This where the obligatory Queen reference goes

Exercise is important, to be sure. My problem (besides being about 50 pounds overweight) is that most exercise is dull.

Sure, some people can abide going 40 minutes on an elliptical machine or treadmill or whatever. But it is BOOOOOORRRRRRRRINNNNNNNNG. There is no short-term incentive (for me, at least) to clamber up on such instruments. At least with basketball or softball or something like that, there’s the competitive aspect. But with ellipticals or treadmills, there’s nothing to take your mind away from the fact that what you are doing sucks balls.

Which is why I enjoy riding my bicycle, something that until recently I totally forgot that I enjoyed.

While there’s not really a competitive aspect to bike riding (unless you’re, you know, in a race or something), it’s something that exercises the senses and the mind as much as it exercises the body.

There’s something exhilarating about feeling the wind rush past and smelling flowers and neighborhood cookouts and seeing deer gallavanting mere yards ahead of you. There’s the fun of having to calculate a twisting path through the woods as you roll past trees and branches that are mere inches from your body on a trail that’s not much wider.

And nowadays, I can indulge my geekery when I go for a ride.

My phone has GPS technology, which means I can map the routes I take, save them and share them with the world. Friday’s route, for example, took me from Firestone on South MacArthur Boulevard to about halfway to Chatham and back while waiting on a car repair.

The GPS application also can use the phone’s camera to take photos with the geographical information embedded in the file, such as the following here:

Back in college, my bike was my primary mode of transport. I was lucky enough to have a car, but Carbondale was a small-enough town that a reasonably healthy person would have nearly everything he’d need within a short bike trip. My friends and I would ride everywhere: to class, to the grocery, to the beer store, to parties and bars… I bet we’d ride 40-50 miles in an average week. It’s no wonder I weighed 140 pounds back then.

Nowadays, though, I’m fat (my BMI is in the 29.9 range), and I need to lose weight. While finding time to ride certainly is an issue, I figure getting out a couple times a week at 5 to 10 miles a pop is better than what I had been doing, which was nothing.

Fun is a powerful motivator, and I’ve rediscovered how much fun I have riding my bike. And combining that fun with my inherent geekiness bodes well for my future health.