It’s the day after American Thanksgiving, meaning it is now WINTER HOLIDAY SHOPPING SEASON, so BOOK SIX is now available in the online store! Go get it!
also the It’s Walky! book 1 kickstarter is still chuggin’ along
Discussion (157) ¬
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Joyce no
Seriously, it’s not even plugged in. She’s not a real #GYMGURL.
Treadmills and work out bikes are more fun!
I like stationary recumbent bikes, but treadmills are awful and the opposite of fun.
I like treadmills because I can do a slow walk with VR goggles on my face, and watch cartoons.
Eeeh, I have an easier time keeping a stable BPM with treadmills. It’s “I have to go at this exact speed and I fall if I don’t” vs “I have to pedal really fucking fast at some kind of speed but I control all the variables instead of having a machine do it for me”. With a bike, I end up trying to hit my target BPM then slow waaay down so I don’t die. Also, bikes, recumbent or not, hurt my ass :/
I like to put a treadmill on super low and just walk to music for a few hours or while I talk to my mom. With bikes, I just go slow.
I like putting treadmills on high speed, supporting my weight on the rails, and just pretending I’m running.
…..
…. someone explain to me why people fitness? I swear, these games are so easy to find exploits for, why isn’t everyone doing it?
Is it bad that while I imagined that I had to laugh out loud? 🙂
Because some people actually like doing the movement. I love sprinting on the treadmill, or running in varying speeds (which is easier to control on the treadmill than in nature, though I like running outside too, just not when it’s freezing – I easily get cold and my longs hurt from the cold air). It can be pretty fun if you have a certain goal + I specifically only listen to fun music or music I love while running and working out, including old Anime songs (they are veeery good for sprinting), or Disney, or songs from up-beat musicals, besides ‘normal’ ones.
And on a more serious note, it specifically helps me with depressive episodes (any kind of movement does, but for me it gets especially bad if I don’t at least get to power myself out once a week), my state of mind just goes downhill much much faster without it.
My body actively rejects cardiovascular exercise.
I am the epitome of 0 endurance but crazy sprint speed.
I ran distance every night for 6 months and it never at any point got any easier. I just got more and more hurt. Running a mile still felt like someone was shooting fire into my lungs like 4 months into it.
And I was running 3 miles a night towards the middle of it.
I stopped when the Plantar Fasciitis pain had migrated halfway up my back…that was my body’s long term plan of shutting the whole thing down.
I’m no expert, but it sounds as if you completely overworked your body. :/ You should never run every day, unless you’re the epitome of healthiness and training for a marathon (and even then, most people don’t run every day). Your body needs to regenerate, at the very least 24 hours, but usually 48h to 72h are best, depending on your overall state and whether your muscles need alonger break. And you might’ve not only started off with too many intervalls (I can’t even imagine running every night), but maybe also too fast.
Which is probably why you developed pain, you overworked yourself.
At least that’s what it sounds like. Again, I’m no expert, I just have personal experience as someone who started very slowly. Before building my endurance, I also was a fast sprinter, but I could only run like 12+ seconds before I couldn’t breathe anymore.
Now, I have lots of endurance, but I also built that up in the past 5 years. I started out with being able to run 3-4km at barely above walking speed, because I didn’t do ANY sports, besides occasionally swimming in summer. It took me two years to even run my first 8 km without any walking breaks in between.
Now I can run up to 12 km easily (around 7.45 miles), the longest I ran was during a charity event against cancer two years ago, which was 20 km (around 12.45 miles), with at least walking two kilometres in between, my legs burnt afterwards (well, in between too), but it was for a good cause. My capabilities decreased, also because I couldn’t run for half a year due to an injury, but I’m slowly building up again.
So if you ever try again, just start off real slow.
And again, I’m no one to diagnose, I don’t mean this to be negative in any way, and I hope it was alright to comment this.
