Fit for Fall

This week must be a week of epiphanies for me. As I was helping my Grandmother clean out her garage the other day, I happened upon a scale. So, naturally, I stepped on it. “Holy shit!” I gasped under my breath, and, had my Grandma not already turned off her hearing aid out of boredom from my B.S. reasons for not yet being employed, she definitely would have heard this. I quickly looked around to make sure nobody had seen, let the scale recalibrate to 0, and tried it again. Damn. I stealthily snapped a picture on my camera phone for evidence. Ladies and Gentleman, as Ed Harris would say in The Rock, “I shit you not.” This was the reading on the scale:

Wow. I am officially the size of an NFL running back.

If you will pardon my French for a second, when the fuck did that happen?? Although, because of the team’s epic losing streak, it is somewhat embarrassing for me to admit that, my freshman year in college, I played a sport that required you to make weight twice-a-week below 172 pounds. Granted, that was quite a stretch for me, and because my playing weight in high school was around 185 I was forced to spend many a morning running in sweats and spitting in a trash can to shed the last few ounces, but still. Fuck me if I’m wrong because I’m not a genius or anything, but if you do the math here, that means I have put on 40 pounds since the end of my competitive athletic career.

Once again, please excuse the language, but holy shit! Do you know how much that is? That’s almost 25% of my old body weight. Do you know what weighs 40 pounds? A full sack of dog food. A 5-gallon bucket of water. A 40-pound dumb bell. A 5 year-old kid. Think of that. Think of taking a 5 year-old, and swallowing him whole with no digestion. That's essentially what I did. Weird.

I was talking to a buddy of mine from school on the phone tonight who has been complicit in this non-stop, 24/7 life of hot-and-cold-running eating, sleeping, partying, and being in the “supine” position since we handed in our theses, and he came up with a good idea: “Hey Wilos,” he said. “You can look at it as though you are getting ready to hibernate for the winter! I watched a show on Animal Planet about that today. Basically, think of it as though you’ve been going around, gathering berries for your great winter slumber.” Come to think of it, he’s basically right. I (have been, and) am preparing for a long winter to be spent hibernating in my parents’ basement (which we call the “Womb” because of its soundproof walls and dearth of windows that would allow any natural light to seep in) wherein I will probably breeze through a season or three of a TV show on DVD each winter week.

I guess it makes sense. All weekend, my dear sweet Grandmother, who, at 86 years-young, still skis 14 days over Christmas, plays tennis with far better consistency than yours truly, and lifts her small weights every day to stay in shape, was dropping subtle hints that I finally realized were not just cute coincidences but were aimed at saying, in so many words, “Wilos, lose some fucking weight!!” Some of these included: after my sister and I explained to Grandma that the old golf cart was running very slowly, “Well, dear, that’s because there’s so much weight on it…” and, (twice) after playing tennis, “Well, dear, the reason you are so sweaty and need to put down a towel on the chair for lunch is because that’s probably a lot more exercise than you’ve gotten in a while…” As Adam Sandler once so aptly put, “whoa, you gotta love your Grandma.” Bless her heart.

Basically, after taking a step back (waaaay back, so I could properly fit in the mirror) and looking at my reflection, I realized that, with the exception of the occasional jog or exercise-bike ride at school, and perhaps a few 1-2 week stints of lifting weights, I really hadn’t worked out much since the winter of my freshman year of college. In hike skewl I played three sports and was always training for those, and, in fact, like any meaty high school jock in America, I loved to lift. I got pretty big senior year, and my friends jokingly called me “God the Bod” (did I mentioned that I was The Man in high school?). I was even such a tool that I would wear wife beaters underneath my shirt and would jump at any opportunity to remove said shirt (I also enjoyed rocking the occasional lax pinney at the beach like a complete chatch), but that is for another entry that I will write in the near future.

