Do you want a heart attack with that?

I was thinking about the subject of obesity the other day.

I'm not sure if they still do it, but McDonalds used to have a staff training policy that whenever a customer placed an order without french fries, the staff were instructed to subtly upsell by asking' "Do you want fries with that?" Lots of times the customer will be persuaded to add fries to his or her order. Now all these fast-food outlets are trying to position themselves as offering "healthy choices". Have you ever had a McDonald's salad? It tastes like it was made by a lion or some carnivore that had no idea about fruit or vegetables. And it's plastered with some sauce that will make you gag.

When I go to our local swimming pool, I see a lot of people who would fit the obese spectrum from mildly obese (can you be mildly obese?) to very obese. I saw a woman one day who looked to be in her 30s and her thighs were as round as the trunk of my body. I am not a thin little supermodel either. I weigh 88kg, am 1.83 metres in height ( 6 foot in the old system) and have a solid but not fat build. I have seen several people at the swimming pool whose feet are constantly in the shade of their bellys.

Now I have no wish to be harsh or judgemental, but you do not go to bed one night as thin as a Hollywood starlet (unhealthily anoxeric in some cases) and wake up in the morning obese.

When I'm putting on a few extra pounds/kilos, I workout more and try to eat a bit less and get more exercise. Don't these folk, who are headed down obesity highway, ever stop to think: "I'm starting to expand, better rein that in."

I know people say obesity is driven by emotional problems and low self-esteem and I won't argue with that, but if you want to live longer for yourself or your partner or your children or just to be plain cussed, you gotta stop chug-a-lugging the soft drinks or the alcohol and eating Maccas or KFC.