August 3, 2005 - In Search of Buns of Steel

Musings an Online Journal of Sorts By Alyce Wilson
August 3, 2005 - In Search of Buns of Steel
	I actually had enough time yesterday to do some exercise videos, and I decided to try a tape my brother's wife had given me, Buns of Steel 2000. That wasn't exactly my problem area, though I might have been able to use Hips and Thighs of Steel, but I thought I'd give it a shot and see what I thought. I expected just a half hour toning tape, but it actually had 25 minutes of aerobics first. It was very old school. If the title hadn't proclaimed that it was from 2000, I could have sworn it was from the early '90s. Maybe these instructors are simply stuck there. There were three instructors, two bleached blonde and one African-American. The blondes were both wearing the harsh makeup of the Eighties, and their heavily styled hair did not move when they worked out. Both of them plastered plastic grins across their faces for the entire workout.
The shorter blonde instructor had super dark eyebrows that made her look like Groucho Marx. I'm not sure if they were drawn on or if they simply matched her natural hair color. The African-American instructor looked much better, except for her strange gold leotard, which actually had a turtleneck! Perhaps the others forced it on her, fearing that her natural good looks would upstage them. All the leotards were strange in one respect: they were cut thong style, presumably to show off their buns of steel. They wore them over flesh colored stockings, which had the added advantage of keeping the thong where it belonged. I could say more, but you might be eating. Apparently, buns of steel is a code word for absolutely flat butts, since none of them had discernible "buns" at all. They had muscles where their buns should be, which struck me as particularly funny. I wondered what they sat on. But they'd probably sell less tapes if they called it Flat Buns or Invisible Buns. But none of these things mattered as much as the workout, and I must admit I got a good workout, though I had some issues with the tape nonetheless. They switched between the three instructors, some of whom were better than others. I thought the African-American was pretty good, but Groucho drove me batty. It was hard to concentrate on the movements, between staring at her eyebrows and recoiling from her overly perky exclamations: "Come on! Everybody wants tight buns!" Not to mention, every time one of the instructors turned so that their "buns" were more visible, in those ridiculous thong leotards, I had to stifle a laugh. Some of them used dance moves, which made it fun, and they went pretty fast, which was fine for an aerobics veteran like myself but would be difficult for newbies. The camerawork and editing was also really strange. They showed a lot of medium shots of just the upper body, so that you couldn't see what the legs were doing! And sometimes just as an instructor was switching to a new movement, they would show one of the other instructors following her, instead of the key instructor demonstrating the movement. The toning workout itself was good but nothing spectacular: mostly squats and lunges. The exercises weren't much of a challenge for me, and today, the day after, I'm not particularly sore in that area, although I have some overall muscle soreness which I attribute to getting back into my full exercise routine at last (two Denise Austin kickboxing tapes plus the Buns of Steel 2000 tape, plus a dog walk). I figure I probably use the muscles worked in this tape quite frequently already, between walking up and down the stairs at my apartment and doing my kickboxing tapes, which emphasize low stances that use a variety of muscle groups. Overall, I much prefer my Denise Austin tapes because, although cheerful, she has a much more natural way about her, from her makeup to her smile. I actually think I could meet Denise Austin on the street and have a conversation with her. Her workouts are both fun and challenging, and I like that each one of them is only 25 minutes long. On days when I have less time, I can work in one of them instead of two or three. Still, variety is good, so I can work this tape into my workout once or twice a week. I may even see if there's a Hips and Thighs of Steel workout available. Besides, I can always use a laugh.
Moral: J. Lo does not have buns of steel. Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson Musings Index
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