Boxing Bootcamp: Day 5

Bone Thugs and Harmony -- and specifically whichever album has "1st of tha Month" on it -- has become something of a Pavlovian trigger for me. See, there's a limited music selection at 3rd Street Gym, so Simon (or whoever runs the sound system) ends up repeating the same albums every couple days while we run in place, shadowbox, do squat thrusts, push ups or whatever else. For some reason -- and this might only be my imagination playing dirty tricks on me -- every time we do sit ups, specifically, I hear "1st of tha Month" playing in the background. So now, every time I hear that song (which used to be limited to "a couple times in 10th grade" but this week seems more like "every moment that I'm awake"), I want to do sit ups. Just thinking about that song -- or cashing welfare checks -- makes me want to do sit ups. I think I'm losing my mind. Anyway.

Got a little bit of a "news tip" while sweating my ass off this morning. While it's likely safe to assume most of the bootcamp's participants (masochists) are, like me, here to get in shape and learn how to beat people up, turns out that one of they guys in class -- we'll call him Action Jackson -- is actually a bartender at a certain notorious club on 6th St.; he's enrolled because he's part of a month-long bet with his coworkers to see who can lose the most weight. Winner gets $1,000. I noticed that he was sweating particularly hard today, and he pointed out that not only was he wearing a thick blue hoodie sweatshirt, he was also wearing a garbage bag underneath the sweatshirt. What? That's not news, you say? Eat me -- that's funny.

First week: over. Lessons learned: 1) Bone Thugs and Harmony are up to something. 2) It's difficult to box with glasses on. 3) There is no "I" in "welfare."

Boxing Bootcamp is a bit of fun orchestrated by 3rd Street Gym, SF Weekly's Matt Stroud, and Rob Quintiliani from the SF Bay Guardian; the fun involves Rob and Matt training for 6 weeks before pummeling each other publicly for everyone's amusement. Questions? Write to Matt Stroud.