What CoMa said, but also watch your speed and your technique. keep your feet light and don’t “lock”your knees. if you’re running sprinting speed for a mile run and you’re working on endurance, you’ll definitely burn out. your body is rejecting your methods, so try searching up a video on how to run and reset yourself. This exact thing happened to my friend. The second he got his technique down, running got fun for him and he dropped 100 lbs in a year. I’m still trying to catch up but please please if you think something is causing harm instead of helping in excercise, try to find out why before you get hurt. This is for everyone.
I just go outside.
The alt-text makes it sound like it was a honest mistake. Like Willis tried to draw something else entirely, and it turned out to be an exercise machine.
Maybe this is some mutated strain of Butts Disease.
Exercise Machine Disease doesn’t roll off the tongue as easily.
It’s less a disease and more a form of demonic possession. Which is a shame, because it makes it that much more convoluted to cure.
E.M.D. sounds like it could be a thing, though.
Joyce you precious little cinnamon bun, you’re just so adorable sometimes
Cinnamon Buns Of Steel
Joyce is now going to exercise every day.
And invent new days as excuses to see Jacob glisten.
Of course, she’ll need to make sure that Jacob knows about these new days, so that he’ll report to the exercise room with that glistening phalanx of muscles.
Well, at least it has the side effect that her health might improve. (Not that she was sick-ish, but working out muscles might help her state of mind with walking alone outside.)
Yes. A little bit of exercise is going to solve her otherwise totally untreated PTSD from being the victim of a roofie/attempted rape. Sensible.
/s
I can understand the sarcasm, though I didn’t intend my comment to suggest anything like you put it. I never said it would treat her PTSD. I specifically said “might help with her state of mind”. Exercise can relieve stress, can help focus and enhance calmness. I’ve personally experienced the positive effects that exercise can bring (though from the depressive side of things), and I just imagined that it has potential to simply help her a bit. Doesn’t mean she wouldn’t need other treatment – that she definitely does. I know that not everyone’s the same, so it might do nothing for her at all.
I never wanted my comment to come across like I’m thinking she’ll become superfine with just a bit of exercise, so sorry about that.
joyce….joyce stop…. just…..
Fitness Conquistadors. Sounds legit.
I would not be surprised if that was the name of a gym.
One of the Community Colleges I attended used to have Conquistadors as the sports mascot. It got changed to the Suns because the sports press and media complained that it was too tough to spell and pronounce.
Depending on the year of the change, maybe it’s for the best.
The late, unlamented San Diego Conquistadors toiled in the lower reaches of the ABA some 4 1/2 decades ago, and were commonly called the Qs by press and fans.
Pretty nifty, actually.
Ugh. Posting late at night after a day of overeating: I didn’t mean “Conquistadors” was a good name, even in the early 70s, in the American Southwest. Just that shortening it to Qs for headlines was neat.
I feel like a sports team should only be allowed to use the name conquistadors if they have a long string of victory primarily because they wore metal armor and most of their opponents were dying of disease.
Don’t forget that they’re the only side allowed to bring firearms to the fight.
…..
…. and, you know, massive acts of genocide in the name of Christ.
….
…. GEEZ, that name is worse than “Redskins”.
In a vacuum is one thing. But considering the retrograde defense of the Washingtons’ nickname started, I believe, in time for Jack Kent Cooke (d. 1997) to get all snippish and butthurt about it, I still give the nod to the football team in that contest.
The Qs’ name is little cared about except by obscure and minor league sport geeks like me, and I don’t know if there’s a lot of teams which need to be renamed from it now.
And now I want there to be a sports team whose collective name is the Spanish Inquisition. “Our three weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency!”
“… wait, we’ll come onto the field again.”
Because nobody expects them . . . to win?
BTW, Joyce’s form & technique on that machine are perfect. Truly, she’s Master Fitness Conquistador rated. (probably has the certificate mounted on her wall)
Joyce, that machine isn’t even turned on.
Jacob is NOT a machine.
Nope, but Joyce is.
Turned on, I mean.
