You might be a 60-year-old gym rat if …

• Two Aleve with your morning coffee act as preventive medicine before you leave for the gym.
• You wear baggy shirts and yoga pants, instead of tight-fitting tanks and bike shorts.
• Older patrons ask you how things work, instead of bothering that young whippersnapper at the front desk.
• The music blasting out over the loudspeakers is vaguely familiar, but you couldn't sing along to it.
• You're not in a hurry to get there, and you're not in a hurry to leave.

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It's a good day to be a gym rat here in the Middle of Nowhere. It's started raining, and it looks like the morning off-and-on showers might turn into a soaker by noon.

Since we haven't had any snow to speak of this winter, the rain is a Good Thing. Gardens need moisture year-'round, and not many gardeners are willing to drag their hoses out of storage during a mid-winter dry spell.

I walked yesterday morning, in brilliant sunshine without a jacket. I pushed myself to do 3.5 miles in an hour. It's so much easier to do 3.5 mph on the treadmill than outdoors on hills, but I did it. Felt very strong when I got home. And very sweaty. Heh.

February's NaBloPoMo theme is "relative." So far I haven't run with the themes, because I've always thought this blog had a theme of its own and I try to stay within the knit-run-reap-eat parameters. Also, the reason this blog exists (instead of my original one, the Shrinking Knitter), is because of some issues with some relatives. (Have any of you started a new blog to hide from someone who found your old one?) So writing about "relatives" is not going to happen.

But the word relative is adjective as well as a noun.

relative |ˈrelətiv|
adjective
1: considered in relation or in proportion to something else

In my case, the relative effectiveness of going to the gym versus walking outdoors can be measured by the soreness in my muscles. My back, shoulders and arms feel fine after a walk outside. After a trip around the Nautilus/Cybex machines? Not so much.

But it's, ahem, relatively easier this week than last, and I feel relatively stronger today than I did a week ago. And with the January weight loss, I feel positively fantastic about the decision to pony up for a six-month membership.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to remind me to come back and read this post when I slide into complacency, busy-ness, fatigue or just plain old I-don't-want-to. Thank you in advance.