The Romanian Dream » fat

You know you’re too fat when… (Losing weight saga – 10)

Mircea — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 04:08:15 +0000

Here is another episode of the Losing weight saga.

Some time has passed since the begging of the saga, some weight has been lost (more on this subject soon) so now I can look back and laugh about some fat-induced situations that sure were not funny at the point in time at which they occurred. So I will give you a couple of signs that could help you realize you’re too fat, if that’s the case. Without any further ado, here goes.

You know you’re too fat if:
- you lose your breath after climbing 2 rows of stairs
- you prefer to wait for the next bus instead of running after the current one that’s about to leave the station
- pizza is something that you eat on a daily / almost daily basis
- you explain your weight by the fact that you’re big boned.
- your weight is a limiting factor in what you can and cannot do
- your belly is preventing you from tying your shoelaces properly
- you cannot remember the last time you had a good night sleep
- your feet are killing you if you walk for more than 10 minutes
- you’re fat is doing a good job insulating you (you’d be surprised)
- high blood pressure is something normal to you
- your idea of exercise is watching sports on TV
- you have no clue what’s the difference between protein and carbohydrates
- you think that drinking sugar free soda is totally acceptable
- eating a Snickers bar relaxes you
- your desert is followed by another desert
- you eat uncontrollably to fight your emotions
- during summer you’re sweating out of control
- you get chills up your spine if you look at yourself naked in the mirror
- you go straight for the largest size available when shopping for new clothes
- a big towel is not big enough to wrap your waist
- you have troubles fitting into a normal seat in an airplane
- you’re not allowed to do certain things because of your weight (for example: skydive or ride a horse)

Should I go on?

Food Content and Labels

Mircea — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 01:03:02 +0000

Ever wondered how the caloric value for different foods is measured? I mean, everything must have a neat label that informs you, the consumer, about the contents and caloric value of the product you’ve just picked up in your friendly neighborhood (or not) supermarket. But how are those values established ?

Well, it seems that there is a pretty interesting way of measuring the caloric value, the proteins, carbohydrates and fats in any food.

Here is a good starting point: http://www.slate.com/id/2099285/

Some interesting links derived from that:

The Kjeldahl method: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kjeldahl_method

Wilbur Olin Atwater: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilbur_Olin_Atwater – the father of measuring caloric values and food composition. Everything that is done today is more or less derived from the work of this guy.

USDA Nutrient Database: http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Funny – How Japanese View the American Police

Mircea — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 06:04:35 +0000

Taboo – Fat People

Mircea — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 05:40:28 +0000

Introduction here: http://theromaniandream.com/blog/2009/07/17/taboo/

Today’s topic: Fat People

Header: Before going into the actual subject, let’s watch a documentary on the subject of unhealthy eating: http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/peter_jennings_reporting_how_to_get_fat_without_really_trying/

For those of you who don’t have 44 minutes to watch it, I’ll sum it up for you. It’s really hard to eat in a healthy manner here in the US if you’re not willing [or are unable] to spend money on selected, quality food. Yeah, it’s seems kind of obvious at first, but if you don’t make a whole lot of money it basically means that you’re stuck eating crappy food that will basically destroy your health in the long run. The more than sad part about this is that people don’t even realize this and the junk they usually eat is associated with ‘normal’ food. (when I say junk, don’t think about McDonalls or KFC, think about what you usually buy at the grocery store. Even fruits, if not organic aka expensive, can be junk)

Scene1: A nice restaurant. A lovely couple sits down at a table. They order something to eat. Nothing out of the ordinary. The food arrives. Just look at the size of these dishes. Jumbo.

Scene2: You pick up a product at your local grocery story. You look on the label to see what it contains. It comes as no surprise to see that the sweetener used is corn syrup. Yummy.

Scene3: A gym. An overweight person drives his car as close as possible to the entry of the gym and parks there. No use to walk more than necessary. It does not matter that this defeats the whole idea of a gym. Now replace gym with everything: store, mall, cinema, fast food place, etc. Always optimizing for minimum walking. Walking is bad for you. It puts all the pressure of your stuffed body on your knees and ankles. Walking is bad, mkay?

Scene4: You browse the internet. All over there are commercials for loosing weight. Miracle products. Miracle diets. Basically the same thing happens in printed magazines. Everybody is after the 2 step miracle cure/diet that will make everybody slim and good looking. Everything else that involves eating correctly and exercise is… c’mon, do you really think anybody has time for all that crap?

The bottom line:

Food, as everything else is a business here in the US. It doesn’t really matter how healthy it is as long as you make a profit. It doesn’t really matter that an icecream milkshake topped with whipped cream and caramel, jumbo size can have as much as 1300 calories. Who the fuck cares? It tastes good. It looks good. Let’s grab it. Yeeeeah.

Instead of an ending I’ll leave you with the 3 sizes most food product come in over here. The 3 sizes are: king size, extra large and jumbo.

Prison Break with a twist

Mircea — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 20:51:40 +0000

You probably know the Prison Break TV Series. One guy is going to prison to save his brother who is facing the death penalty… yada yada yada. They should have stopped after the first season. Maybe just because the show is too popular, they have to keep going on and on with all kind of impredictable scenarios and situation turns. That’s just lame.

I admit that from the producer’s point of view it’s hard to stop when a show is popular but I think they should have chosen another path to keep it going. They could have done the whole prison escape thing again (actually they did in season 3, but never mind that) changing one main thing about the movie.

For example, Michael Scofield could be fat. Don’t laugh! Think about it. He would have had more room to tatoo itself. It would have been harder, if not impossible, to charm Sara. He would have had troubles crawling through all the nasty places it crawled and all the inmates would have tried to get him in the sack due to his man boobs. It would have been totally different and only some elements could link this show to the first season. And it would have been way more interesting.

Another twist is that Lincoln could have been the actual killer. And they are actually working on framing someone else instead of him. Or Sara could have been f*in ugly.

The posibilities are endless as long as there is a prison involved at some point.

Just end the show already and let everyone focus on more important TV series. Muhahaha