What Muffin Top, Damnit?

I've been working out a lot lately.

HAHAHA! That was a complete and utter lie. I just wanted to try it on for size. It sounds good, huh? So here's the truth: I've been thinking about working out a lot lately. Okay, okay, I haven't been thinking about it a lot. Just a little. Especially this morning.

It's finally cooled off here, I'm no longer a hot, hot mess, and I decided today was a good day for jeans. I experienced the first glimmerings of dismay as I surveyed the neat piles of denim in my closet. I took a deep breath and seized the closest pair. I got one leg in and heaved the jeans to the top of my left thigh, at which point any momentum ground to a halt. I engaged in a shimmying struggle to get them up any farther.

"Fine, I'll just get another pair," I thought, flinging the clearly-shrunken-in-the-wash (and hideously ugly to boot) jeans on the bed. The next pair similarly resisted my frenzied hitching and heaving. I hunched in the middle of the bedroom, panting, the jeans wadded up at the top of my grotesque sausage legs.

I scraped them off, kicked them under the bed, and looked balefully at the remaining jeans in my closet. Was I going to subject myself to any more of this humiliation? Yes, yes I was. This time, though, I checked the labels. Finally I found what I was looking for: the jeans that are about 10 percent denim and 90 percent some stretchy material. They slipped on like a rather snug glove.

"That's more like it!" I thought triumphantly, sauntering over to the full-length mirror to admire myself.

Big mistake. I should have just thrown on a baggy, forgiving shirt and left the room, because what greeted me was a reflection of myself crammed into ultra-tight pants with a pale and doughy muffin top. For those of you unfamiliar with the term "muffin top," allow me to illustrate (brace yourselves):

Incredibly, here's what I thought I'd see (note, please, the ample bosom; that should have been a clue that I was delusional).

And THIS is what I actually saw. If you click on the images, you can see them in all their glorious detail. 

So, here I sit in my nearly 100-percent-stretchy-material jeans, vowing that I will start exercising, STAT! Oh, and in case you are wondering, I immediately put on a baggy, forgiving shirt after seeing my muffin top in the mirror. The cat? I have no idea where she is. Kitty therapy?