The Conner Workout
A/N: This story is set in the infamous last season where the Conners won the lottery; while I'm aware a lot of people didn't care for the lottery storyline, I hope you all enjoy this story. All standard disclaimers are in place, don't own, don't sue.
"Dan," Roseanne said as she padded into the bedroom in a pair of stretch pants and a T-shirt.
"What?" Dan tiredly groaned from where he lay on the bed, already dressed for the night in his sweat pants and Chicago Cubs shirt.
"We're fat," Roseanne said as she flopped down beside him.
"What're you talking about?" Dan asked as he sat up. "We look great."
"I'm serious, Dan, we are fat," she replied.
"No we're not, you're jolly and I'm husky," Dan said as he crinkled his eyes and smiled a great big cheeky grin.
Roseanne turned and looked at him and said point blank, "You're fat." She leaned back against her pillows and said, "You're fat, I'm fat, we are both fat."
"We've always been fat, what's the problem?" Dan asked.
"Remember your heart attack last year?" Roseanne asked.
"I was unconscious, I don't remember any such thing," Dan sarcastically replied.
"Well I remember," she said, "and I remember in the hospital thinking how I was to blame for it."
"What?" Dan asked. "What you do mean, Rosie?"
"I mean for 20 years all I did was cook fatty, greasy meat, and sat on the couch with you drinking beers watching TV…"
"Ooh, who's in the mood for a midnight snack?" Dan pushed back the covers and put his feet on the floor.
"I'm serious, Dan," Roseanne said, "I feel like it was my fault. And we raised our kids the exact same way."
"We never gave the kids beer," Dan responded, "and they all turned out skinny."
"So why can't we?" Roseanne asked.
"Can you actually picture us skinny?" Dan asked.
They looked at each other for a few awkward seconds before both turning away, shaking their heads and making disgusted noises.
"Okay, so maybe not skinny, but it wouldn't hurt us to get in shape," Roseanne said.
"We get plenty of exercise," Dan told her, "and usually around this time each night too!"
Roseanne looked at him and said, "I'm serious, Dan, we could be doing much better than we are."
"That's our life story, Rosie."
"I know but, you know now that we've got all this money, there's no reason why we can't," Roseanne said, "I mean before we couldn't get in shape because we had jobs and the kids and didn't have any time or money or…interest…but we can do whatever we want now."
"So why do we want this?" Dan asked.
"Because whether you want to admit it or not, Mr. Fantasy Football, we're getting older," Roseanne said.
"We've always been getting older."
"Yeah but now we're going from older to old," Roseanne said, "and if you think about it, we both probably got about 10 more years we could go on like this before our health is totally screwed up."
"10 years is a long time away, can't we worry about it then?" Dan asked.
"No, Dan, I'm serious, I want to get in shape now, I want to be a fun grandma and be able to do stuff with Harris, how can I do that if by the time she's 2 she can already run faster than her grandmother?"
"Hmm, so what do you think we should do?" Dan asked.
"Well…I don't know yet," Roseanne said. "But I think this should be a family effort, you know, the whole family."
"Including your Mom?" Dan asked.
"Okay, just the kids and, you know, their husbands…and Jackie," Roseanne said. "Maybe if she gets her butt whipped into shape she can finally get the right man, and she wouldn't have to hang around here all the time."
Dan threw the covers back again and said, "Well hot damn, let's start now!" and power walked out of the bedroom.
Roseanne tilted her head back and laughed.
"Roseanne, are you sure this is a good idea?" Jackie asked.
It was a brisk spring morning in Lanford and the temperature was in the low 50s and everybody was dressed in jackets and sweaters and gloves.
"Yeah, I saw that movie 'Heavyweights', I know what I'm doing," Roseanne told her sister. Then she yelled for everybody's benefit, "Okay, everybody ready?"
Everybody grumbled and moaned in response.
"Shut up," Roseanne said. "Okay, on your mark…get set…go!"
Everybody took in a deep breath and was off and walking down the sidewalk. Darlene pushed Harris in her stroller, Jackie walked with Andy sitting on her shoulders and D.J. carried Jerry. Becky and David got in the lead when David looked around and asked, "Where's Mark?"
Everybody turned around and saw him running up to the opposite end of the block.
"Eh leave him," Dan said, "by the time we turn the corner we might bump into him."
The kids quickly got on ahead and soon Jackie was also leaving her sister and brother-in-law in the dust, and after a few more minutes, Dan mentioned, "You know something, Rosie, I do believe that our loved ones have eluded us."
"Good, that's the way I like it," she replied.
Dan put his arm around Roseanne and asked, "Remember when we used to do this early in the morning?"
"Yeah," Roseanne replied as she put her arm around him, "It was nice, just the two of us like this…why'd we stop?"
"I don't know," Dan answered.
"How're you feeling?" Roseanne asked.
Dan exhaled painfully and said, "My calves are burning. How about you?"
"My feet are already killing me," she confessed.
"Can we go back to the house now?" Dan asked.
"No!" Roseanne sniped. "We just have to…work through the pain."
"Read that someplace?"
They walked for a couple more minutes before Roseanne was making a series of pained whimpers and they sat down at a bench at the corner.
"Maybe this was a bad idea," Dan said. "We're set in our ways."
"Yeah well we just got to change our ways, that's all," Roseanne said.
"Roseanne, you've said that 20 times in as many years," Dan reminded her. "Face it, we're fat, we'll always be fat."
