Hubby invents a new way to lose weight and save time.

Well here we are.  The day before Thanksgiving in the US.  For those of you outside the US, tomorrow is the day when families force themselves to get together (generally fighting mass crowds because today is the busiest travel day of the year)  and make nice with each other while stuffing themselves with mass quantities of foods that, on a normal day, we would not eat because most of them are gross or insanely unhealthy. (I mean...seriously, turkey?  A whole turkey?  And...let's take a vegetable...the sweet potato. Now, let's dump a crap ton of butter and brown sugar on it, and then, for fun, let's put marshmallows on top of it.  If you have to put that much stuff on top of a vegetable just to be able to eat it, maybe you should find another vegetable to eat.  Even broccoli only requires cheese to make it edible.)

 Then, if we're lucky, we'll fall asleep in front of 18 continuous hours of American Football coverage and wake just in time to get up and go out to stores that are manned by grumpy employees who now have to work on Thanksgiving all so we can get a moderately good deal on electronics and other stuff
we simply don't need but have to have for Christmas.

Now, if you're an unlucky person, in addition to all of the above, you'll have a to play that most horrible of Thanksgiving Day games:  Let's go around the table and say what we're thankful for.  I hate that game.  Hate it.  It never ends well.  Best case scenario, no one bursts out in tears and everyone says something trite like, "I'm thankful we're able to get together again."  (Which overlooks the fact that the odds are quite good you'd be MORE thankful if you never had to get together with these people EVER AGAIN.)

By the way, I LOVE Thanksgiving. I really do.  Hubby and I are headed out to see my mother-in-law and that might sound terrible, but it's going to be great because my mother-in-law keeps it low key and pretty stress free. I don't have to fake it there. I can wear sweats and watch TV and maybe we'll go see the holiday lights at the local city park, maybe not. We'll just see how things go. Plus, I won't be forced to eat sweet potatoes. (I cannot stress how much I hate them.)

But that's not why I'm here.  I'm here today to talk about a genius idea Hubby hit upon while we were driving home from church this past Sunday.

Due to road construction, which apparently is never going to end in this corner of Wisconsin, there was a detour right at the end of our church's driveway.  Now, we could have taken the back driveway to get out of the parking lot, but we didn't.  Why?  Because we've been going to that church for more than 20 years and we've been going in and out of the front entrance and we forget about the detour every time.  We both just turned 51 this year. Cut us some slack.

Anyway, we got to the end of the driveway and realized we had to take the detour which involved a left hand turn and then driving around a couple blocks to get home rather than taking a right hand turn and driving straight up one street.   In short, we were taking the long way home through a neighborhood that wasn't ours.

I should mention that when I see people jogging, I used to mock them. Especially if I saw fluffy people jogging.  I would make a snarky remark like, "Well, first day of the new diet plan" or some such nonsense.  (See, there's a reason why stuff happens to me. I haven't always been a good person.)  Now that I have two bad knees and two arthritic feet and it's difficult for me to walk much less run, I cheer on anyone, ANYONE who takes it upon themselves to jog outside in public where people can see them.

It should be noted that I don't cheer quite so loudly for the ultra fit marathoners who insist on breezing by me on the sidewalk in the mornings wearing their super coordinated outfits and breathing lightly enough to greet me. Meanwhile, I'm probably wearing whatever I fell asleep in the night before and if I'm more than a block from home, most likely I'm either limping, wheezing, or wishing I was anywhere but outside walking.  Probably all three.

But, when I see a fluffy person jogging, or an old person, or a younger person who has some sort disability, I cheer (to myself) loudly.

Such was the case last Sunday as we drove past houses we don't generally see, I noticed a jogging fella. He wasn't terribly fluffy, nor did his clothes have that "just slept in" look about them. But one thing did catch my eye: how he was holding his hands.

There's a way most people hold their hands when they jog (I've been told.)   Arms bent, hands in fists, arms move back and forth a little with each step.

 Now I have seen a wilder version of this, on someone who wasn't so much jogging as trying to outrun some dogs or a cop or a thundering herd of wildebeests.  (No I don't stop for these things. I'm an observer who observes. I'm not someone who gets involved. Whatever the kids was running from was not nearly as funny as the image you all have in your heads of someone running from a thundering heard of wildebeests. In fact, I bet half of you looked up wildebeest on your phones right now.  And, since many of you reading this are probably on your way to a family gathering where you will choke down those mashed potatoes in silence rather than admitting you never really liked your cousin's husband's hair cut, or whatever ridiculous topic your tribe has that will start a battle, you at least now have a funny image to take you away from it all.  You're welcome.)

Where was I? Oh, right.  The guy jogging.

This guy wasn't holding his arms that way, not at all. He had his arms bent at the elbow, but then both arms where out in front of him, and his hands faced forward, his fingers bent as if he was carrying a long stick horizontally.  Or maybe weightlifting.  

This struck us both as funny.  I started the ball rolling with my tried and true, "What is up with that?"

To which Hubby said, "I'm not sure."

We were quiet for a moment.  Hubby and have been together so long that we know all our stories and we've talked about everything. The only thing we have left is ways to try and one up each other with funny quips.

Hubby said, "It's like that Tim Hawkins video maybe, he's raising his hands to the Lord."

That video makes me laugh every time.   Here you go, take a look.

I said, "Well, he's killing two birds with one stone.  Worshiping God and jogging.  Worship aerobics."

Hubby's eyes twinkled.  I knew I'd lost this battle of quips.  "No," says he, "He's PRAISERZIZING."


Have a happy and safe Thanksgiving everyone...and for those of you who are going out shopping tomorrow or Friday, don't yell at the retail people.  While you were stuffing your face with food you only eat once a year, they had to get ready for work, and now they have to make the same friendly chit chat roughly ten thousand times in the next eight hours.  Be kind.

And for those of you readers no in the US...have a lovely rest of your week!