Curse You Fast Food!

For Superman it's Kryptonite...for Valentino it was the ladies and although I do enjoy the fairer sex, my one true weakness is Fast Food.

As my finely sculpted body shows, fast food doesn't like me. I've always been a big guy. Even as a child I carried extra weight just in case I needed some spare body warmth, but since I graduated college I've really packed on the tonnage. I have more chins than a Chinese phone book and my love handles have taken on a life of their own.

So who or what is to blame for this? Sure I could do the right thing and look in the mirror and blame the person starring back at me but that's not the easy cop-out. I could blame my parents who always told me I had to eat all the food on my plate before I could go outside and play. No, it's much easier to just blame the evildoers of the fast food industry.

In high school I was a big guy but I was still in pretty decent shape and able to play football, rugby and baseball. Even in college and a few year's after I had added more weight, but not to the point that I couldn't track down a fly ball or run the bases. However it was during those college years that my love affair for quick and greasy fattening food took hold.

It all started to go really bad with my first real job at McDonald's. Yes, that's right, I worked at Mickey D's and it wasn't as awful as you might think. The girls I worked with were all cute and the steady pay was a nice perk as well. The trouble was I started out working full-time midnights on the grill. I was always busy as I worked at the restaurant on the Highway but one of the incentives to get people to work that shift was "free food" for the employees. It was the only shift where this happened and of course that was music to my ears...or mouth as the case was.

I'd found myself inventing menu items. Instead of the usual Big Mac's or Quarter Pounders, I was the first one to actually make double or triple Mac's (before they actually made it a menu item). How about the ever popular Quarter Pounder with Chicken and extra mayo? And of course my super size fries were always full. It wasn't long before my belly started to change to a "super size".

So that's where my love affair for fast food began. It was just a natural progression to move on to eating Whopper's at Burger King, Double Classic's with cheese at Wendy's and Double Cheeseburgers at Harvey's. If it was quick, dripping with grease and came with a toy, I was eating it. It was also common to see me inhaling a large bag of potato chips at night and drinking one Coke or Pepsi after another.

Now 17 years later I've moved from being a big guy to super sized guy who is nowhere near as active as I used to be. The aches and pains have begun as well. I still get some exercise rolling out of bed and going to the bathroom. Actually, I love playing golf and I try to walk the course as much as possible but some days the nagging ankle pains from my football and rugby injuries flare up and grabbing a power cart just seems too inviting.

I have certainly cut back on my intake of fast food and snacks today and I feel a little better but some days I just can't resist the temptation. Ask any overweight person and they'll tell you they'd like nothing more than to be thin, healthy and attractive...you know...one of the beautiful people; but it's easier said than done. Not a night goes by when I'm laying in bed thinking, "tomorrow's the day I get serious about losing weight." Yet, tomorrow comes and goes and the willpower just isn't there.

I've come to the conclusion that surgery is the only way I'll ever be thin and I just can't afford that, so I try to be as happy as possible with who I am and who I've become and I'm cool with that for now. I've never had my cholesterol checked but I can imagine my doctor would faint at the sight of the results. Oddly enough I went to the doctor recently and my blood pressure was just fine. I check my blood sugar from time to time and so far so good but I'm sure it's just a matter of time before I'm diagnosed with diabetes. It runs in the family and is likely to happen.

I'm trying to cut back on my fast food intake and I try to make smarter menu choices and I'm happy about that. I used to eat out every day and now I might eat out once or twice a week. It's not perfect but it's a step in the right direction. Now I just need to haul my ass off the couch and get more active. I think I'll go for a walk right now...right after I go to Taco Bell.