United States of OBESITY

nns1400

You mean they's supposed to drink water? Like out da toilet?

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If someone really bothers you, think about walking a mile in their shoes...then, you'll be a mile away, and you'll have their shoes.

nns1400

Okay, here's an interesting conundrum. My kids are heavily involved in sports. Which means there are lots of times (more than i would like) that we are stuck eating at concession stands. Every sports club, be it soccer, baseball or football, bans you bringing in your own food and drink. But they only sell popcorn, hot dogs, hamburgers, nachos, soft pretzels (with "cheese"!), ice cream, beer, soda and gatorade. And water. And candy.

Four nights a week, I leave work, we change and go straight to practice or games. I also admit to feeding my family QuikTrip taquitos in a pinch. So the kids are getting lots of exercise AND eating lots of crap. It sucks. I wish I was better organized and we always had wonderful fresh food packed along, but it is very hard.

I would also like to add that one of my sons eats very well compared to his friends, but is 20 pounds overweight no matter what he does (he's the football player). He has some very skinny friends that drink soda all day long, eat fruit loops and pop tarts and probably have 20 cavities, but they are still thin. For now....

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If someone really bothers you, think about walking a mile in their shoes...then, you'll be a mile away, and you'll have their shoes.

MountainPro

stranger still, i wear a 32 in waist, but over the past few years have always had to buy a 34 in shops cos they fit better. I have a tape measure it says 32" bang on....

and even more recently, i have bought 32" cammos from Asda, they are actually too big...what the ferk is going on?

i blame the Chinese...

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parawolf

After recent travels to the USA I made some very interesting observations.

Go to a national park like Grand Canyon, Yosemite, etc.. no overweight/obese people to be seen (well I didn't see any).

Go to the city centers, all over the place - in scary proportions too. I needed to buy a pair of black pants for a formal night out, so I just ran into a Walmart attempting to find something suitable. I'm a 34 waist requiring 34 legs.

Couldn't find anything.

Stubled across a store called Lululemon Athletica.

Bought a pair of these in charcoal and are very comfortable. Nice material - very suitable for work or going casual and a predicable fit. Slightly close around the thigh for a cyclist, but going to get that regardless.

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Eden

Hmmmmm sounds like men are getting a welcome to the world of women's vanity sizing....I used to wear a 5, now I'm lucky if a 0 isn't too big and oh, depending on the store (especially if its a high end store where vanity sizing can be worse) maybe a 2 will fit, pehaps a 1, could it be a 0, maybe everything will just be too big. I HATE clothes shopping.

jhuskey

It's that damn metric system! It's going to destroy society one waistline at a time.

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Whenever I can't get excited about riding I just fantasize about someone else's bike.

limerickman

I don't think obesity is confined to USA.
Over here we have kids and adults who are clearly overweight to the extent that they're obese.

I think a number of factors are involved.
Modern living doesn't require us to have walk to work/school etc : people resort to driving everywhere : people don't walk up stairs, they take lifts (elevators).
Kids don't go out to play, they play computer games instead.
Couple this with additives to food, it is no wonder that people are getting bigger/fatter.

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.."But finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. [I]I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets" - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it - Armstrong 2005 TDF
morelike hypocrisy.

Eldron

I blame digital convergence - the TV remote removes the need to stand up, iPods remove the need to get up to change the record (sorry CD), home automation removes the need to open/close the curtains and the Internet pretty much removes the need to leave the house.

We're becoming a planet of do nothingers.

I believe the fun sci-fi prediction that in 10000 years we'll all have 1 foot tall bodies and 2 foot tall heads.

Now THAT would make for an interesting custom Trek....

kennf

My favorite is watching people who think they are dieting order a stuffed baked potato (after walking by the salad bar). Hmmm, I'm trying to watch my weight, so I guess I'll eat... 1500 calories of pure almost pure glycogen. No insulin shock there. I swear aI once saw a 250 pound woman order a baked potato then pick up a BAG OF POTATO CHIPS on the way to the register.

When half the US is diabetic in ten years, imagine what our health care premiums will be like.

If there are any Ben Folds fans out there, listen to the song All You Can Eat. It's awesome.

earth_dweller

One great place to people watch is Las Vegas. You have the obese folks going around in the motorized thingies, a lot of overweight couples walking from buffet to slot machines back to buffets, wearing tight clothes and then the skinny working girls with fake boobies.... fascinating place

Watching obese folks hitting the salad bar feeling all good and then they smother their veggies with some weird cheese sauce. sad actually.

kennf

Vegas is awesome people watching. You hang out at the strip, watch the "30,000 millionaires", with the "hookers in hiding" in the slots, then go downtown, sit at a $10 table, where the cigarette-smoking 60-year-old tell you "you're throwing off the whole table" 'cause you're not hitting on 16. Good times.

italiano

Sure, not only Americans are fat. But, on average, Americans are one of the fattest nations for many own reasons. Interestingly, the phenomena is most noticeable in the South with Fatlanta leading the pack.

1. Higher cultural reliance on fast foods
2. Population dispersion. You have to drive almost everywhere if you live in suburbs
3. Higher disparity between haves and have-nots.. Low income layers are most obese.
4. Compared to Europe, poorly developed public transportation and bike/walk lanes.
5. American brand of individualism renders many health-oriented public actions ineffective.

Felt_Rider

How could you make such a statement against my hometown?
But it does seem to be very true

However, among the obese Fatlanta people I look like a superior conditioned athlete in this town (probably not so much in other places).

nns1400

Well...we've all heard the expression Southern fried...

I once had fried pickles at a catfish place in Mississippi. Better than you would think BTW. But one year when I was working at trade shows all through GA, AL and MS, every meal they served us was fried chicken, fried catfish, fried hush puppies, potato salad and cole slaw. Was pretty good the first time...and I quickly grew to hate the sight and smell of it...ate power bars all the time. Oh, and sometimes they would have BBQ ribs. So there you go...

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If someone really bothers you, think about walking a mile in their shoes...then, you'll be a mile away, and you'll have their shoes.