So that’s how Sarah gets her truck-solid build, Joyce?
+1
I feel this set of strips is shaming me for not going to the gym even though I’m paid through the year
I’m pretty much countering that with going, “Well, at least it means I THOUGHT about the gym today…”
I had the perfect excuse today: gym was closed.
Be sure to give thanks for that.
The power of Carla compelled you. (plus, it’s a holiday)
argh. wish I could delete comments. (either that, or when DW deletes comments, the whole chain beneath it should go as well)
Very smothered Joyce, like fucking sandpaper.
*Smooth
*”Let’s Get Physical” continues on the hacked Muzak*
Not Conquistador by Procol Harum?
Too obvious.
Cortez the Killer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gfjoAyqfLs
this may be a gym, but it isn’t a jungle gym, joyce :V
I feel that weight training is too neglected as a work out choice for women. My female friends tell me they are afraid of becoming too muscular. Considering I am not ripped like Jesus, I wonder why they would think they could accidently end up shredded after doing curls regularly.
I agree. I lift weights all the time. Deciding to start a weightlifting routine was one of the best choices I ever made.
to be fair, I started having clothing issues after a few years; I think part was from gaining muscle, part from gaining fat, and part from the fucking clothes available being made for fucking popsicle sticks lately 😛 … oh, and part might be from a birth defect – I’ve had big calves even when I didn’t exercise at all. but my shoulders just… have some muscle on them now, and womens’ shirts aren’t made to accomodate *any* of that.
I’m a fan of tank tops, personally. And I admit I never wore much “women’s clothing” to begin with. I love the muscle I’ve added to my shoulders, it looks hot.
Or when you’ve got broad hips and absolutely no jeans fit. It’s always been difficult but since I work out (but still have most of my fat on my legs and hips – damn you genes!), or because materials have become thinner, it’s even more difficult to find the ones that fit, aren’t too high or too low on the waist, and look acceptable.
As for women’s shirts I’ve got lucky, I’ve really small shoulders, so I fit into sizes of XS to S, now it’s just S to M, sometimes L. I advise just trying on larger sizes, they sometimes fit much better.
Plus, I like those type of clothes that are designed to be baggy, especially in winter (air cushions beneath them, keeping me warm) 🙂
There are probably as many women as men who seriously weight train at the gym I go to. I think the taboo is fading, and it is becoming more popular now. Perhaps in part because women realize more often that lifting doesn’t add muscle *that* fast, but probably mostly because they no longer care and just want to do a thing for themselves. Which is how it ought to be.
Most of my female friends just don’t like it, or don’t have time for the gym, or have sicknesses that prevent them from lifting etc. I for one have been training with weights for the past 5 years (with shorter and longer breaks in between) and it took me so long just to get the hint of muscles, especially on my legs, because that’s were my fat reserves are. But I also started out with way too much body fat to be healthy for me, and my body loves to decrease every inch of muscle mass I worked for as soon as I take a break (e.g. being sick). My friends tend to think I should look much more buff than I do, because of how long I’ve been working out.
But that’s because my genes are like that. Another friend diets and doesn’t even lose her muscle mass. So trying out some weights is definitely not bad for you, but it also depends on your body type and genetics on whether you build fast or not. Women tend to not build up fast, so nobody should be worryied about suddenly looking like a bodybuilder.
Unless they have a serious testosterone imbalance, it is impossible to women to get too jacked from weightlifting. Those huge women bodybuilders are usually taking androgen supplements.
I’m non-binary but AFAB. I personally really like using weight machines at the gym, much moreso than the cardio I make myself do. One problem that I (and probably loads of other AFAB people) have encountered when working out in the weights section of the gym is intimidation or just general uncomfortableness from cis men working out there as well. Sometimes it may even be well-meaning, but like…thanks for correcting my form, but did you really need to touch me to do that? And actually, since I wasn’t likely to hurt myself anyway, was that really super necessary at all?
