The Rip Off

Yes, but not this rocker. I am returning ten overdue library books today and realizing I haven’t read a new book in a month. I feel like I’ve been busy, writing (tba) little things for Paper, Paste, and Spin this month, still working on Paper Thin Walls, and still slowing catching up with lingering and new Pitchfork reviews. I’ve been reading a lot, but blogs, magazines and online articles, which, like popcorn, make you feel full but not satisfied full.

The biggest thing I’ve been doing, and something that I’m okay with for now, is going to the gym almost daily. I go to the Greenpoint Y because it’s cheap, and I guess I see some of these guys, but I’m most intrigued by the 12-year-old kid who is there every day I am and probably more, and who always walks over to the magazine rack and picks out an issue of the New Yorker and keeps it closed while jogging on a treadmill. Sometimes I also see Craig Finn.

Just to keep things related, I found an iTunes script that lets you put intervals into songs. So, one minute of “Crystal Cat,” then beep, then two minutes of “Paper Planes,” etc. Intervals are for cardio interval training, because, I think, slow cardio is for jerks: if you can read while doing cardio, then you aren’t working hard enough. And I work hard enough, so I stopped reading. On the other hand, Man Man is for free weights, which I do as well, like bench exercises too, guys. I don’t see many women doing this, I mostly see them gripping two pound weights in front of the cardio room mirror, lazily raising them above their heads. Can you exercise ironically? That’s what they look like they’re doing. Maybe they just think they’ll get huge muscles if they lift anything heavier, but they can’t, they don’t have the testosterone. That’s what Man Man is for.