"No!" Roseanne refused to admit defeat. "Yeah we were always fat but we didn't used to be this fat…why can't we at least get back to that point?"
"Because you had four kids and I haven't played football in 25 years," he answered.
Roseanne rubbed her ankle and said, "Yeah but, remember when you did play football, Dan?"
"Of course."
"Remember how great it felt?"
Dan's face lit up in remembrance. "Yeaaaah."
"Remember the Friday night games and the crowd cheering you on as you ran for the…end of the field thingie?"
Dan beamed even brighter. "Yeah."
"And remember all the training you had to do for each game?" Roseanne asked.
The wind went out of Dan's sail and his face dropped. "Yeah."
"And you did it, with no problem."
"Yeah," Dan grunted.
Roseanne looked at him and said, "Now you didn't used to act like that when you did it, don't you remember? You came on the field running and jumping and pounding your chest and screaming about chewing up the other team and spitting them out. What happened?"
"Burgers tasted better than the other team," Dan said.
"I know, Dan, but, your football glory days are over, now we've just got to get back out there and start a new chapter," Roseanne said. "Come on, get up, we're going again."
"Aw, do I have to?" Dan asked. "We're never going to catch up with the others now."
"Well we just have a lot of work to do," Roseanne said.
"Did you just use a four letter word with me?" Dan asked.
"Hey it wasn't a bad word when it meant we didn't lose the house," Roseanne said, "so it shouldn't be a bad word when we get to keep our health either. Now come on."
"Aw man," Dan whined as they took off again. "Roseanne, I don't think we're gonna get lean and mean going walking every morning."
"No but it's a start," she said, "we'll just have to think of something else to try."
"Okay, so the power walk yesterday didn't go as well as expected," Roseanne told the family who was seated all over the living room, "so uh, we're gonna try something different."
"Like what?" Darlene asked.
"We went to the video store and we rented every at-home workout video," Roseanne pointed to a big pile of tapes on top of the TV, "Now we can get fit without ever leaving the house. And look at everything we got to pick from, we got Jane Fonda, we got Richard Simmons, we got…Tae Kwan Bo."
"Oh this is gonna be great," Darlene murmured to David.
"Okay everybody, get up and let's get started," Roseanne said, "David and Mark, move the coffee table, get some water, and let's do it."
Within three minutes of Billy Blanks, Roseanne and Dan were both ready to call it quits and loudly collapsed on the couch huffing and puffing.
"Okay, let's try another one," Roseanne said as she forced herself up and went over to the VCR. "Let's try Jane Fonda, she's nice."
Two minutes into that tape, Dan and Roseanne were staring at the screen completely dumbstruck.
"How do women move like that?" Dan asked.
Roseanne scoffed and replied, "I don't know, I couldn't even move like that in an anti-gravity belt. Next!"
"What now?" Jackie asked.
"Errr," Roseanne went back to the TV and picked up another tape. "Let's give Richard a try, if them big fat women can lose hundreds of pounds doing his videos, we should be able to manage it."
"All to the music of our youth, an added bonus," Dan said.
"I don't want to do this," DJ complained, "I feel like an idiot."
"You've looked like one for years, what's the problem?" Darlene asked.
"Alright, alright, everybody be quiet, let's go," Roseanne said.
The tape started and everybody started copying what the people on TV were doing.
"This is pretty easy," Roseanne said after a while, "we've been going for five golden oldies now."
"Yeah, but I gotta quit," Dan groaned.
"How come?" Roseanne asked.
"I feel strange looking at Richard," Dan said as he left the room.
Jackie put her hands on her hips and caught her breath and said to Roseanne, "I don't think this is gonna work either."
Roseanne scrunched up her face and rubbed her eyes and said, "I'll just have to think of something else then."
"Okay, we're going to give the great outdoors another try," Roseanne said, "everybody on your bikes?"
"Yes," everybody answered from their various positions on their rented bikes at the start of the park's bike bath.
"Okay, get ready, get set, go!" Roseanne hollered.
Everybody started pedaling. Jackie pushed into the lead with Andy trailing alongside her on his tricycle. Behind them, Darlene and David were neck and neck with each other, but David was also hauling Harris in a baby trailer hooked to the back of his bike. Becky had Jerry attached to a child seat on the back of her bike. DJ tried to ride to the front of the line on a mountain bike. Mark promptly rode off the bike path and rode right into a tree and fell off as his bike toppled over.
"Hey Rosie, how're you doing back there?" Dan asked over his shoulder.
"Oh man this is great," Roseanne said, "I can feel the wind in my hair, I really feel alive."
"Are you pedaling?" Dan asked.
"Yes!" she replied defensively.
"I don't believe you, you get in front of me so I can see it," Dan said.
The two of them put on the brakes and were very careful in climbing off the tandem bike they'd gotten. Roseanne grumbled as she moved to the front, Dan swung one leg over the frame and hopped on the back.
"Okay, ready?" Roseanne asked.
"Ready."
"Contact!" Roseanne pedaled and steered to curve with the path.
Roseanne pedaled harder but the bike started going slower. "Dan, are you pedaling back there?"
"Yes, dear," Dan replied as he very lightly pedaled while she did all the grunt work.
After a couple more minutes, Roseanne started huffing and told Dan, "Let's switch again. This front bike's defective."
Dan grumbled as they stopped again, and switched positions again.
