One Third Off | Page 7

and I had written copiously of those joys,
and I now declined to recant of my faith or to abate my indulgences.
All this talk which I had heard about balanced rations went in at one ear
and out at the other. I knew what a balanced ration was. I stowed one
aboard three times daily--at morn, again at noon and once more at
nightfall. A balanced ration was one which, being eaten, did not pull
you over on your face; one which you could poise properly if only you
leaned well back, upon arising from the table, and placed the two hands,
with a gentle lifting motion, just under the overhang of the main cargo
hold.
Surely there must be some way of achieving the desired result other
than by following dieting devices. There was--exercising was the
answer. I would exercise and so become a veritable faun.
Now, so far as I recalled, I had never taken any indoor exercise
excepting once in a while to knock on wood. I abhorred the thought of
ritualistic bedroom calisthenics such as were recommended by divers
health experts. Climbing out of a warm bed and standing out in the
middle of a cold room and giving an imitation of a demoniac
semaphore had never appealed to me as a fascinating divertisement for
a grown man. As I think I may have remarked once before, lying at full

length on one's back on the floor immediately upon awakening of a
morning and raising the legs to full length twenty times struck me as a
performance lacking in dignity and utterly futile.
Besides, what sort of a way was that to greet the dewy morn?
So as an alternative I decided to enroll for membership at a gymnasium
where I could have company at my exercising and make a sport of what
otherwise would be in the nature of a punishment. This I did. With a
group of fellow inmates for my team mates, I tossed the medicine ball
about. My score at this was perfect; that is to say, sometimes when it
came my turn to catch I missed the ball, but the ball never once missed
me. Always it landed on some tender portion of my anatomy, so that
my average, written in black-and-blue spots, remained an even 1000.
Daily I cantered around and around and around a running track until
my breathing was such probably as to cause people passing the
building to think that the West Side Y.M.C.A. was harboring a pet
porpoise inside. Once, doing this, I caught a glimpse of my own form
in a looking-glass which for some reason was affixed to one of the
pillars flanking the oval. A looking-glass properly did not belong there;
distinctly it was out of place and could serve no worthy purpose. Very
few of the sights presented in a gym which largely is patronized by
city-bred fat men are deserving to be mirrored in a glass. They are not
such visions as one would care to store in fond memory's album. Be
that as it may, here was this mirror, and swinging down the course
suddenly I beheld myself in it. Clad in a chastely simple one-piece
garment, with my face all a blistered crimson and my fingers interlaced
together about where the third button of the waistcoat, counting from
the bottom up, would have been had I been wearing any waistcoat, I
reminded myself of a badly scorched citizen escaping in a scantily
dressed condition from a burning homestead bringing with him the
chief family treasure clasped in his arms. He had saved the pianola!
From the running track or the medicine-ball court I would repair to the
steam room and simmer pleasantly in a temperature of 240 degrees
Fahrenheit--I am sure I have the figures right--until all I needed before
being served was to have the gravy slightly thickened with flour and a

dash of water cress added here and there. Having remained in the steam
cabinet until quite done, I next would jump into the swimming pool,
which concluded the afternoon's entertainment.
Jumping into the cool water of the pool was supposed to reseal the
pores which the treatment in the hot room had caused to open. In the
best gymnasium circles it is held to be a fine thing to have these
educated pores, but I am sure it can be overdone, and personally I
cannot say that I particularly enjoyed it. I kept it up largely for their
sake. They became highly trained, but developed temperament. They
were apt to get the signals mixed and open unexpectedly on the street,
resulting in bad colds for me.
For six weeks, on every week day from three to five P.M. I maintained
this schedule religiously--at least I used a