COLUMN: This New Year make a resolution to keep that resolution about losing weight

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by Packy Saunders

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A LOT of people in America are fat.

Statistics will give a dynamic range of the percentage of Americans that rank in the soft to softer category.

But to keep it simple, let's say that a whole bunch of us fill the description.

The perennial quick fix for our problems is a New Year's resolution. So until the first of February, we go at it: diet, exercise and no choco- late.

Some dieticians and doctors will tell you that our nationwide corpulence is the result of overconsumption.

This seems reasonable when you consider the increase in portion size in restaurants.

A Big Mac was once considered big. Now there are double Big Macs, Double Whoppers and supersize french fries.

The refined sugar beverages we call soft drinks have also gotten out of hand.

We are reminded of the empty calories in beer and other alcoholic drinks when we say "beer gut" and "beer belly."

When are we going to hear "Coke belly" or "Dr Pepper thighs?"

We should when you consider the amount of refined sugar that goes into the 64 ounces of a Stop-N-Go Hoss.

Although overconsumption is not the primary demon in our fatty American purgatory, Director of Student Activities Sarah Nelson Crawford will be the first to assure you that a balanced, vegicentric diet can take you places that burgers, fries and sodas cannot. Diet is important.

What we need to grasp is that we are not going to become an ideally healthy nation without more physical activity and enjoyable exercise.

What makes me such a critic? Well I took my place upon the scale back on Dec. 20. Its response was a creak and swoosh that sent the needle shooting past 320, rebounding to 180, and finally settling on 267 pounds!

To put this in perspective, I weighed 155 pounds entering high school in the fall of 1989 -- at the same height.

But hey, fat is fun. There is more of you to love. You can eat anything you want and not worry about getting fat -- you're already there!

Also you are almost guaranteed to never drown if you are fat because you float. Membership has its privileges.

Even though so many of us out there are leaning on the heavy side, we fat folk do not receive nearly as much acceptance. Something had to be done.

The decision was made to beat the New Year to the resolution punch.

Slowly, I started going jogging as much as I could over break. You won't see my name entered in any marathon or speed contest, yet I got rid of about 15 pounds of flesh in my first four weeks.

This is not a resolution. It is a start. Where I go with this, nobody knows.

But if the past is any indicator -- we'll all quit our health quests.

The point is to try and to try now. Find something you enjoy and do it. Stick with it or try something else.

While it is forgivable to fail a class, our bodies don't have the same flexibility.

We get enough mental workouts here; now let's get outdoors and play.

Copyright © 1996 The Rice Thresher. All Rights Reserved.
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