Alabama Cracks Down On Fat Employees

The State of Alabama, #2 in national obesity rankings, is putting State of Alabama employees on a diet.

Alabama has given its 37,527 employees a year to lose the fat and get fit or the state workers will have to pay $25 month for insurance that is currently free.

Employees must get a health screening. If the tests show blood pressure, cholesterol, glucose or obesity problems the employee will have a year to improve their health. If the employee shows progress by the end of the year they won't be charged. If they don't make progress they start getting charged starting January of 2011.

Gar the Texan blogged about the obesity issue a few days ago. Apparently Gar the Texan was denied an alcoholic beverage due to the server thinking he'd had too much. After that Gar the Texan was in a fast food joint getting himself a greasy burger when an obese person waddled up to the counter and ordered a couple Mega-sized Happy Meals.

Gar the Texan opined that the same principle involved in denying booze to a drunk should apply to denying excess calories to an obvious chunkster. Even though the chunkster is just doing his part to contribute to the Strategic National Fat Preserve.

I think I agree with Gar the Texan on this serious issue. I have been in situations recently where I eye witnessed a morbidly obese person buying stuff that should not be stuffed in an obese person's mouth. I would have loved hearing, "I'm sorry ma'am, I can not in good conscience sell you that because you are obviously morbidly obese."

Mount Rainier Appears On Day 2 In Tacoma

I am dead exhausted, having slept only an hour or two last night. I've had a busy day today, so tonight I am firing on about a half a cylinder. Whatever that means. Like I said, I'm exhausted.

Even so, tonight we had a BBQ outside. My sister made the tastiest burger I've ever had on the tastiest bun I've ever tasted.

After the BBQ I was asked if I wanted to come along to walk Blue & Max, the poodle pair who will be left in my dangerous care tomorrow, after I take their primary caregivers to the airport, departing for a week in the other Washington, with the initials D.C. at the end.

We drove to Owens Beach at Point Defiance. Point Defiance is a park in Tacoma. It is one of the largest urban parks in the world. As you can see in the photo, The Mountain, as in Mount Rainier, was out tonight. There were large throngs of people having fun at the beach, kayaking, picnicking, jogging, biking, weenie roasting, walking and in one case, an older gentleman appeared to steal a kiss from an older lady with a cane. I told her I hope she knew that man. She said she did.

I was out and about in Tacoma all day today, and again tonight. And just like my previous returns, after extended periods of exile in Texas, I am amazed at how many people appear to have had the air let out of them. I'm seeing so few fat people here. Washington is not doing its part in contributing to the National Strategic Fat Preserve. Or maybe Washington is doing its part in drawing down on the Fat Preserve and helping bring down food prices.

We drove the waterfront back after the poodle walk, lots of people at the waterfront restaurants, Mount Rainier hovering over them. The sun sets way later up north than down in Texas and it sets in very scenic way, what with all the water and mountains. It was perfect tonight. Even a ferry boat got in the view.

I hope Fort Worth succeeds with its Trinity River Vision so Fort Worth can be like Tacoma, with scenic waterfront property and a lot of deflated people using the Fort Worth waterfront. That'd be nice for Fort Worth....

Southwest Airlines Targets Fat People

Heavy duty participants in the National Strategic Fat Preserve, be warned, if you fly Southwest Airlines and if you appear unable to fit in a seat with the armrests down, you will likely be told that you need to buy an extra ticket if you want to fly.

Some people seem to think this is some form of discrimination.

What I think is I find airplane seats uncomfortable enough. I'd be miserable stuck next to someone for 4 hours who was oozing into my space, who made it difficult to get to the aisle en route to the restroom facility.

Why should a little person like me, a mere 172 pounds of me, pay the same as a person weighing 400 pounds? It takes way less airplane fuel to haul me 4000 miles than it takes to haul a 400 pounder. Why should I subsidize the airfare of a hugely obese person? How is it fair for a hugely obese person to fly for the same price as me?

I'm thinking the only fair thing would be to make all airfares based on poundage. Your personal weight plus whatever luggage you're dragging with you times a fixed amount per pound per mile.

For instance, if Southwest Airlines charged .0005087 per pound per mile, at 172 pounds, flying a roundtrip of 4000 miles it would cost me about $350. While the 400 pounder would pay $813.92.

Doesn't it makes good sense that your airfare be based on your share of the fuel consumed to haul your heft through the sky? And what a great incentive for some of our biggest fat banks to start drawing down on the National Strategic Fat Preserve.

Fat Matt Damon: Good Will Plumping

A couple days ago, when I mentioned that Matt Damon was doing his part in contributing to the National Strategic Fat Preserve, one of my acquaintances commented that I was being mean about fat people. That if I was fat I'd be more sensitive about the subject because I'd know how hard it is to lose weight.

I feel this person totally missed the point of what I was saying, that being that Americans have stored up this huge food bank on their bodies that gives us an advantage over all the other nations, except for Australia, which is even fatter than America.

With food prices skyrocketing all over the globe, Americans can now draw down on our collective fat bank, saving money, and driving down food prices as demand for food drops.

Now, my acquaintance, who thought I was being mean, has worked very hard to store food. I believe she is now about 300 pounds overweight. It takes about 2,500 calories above ones daily maintenance need, to gain 1 pound. 2,500 calories is about 4 McDonald's Big Macs. That means my acquaintance is contributing, what amounts to 1,200 Big Macs, as her part of the National Strategic Fat Preserve. That's impressive.