"Ready?" Dan asked.
"Ready," Roseanne said as she found her balance.
"Let's go."
Once they started rolling, Roseanne gripped the handlebars and for one brief second, kicked her feet out to the sides and stuck her tongue out at the back of Dan's head.
Dan made a bunch of pained whispering noises as he put a pillow down on the couch and sat on it.
Roseanne came out of the kitchen with two cans of beer and held one out to him. "Here's some alcohol to kill the pain."
"Where's the rest of it?" Dan asked.
Roseanne glared at him knowingly. Dan looked away and drank his beer.
"You know, Dan, you might want to invest in a pair of bike shorts," she said.
"No I don't, I ain't doing that again, you can't make me," he replied.
"You know, Dan, we actually did pretty good out there today," she said as she kicked her feet up on the coffee table.
"Yeah well we ain't getting our money back on those bikes," Dan said.
"Man, who knew that a bicycle built for two could collapse under the weight of two jolly, husky people?" she asked sarcastically.
"Never mind the one Mark crashed into the tree, the mailbox and the trash can," Dan added.
Roseanne scrunched up her face and laughed in memory of those events.
"Remind me again why we wanted to do this," Dan said.
"Because we want to be the fun grandparents that can keep up with their grandkids and do fun stuff with them," Roseanne said.
"Can't we just race around on our scooter chairs?" Dan asked.
"No, Dan, I want us to grow old and gray together," Roseanne said.
"We can do that in a rest home where we have nurses and orderlies to do everything for us," Dan replied.
"No, I don't want that," Roseanne said, "I want to be like Nana Mary."
"Where is she these days anyway?" Dan asked.
"I don't have any idea," Roseanne replied. "She made a killing at poker and bought a Winnebago. Last I heard, she sent a postcard from Vegas."
Dan thought about it and said, "Okay, sure, I wanna be like Nana Mary too. But what do we do now?"
"Uh…maybe we're trying this wrong," Roseanne said, "maybe we need to try something more organized."
"$400 for gym memberships, man!" Roseanne said as they walked into the gym, "How do people who don't win the lottery afford to lose weight? And did you see how much the outfits cost they wanted us to get?"
"Yep," Dan said, "people love to underestimate the power of a good pair of sweats."
"With all your money you better spring for a better pair, Dad," Darlene said, "one mistimed body bend and the elastic's going to slingshot out of those."
"So what exactly are we doing?" DJ asked.
"You can do anything," Roseanne said as she gestured around the room, "you can lift weights or run on the treadmill or ride the bike or…whatever the hell that thing is…"
"It's an elliptical machine, Roseanne," Jackie said.
"Whatever…uh, the girls and I are going to try an aerobics class," Roseanne said.
"Fine," Dan said, "you go do your aerobics and get all soft, and the guys and me will," Dan flexed his biceps and said in a voice mocking Arnold Schwarzenegger, "pump some iron!"
"Uh…can I join the aerobics class too?" David asked as he went over to the women's side.
"Sure, you can borrow my spare sports bra," Darlene replied cynically.
DJ sat down at a weight machine and grabbed the two bars out to his sides and tried to squeeze them together. He strained and struggled and groaned and scrunched his eyes shut but he couldn't get anywhere.
"Dad, I think this one's broken," he said.
"No, DJ, you just have to adjust it," Dan said. "Hop up and the old man will show you how to do a proper butterfly press."
"What's that?" DJ asked.
"What this thing does," Dan said as he sat on the bench. "Observe." He reached his arms up, pressed his forearms against the thick pads on the bars, and put enough pressure on them to bring them towards his chest and all but slammed them together. Then he did it again, and again, and counted, "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9…" Then he lost his grip on the bars and they slammed back into place. "Oh man," Dan grabbed at his chest.
"You alright, Dan?" Mark asked.
"Oh man, I pulled something," he said.
"You sure it's not another heart attack?" DJ asked.
"No, I'm fine," Dan said as he huffed and puffed. "It's just muscles not used to working, that's all." Dan drank half of his water bottle and leaned over and sighed, "Oh man, I really did get out of shape." He looked at DJ and told him, "Look, don't tell your mom about this."
"Don't tell me about what?" Roseanne asked as she came up to them.
"Oh hi, honey," Dan shot to his feet, "what happened with the aerobics class?"
"Uh, well, turns out my knees don't lunge as deep as they're supposed to," Roseanne explained, "And that skinny snooty instructor gave me a dirty look for staring at everybody else during the butt lifts."
"Mom, Dad's having chest pains!" DJ told her.
"What?" Roseanne went over to Dan. "Are you alright?"
"I'm fine!" he insisted, "Everybody just stop asking me about it and leave me alone!" With that, he turned and stormed off to the locker room.
Roseanne was left standing there in a stupor for a few seconds, then she yelled after him, "HEY!" and took off after him.
Mark grabbed her by the arm and stopped her. "Whoa, Mrs. Conner, that's the men's locker room, you can't go in there."
"Ha! Just watch me!" she replied as she marched over to the door and went in. A second later she doubled out screaming, "GAH!" After gagging a couple times she said, "DJ, go get the air freshener out of the car."
"Right."
"And then make sure you hang it on the biggest, sweatiest guy in here," Roseanne said as she disappeared back in the locker room. From the other side of the door her voice could be heard resonating very loudly, "OKAY ALL YOU STUPID MACHO JERKS! GET OUT OF HERE WHILE'S I TALK TO MY HUSBAND!"
