The New Yorker,” where one power walks in place with a cell phone in one hand and a trenta in the other (which A. if you haven’t heard of a trenta, it is the new 31 oz. size from Starbuck’s and B. one of the roommates walking, C.C., is from Brooklyn and has admittedly done “The New Yorker” on occasion).

            Secondly, we created new names for the women in the music video. Katie, who owned the video said that her and her mom called the fitness instructor, Leslie, Sarah Celine, because she looks like Celine Dion and sounds like Sarah Palin (which is so true, google the woman if you don’t believe me). So, coming into this, we knew we were walking with Sarah Celine. Even though Sarah Celine mentioned all the names of the walkers with her on many instances, we all assigned names to them anyways. There was a woman who looked like Liza Minnelli, who we named “Liza.” There was a woman named Mary, who Sarah Celine said, and I quote, “Mary and I love tag teaming together,” in reference to letting Mary take control of the exercise for two minutes; thus, she became “Tag Team Mary.” There was a woman named Jo, who Sarah Celine referenced to as “Grandma Jo” and the name stuck. And then there was a 60 year old woman named Carol, who lost 65 pounds, and who Sarah Celine kept making fun of the entire video and we came up with a scenario that Carol would come in with a gun.

            If this wasn’t bad enough, we assigned each other characters of the video. Katie became Sarah Celine because she knew the video better than the rest of us. C.C. became Carol, because it is her last name and because Carol had a gun (we tease C.C. that because she is from Brooklyn, she carries a gun). Daniela became Liza, because Liza was the only brunette in the video in a sea of blondes and Daniela was acting like she was a non-conformist. Ylianna became Sarah Celine’s daughter, Maria, because that is her middle name. And I got the reward of being Tag Team Mary, because Katie and I used to share a room last year.

            In the end, the exercise video became more interesting because we were doing it as friends, together, and doing crazy stuff. And luckily, to counter the same repetitious cycle of a single video, Katie bought more. I think I can hear those 1970’s hits starting up…time for Sarah Celine!