There are lots of serious and dangerous events going on in the world and here in the United States. Too dangerous and serious for the Rich Freggiaro Cycling Blog. We try to keep things light-hearted here. Recently I came across a few items that are quite different, but related; call them Variations on a Theme…
PepsiCo and custom spirits maker Empirical are teaming up to launch a new spirit that tastes like a Doritos nacho cheese chip.
I was certain this had to be ‘fake news’ but it is true.
The Empirical x Doritos Nacho Cheese Vacuum Distilled Spirit is described as capturing “all the indulgent flavors of your favorite Nacho Cheese in liquid form,” according to Empirical’s website.
Not only is it real, but according to the company’s web site the supply is completely sold out. I was invited to sign up to receive an e mail or text informing me when it was back in stock, and I was assured they were ramping up production to meet the demand. I demurred; I get too much e mail as it is.
This addiction to the flavor of Doritos, to the extent that one craves it in his/her/their/ze pre-prandial cocktail is part of a larger problem: namely a large number of us are too large. (BTW did you notice how I am starting down the pronoun correctness path? A slippery slope…).
Like almost every cyclist I know, I fret over my weight. Of course back in March 1999, when I hit my doctor’s scale at 190 lbs. I had something to worry about. But now anytime I go north of my self assigned 169 lbs. (before breakfast without any clothes on) food turns to ashes in my mouth and I stay away from pizza or burritos, two of the things that make life worth living.
Don’t believe I could have been approaching 200 lbs. at some point? Here is proof from September 2000, before I got serious about cycling. And the improved version from 2011.
I don’t think anyone I ride with is going to need this, but Southwest Airlines is quite accommodating to the new reality.
Low-cost carrier Southwest Airlines is being celebrated by “passengers of size” on TikTok after they discovered they can request complimentary seats – one or two, depending on needs – to accommodate their girth.
Customers whose bodies “encroach” past the armrest are entitled to an extra seat, according to Southwest’s inclusion policy.
I had no idea, but apparently there are ‘influencers’ who write about how to travel as a plus (+++) sized person.
“Super fat is how we identify,” Chaney, business owner of Jae Bae Productions, said. “There’s a spectrum of fatness. And as a super fat individual, you start needing different accommodations… I just felt really happy that there was something like this for people.”
I identify as a married monogamous heterosexual male cyclist, even if that last part might make some of my riding partners giggle as they power away leaving me in their dust.
Southwest is merely responding to the disturbing trend towards obesity and the accompanying adverse health effects. Those effects even have a name: “metabolic syndrome”. This includes a cluster of weight-related ailments such as high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol levels, excessive abdominal fat, and a poor cellular response to the insulin hormone.
The U.K. has an idea…
“It’s quite right to urge that waist measurements be now taken annually from the time a child first goes to school,” Tam Fry, chair of the National Obesity Forum in the U.K., told The Telegraph.
Measure away: unless kids are going to play outside more and eat less junk food and spend less time looking at screens nothing is going to happen. Because many of their parents are doing the same thing.
The U.K. is trying to follow Japan’s lead. Japan has a remarkably low obesity rate of 4.97%. Compare this to the U.S. (36.47% ) and U.K. (27.88%). And if you adjust for Sumo wrestlers, the Japanese number would be even more impressively low.
But even with such a comparatively lean population, Japan is trying to be proactive and passed a “Metabo Law”
The law mandates that all employees aged between 45 and 74 have their waistlines measured by their employer annually and receive guidance if they do not lose weight after three months, but, despite rumors, Japanese citizens themselves cannot be fined or imprisoned for being overweight.
The expression on the pretty young woman’s face is priceless. (I fell off the pronoun wagon: she is a she or I’m losing it). How would you like that job? An 8 hour shift of wrapping measuring tapes around the bare tummies of middle aged men and women and other genders.
I’m pretty sure the same people who brought us Covid lockdowns and want to take away gas powered leaf blowers cannot weight (!) to ‘help’ us lose excess adipose tissue. Cigarettes have warning labels (in France they are quite graphic). Perhaps the CDC will start with ‘hazardous to your health’ warnings at fast food restaurants and movie theater snack bars. Taxes and regulations to follow shortly…
Rich Freggiaro Cycling Blog 