Immediately following her announcement, 20 men of various ages and builds ran tearing out of the locker room in sheer terror.
Roseanne walked over towards Dan who was slouched on the bench moping.
"Hey there uh...Rudy, you ready for the big game tonight?" she asked.
"You don't have to say it, Roseanne," Dan said, "we let ourselves go...I let myself go."
Roseanne sat down beside him on the bench and said, "Well yeah...but tell you the truth, Dan, I think we're in pretty good shape for the shape we're in. Think about it, we've been through 25 years of marriage, 4 kids, 1 grandchild, hard times, recessions, depressions, unemployment times 10, crappy jobs, no jobs, overdue bills, taxes, 2 mortgages, overdrawn bank accounts, triple coupon days to get groceries, failed business, teen marriage, teen pregnancy, all our crazy parents who are responsible for making us the sort of people we are."
Dan batted his eyelashes and grinned a huge exaggerated grin.
"Crystal marrying your dad, Jackie getting beaten up, you going to jail, two Healy men becoming part of our family."
Dan spouted some bad imitation Japanese as he mimicked committing harakiri. Roseanne smiled at him and said, "You know, if it wasn't for fatty foods and beer and ice cream and the TV lineup, we would've had nothing to hold us to our sanity."
"Sanity? What's that?" Dan asked in a mad scientist voice.
"We've been through a lot, Dan, and we could've turned out way worse than we are," she said. "But I think all things considered, we're actually pretty good...you know, just like that Johnny Cash song about the flag."
Dan started humming a patriotic song and saluted.
"You know, we did what we had to do," Roseanne said, "as the parents we made sure everybody else was taken care of first...now it's time to do the same thing for ourselves."
"I don't think we can do it, Roseanne," Dan confessed. "I never thought I'd be so far gone I couldn't do a set of weights."
"Oh, we'll get there," Roseanne said, "it's just going to take time, you know what they say, uh, Rome didn't fall down in a day, or something like that."
Dan tried and failed to stifle a small laugh.
"We just gotta start nice and slow and work our way up," Roseanne said, and took his hand and had him stand with her, "Now come on you big sexy manly stud, you come on out here and show me how to use one of these eclipse-ical machines."
"Okay, so the gym thing was a waste of time and the money," Roseanne said when they went home. "But your dad and me have been thinking and we decided what we're gonna do now is go all out real fancy schmancy and expensive. And we're gonna give swimming a try."
"We're getting a pool?" DJ asked.
"Nope," Roseanne answered, "We're all gonna go down to the Y and use theirs."
"The Conners are sure coming up in the world," Jackie said.
"Okay, so we need to sign a membership and uh, we gotta get swimming suits, and towels, and them shoes you wear to the pool so you don't get athlete's foot, what else?"
"How about a beach ball?" Darlene asked sarcastically.
"What about that pet shark we always promised the kids, honey?" Dan asked.
"Come on everybody, this will be great," Roseanne said. "Swimming is like, the perfect exercise, there's no way this can get screwed up."
"That's the last time I ever go to that Y," Roseanne said as everybody padded into the house in their swimsuits, towels and sandals. Jackie wore a mid length robe over her suit, her hair tied up in a towel, and carried Andy on her hip in his Little Swimmers. Becky had a T-shirt over her bikini as she carried Jerry in. Mark, David and DJ were all wearing swim trunks, Darlene wore a black T-shirt that went down her thighs as she carried Harris who was still wearing her arm floaties, Dan had on a pair of swim trunks and a white T-shirt that was pasted to his skin, and Roseanne had one towel wrapped around her midriff and another draped over her shoulders.
"I've never been so embarrassed in all my life," Becky said with disgust.
"So I lost my trunks doing a cannon ball into the pool, I apologized," Dan said.
"Not that," Becky said, and turned to Mark, "why did you have to get into a fight with that guy?"
"Hey, he was checking you out," Mark replied.
"There were women there checking you out and I didn't beat them up," Becky said.
"Too bad, it'd be like a live episode of Jerry Springer," DJ commented.
"The nerve of that swim instructor," Roseanne said as she tightened her top towel, "ain't none of them people ever seen a beautiful woman in a two-piece?" She turned to Dan and asked, "And where were you during those comments about harpooning the whale?"
"I think they were talking about me, sweetie," he replied.
"Oh...well, you still should've decked them," she said.
"Roseanne, when you have $108 million, you don't deck people, you hire somebody to deck them for you," Dan said.
"Anybody else got any ideas?" Jackie asked.
Darlene passed Harris to David and said, "Here, take her, she's wet."
"We're all wet," he said.
"Yeah, but she's warm and wet," Darlene said, and headed towards the kitchen.
"Maybe we should have a pool put in," Dan said, "then we wouldn't get any dirty looks from people."
"You mean like from the neighbors, Dan?" Roseanne asked.
"Well who cares about neighbors?" he asked, "Our property, our pool, our rules." He hugged Roseanne and murmured in her ear, "You could swim in nothing but a string bikini."
"Ooh, let me think who that would really be for," Roseanne said with an exaggerated wink. "Besides, we have a pool put in, we got to clean it."
"We can hire somebody to clean it," Dan said.
"What, you don't want to be my sexy pool boy?" she asked.
"If it doesn't involve any actual cleaning, sure," he replied.
