You willingly pay because you want to be a part of the event.

found in the archives and never published.

Written August, 2016.  

AN OLYMPIC MOMENT

As I write this, THE 2016 summer games are on display in Rio De Janero, for all the world to see.  These games started a week ago.   Most countries desperately want to win a gold medal for the event they enter, so they send athletes that do nothing but practice year-round for a few minutes in the limelight.  

Take the 100-meter dash, for example.   It is a very difficult race, but it is over in less time than it took for me to type this sentence.  (I am a poor typist) The good news is that none of the athletes for this event ever needed to train by running a mile.  EVER.  No long-distance training of any kind.  Zero.   What the hell were MY coaches thinking, when I was running track in High School?  I was on the 220 relay squad.   That event was twice as long as the 100 meters, but we trained each morning by running a mile as a warmup for our training sessions!  What was up with that?  Anyway, it is nice to finally get a chance to vent my frustration about long distance running.

The thing I heard most often about the Rio Olympics was the outrageous cost for everything associated with the event.  Food, lodging, and transportation were extremely expensive. 

In order to “honor” all these tremendously athletic, toned bodies, I decided it was time for me to take my annual visit to the Perfect Body Fitness Connection Station.  I will abbreviate this for future mention of it in this article as PBFCS.  I think I am a member here, but it has been so long since I have been to a gym, I don’t know if this is even the gym I belong to.

I moved to the country a few years ago and now it is about an hour and a half drive to my office. So, I often stay with my mom, who lives about 30 minutes from my office.  There happened to be a PBFCS on the way to my Mom’s place.  She and I usually go out for dinner or eat take-out in front of the TV when I stay with her.  You can see that is not an exercise friendly situation.  She lives alone, so she keeps a small radio turned on in the kitchen.  And in the next room is the TV, which is blaring sound at the same time.  Sometimes there is even the sound coming from her TV in her bedroom.  

All this noise is a bit too much to take.   So, for me to be able to delay all this noise by a couple of hours by hitting the gym would be a great incentive to get in a workout.  So, I thought I should I stop in at PBFCS and sweat.

Exercise is very boring.  My brain will think of anything OTHER than exercise to cope with the boredom.  So, my brain did what it often does and comes up with a plan to take advantage of a current situation.  As my homage to the Olympics being in Rio, and the extortive rates vendors are charging for food, drink and ancillary items, I conducted my plan.  

While in the bowels of the work out center, I pulled from my new looking but ten-year-old gym bag a large innocent looking mayonnaise jar.  No, I was not about to make a sandwich.  I carefully opened the lid and released about 10,000 mosquitoes, laced with the Zika virus, to feast on the sweat covered semi clothed, CO2 expiring people in the facility.  Then I started swatting my body and yelling like a mad man:   Zika?  Zika!, Zika!...... 

Then I ran outside to my awaiting cashier table.  Next to me were crates of insect repellent.  I sold them for about 4 times the U.S. rate, just like the prices the vendors at the Olympics were charging for cokes and hot dogs.  I felt like I was doing my part to contribute to the Olympic heritage.   

I love it when a good plan:  exercise and commerce, comes together.