A Wii Bit Of Pain

The usual suspects.

Because I am a Cubs fan, play softball, sign up for endurance races and can't say no to good pizza, beer and ice cream, pain is not a stranger to me, my anatomy, my heart and my psyche. Once when I was 12, my right hand was dangling off the top of a car when my friend Vanessa slammed the door shut, catching my ring finger. The pain was so immense and intense that it took me five seconds to scream. I never saw a doctor for it, but I must have at least hairline fractured it. The ring finger on my right hand will be forever crooked, making it very hard for an engagement ring to make its way on. Pain. I know you.

A few weeks ago, I was over at Wallie and Ben's and after a few rounds of Guinness and Texas Hold'em, the Wii machine was revved up. It was my third time playing this thing, and I wasn't hooked immediately like when my parents got us a Nintendo Entertainment System 16-Bit when was 13. A white box and nunchuks do not measure up to Mario and Luigi in their most basic pixelations. So I knew that it's quite possible to play Wii well belly up on a couch with just a flick of the wrist, but I couldn't do it. What's the fun in that? I had to be standing in front of the 32" flat screen TV flinging my right arm around from baseball to tennis to boxing. Completing forehands and backhands, full pitching motion like the bases were empty and busting balls with hooks and crosses. It was like I was playing Wimbledon, the World Series and the Main Event at the Bellagio. I was Joanne Sports Schmuck powered by beer so when I woke up Sunday morning, I had a sore right arm. I mean, it's a pretty good arm that's worked out nicely regularly, but Wii must have found some muscle threshold to trash.

I made it through three hours of softball practice that day and on Monday morning, it hurt worse but I braced it for the first of 30 personal sessions I'd received as an early birthday and Christmas gift from my fantastic parents. My arm raged on as my girth measurements were taken but you know what hurts more? Being told you have a body fat percentage of 37.2 percent. Really? I couldn't believe and I still refuse to accept it. I know I'm not stacked and my BMI makes me out to be the biggest loser but the last time I checked on an electronic scale, I was about 24 percent, just four percent from what a good athlete should be. Apparently, the calipers' pinch method is the most accurate measurement, short of being dunked into a density tank at a lab. I still don't buy it, but my trainer Augustine inked it onto my record, so it's now a true fact. Nothing was in as much pain than my jock ego right then, when the chart declared me obese. Seriously, no way. Unacceptable. But it is now my goal to beat those calipers at their foolish game and show them who's boss.

Pinch test. You're cruising for a bruising, motherfucker.

(Check back tomorrow for a three-weeks-later follow-up!)