Now, regarding my acquaintance saying I'd be more sensitive regarding fat people if I'd ever been one and had to ever lose weight.

Well. In February of 2004 I had to fly up to Seattle and was locked in a room with all the chocolate I could eat for 10 days. When I was out of the chocolate room I was taken to buffets, burger joints and all you can eat cod at Anthony's Homeport. On the way back to Texas I spent 10 hours in Phoenix where I was forced to eat at an Applebee's Happy Hour and then drug to an In and Out for 2 of the best hamburgers I've ever had.

By the time I got on the plane I was a bloated mess. I didn't make it back here til 4 in the morning. When I woke up that day and saw my bloated self in the mirror I was appalled. When I got on the scale I was even more appalled. That scale said I weighed 217 pounds. 12 more pounds than when I'd left 11 days before.

It is now June 28, 2008, 4 years after I weighed 217. Today I weigh 172. That is a 45 pound weight loss. So, don't go telling me I don't know how hard it is to lose weight. It's real easy. You just eat less, eat good stuff and exercise. It took me about 2 months, after my 217 high, to get under 200. After that it's just slowly melted off.

I do feel a bit guilty about this, because I am contributing absolutely nothing to the National Strategic Fat Preserve. And I don't intend to.

Matt Damon's Fat

Way back in 1996 Matt Damon played a heroin addict in a movie called Courage Under Fire. He had to lose 40 pounds in 100 days for 2 days of filming for a movie that I don't think ever got released. Damon had to take meds for years after this, due to damage done to his adrenal gland.

And now, 12 years later, Matt Damon has gone the other direction, as you can see in the photo. While he appears nowhere near being obese, it is clearly obvious that Matt Damon has decided to contribute to the National Strategic Fat Preserve.

Matt Damon may be endangering his health, again, for a movie, this time one called The Informant.

Australia Overtakes America's #1 Position

I am in some sort of state of minor shock. For weeks I have been imploring Americans to draw down on our National Strategic Fat Preserve in order to cut food costs and shrink waist lines. And for aesthetic reasons.

I bragged about how we Americans have such an advantage over other nations in this strategic area, with us Americans collectively storing billions of dollars worth of food in our personal Fat Banks.

And, so, what do I learn on this last day of Spring? Australia, of all places, has passed us Americans as the fattest people on earth. How could this happen? I think of Aussies as being like west coasters, a fit and trim people with plenty of health nuts.

26% of Australians are obese. Only 25% of Americans are obese. With a population of 300 million, that's 75 million obese Americans. Australia's population is only about 20.5 million. That's even less people than Canada and California. With 20.5 million people, and 26% of them obese, Australia only has 5.33 million obese people compared to America's whopping 75 million.

So, though we may no longer be #1 in the percentage of our people who are obese, America is still proudly #1 in total number of obese people and in the amount of calories stored in our collective National Strategic Fat Preserve.

How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World

This blogging is yet one more chapter in my ongoing campaign to get Americans to draw down on the National Strategic Fat Preserve by eating less, eating better and sitting less. And dressing better. Or at least in clothes that fit.

The photos you see here were all taken at the Fort Worth Stockyards, a prime hunting ground for plumped up Americans.

I read an interesting article from the UK, via the Daily Mail, titled "How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World." Here's a blurb----

"It is true that there is nothing quite as grossly fat as a fat American. Even clothes sizes have to be coyly renamed to accommodate them. Restaurant chairs and plane seats just aren't big enough.

Only recently, a woman succeeded in suing the hugely fat American who sat next to her on a long-haul flight and overflowed into her space, crushing and injuring her.

But the rest of the world is getting bigger, too. We should be sitting up — while we still can — and paying serious attention to the American situation."

Read the entire article by going here.

National Strategic Fat Reserve

Last week I suggested that Americans fight rising food prices by cutting back on what they eat and burning up some of the calories stored by over 63% of Americans in the collective National Strategic Fat Preserve.

A couple days ago I was at Wal-Mart and was being freshly amazed at how many people, mostly female, stuff themselves into clothes that are much too small for their swollen selves. I don't know how they get some of those jeans and shorts onto their bodies. It would seem those tight tops and bottoms would be very uncomfortable.

But to me it's the aesthetics that are the main issue. Don't these people have mirrors? I've really grown weary of seeing way too many people who look like they are about to explode, with their clothes straining to keep them from doing so.

So, yesterday as I drove away from my abode I saw a group of 6 women dressed very attractively and colorful in loose fitting native type garb. They looked really good. This got me to thinking why is this not the style that plus-sized American women universally adopt? It would seem to be way more comfortable, cooler in hot weather, aesthetically pleasing and just all and all would make going to Wal-Mart a visually more pleasing experience.

The Japanese Government has grown concerned that Japan is getting too fat. An April 1 Government edict requires companies to regularly measure the waists of employees aged 40 to 74 as they diet and exercise their excess weight away.

Toshido Okada has written a Japanese best selling diet book called "Sayonara Mr. Fatty." The book is based on his experience of losing 110 pounds and no longer being a Mr. Fatty.

The percentage of overweight Japanese is way lower than the percentage of overweight Americans. We lead the world in our level of stored fat. By far. The number one thing that surprises Europeans, upon their first visit to America, is the huge number of what they call "Balloon People." They see way less "Balloon People" when they visit the West Coast. Way more when they visit the South. Way way more.

Below, a video called "Fat Americans."