100-ish Days of Jane Fonda’s Original Workout (1982)
This is the part where I talk about my new workout routine, sorry!
If you know me at all you know that I really hate working out. I don’t hate physical activity, like dancing or hiking, but the idea of just hanging out at a gym for an hour while doing repetitive motions and being able to be perceived by other people while I am at my lowest just makes me want to die, frankly. Sure, I tried the workout group with my coworkers but our leader was once training for the Marines so her workouts were so intense that it made my muscles ache for days while I never seemed to improve. When our building’s gym inevitably closed due to a virus going around (have you heard of it?), I finally felt free.
As months went by, I kept seeing people on Instagram and TikTok and the like doing workout challenges. When I could kind of have a social life by doing outdoor things in the summer, I wasn’t really interested in devoting my time to fitness but once it got really cold out and any kind of social interaction was off the table, using my yoga mat seemed more interesting.
Most of the YouTube exercise videos were simply too intense for my tastes. I wanted to do exercise, sure, but I didn’t want to be a sweaty gross mess afterwards. And that’s when it hit me—the Jane Fonda workout. I had seen some people doing this classic workout tape on an almost daily basis and it seemed like a good choice. It was the workout tape that began an almost 40 year-long era of workout tapes. Jane Fonda also is very attractive even now so her workouts must work.
The first few days of doing the tape were absolute hell. My whole body hurt in a way that it never really hurt before. The 30-minute “Beginner’s Workout” is a full-body routine that is definitely not beginner and not for the weak. I am very weak, both in muscle mass and in spirit. The 80’s background music was stuck in my head all the time. At work my head was constantly filled with synth beats over Jane saying, “And stretch it out.” After doing this workout routine every day for a week straight, I just accepted that this was going to be my life.
Doing the same thing every day, even if you like doing the thing, is going to have some effect on you. Sure, one of the effects is that I now can do the ab portion of the workout without almost ascending into heaven. Another effect is that my ass is slowly disappearing—that is bad, but expected since people in the 80’s hated having a nice, juicy fat ass. By watching the same thing over and over every day, I’ve started noticing what the other people who are not Jane Fonda are doing. They are significantly worse at the workouts than Jane is, which makes me feel better. My favorite background character is Blonde Lady In Green. She makes some incredibly silly faces and also really lazes out at some of the hard parts, and I appreciate that.
Will I ever stop doing Jane Fonda’s Original Workout? At this point I don’t think so. I’m in so deep that I paid $9.99 after it was taken off of YouTube and stopped being free on Prime Video. I’m addicted to bouncing around, doing leg lifts, and avoiding doing the butt workout in fear that my butt could get any smaller. Eventually, I will become as strong as Jane Fonda and will be able to take her out in a fight. Maybe someday I will graduate from the beginner’s workout to the 50-minute Advanced Workout (that will actually never happen because I have a life).
Sorry for bothering you all with fitness talk you never really asked for. It’s really the only constant in my life. Anyways, if you’re bad at working out and hate doing it, I highly recommend doing Jane Fonda’s Original Workout (Beginner) (1982). We’re getting absolutely ripped.