And then there are the ones who will more openly harass you.
Don’t get me wrong, most guys that I’ve come across are just there to workout and mind their own business. But there’s enough of them with the creep factor that I can see it as a deterrent to AFAB people getting into it.
SHE is.
*sigh* WTB option to delete reply when you screw up replying to a specific comment
I’ll chip in!
Gotcha covered.
The sad thing is that I know Joyce must be doing something wrong in the last panel, but I have no idea what.
Was thinking the same! I do trail running, hiking and yoga for fitness. I don’t ever touch exercise machines, and I don’t know how they work. XD;
I exercise on machines like those three times a week, but I’m pretty naive, *but* I’m sure she should be facing the other direction, with her back on that pad and such.
It can be used a few different ways though I think that with what she’s doing, she’s more likely to have her grip slip and she fall off.
The bars she’s holding are for dips, and she’s facing the right way if she wants to do those. Of course, she’ll need to take her feet off the platforms first…
Yeah, I have no idea what that exercise machine is, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Joyce isn’t using it right.
It’s for doing crunches. You rest your arms on the bars, grip the handles, and pull your legs up.
The other answers are true, but also her saying to add weights is part of the joke, because for that exercise, your body is the weight.
I’m pretty sure she’s on the wrong side of the mechanism but I couldn’t give you too many details.
Okay, see that vertical pad there? You put your BACK against it, Joyce. You put your forearms on those horizontal pads and grip the vertical handles with the pads. Think of it like a chair with a back and armrests but no seat. Then you put all your weight on your forearms and just letting your feet dangle. Then you either slowly pull your knees up to your chin, or you swing your feet up and out in front of you to waist height while keeping your legs straight. Then return to the starting dangling position SLOWLY. (Well it doesn’t have to be turtle-slow but don’t just let your legs drop, you have to ease them down slower than gravity would drop them.) That’s one rep. Do 6-15 reps and that’s a set. Take a break, towel off sweat, get some water, maybe rotate through machines every set. Do 2-4 sets and you’re done with that machine for at least two days.
*grip the vertical handles with your hands.
…or else it gets the hose again.
…. huh, okay, staring at that machine a bit more I can see two other modes.
Second mode, face the machine like you are Joyce, holding those handles you’re currently holding. Support your weight on those handles, letting your feet dangle straight down, and NOT braced against the frame the way you are now. Slowly lower your body by bending your elbows, and then lift your body by straightening your arms again.
Third mode: There appears to be a chin-up bar in the back.
I see so many people trying to do this exercise fast. You get much better results doing it slowly, the way you describe. Also, pause at the top and bottom. That eliminates the benefits of inertia and rhythm.
Hopefully Jacob and/or Joe stop her before she hurts herself using those machines improperly.
…. Jacob might. Joe’s getting cell phone footage for blackmail.
Thanks to your grav, my mind went totally to Sarah and Other Jacob. “Don’t use it improperly or you’ll hurt yourself”.
(I’ll show myself out.)
Yeeeep once she saw those arms she tossed logic right out the window. She is the best fitnesser. :p
Also “I am very expert at fitnessing” is a perfect title for this book.
Suddenly Joyce is going to be really into fitness. Maybe she’ll also try to talk Sarah into joining her.
Dose swinging a bat at a punching bag count?
Joyce came quite close to the old cliché
“Horses sweat. Men perspire. Women glow.”
(But honestly, I sweat big-time.)
I waterfall.
Really convincing there Joyce, I’m sure they absolutely believe you.
Yes, she is the bestest fitnesser <.<
Jacob’s bicep sticks up more in panel 3, while he is using the related muscle to pull.
This is how muscles work– by pulling inwards– and I wonder how often artists actually bother to do that rather than simply “this limb will magically pivot at the joint like a remarkably lifelike robot.”
Drawing machines is excellent exercise. Brings out the good sweat.
Would Yotomoe please pop back and do a sketch of Sarah and Joyce as Fitness Conquistadors if there’s enough public demand?
