Go for a Ride

No duh.

Seriously.

Are you kidding me?

I flippantly respond to the study just released by British researchers making the incredible claim that, wait for it, PEOPLE WHO EXERCISE ARE HEALTHIER THAN THOSE WHO DON'T.

This revolutionary claim has stopped my world. Literally brought it to a screeching and skidding halt. Wheels locked up. I don't quite know how to respond. But I will try.

There are few things that we can depend on these turbulent and testy days, two of them, and perhaps they are they are the two sides of the same coin, are the trends of:

1) Somebody, somewhere will state the glaringly obvious trying in desperation to pass it as (hopefully profitable) news, and,

2) The current administration will dump something of relative importance upon the poor unwitting American populace as subterfuge to distract attention away from Mr. Mueller's pending knock at the White House front door.

They ARE the same thing. It is a modern ploy shamelessly ripped from the Marshal McLuhan playbook and tweaked to fit the modern media and the microscopic attention of its audience.  Since the days of Jack LaLanne we have been told that moving your body outside of the comfort zone established and guarded by the brain (or lack thereof) is actually good medicine, and that the news cycle treats noteworthy events (an exchange of wisdom between Little Rocket Man and The Deranged Dotard) far differently on weekends than it does to fill the clock Monday through Friday. So, as any self respecting dictatorship would do, bad news, questionable moves, outright political shenanigans and overt financial self enrichment, is leaked to those outlets supporting such deviousness. I need not name them.

It is not news, or shouldn't be, that regular exercise keeps one healthy. The study cited above does state that those that ride 30-55 miles a day have muscle mass, cholesterol levels and immune systems matching those 30 years their junior. So we got THAT going for us. I am now leaning towards the theory that the main reason more people choose to ignore this data is that we are inherently lazy. Capitalism has won another round. We would rather sit and watch others play, move, dance, ski, walk, march and run on a 70 inch curved flat screen, than actively participate in those activities ourselves. Or cruise in a shiny new BMW. WAY easier than pedaling.

We are also politically lazy, conditioned to obey. We have allowed a thoroughly corrupt regime to take control of our lives. Our quality of freedom has diminished so rapidly, so broadly and with such rancor (divide and conquer) that our personal identifications no longer call Yankees heroes but second amendment right-wing confederate morons. The mega-rich corporations are watching all this play out with a special glee and hubris usually reserved for Tour de France winners or Super Bowl champions.

They are laughing at us.

Guess I'll go for a ride.