Darlene hung up the phone in the kitchen and returned to the living room and told everybody, "Okay, I think I solved our problem."
"What do you mean?" Roseanne asked.
"I have rented the city pool for the Conner party of 11 for Saturday night from six until closing," Darlene said.
"We have a city pool?" Dan asked.
"It's gonna be freezing at this time of year," Roseanne said.
"No, it won't, they heat the city pool," Darlene explained.
"They heat a pool so people who go swimming to cool off when it's hot can be hot when the weather's cold, that's a genius way of handling our tax dollars," Dan commented.
"Well that's great, we'll try it out," Roseanne said.
"Well that went marginally better," Roseanne said as they reentered the house late at night after the pool's closing.
"Partially because it was dark and you couldn't see anything," Darlene said.
"Also because there wasn't anybody else there," Becky added, glaring at Mark, who was perfectly oblivious.
"That was really fun," Jackie said, "we should do that again."
"All except for Dan swarming around playing Creature from the Bottom of the Sea," Roseanne said.
"I was positive I was under Jerry's inner tube," Dan told her as he came in. "Besides, I'm the one who's gonna have a hernia."
"Yeah, but I'm the one who's going to have swimmer's ear for a month," Roseanne replied as she jabbed at her ear with her fingernail trying to get the water out.
"We could go back and do that again," Jackie told her sister. "That'll be great in the summer."
"Yeah, but what're we going to do in between that?" Roseanne asked.
"When did this park get a tennis court?" Roseanne asked. She stood on one side of the net with a racket and Dan was on the other side. "So what am I doing?"
"I hit the ball over the net to you, you hit it back over the net to me," he told her.
"Okay, I can probably do that," Roseanne said, "who starts?"
"I'll serve."
"Oh good, 2 eggs over easy with toast and pancakes," Roseanne said cynically.
Dan dropped a tennis ball on the court, then hit it over the net. Roseanne stood where she was not moving a muscle.
"Okay, when're you gonna hit it?" she asked.
"I already did."
"Where?"
"Behind you."
Roseanne turned and said, "I didn't see that."
"Let's try it again," Dan said, "this time keep your eye on the ball."
"Yeah, that's only the dumbest thing anybody ever said in the history of stupid sports," Roseanne murmured.
Dan hit another ball over the net, Roseanne watched it go flying past her and just stood there in awe.
"What's wrong?" Dan asked.
"It's going too fast, I can't hit that," Roseanne said.
"Okay, you hit one to me," he told her.
He tossed a third ball over the net for Roseanne to catch. She threw it up in the air and swung at it, but missed.
"Roseanne, what're you doing?" he asked.
"I really have no idea," she said. She bounced the ball on the court and hit it, but it didn't go over the net.
"Try again," Dan told her.
Roseanne bounced the ball again and hit it harder, it went over the net this time, Dan hit it back and it went sailing clear over her head again.
"You're not playing fair!" she screamed.
"Okay, Rosie, get your racket, come with me," he said.
"Where're we going?" she asked.
Dan pointed with his racket, "You see that board over there by the gate?"
"Yeah, so what?"
"That's a backboard."
"What's it for?" Roseanne asked.
"That's what you do if you don't have a partner to play with," Dan said.
"Okay...so what?"
"Come on, I'll show you."
Roseanne shrugged but followed him.
"Stand there, hit the ball towards the board," Dan told her.
She did, it hit the wall and bounced back towards her quickly. Roseanne let out a startled yelp and hit the ball with her racket like she was trying to beat it to death.
"Fun, ain't it?" Dan asked. "Try it again."
Roseanne hit the ball again, it hit the wall again and bounced back to her. She hit it again and it went back towards the wall.
"Hey, that's not bad," she said.
"Yeah, you keep doing that and you'll be a regular Billie Jean King in no time," Dan said.
The ball bounced off the wall at an angle and came back and hit Dan.
"Ow!"
"Ha ha ha," Roseanne taunted him. "Maybe you need to practice some swings too, Bjorn."
"Oh yeah?" Dan bounced the ball and hit it back to the board at an angle, "take that."
The ball came back in Roseanne's direction and she swung at it and sent it railing back to the wall.
"You take that!" she said.
"Two can play that game," Dan said and hit it back to the board again.
They kept up a steady game hitting the ball back and forth towards one another until one bounced off at a different angle and hit Roseanne in her shoulder.
"OW!" she screamed as she clutched her shoulder. Then she threw down her racket and said, "I'm going home and eating ice cream," and turned around.
"Oh man," Roseanne said the next day as she rubbed her chest and her arm. "Everything on me's hurting."
"That happens when you play tennis, Roseanne," Jackie said as she took groceries out of a sack. "You don't use 'swinging' muscles very often." She took a bottle out and told Roseanne, "Drink a glass of this."
"What is it?"
"Cherry juice, I was reading it takes the inflammation out of your muscles, like a natural pill."
"What's wrong with a pill pill?" Roseanne asked.
"Just try it," Jackie said. "I've been using it ever since we started this whole fitness...fiasco...it's been helping."
Roseanne grimaced but said, "Alright," and poured a glass.
"Ah, there she is!" Dan beamed as he entered the kitchen. He held an imaginary microphone to his mouth and said, "We caught up with Monica Seles in her fabulous mansion after her win at the French Open for a candid interview. Miss Seles, what is your secret to success?"