Anyways, since I am a man and, therefore, am as inherently lazy as a sloth, I basically rode out my physical fitness for almost the whole four years of college. And, to be honest, I stayed in alright shape. Sure, I got a tinge of the “frat fat” – a thin layer around what used to be a 6-pack, the patented Galvin Double Chin, and experienced a bit of the redistribution of muscle weight into fat that allows for the transition into a prime example of a washed-up athlete’s body without putting on any significant weight. However, come the time of my senior spring, the jig was up. I had hung on to the fruits of past labors for too long, and the well of metabolism eventually ran dry.

I remember hitting the Big Deuce (two hundo) upon returning from my post-graduation trip to Greece, and, as one my friends noted, “Wilos, you have hit a benchmark that is, for an athlete who is trying to bulk up, one of the happiest days of his life, but for an ex-athlete, one of the most dreadful.” In light of my frame and the circumstances, two bills wasn’t all that bad, and I thought I could turn it around pronto. But, as the dog days of summer wore on, apparently the lbs started to add up.

And sure, I guess I look a little bigger (a number of people this summer have said, “Wow, Wilos, you’re lookin’ thick man, you been hittin the weights?” and I chuckle a bit on the inside), but in reality I’m not that fat. I guess I like to look at it as more along the lines of the “Phat” (pretty hot and tempting) that Chris Tucker popularized in the classic Rush Hour. I do not need to heed Dante’s warning and “all hope abandon” as I enter the fall of 2009. I think as long as I stop sleeping 14 hours a day, eating loads of crap, imbibing large quantities of highly-caloric alcohol on a nightly basis, lying down all the time, and if I add in a little bit of exercise, I should be fine. That, or, maybe someone can sign me up for Nutrisystem for an early Christmas present.

Damnit!

I’m sitting here in the basement of my parents’ house watching the FSU vs. Miami game, and I just had a huge revelation. FUCK! I am no longer in college.

It wasn’t the day that the College Football Preseason Annuals hit the newsstands. It wasn’t summer turning into fall. It wasn’t the actual kickoff of college football season. It wasn’t talking on the phone with friends in younger grades, it wasn’t searching for jobs (haven’t quite “tried that out” yet), or receiving firey emails on my fraternity’s email list about rush parties that are less than a week away. Instead, this epiphany of an oh so tragic truth surfaced when ESPN's camera zoomed in for about four seconds on one of the FSU Cheerleaders.

No, there was not an emotional moment of nostalgia when Neil Young’s rendition of Helpless during The Last Waltz came on the iPod shuffle, and I balled my eyes out (that was 2 hours ago…). It took the visual stimulation of seeing this absolute baberaham, dressed in her skimpy cheerleading uniform, shaking her pom-poms (and what her mother gave her), and having absolutely no idea that there was an instant classic rivarlry football game taking place behind her, for me to realize that I can no longer actively partake in the debauchery that is college.

Not that I would have been able to capitalize, but I no longer have any chance of ever seeing a girl like that, in an environment like that, who is – pardon my language – looking to get plugged by some gigantic football player or some hammered frat daddy later that night. FSU just lost on a last-second play, but fear not: this chick (and thousands of other broads just like her around the country) is still looking to party and hook up tonight, and the highlight of my night will be watching Erin Andrews interview Jacory Harris about his shoulder injury, which he just described as his “funny bone.”

Oh well. I guess at least I don’t have to do homework.

P.S. For a website that boasts a congregation of pictures of absolute smokeshows from SEC schools that will make you wish that you had listened to your testosterone and went to a state school in the south, check out http://poonsec.blogspot.com/

Streaking

Cal Ripkien’s 2,632straight games. The 1972 Miami Dolphins’ undefeated season. Joe DiMaggio’s 56 consecutive games with a hit. Orel Hershiser’s 59 consecutive scoreless innings. Bowling a 300. Pitching a perfect game. Pitching a tent. These are some of the all-time great “streaks.” However, when the sun sets on Monday, September 7, historians will be able to add another great streak to the annals of ass. Wilos will have gone the whole summer without hooking up with a chick.