Take a bite, Joyce. It can’t hurt.
I think those machines might be a bit hard on her teeth, though.
They probably also taste terrible. All that dried sweat on the handle bars.
Goodness me, I think Joyce may have entertained a naughty thought.
Heavens no she was merely avoiding awkward eye contact with that bicep, it’s quite rude you know
Hope you had your smelling salts at the ready. Who knows how long we’re gonna watch her watch Jacob work out?
now I’m thinking at how bad it gotta smell in a *basement* sweat room and I can’t unthink it.
…. TECHNICALLY that isn’t an exercise machine, Willis. Because, you know, not a machine. Just a frame. Also you don’t add weights to it, Joyce.
Technically, even levers and slopes are (simple) machines, so…!
And there are neither levers nor inclined planes intended to be used as such in that fixture, so nyeh.
Do you even lift, Bro? You can CLEARLY see that there’s a place for weights on the vertical poles attached to the arm rests! 😀
Fitness coonquistadors! Flex those Vasco de Guns.
It occurs to me that Joyce unknowingly chose a fantastically politically incorrect random metaphor to use. It’s probably her luck at work again!
True that. Joyce can’t help being an accidental racist.
As can I – good lord, I just saw the misspelling in my initial comment and it’s embarrassing.
What exactly is it about Conquistador that is politically incorrect. Is it that it was an oppressive genocidal force? Or is it that they’ve been praised as heroes, liberating heathens from barbarism and spreading the word of God up until fairly recently? Because both could apply to most (or maybe even all) military organizations throughout history.
Or am I completely wrong and it’s something completely different? I only ask out curiosity for what makes Conquistadors politically incorrect.
Its because they were a jobber tag team wrestlers in the WWF/WWE back in the 1980s.
Curious Spaniard here: do Americans pronounce the ‘U’ in ‘conquistadores’?
Not in my experience. “kon-KI-sta-door”, usually. Not like “kween”.
Joe really needs to six poor Joyce down and explain to her the saying about “When in a hole, stop digging!” Seriously, though, I think that watching Jacob’s anatomy at work may have Joyce a little off her A-Game when it comes to bluster!
Oh… It’s suddenly occurred to me that this is the scene where Jacob shows Joyce how to use all the exercise machinery and, as a result of that, the two are in somewhat… intimate quarters for a while.
Ok i swear I’m not actually meaning this for the fulfillment of my own perverted fantasies… legitimate observation here.
Joyce really really needs to discover masturbation in a healthy manner soon. I’m sure that was covered under her “Sex is evil” brainwashing but those hormones are going to ruin her if she doesn’t find a way to placate them.
A lot of churches preach against male masturbation, but I don’t know if they ever tell girls not to do it. Might be covered by the whole “sexual stimulus is evil” spiel. But I’ve never seen the bible say don’t flick the bean
The lines of silly doctrines are a bit blurry in the non-denominational evangelical circuit, but I think masturbation falls under “worldly pleasures, will lead you away from God and to Satan, avoid.”
they don’t specifically say it, but a lot of people will assume it’s more evil for women (not 100% certain why, they’re not spilling their seed on the ground and in that case, periods are evil maybe lol)
my fav anti-female-masturbation would be this
nuts, it didn’t do it quite right, does this work?
Yeah, it works . . . but good grief, that is so warped!
“Ringing the devil’s doorbell.”
“Self-raped her sin cave.”
I swear if I wrote a character that said these things I’d be accused of hyperbolic strawmanning.
And yet they managed to fuck it all up with “REMEBER to ask the hard questions.”
I don’t know. I think I’ve heard “ringing the devil’s doorbell” before, but “self-raped her sin cave” wraps so far past horrifying it almost makes it back to awesome.
The sin cave one is right up there with “soiled doves” for just godawful agency-denying misogyny.
I do like “ringing the devil’s doorbell”, which neither I nor my wife had known.