Roseanne covered one side of her face and glared at him through her other eye that was rolled up, and said sarcastically, "Little chocolate doughnuts."
"Don't tease her, Dan," Jackie said, "she's sore after yesterday."
"Oh isn't that too bad?" he crooned.
Jackie shook her head and told them, "Later," and headed out to the back porch.
"So how're you really feeling, hon?" Dan asked.
"Uh, here's my medicine," Roseanne held up her glass, and took a drink, then she scrunched up her face and squeezed her eyes shut. "Needs sugar."
"I guess there's a reason most tennis greats start when they're in kindergarten," Dan said, "instead of when they're grandparents."
"Kind of like football heroes," Roseanne grumbled.
"Is that supposed to be a shot at me?" Dan asked.
"If it was, you couldn't duck it," she replied.
"Ho ho ho, very funny," he said.
"Yeah well it's not like you'd know, you're just another old guy past his prime, face it, Dan, you're George Burns without the jokes."
"Whoa, hold it, are you calling me old?" Dan asked.
"Yeah, I'm calling you old," Roseanne said.
"Well if that ain't the big OLD pot calling the vase Ming," Dan replied.
Roseanne glared at him, "You better not be calling me old."
"Well I am. Old, old, old!"
"Old! Old! Old!" Roseanne parroted back at him.
Then the two of them were facing off in the kitchen yelling in unison, "Old! Old! Old!"
Darlene and David entered the kitchen carrying Harris, and Darlene said to her baby, "You see, Harris, that is why it's important to keep using your brain when you're older, so you don't wind up like that."
Dan and Roseanne quit yelling at each other and noticed the other people in the room.
"We can come back later if this is a bad time," David said.
"No, don't bother, this is just our method of foreplay these days," Roseanne told him.
"So what's going on?" Darlene asked.
"Your mom overdid it yesterday," Dan said.
"I did not, I'm just a little sore...ow!" Roseanne clutched her ribs.
"That's it, we're going to take the day off so you can rest," Dan said.
"I don't want to rest, I want to get active, I want to get in shape," Roseanne said. "I want to have a shape. I want to do something. I don't want to be old. There's got to be something we can do that don't involve running or swinging at nothing."
"Like what?" Dan asked.
"How about yard work?" Darlene asked.
"Very funny."
"I'm serious," Darlene said, "don't you know mowing the lawn for an hour burns as many calories as riding a bike?"
"It does?" Dan asked.
Darlene nodded.
Dan and Roseanne looked at each other.
"I'll go borrow the mower from next door," Dan said, "you take the back yard, I'll take the front yard, let's see who gets done first."
"You're on!" Roseanne said, and they headed for the back door.
Darlene tilted her head back and laughed. She hugged Harris tighter to her and said, "Again, that's why it's important to use your brain when you're older, so you don't wind up like them."
"Isn't that true what you said?" David asked.
"Yeah, but it's still pathetic how they jump on it," Darlene said.
"Well I'm proud of your parents, this is hard for them but they keep working at it," David said.
"Yeah, come to think of it, I haven't seen Mom run around this fast since the time DJ's hair was on fire," Darlene replied. "A couple more years and she ought to be able to keep up with Harris just fine."
Roseanne moaned and whimpered as she walked over to the picnic table and promptly collapsed on the bench. "My feet hurt...my legs hurt."
Dan came up the driveway holding his arms out at his sides with his head drawn back in a grimace of pain as he moaned, "Oh my aching everything."
"You know, Dan, if we ever started a lawn care service, we would die the two fittest people in all of Lanford," Roseanne said.
"Yeah, but who wants that?" he replied.
"Man, I'm exhausted, I'm sweating like a pig," Roseanne said.
"Me too," Dan added. He turned to her and coyly asked, "You wanna put it to good use and go to bed?"
Roseanne inhaled a laugh and wryly remarked, "Well that should burn about another 300 calories. Let's see, grass needs mowing about once a week...so there's that...we could always go swimming right after and cool off."
"Yeah they ought to love that at the city pool," Dan replied.
"Man, look at all the exercise equipment they got in these novelty catalogues," Roseanne said as she flipped through one that came in the mail that day. "Hey, here's an exercise bike that only has the pedals."
"Hmm," Dan said as he stared at the TV.
"And here's one that you pedal the handlebars too," Roseanne said.
"Hmm."
"And here's an exercise chair."
"Mm-hmm."
"And here're some different workout videos," she added.
"That's nice," Dan said.
"And look at this, they're still carrying that Butt Master."
"Um hum."
"You know, Dan," Roseanne said, "maybe we ought to order all this stuff and give it a try, and if we don't like it, we can send it all back and get it off the credit card bill."
"We have a credit card?" Dan asked.
"Dan, are you listening to me?"
"I'm listening, you found a bicycle chair with a butt on it," Dan replied as he changed the channels.
Roseanne smacked him on the head with the catalogue. Dan ignored it and flipped to another channel.
"Hey, go back," Roseanne told him.
He did, and it was an infomercial for a ski exercise machine.
"Hey, that looks real easy," Roseanne said.
"You're not serious, are you, Rosie?" he asked.
"Yeah, we can afford to try anything, why not?" she asked. "This is the shopping network, let's see what other things they have for sale."
"Oh joy," Dan sighed, "just how I wanted to spend the Friday night lineup."
"You know, Roseanne, I think this is just a little nuts," Dan said, "we might've gone overboard this time."