Damn. I mean, I’ve had my fair share of dry spells (see: TI Initiations and the weeks to follow, sophomore year), but this one is pretty bad. It might not be my longest; but, given the circumstances (recent college grad with no job, a fact that has allowed me to go out any night I see fit), this one cuts deep. I mean, come on, not even a lousy d-floor make-out! Not even a lousy hj under the table at the Olive Garden whilst sharing a Chicken Carbonara and bowl of endless breadsticks!

My last intimate contact with a member of the opposite sex (aside from the goodnight kiss that my mother gives me on the forehead as she tucks me in to the bottom bunk of my bunk beds each and every night) was back in early June. I treated myself to a little “sky rockets in flight” with the broad upstairs after I finished packing up my college dorm room. Thought it’d be nice to give me something to smile about as I bid my school farewell in the rear-view mirror. Smooth, right? Resident Stud Wilos closes down shop with a bang (hiyo!). Gettin ready to slide on in to my post-collegiate victory lap wherein I would be up to my eyeballs in women. Nope. Nothin’.

I dunno what it is. Maybe it’s the fact that I wear a rubber “Livestrong”-type bracelet from my elementary school’s 5-Year Reunion. Maybe it’s the fact that I oftentimes over-serve myself to the point of losing control of my bladder. Maybe it’s the fact that my hair resembles that of Bozo the Clown. Maybe it’s Maybeline!

Whatever the underlying factors, I have come to the conclusion that the reason I am in the throes of this epic summer drought is that I do not posses the slightest hint of what one would call “game.” Boom. I have no game. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Looking back on it, as laughable as it sounds, all of the tail I pulled in high school stemmed from the fact that either a) the girl was a staunch practitioner of the Open Door Policy or b) I was a senior, the BIG varsity quarterback, and, quite simply put, I ran shit. (Cocky, much?)

Take last night, for example. I was out at a bar in Nantucket called the Chicken Box which is, to put it in layman’s terms, packed wall-to-wall with hot soup. I mean, there are some FBI (Female Body Inspector, of course) Certified, Grade A scorchers in there. And that’s the eye candy. My target range is more along the lines of the slightly overweight chick in the corner, eyes rolling back in her head, guzzling her seventh vodka-soda, and dancing by herself. But I can’t even bag that! You wanna know how my night ended?? (Probably not, but…) I ended up on a random beach by my house drinking scotch-and-waters with some bizarre dude that I shared a taxicab with. Hmm.

I really just don’t know how to get with chicks. Maybe you have to “talk to them.” Maybe you have to “spend time with them at the bar.” Perhaps it would behoove me not to be the guy sweating pure ethanol through two layers of shirts because he is running around the dance floor Rabil-ing dudes right and left. I dunno.

So, as I sit here on American Airlines flight number 853 headed for O’Hare Airport (from where our family will drive out to our grandparents farm), it looks like, save for an act of God or an act of incest, Labor Day will come to pass with old Wilos notching an astounding zero hookups in the season that was the summer of aught-nine. In the words of Vince Vaughn from Wedding Crashers, “hell of a season, pal.” And, with the way things are going, look out Cal, cause this streak ain’t ending anytime soon…

(Eds. Note: credit for picture goes to BJG)

Rule No. 1

I was hanging out this past weekend with a friend of friends in THE City (New York City that is, for all of you who thought I was referring to Des Moines), and I realized that our host and his two roommates referred on two separate occasions to “Rule Number 1.” The guys were very cool, so I immediately ruled out the fact that they might be trampling on the grave of Wedding Crashers by quoting an extremely cliché and oft-overused exchange between Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson (what the hell happened to Luke Wilson, by the way?). So, I thought that perhaps the trio had a bro-riffic series of rules forged through years of time spent together, but I used my deductive reasoning to cross this off when I realized that “Rule Number 1” was a joke of sorts.

