In Grand Central Terminal you have a choice of taking an escalator or a staircase. By my unscientific observation, I’d say roughly 98% of folks take the escalator. You have four categories of commuters: 1) people who walk the stairs, 2) people who take the escalator, 3) people who walk up the escalator and 4) people who get pissed off at people who just stand there on the left side of the escalator traffic, blocking the way for the Category 3 folks. How lazy have we become? When I was last in advertising the office had an internal staircase connecting the many floors. I worked with a much younger guy who took the elevator to go DOWN one flight. Now there is the Segway, the revolutionary people mover. If you buy one, you never have to walk down the street again. Just hop on and ride. In New York where I live, you see bicycle messengers flying up the bike lane without even pedaling. Electric bikes. And don’t get me started on airport moving walkways. I prefer to avoid them unless I’m carrying an unwieldy load. I get a kick out of walking faster than the people standing on the moving walkway. But no matter how fast you walk, you can’t go faster than those annoying carts which take disabled people, extremely old people and extremely lazy people to their gate. They beep incessantly so that the walkers have to get out of their way .Al, faced with the dilemma of possibly missing his flight, succumbs to the cart.

Our other comic dealt with Marv’s little addition to his workout. Marv is always looking for a way to make the rules work for him. Remember his small pretzel bowl as a way to exercise portion control? He fit them in the small bowl, but stacked the pretzels sky high. Then there was the diet that gave you a “cheat day” where for one day a week you could eat anything you want. Marv cheated on his cheat day by having two cheat days per week. Hence his addition to his chair exercises by balancing a bowl of ice cream on your stomach while simultaneously doing leg lifts. Neither John nor I would ever do such a thing. Ever. You can look at Marv and say his actions are self-defeating. We prefer to see it as a Master Class in multi-tasking.

Have a great weekend.

Andy and John