You know when you first try to introduce exercise into your daily routine and almost all of your clothing items become excuses not to continue?

You go on a hunt for your Thorlo socks. Without Thorlos, you know you’ll get blisters which will result in countless hours away from the house at the spa while someone massages and files you back to health. Your mindset has shifted and you are no longer scouring for Thorlos, instead you are on the phone booking a pre-emptive pedicure.

Shoes—forget these old shoes with one lace that’s fraying. You favour one foot so as not to worsen the frayed lace which causes you to get shin splints in your opposite leg. The frayed lace remains in its original state. This will of course keep you off your feet for several weeks and the treadmill will once again be nothing more than a clothesline in the basement with Littlest Pet Shops magnetized to the hand rails.

Wrong bra—your “good” sports bra has been washed so many times it’s now a baggy pyjama top. To the mall to find something decent! (And to show off your newly painted toes)

I have to go to the bathroom. This always happens about six minutes into an up-tempo walk on the treadmill—just as things are starting to get intense. I guess I’ll just turn the machine off, visit the loo and forget what I came downstairs to do in the first place.

I forgot my water bottle.

I’m wearing my watch, damn! Now I have to disembark, remove the watch, walk over to the shelf to place it next to the video games which are in dire need of alphabetization and start over. It’s not even worth it. I might as well just eat some chocolate almonds after I finish dusting and arranging these Atari cases.

I forgot my chocolate almonds.

Headband—if it wasn’t for that one rogue hair brushing my forehead from an impossible angle, I could continue. If I had a headband, I could….wait! I do have a headband. Stop the leg presses! Now where is it? Two hours later I’ve forgotten why I’m cleaning my bathroom vanity.

An old, fake high school gymnastics injury that used to get me out of wearing a leotard in public is acting up again.

It’s not just me, Greg has the same issues. He heads out to go for a walk but his recurring complaints are that his shoes are too tight, too big, too orange, not enough Oasis on his ipod, chaffing, my God the chaffing, he stopped at a neighbour’s house for a beer with another husband who was “encouraged” to take a little time for himself and of course, he got lost.

I think the people I admire most are the ones wearing Vans sneakers, pyjama tops and a kerchief they think strangers will assume means they were cast members on the first season of Survivor. They sport gardening gloves, swimming goggles and the word Juicy or Bum written across their backside as they race past my house in a full sprint—I salute you.

By salute I mean, I stand in my front window flashing a chocolate almond smile and of course, my Thorlos.