"Well we're going to give everything a try and see which of them we like. Everybody's going to try something different, then we'll switch. Everybody ready?"
"Yes," the rest of the family announced from their various positions in the living room.
"Okay, it's time for the 'Gilligan's Island' marathon, so we've got four hours of TV to watch while we work. Ready? Let's go."
Everybody started using the piece of exercise equipment they were on, which had taken over the whole living room and in fact made it necessary to move the coffee table, the couch, and the chairs over towards the kitchen for the time being. Jackie was pedaling softly on a computerized bike, Becky was jogging on a treadmill, Dan was seated on a rowing machine, Darlene was on a Healthrider, DJ was on a Stairmaster, Mark was on a twister stepper, David was on an elliptical machine, and Roseanne was on the ski exerciser. With everybody going at once, the combined noises of all the machines working made it impossible for anybody to actually hear the TV, but it definitely didn't interfere with the viewing.
"Okay, everybody stop!" Roseanne bellowed, "Now switch."
Every five minutes the Conner family kept switching from one machine to the other, until they'd tried all of them. Dan liked the rowing machine, Becky liked everything except the rowing machine, Mark liked the rowing machine and the twister, David liked the stair stepper, Jackie liked the bike and the Healthrider, Darlene hated all of them equally, and Roseanne was in love with the ski machine.
"Okay, so what we're gonna do is uh...Jackie gets the bike," Roseanne said.
"You serious?" Jackie asked.
"Yeah, sure. And uh...Mark and Becky can take the twister and the elliptical machine. Ooh, and uh...we'll keep the treadmill and the stepper here for the kids, and your dad and I will keep the rower and the skier for ourselves."
"Where're you gonna find room for them?" Darlene asked.
"We'll figure something out, hey Dan, we can do these at night when we're watching TV, you rowing, me skiing, it'll be like we're on vacation, you off in your boat, and me...skiing with Wayne Newton."
"I knew there was a catch," Dan said teasingly.
Roseanne moaned as she fell against the mattress.
"Tough day on the slopes, hon?" Dan asked.
"Why is it so hard to get in shape, Dan?" she asked.
"Because if it were easy, everybody in the health industry would be out of a job," he answered.
"I mean we're trying everything but it's not getting any easier," Roseanne said, "We're still tired all the time, it's still just as hard doing it every time, and we're still fat."
"You wanna give up?" Dan asked.
"No," she answered as she groaned and stretched, "I want to get back to the shape I used to be."
"All due respect dear, I don't think there's enough Spandex for that."
"That's not what I mean," she said, "I mean I used to chase the kids around when they were little and work and keep the house clean...okay, so I'm not real big on cleaning the house...but I should be able to do a lot more with the kids than I am."
"You will, it's just going to take time, just like you said."
"Yeah well sometimes I don't like being right."
"Let me call the newspapers!" Dan said as he reached for the phone.
Roseanne sat up and held her head in her hands, not looking entirely different from the last time they got high on marijuana several years ago.
"You feeling okay?" Dan asked.
Roseanne kept her head down but nodded.
"You overdo it today?" he asked as he put his arm around her and pulled her against him.
"It's so much easier to be in shape when you're a kid," Roseanne said, "you know? They don't even know it's exercise, it's just playing; jumping rope, riding bikes, playing ball, why can't it be that easy for us?"
Something occurred to both of them and they looked at each other curiously.
Dan spoke into his imaginary microphone again as he announced, "Welcome to the First Annual Conner Lawn Olympics! The first competition is doubles badminton with the fabulous Conners facing off against Jackie Harris and their own son, DJ Conner, over at the second net is the doubles doubles' badminton with David and Darlene Healy on one side of the net with Becky and Mark Healy on the other side of the net, and the juniors exemption at the corner of the yard starring Andy Harris and Jerry Garcia Conner in the special net-free division. And the competition begins now!"
A few days earlier, Dan and Roseanne had gone to check out a new sporting goods store that had opened up recently, and checked out the section for lawn games, and there had been no shortage of an assortment: tether ball, horseshoes, bean bag toss, volley ball, Frisbees, lawn tennis, lawn darts, and badminton. They'd decided badminton seemed the least lethal game for them to take home and try, but after punting the birdie back and forth a few times, the strings came undone in their rackets. So Dan decided to try something else, he went back to the store and bought two heavy duty tennis rackets with plastic netting on them. That proved more effective, and he and Roseanne were able to knock the birdies to each other over the net all afternoon, and decided this would be the next installment of the Conner workout. They went back, bought a second net, another tube of shuttlecocks, and six more tennis rackets. Then saw a cheap plastic set for children that just had two light weight plastic rackets and a lighter weight birdie, no net, and decided it would be a good starter for Jerry and Andy.
And the games began. Dan knocked his birdie over the fence for Jackie and DJ to fight each other over who was going to hit it first. Jackie swung at it, and sent the birdie flying directly at the net and it got caught in one of the holes. DJ pulled it out and hit it over the net, Dan hit it right back to him, DJ swung again, and this time, somehow, the birdie got caught in the plastic netting of his racket, and everybody had to wait while he pulled it out. Over at the second net, Darlene and David were giving Mark and Becky a steady competition until Mark ran too far, fell into the net, took the whole thing down, and got tangled up in it. The two toddlers on the other side of the yard decided to follow Mark's example and laid down on the grass rolling around in circles.