(But those are just me; I’m not telling you how to feel about these terms. )
you gotta admit the term “sin cave” is hilarious tho lol (it’s like my favorite part of the whole thing, like, come right in, boys and girls, my sin cave can accommodate you if you and I both want it to)
but yeah, my boyfriend likes “devil’s doorbell” too, and we debate, from time to time, if a dick is also a devil’s doorbell
Of course it is bad, if females masturbate, they will discover they enjoy sex, and become wanton harlots. Then there will be hordes of loose women leaping out of bushes, assaulting all our upstanding, virtuous boys and leading them into a life of sin and debauchery.
Tell me about it. It was an early twenties experience for me (but through no fault of evil sex proselytization). Poor Joyce must be feeling so uncomfortable.
I think I posted about this before. Something along the line of: when Joyce finally discovers masturbation, probably accidently, she is going to explode.
Barely sweating is more like it.
Barely sweating, or sweating bears?
Joyce’s face in Panel 2 looks like she’s got some imouto-genre scenarios going through her mind.
I love the new Danny character model!! It is amazing!! I’ve been grinning and laughing at it so much because it is so amazing! Danny looks so dang cute and queer!
testing email for Jocelyne avatar again
how about this
although I know it wouldn’t work out, I lowkey ship Joyce and Joe. It’s always like “YOU COULD BE SO HAPPY TOGETHER IF YOU WERE JUST A LITTLE DIFFERENT” but then it’s like nuts, y’all wouldn’t BE Joyce n Joe if you didn’t slowly grow that way yourselves sigh
I’m with you.
And they could grow that way themselves… together…!
My ship… it WILL set sail! I juuuust need a few more crew members… yess….
Help someone who gets all his exercise at work out. How is that last machine meant to work properly?
Sit with your back against the pad with your arms grasping the bars at the end of the arm rests and move them in and out.. They’re supposed to exercise the pectoral muscles, I think.
I didn’t think that machine actually had weights (hence part of the joke.)
Isn’t the machine one where you stand with your back against the padding, grip the handles, and use it to do leg lifts of some type? (I.e. bring your knees as close to your chest while supporting your weight by your arms.) I think that’s how it goes. (I go to the gym, but that’s not a unit I actually pay attention to.)
That second panel. The look on her face is precious.
“Mmm… tasty salty goodness… No! Bad Joyce! He’s Sarah’s not yours!” Something like that, anyway!
I’m into fitness too. Fit’n dis Joyce onto this equipment and making it look like that’s totally how you use it. I’m doing it right, right?
I didn’t know that I wanted a montage of Joyce, Jacob and Joe working out together but now I need it BADLY.
I would like to request a work-out tank top that says “fitness conquistador” on it, please.
Awww! I don’t know why, but Joyce is looking even more adorable here than ever!
There’s a few comments here that were apparently replies to a deleted one. Wonder what it said, and why it was removed. …Eh, probably better off not knowing.
There are some comments that don’t make sense unless you have followed the link in the preceding comment. Links are not obvious – different coloured text.
Oh, Joyce. You’re not a fitness conquistador unless you’ve heartlessly murdered hundreds of fitness natives.
Why do I get the feeling Joyce’s private bits just exploded in the second panel?
Ooh, fitness. It is the place I am from. All the time.
Joe just looks concerned
Somebody show her how to use that thing before she hurts herself.
Add all the weights! :p
On the one hand, Joyce no.
On the other hand, bonding with friends by learning how exercise equipment works? Sounds fun, in the way that doing anything with your friends is fun, but also in that, like. Joe being a real human being and him and Jacob and Joyce hanging out and bantering sounds like a potentially cute scene. I want to see more Joe + Joyce hanging out and talking because they’re so clearly good for one another, and we haven’t seen them be actual friends too much in person because of Joe’s BS masculinity walls, so I’m looking forward to seeing that now that he’s improving.
On a third, unrelated hand, panel two and four Joyce with the messy hair is really cute.