Socialization bad

I witnessed an interesting example of how women compete with one another yesterday at the gym. I went to my snazzy exercise ball class--somewhat of an abs class, but really all about the CORE, whatever that means--and I had a different instructor.

This woman is the hot middle school teacher. You all remember her? Petite brunette, super perky, and in awe-inspiring shape. Well, chicky's got some issues.

As we all rolled into place on our ridiculous giant red balls (hahaha), she announced that she was "flying to Portland to see her 90-pound sister this weekend, so we were going to kill ourselves today." And then she proceeded to beat the tar out of us for the entire class, leaving me and at least a dozen other women in a crumpled, sweaty pile, weeping softly.

Damn.

This was a sibling! Her sister made her this way! This woman is an aerobics instructor! She's adorable! She weighs likely 110 pounds, tops! WHAT IS HER PROBLEM!???

I'd like to add as an interesting aside that the one fellow in our class--boys need core, too!--refused to even do some of the ridiculous butt things we were doing. (Effective things, but intensely painful and goofy looking.) Aerobashrew looked over at him, laughed, and said, "You will never understand." He shrugged, smiled, and kept doing his crunches.

Gulp.

For whom do you work out? Are you like my new favorite ad--for Kaiser--that says, "Be your own cause" or are you determined to be fitter than the Joneses? I can honestly say I'm not sure. Only that I'm super glad I have a brother rather than a sister.