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One thing I of course love about working out is how much better I feel and look. I enjoy being able to get smaller clothes. Who am I kidding? I love being able to get smaller clothes! No matter how much I exercise, chasing my kids around the playground will always wipe me out. Seriously I would love to see the winning triathlete of an Iron Man chase after kids at the Boston Children’s Museum and then rate her level of exhausation on a scale of 1-10. In general, though, I have a lot more energy now meaning that I’m much more willing to engage in games that involve a million little pieces scattered on the floor or microscopic bits of playdough stuck the table and floor.

There has been one little drawback. My feet. Due to my running and swimming (and I’m sure the biking contributes) my feet just feel plain gross. The skin gets all thick and dry on the bottoms of my feet, and my toenails have a slightly yellow tinge from the chlorine. Fortunately, unlike when I swam in high school and college, I seem to have avoided plantar warts. That means foot warts, people! Anyhow, on top of all that, sometimes my feet are just sore. My primary care physician has me ice them and take Advil, which seems to take care of the soreness.

Because of all of this, when a friend invited a bunch of us out for pedicures, I happily accepted the invitation. I also happen to really enjoy getting pedicures. The pedicurist did an amazing job buffing and filing the bottoms of my feet and toenails. Then she applied some interesting green mask that reminded me of something out of a swamp followed by lots of lotion. The end result was that my feet were fabulously soft. In fact they were so soft that I fell down the stairs in our home later that day when I was walking barefoot. I just slid right off the top stair, much to my older son’s combined horror and delight; we had talked about calling 911 if a variety of emergencies occurred, and someone falling down the stairs had been one of my examples. Fortunately we talked him out of making the call.

Today I went with my moms group for another pedicure. Once again my feet have been magically transformed… for a couple of weeks anyway. I was extra careful this evening when on the stairs. Now if I can just remember that tomorrow morning when I come downstairs…

by Alex Elliot

Photo graciously provided by fauxto_digit, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved