Karen - I don't know, I have read that the obesity rate in the south is very high, some say because of so much fried food, but I don't know if that is accurate.

With me, at 5'1" - ish and small framed (no hips or shoulders), I have had to actively watch my weight my entire adult life.  I was chubby in 7th-8th grade (up to 130 lbs), and I remember a car driving by once when I was walking home and someone yelled, "Hey!  Heifer!  Lose some weight!"  I never forgot it, and really, 130 lbs wasn't exactly obese at all, but in those days people were a lot thinner. I knew exactly one fat girl in elementary school (I still remember her name) but nowadays so many kids are overweight they have sections for fat girls in the major department stores (Girls Plus), and I was recently shocked to see the local high school swim team was mostly quite overweight.  They are athletes, so I expected more athletic-looking people.

I lost 25 lbs over 9 months as a freshman in high school and have stayed mostly slim since then, with the exception of pregnancy, but even then, the day I gave birth to each of my children I was almost exactly 25 lbs up (with the baby), so I really worked to NOT gain weight with pregnancy.  I am about 109 lbs now, but still have a potbelly darn it, but that isn't going away unless I lose another 9 lbs and I just don't have the gumption to work that hard to be thin.  The best thing, though, is that my DH still treats me like I'm a young hottie, belly and all....

Well Holly, that's cause you are a hottie!

A boy on my street called me "Fatso" when I was in grade 5. It hurt. Then a year later my brother poked me in the stomach and called me the same name...that was it for me! I started dieting in middle school, as in, I would only eat an orange for lunch. Of course that doesn't really work to do anything except make one miserable. Then I happened to start playing sports after school and got slim as I shot up in height.

I blame cars first and inexpensive high-calorie food second for the obesity problem. If we were poorer and had to walk more...  And now there is the digital age, hard to rip your kids away from those video games.

KSA, a young woman from Texas came to work in our lab in Toronto one year. Wow, the make-up - it was really piled on thick.

When I was in Italy, I noticed NO woman, no matter how old (70s, 80s, 90s), lets their hair go grey. I must have really stood out.

Singles:  When my oldest son was on the Junior High School wrestling team, the form fitting and hard to grasp wrestling uniform was called a single.  I think it was all one piece, or that may have been my assumption, going by the name.   Sometimes we would tease him about the wrestling team's "onesies".

Not too many guys seem to be speaking up about appearance issues and weight, which is normal for guys. But being abnormal I can give my thoughts comfortably in this forum.   When I was in college and in pretty good shape, I was a physical education major.  I was not a cool kid though, among the cool physical education majors who mostly picked that as a way to satisfy their parents who just wanted them to go to college for two years, at least, but still hang around a basketball court most of the day and shoot hoops.   I went to class, got good grades, and didn't kiss up to the instructors who I thought were pigs, acting totally hypocritically compared to what they were teaching us.  I was no one's favorite and didn't care....We had to learn how to teach just about every sport that might be taught in a HS gym class, so we learned how to do just about everything pretty well.  The one class where I did really well was swimming.  There was one former HS Swimmer in the class, and he was much faster than everyone else except for me.  He was faster than I was and the apple of the swim class instructor's eye.   By the third week of classes, he was no longer faster than I was.   One day during instruction time outside of the pool, which almost never happened, the instructor gave me a shoutout about how fast of a swimmer I was..it was a set-up.  She said "Do you know why Brian swims so fast?"  She reached over and grabbed a piece of fatty skin on the back of my arm and said it was because of all of the fat on my body.  Even the class mates who were generally unkind to me were like, "Wow, that wasn't very nice".   I was pretty crushed and embarrassed and stood there in my mostly naked skin, feeling very uncomfortable in it.  Yeah that hurt and it still does.  I'm still not lean.  I was 22 and in good shape, but I was still not lean. 10+ years ago I was 20 pounds lighter than I am now (165 vs 185) and ran a 1:38 half marathon for my first race at that distance.  I was still not lean.   I know if I focus on my appearance, I will be disappointed and frustrated, as I've been down that road numerous times in the past.  But if I train for fitness and use the competitive juices for training for swim meets several times per year, I'll enjoy my workouts, eat a healthy (mostly, I guess) diet, and try to keep a neat appearance with good fitting clothing.   With the onset of Crohn's disease several years ago, I've been forced to take a look at what I eat, how often I eat the things I probably should keep very limited, and put intelligent decision making into practice at the kitchen table.  I've got a belly and always will, but I remind myself what I would look like if I didn't stain like I do, eat like I do, and work outside in the yard like I do.

