"You should know by now that when he uses the air quotes he is getting ready to be sarcastic!" � Victoria, Queen of Fourth Graders

On the coldest day of the year, I woke up at four-forty in the morning, got ready, and went to the gym. I was up so early that the heroin addicts were not having breakfast on my car waiting for the methadone clinic to open and they had not shown up by the time I returned.

I arrived at the gym, went down to the locker room to secure my coat and gloves. This is the first instance where it felt like the first day in a new school � fumbling with a new locker. If you have ever been to a new school, you know what I am talking about: every school has different lockers and they do not all work the same. Unlike being at a new school someone offered to help me with the locker, at a school people would just stare at you as you fumbled with something that would prove ultimately to be simple. I did not accept the help because it came from Vice-President Cheney�s body double, which does not improve in looks or figure in just standard white man panties yeah, I thought it was a sweater too, but apparently it isn�t because I did not want to stand to close to someone ready to be naked.

After I fought the locker into submission, I went up to the cardio room � where I wanted to use the treadmill, or an exercise bike. �Exercise Bike� is a really stupid term since you exercise on all bicycles, if there were a lazy bikes or sloth bikes you know Kipp and I would have a matching set. I used the treadmill for an hour because it took me forever to figure it out so I decided to master one machine a day.

During the process of selecting the machine to use, I was gawked at by a pack of Amazon Women who were there, they pointed at me and whispered something so I asked, �Does Maria know you�re here because you are supposed to be governing California?� Okay, I only said that in my head. I would never snark a person who has a neck the width of my thigh. Oh, in Texas we call them �Gym Teachers� Apparently, it is funny that my shoes match my pants and jacket. I informed them that I was color-blind and matching was not intentional.

I was on the treadmill for five minutes when I realized that I did not have an appropriate play list on my iPod. I had no idea I would need one, but I found that angry chick music sung by Canadians who abuse their instruments was a good motivator. I am currently soliciting advise on what to listen to as I pedal, climb, or job in the morning because just staring at the mirror in front of me listening to Alanis complain about something is not going to be fun forever.

When I left, I left wet because it had not occurred to me to bring a towel and I am not comfortable using the Y�s loaner �you don�t know where I�ve been� towels. I had also forgotten that it was the coldest day of the year and wet hair was a painfully stupid idea. Tomorrow I will remember two things: bring a towel from home, and get a parking token.

My city is not Connecticut�s finest, and while I would rather live in my city than in any west of Philadelphia or south of the Capital, it is not the safest place to park a car , so the gym offers free, monitored parking but you need a token to get out of the lot. I am not sure what the token does but you do need it to get out and upon learning this I had to leave my warm car, with wet hair and job back to into the Y and get a token. After acquiring the token I had to figure out the machine to release my car from the lot � which is something you need to be tall for and I am not, so for a fourth time I had to climb out of my car and frantically try to catch my death of pneumonia.

However, I am not ill because of this ordeal and my entire day has been energized at a new and obnoxious level I thought impossible without a daily infusion of Starbucks.