My Panic Workout

Fitness in the age of political absurdity

As we continue into our second month of 2017, many of us are looking to meet newly set fitness goals, but also panicking at the dissolution of fundamental human rights by the Trump administration. Thankfully, I’ve found a way to combine both of these activities into one amazing workout.

1. The Teeth Chatter

How many calories does anxious teeth chattering burn? I don’t know, but my dad’s apolitical Labrador Retriever, Jack, shares this same anxious tick with me, and Jack is super fit. He also has terrible gas, but this is more likely due to his love of bananas and eating out of the trash than anxiety. The best time to try the teeth chatter is anytime audio of Trump plays, so that your gnashing teeth drown out his bitchy digs at… everyone and everything.

2. Headbanging

In the dictionary, headbanging has two definitions: 1. “Violent rhythmic shaking of the head by fans of heavy metal music,” or 2. “Violent rocking of the body and shaking or knocking of the head, by children or mentally disordered adults.” It’s also a fantastic way to engage your neck muscles, dry wet hair, and experience the temporary relief of safely expressed rage.

3. Double Chilled Wine Bottle Triceps Curl

I like Riesling for this, but almost any wine will do. Raise a bottle in each hand, extend over your head, lower with your elbows at a 90-degree angle, raise back up, and repeat. You can also do this while headbanging in order to up the workout’s intensity. After 20 reps or so, uncork and hydrate, or anaesthetize.

4. Screaming

It doesn’t burn calories on its own, but add a few butt clenches or leg lifts and it does. Try like, 50 butt clenches, or 25 lifts per leg, while engaging your diaphragm in a primal shriek.

5. Abdominal Flex/Trying Not To Throw Up

Pull your abdominal muscles inward, as far inward as possible, as if the tiny hand of a particular lecher were trying to touch you. Hold for a ten count and exhale, for 10 reps. Try your best not to barf, but keep a receptacle within reach lest you accidentally remember our President cares more about his hair than education, health, free speech, Nazis, the world’s second largest religion, constitutional checks and balances, possible nuclear war, criminal justice reform, and the planet’s future ability to support life.

6. Viciously Tearing Photos in Half

Again, we’ve got enough options here for a full deck of Neo-Nazi baseball cards, and a slight rotation of the wrist will engage your radials and maybe your delts and perhaps your biceps, depending on how hard you tear. Whether you pick Jeff, Betsy, Kellyanne, Mike, Ben, Ted, Rick, Sean, Jared, Paul, or Mitch, please recycle the shreds of their faces afterward.

7. Pillow Punching, or Kicking

Sometimes it’s just nice to punch or kick something with more structure and substance than the President’s policies. You can up the ante by punching two pillows simultaneously, one representing the House, and the other the Senate, both of which are controlled by Republicans more pliable than silk-wrapped decorative sacks of goose down.

8. Putin Power Squat / Cossack Dance

With your feet shoulder-width apart, enter a low squat, working your gluteus muscles and calves, and try to kick your legs out from under you in time with the music of the Red Army Choir or this more upbeat Putin anthem, which is just catchy enough to raise your pulse and drown out your doubts with synths. This exercise burns serious cals, tones your posterior, and like vodka drinking and normalized media censorship, will help ease your transition into a more Puti-ful America.

9. Helicopter Arms

Spin in a circle with your arms outstretched, like a propeller, to prevent anyone from interceding or trying to console you, regardless of whatever alternative facts they offer. If you feel vertigo, don’t worry — that’s just the way things are now.

10. Marching

This is getting more and more popular, which is good news if you need a workout buddy or buddies and want thousands of people to choose from. After gathering at your local starting point, if you’re not marching right away because the streets are literally too full, march in place to engage your quads and deepest personal convictions against autocratic rule by a spray-tanned man-child and his billionaire yay-sayer club wearing civil service like a bad wax death mask. It gets the blood moving!