Back at it

I was not allowed to exercise for a week after a lil procedure I had done last Saturday (well, 5 days + discombobulation due to ophthalmology eyedrops) so it was nice to get back to the gym today. Especially because I’m feeling a bit like a blob (logging in here and seeing “It’s Sausage Week” might be another clue as to why that is).

I’m at the “pants feel tight” stage, which is when I usually put a lil effort into diet and exercise and get back on track, but not sure how that will work in light of my post-concussion brain. I need nutrition and specifically carbs (brains run on glucose!) to get better. The trick I guess is to get those needs met without going overboard in other areas.

Like fat. Pretty much every day I log my nutrition in Cronometer, and pretty much every day it tells me I’m way over budget on fat. Oops! The problem is, fat is yummy.

It’s funny how no one ever puts it that way. 

Like, I saw an infographic the other day about women’s clothing sizes and how they don’t match up (super annoying) and how they also don’t match up to actual women. Or should I say, actual American women. I mean yeah, I have definitely noticed that Japanese brands, for example, run way small compared to American brands. Last fall, when I had to buy a bunch of sweat pants and spaghetti strap cami tops—i.e. clothing I could easily step into and pull up with one hand—I had fun surprises when the same letter size was too small in one brand and too big in another. Simons and H&M had small smalls. Old Navy had huge smalls. Interesting to note, too, that the infographic left off most of the big American brands like Gap. Could it be that American brands cater to American markets, and European and Asian brands cater to European and Asian markets? If you look at a label from H&M, it lists about six different sizes—US, UK, Euro, China, Mexico, and Australia. They all have totally different systems. Why is is such a surprise that items designed and manufactured in different countries would use their own sizing instead of American sizing? US defaultism at its worst.

This at the same time as people are losing their minds over GLP-1 drugs. Are they going to save the world? Or destroy it? Is it “fair” that some people might get to be thin without “doing the work”? There was an editorial about this a few weeks ago marvelling about these things, most amusingly that the per capita cost of obesity in the US—roughly $200/month—is roughly the same as a prescription for these drugs. Give them to everyone! It’s gonna be great!

Which makes me inwardly groan at the thought of all the other wonder drugs that were expected to be panaceas and turned out to cause a whole host of unexpected problems. The marketing of these new drugs, and how easy it is for people to get prescriptions without even a real medical appointment, seems like a set up for disaster.

And shouldn’t the real question be, what caused this shift? Why are this many people in the US suddenly so overweight? At no time in history has there been such a massive shift in such a short period of time. And it’s pretty well confined to the US, although some countries are working to catch up. Why not figure out the root causes and work on those? Maybe stop adding corn syrup and soy to everything, maybe stop eating convenience foods in cars, maybe drive less and walk or bike more!

Anyway I’ve complained about this stuff enough elsewhere on this blog, so I’ll drop the subject for now, because I’m about to go to dinner with friends. A proper meal, sitting down and socialising with people as we break bread, not a solo drive-through dinner.