The usage of “Rule No. 1” came about under the following circumstances: when someone felt bad about something, be it drinking obscene amounts of liquor on someone else’s tab and not paying the person back, engaging in questionable antics with a girl, or committing any act that a girl would be infuriated with, they were “breaking Rule No. 1.” As I’m sure you can see, breaking Rule Number 1 is feeling bad about something. In essence, never feel bad about anything you did that brought satisfaction to yourself or to your friends. The guys accentuated the joke by saying, “what’s Rule Number 1?” “Never feel bad.” “What’s Rule Number 2?” “Never feel bad,” and etc.

Perhaps I have been living under a rock for the last twenty-two years, but I had never heard this terminology and, I’m not gonna lie, I liked it. I believe that this concept would be classified under the family of “Sorry For Partying,” “Never Apologize,” and the more traditional “Fuck you.” Sorry for Partying was a phrase that took its formidable roots at my school on that fateful day that was Fall Lawn Parties 2008, which spilled into an epic night at the fine establishment Winberries, which went hand-in-hand with the ushering in of “Disturbia” as the anthem of the year/my life (citation here goes to a cohort of people, including CJB, EAS, JF, and MJB).

I am quite tired and do not feel on my game tonight, so I will cut this post short by leaving you with a picture. I will throw out a WARNING, as this picture is pretty gross and not for those with a weak stomach. It occurred on the night referenced above, and if the custodian charged with cleaning this up or any residents of Spellman entry 5 are reading this, I offer you my most sincere apologies. For partying.

Wilos' Blog

What I will now write is somewhat of a disclaimer for this mutated beast of a “blog” that I created about a week ago (on a side note, how the hell did they come up with that name, anyway?). I had been out on the town, returned home, had had a few too many pops, and thought it would be funny to rip on people who are a tad too into themselves, as that is a pet peeve of mine (along with Princeton FluFest – citation to MPC). However, after some thought, sarcastically chastising others for behavior which, I’m sure, at one point or another, I myself have been guilty of becomes a) old and is b) probably unhealthy for my general outlook on life.

So, when my lazy ass gets around to it, I will try to change the name of this site to something along the lines of “Wilos’ Blog.” I must admit, I cannot take full (nor, for that matter, any) credit for this ingenious title, as it is similar to the name of a very amusing book that I received from a friend about a year ago (JDB). The book was entitled Rickles’ Book, and it was Don Rickles’, who happens to be, in my esteemed opinion, one of the funniest comedians around, autobiography. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrzJf334rXI&feature=fvw for a scene from the cult classic Dirty Work, wherein Rickles goes off on one of his patented rants.

Anyways, as I can only imagine you have no doubt realized, I tend to ramble a lot and go off on tangents before (and, sometimes, I don’t even get a chance to) I make my point, so I will try to get to it. This will be – if I have the willpower and commitment to write stuff down every once in a while – my blog, and I will write about random stuff. Hopefully the blog will take on some type of an identity (i.e. I will write about either specific things or broad topics), so for the meantime if you happen to be reading this, please bear with me.

Lastly, before I sign off and finish watching The Soloist (great uplifting movie by the way, with Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr.), I will close with one point. I am a firm believer that, in some ways, for a guy like me who happens to be gainfully unemployed, living in his parents basement, and currently lying on his sofa wearing a Mount Lebanon Women’s Lacrosse hoodie, writing a blog is quite narcissistic. I mean, after all, who am I to think that others care what I have to say about the tools that run around Nobadeer Beach in Nantucket? It’s one thing if you are doing something cool like living in Kenya for the year or teaching English in China, but I have little of interest outside of my own rambling thoughts and opinions.

So, please do not take this as a self-interested guy trying to write for the enjoyment of reading his own work (well, not 100%...). I see this as a forum for me to collect some of my jumbled thoughts on paper, keep in touch with my writing, and hopefully find out a little bit about what the hell is going on inside this weird little thing that one might call my brain. And, if I happen to elicit a laugh or two from friends, then all the better.

-Wilos

P.S. I realized that last part sounded a little too self righteous. I was the man in high school.