Carol’s Column

So who says fresh air is healthy?

IT'S catching. It's dangerous, this new health kick that everyone's gone crazy about.

I realised this fully when I found my dog doing push-ups in the lounge the other night.

Once, we were a happy, united family. That was in the old days when breakfast was a merry fried sausages, bananas and eggs, two slices of toast, butter and marmalade affair.

When cups of steaming, strong black coffee were poured with gay abandon and laced with plenty of pristine-white, refined sugar.

Not now. Things have changed.

Today this family takes on the world stuffed with yoghurt, muesli and wheatgerm.

Freshly-squeezed fruit juice (hour-old juice is useless they say — the vitamins are played out and useless if they have to wait around too long).

There are seaweed, iron, kelp and green-lipped mussel pills to keep you as healthy as a fish.

Honey is healthier than sugar and all-bran keeps the inners running.

It's a sad reflection on the general state of things I thought to myself as I snuggled up to my spouse under our non-allergenic, sterilised and scented albatross down-and-feather duvet.

"It's frightening isn't it?" I murmured to the warm bulk on my left, "how everyone's gone health crazy. The whole world's gone mad jogging, swimming, skipping, walking. We're breeding a nation of health freaks."

Encouraged by my husband's quiet thoughtfulness, I continued: "Take dinner parties these days.

"When did we last enjoy a creamy vichysoisse, thick with the taste of potatoes and leeks?

When did we last enjoy a bouef Wellington with a rich, crunchy pastry? When did we last finish off a meal with a delectable créme brulee.

"Today, all the hostess dishes up is raw vegetables and fruit juice because everyone's on diet. I can't stand it."

My husband didn't say a word.

I gave him a gentle shove! Good heavens. The bed next to me was empty. I'd been talking to the king-size Continental down pillow.

He'd disappeared.

I was sick with fright until I heard a rasping, gasping noise and the door burst open.

"Just been for a quick 10k early-morning jog around the Zoo Lake," he gasped as he wheezed his way to the bathroom for a bracing cold shower. "It was magnificent."

I shuddered and snuggled deeper into the duvet.

I'd just shut my eyes when I was woken by the most dreadful sound.

It's an earthquake. The house is collapsing — was my immediate thought. Wrong.

My husband stood at the window breathing in huge gulps of air. His massive frame shuddered.

"Are you OK?"

I moved to the window immediately.

"Why don't you try it — fresh air. There's nothing quite like it," he choked and spluttered as he breathed.

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Just then, I was distracted by the sight of our octogenarian neighbour shooting past the window, dressed in running shorts and pea-green takkies, his stringy knees wobbling in the wind.

He smiled, adjusted his false teeth and waved cheerily.

"Keeps you young," he bellowed chirpily as he disappeared around the corner.

Yes, the health kick's really in.

Later that day, I found the greengrocer throwing a watermelon in the air.

"Just practising," he smiled at me through the gap in his teeth. "It strengthens the muscles."

As I emerged from the shop, I was bowled over by a herd of joggers.

At home, my entire family was out on the lawn exercising in time to the Beach Boys.

Have you ever watched a goldfish doing callisthenics?

OK, I muttered as I puffed into the house. I'll show them. If you can't beat them, join them.

I bought a bike. Oh not one of those grand, 12-speed, shiny affairs. It was a rather, modest, black-framed, upright, solid kind of a bike.

The kind my grandfather used to ride, dignified and sedate, with a carrier on the back.

It took me an hour to get to the Rosebank Mall, normally a five-minute walk.

I couldn't imagine why it should have been so difficult until I discovered the bike was deformed. It had no pedals.

Invigorated but healthy, I cycled merrily home, breathing in lots of air.

There were one or two minor mishaps — such as the Kamikazi beetle that flew into my eye causing temporary lack of vision which in turn caused me to collide with a stationary motor car.

This was not funny. Bruised and battered, I limped home dragging the bike behind me and immediately retired to bed.

"You look terrible," said my husband commiseratingly when he came home from work.

An unusually observant comment from him considering that the eye that had made contact with the beetle had swollen to twice its normal size and the surrounding areas were purple, black and blue.

My leg was in bandages as I had sprained my kneebone and my nose was somewhat out of alignment.

"You know," he added as he stripped for action into his running shorts, "you really should try to get out a bit. Take a little exercise, have a little fresh air, live a healthy life."

Yes.

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