I am shocked now by how many high schoolers are bigger than me.  

Anne - when I was on the Japanese deep sea trawler in the sixties, I was so much the tallest of all 100 crewmen that they issued me a hard hat helmet when I kept banging my head at the top of the stairways.  Of hundreds, if not thousands of passengers on my daily subway commute in those days, I used to try and see if there anyone around was taller than me.  Now that I've lost a huge 3" from my original 5'10", I know the feeling.

It's demoralizing to be in the last few miles of a marathon and have racewalkers overtake me and leave me in the dust, and this while I'm jogging!

Holly - no problem. You'll get over it when you get older.  It's been decades since I thought it humiliatingly odd that both of the only two racewalkers I've ever seen in my life in races out here could pass me and I couldn't keep up.

. . . NO woman, no matter how old (70s, 80s, 90s), lets their hair go grey.

Enks - Japan corollary: NO woman, no matter how old in Japan (70s, 80s, 90s), actually looks old, . . . especially now that I'm getting older than most of them anyway.

In biggest news of the decade, if not two decades, for me is today's successful Internet switch from Century Link I've had ever since internet service began that apparently inadvertently got cancelled during 50 minutes of trying to arrange transferring service last Tuesday from the island to the whatever the part of Seattle it is that we've been moving to right between downtown and Lake Washington's favorite little parks I like a mile to the east and, after spending a tedious 90 minutes with Xfinity on Friday with a very patient tech who never seemed exasperated with me for enrolling in their internet and also along with phone service both so I can get free of the constant price increases after twenty years with T-Mobile, today's installation of the Xfinity modem on my own, without anyone's help about the internet anything for the first time, went miraculously smooth.

Oddly enough, though, for the most part, T-Mobile had excellent customer service at their many, many local outlets, the price increases without notice and explanation were frustrating and stressful, Xfinity's much more dealable pricing for both internet and phone combined was not matched by their terrible personal customer service as, when we went to their downtown store to pick-up the needed internet modem, they had us sit down at a customer service table for 24 minutes wondering what in the heck was going on but, being old and not caring (and knowing we couldn't do anything about it even if we did care), we just waited it out until the same clerk finally emerged from his going in-and-out of the back room, chatting with other techs, enjoying whatever was on their  screens, etc. and came to us with a big Xfinity bag saying, "here it is."  Not a thank you for using Xfinity, explanation of why we had to wait so long, nary a comment or guidance on setting it up or anything. Fortunately, by the time we got back, I had an e-mail from Xfinity with a hot link to setting up their app that already apparently knew enough about me that I just plugged the modem in and watched its gradually installation letting me sign it into my laptop and voila !, here I am. Yippee.

ps tank tops - NPR had a little vignette on Sunday on emerging tank top fashion that elevates them even to the rich-and-famous receptions the Eastside is renowned for around here.  As for me, tank tops have little wider straps better for holding up than the narrow singlet ones.

pps - NPR said it and I've see a lot this summer on muscle machos around here, men can wear it too.

MIKE! - do not get any ideas.

I’m tired just reading through today’s thread - the focus on fat kind of depresses me too. I know that wasn’t Jay’s intention when he tossed out the belly question, but it definitely evolved. I’m just trying to stay fit for life and figure out what foods work best for me and what I need to avoid to stop having stomach issues when I run. Life is too short.

20 minute Peloton barre class, 2 hours at the beach and some time lounging at the campground pool.

I joined the Piping Plovers run club for their Monday evening run. I am definitely more of a morning runner, but wanted to join in on a group run and I used it as a practice run for Berna’s Great Legs for Women Thursday evening.

2.6 miles to the Eastern Trail, 4 miles on the Eastern Trail with the group (sort of) and 2.5 miles back to the campground.

Stretched , showered and ready to call it a night!!
Sleep well Masters

Tom White - That's quite a scare.  May your bruise fade quickly.

Dave59 - Hopefully the transition is smooth.

Thanks for putting yourself out there BTY and others.

Tetsujin209 - I'm not impressed with the service you received.

I did PT in the morning.  Ugh.

 

   Also- I think the workforce plays into it, too.  Let's face it- appearing youthful and energetic helps in a lot of professions and workplaces.  

 

I had a chat with my boss at 3:00.   He suggested that I take over inventory control.  That's a position I had wanted for several years. He wants a 5-year commitment.  I'm interested.  He's got to put the job out on the company website, and he has to interview others.