Gentlemen, It's Gut-check Time

We deserve this, of course, we men. For years we've objectified women by their breasts. Now women are judging us by our abs. We catch them snickering as we come out of the tub. We pull up our T-shirts to wipe our faces, and we catch them sneering. Sure, we put our shirts down and go right back to our Wendy's Big Bacon Classic, but inside we're hurting.

So, what you have now are a lot of men walking around, constantly inhaling, feeling insecure about not having cobblestone, washboard, twisted-steel, rock-hard abs. Worse, because we don't, we're quite sure women will soon beat the holy bejesus out of us. We know this from watching 7 a.m. women's aerobics shows.

First, women did simple, gentle aerobics. Then they did aerobics on a ridiculous $49.95 footstool, which they called "step aerobics." Then they put headphones on and started hollering at their steps. Then they started stepping on each other's steps. Then they started getting on the top of the steps and kicking and punching at some unseen enemy (us), chanting scary things like, "Kick! Punch! Reload!" Soon there'll be roving bands of leotard-wearing women barging through doors and throwing steps at men, who will have to take cover behind their Chee-tos.

Gentlemen, it's gut-check time. We've all got to get us chiseled, cobblestone, washboard, twisted-steel, rock-hard abs. So, as a service to my gender I've spent the last six months figuring out how, exactly, to do that.

Here are my findings: Forget about it.

I bought the AB-DOer (don't). I paid $119.95 for the Body by Jake Ab Rocker. (The hardest workout is trying to figure out how to unfold it.) I used Original Doctor's Ab Cream. (These were the actual instructions: "Apply lightly to target areas at least once a day. For best results apply twice daily." And to get perfect abs in a weekend: Apply 7,072 times daily!) I even tried the BodyVibes abdominal belt ($49.95), which basically buzzes you every time you don't suck in your stomach. My wife does that for free.

So I've come to the conclusion that there's no way to have killer, chiseled, cobblestone, washboard, twisted-steel, rock-hard abs without quitting your job, leaving your family and doing nothing but crunches all day, every day, except, of course, when enjoying a delicious dinner of two jars of Gerber's exciting new Cream of Swiss Chard. In other words, I abdicate.

Now please stand back. I'm going to exhale.