Through the good, the bad, the worse, and the ugly, the game continued for about half an hour before they finally lost all the birdies somewhere between a tree in the yard, the neighbor's fence line, and, in an act of defiance of all laws of physics, up on the roof of the house. When the game finally ended, everybody was sweating like a hog and covered in dirt and grass stains. Roseanne was huffing and puffing as she wiped the sweat from her forehead with her forearm, and announced, "You know what? I think that game's a keeper. We could do this every week when the weather's nice."
Half of the family groaned at that idea, and Roseanne glared at them and said, "I don't recall asking for none of y'all's opinions."
Dan was bent over with his hands on his knees, huffing and puffing and sweating like a hog too, and he told the others, "Your mom's right, that was a great game...who wants a beer?"
Jackie followed them in to the kitchen and asked as she got a glass of water, "So, what do you think?"
"Well I really liked that," Roseanne said as she sat down at the table. "I figure we can do that a couple times a week, and we'll go walking in the mornings...and you know, I'll still do the ski machine, and Dan can keep rowing until he gets his real boat built."
"Har har har," Dan replied.
"And I still wanna go swimming again sometime, you know, just not when other people's are gonna be at the pool," she added, "or our own kids for that matter." She looked at Jackie and said, "I think we're really onto something...I think if we keep doing all these things, we'll look better and we'll feel better."
"I felt better before we tried killing ourselves to get in shape," Dan commented.
"Nobody asked you!" Roseanne said.
"Hey, you know what, you guys got all the money in the world, you got all the time in the world, you could really stick with it this time," Jackie said.
"At this rate we should buy stock in shuttlecocks," Dan said, "then we'll never run out of money."
"DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!" Roseanne's voice bellowed through the entire downstairs one morning about a month later.
"WHAT?" Dan absentmindedly called back as he looked at the morning paper at the kitchen table.
Roseanne entered the kitchen holding onto the waistband of her jeans and said, "My pants are bigger!"
Dan hopped up from his chair and said cynically, "I'll call Ripley's!"
"I'm serious, Dan," Roseanne said, "these are a lot looser than they were the last time I wore them. We must've lost weight doing all that exercise after all. Hey..." Roseanne took a step back and looked at him, "Is that a belt you're wearing?"
"Okay, yeah, my pants are bigger too," he said.
"Come on, let's get weighed and see what we lost," Roseanne told him.
Dan followed her into the bathroom. Roseanne got on first, and she looked at the number for a long time.
"Well?" he asked.
"I can't believe it," she said, disappointed, "I haven't lost a stinking pound. You get on this thing and see what it says."
He did, and based on the look on his face, he got a similar reading.
"Damn it," Roseanne groaned, "Our clothes must've just stretched in the wash."
"That'd be a first," Dan said as they headed back to the kitchen. As they walked in they saw Darlene and David were sitting at the table.
"What's going on?" Darlene asked.
"Your mom got her hopes up that we lost weight with this new exercise regimen," Dan said.
"I can't believe it, we didn't lose any weight, but I know my pants are bigger," Roseanne said, and pointed, "Your dad's are too, look at him, he's got a belt on for the first time in 5 years."
"Mom," Darlene said in a tone reminiscent of her teenage 'you are so stupid, let me explain it slowly' tone, "you are aware that you can get smaller without losing weight, right?"
"That's not possible," Roseanne said.
"Yeah, it is," Darlene said, "it's what those gym people call getting toned, you turned that mountain of flab into a slightly lesser mountain of flab with muscles underneath."
Roseanne and Dan looked at each other.
"What do you think?" she asked.
"Let me see," Dan reached over and put his arm around Roseanne and said coyly, "My love, it seems your love handles have shrunken on me."
"Oh yeah? Two can play that game, let's see," Roseanne put her arms around Dan and replied, "hey, that beer gut feels a little flatter."
"Thanks for noticing," Dan sarcastically remarked.
"Thanks for making me lose my appetite," Darlene added as she and David got up and left the kitchen.
"So...it actually worked?" Roseanne asked. "We spent two months walking and swimming and skiing and rowing and...badminton-ing, and we actually got in shape?"
"Looks like it," Dan said, "now we just gotta find some way to put it to the test."
"Yeah...hey, I know!" Roseanne said.
"What?"
Roseanne held up an imaginary microphone of her own and said, "Roseanne Conner, you've just lost one dress size, what are you going to do now? I'm going back to Disney World! And I'm taking my whole stinking family with me!"
"Are you serious?" Dan asked.
"Yeah!" Roseanne's eyes lit up, "You know we always talked about going back someday when we could afford it," she chuckled, "and we can sure as hell afford it now. We were in good enough shape to run through the park the last time, I bet this time we could do it in half the time!"
"Whoa there, Tonto, that's putting the cart before the horse," Dan said.
"Well okay, but we could still go back," Roseanne replied, "Hey it'll be Harris's first time, it'll be great!"
"So this is that fun cool grandparent thing you were talking about," Dan said, "it seemed like a pipe dream when you first brought it up...but I'm liking the possibility of it now."
"Well cheers to us," Roseanne said as she picked up her glass of cherry juice, "here's to tap dancing with Dick Van Dyke when we're all about a hundred and fifty."
Dan thought it over and said as he picked up his glass of orange juice, "It'll probably sound like a good idea when we get there, what the hell? Cheers."
"Live long and prosper, Dr. Spock," Roseanne said as they clinked their plastic glasses.