The Nerd's Revenge

I imagine him, sitting in his non-descript cube, chuckling to himself. He's a programmer and, while he works on fitness software, he shuns any physical activity himself. In high school, he was the smart, fat nerd - the natural prey of the jock set. They teased him mercilessly. Those early encounters etched a dislike and disgust of exercise on his soul. Still, these are lean times and sometimes one must agree to even the most distasteful of occupations. So, here he sits, working on a workout application. He must realize that not all the people who use his application are like the jocks that once tormented him. He must know that some of them were nerds in high school too, just like him. Yes, he knows these things but he doesn't care. If you use his app, you are an exerciser and he has only disdain for you.

Yes, I imagine him chuckling as he licks the donut frosting from his fingers and imagines me running. I run and my iPod sifts through my music, ignoring anything with a driving beat and instead selecting the slowest, most quiet options. I thought I'd removed all these songs but I was mistaken. I'd forgotten about Van Morrison's Avalon Sunset album. Yesterday, I was about two miles into my run when his algorithms zeroed in on the track, "Coney Island", which is basically a spoken poem. Yes, I'm sure that's just the sort of thing he was hoping to find. Chuckle, chuckle.