So I'm picking up my daughter at the after-school Y program she loves.
Tuesday is Ballet Day, I'm guessing because the waiting room outside the gym is full of little girls in their leotards. I am maybe way out of line even mentioning it, but ALL of these little girls - like twenty of them - are very overweight. Wa-a-ay overweight for such young children. And it's simply obvious, to anyone and it bothers me.
Of course, they are all happy, running around like young children should be. All excited to get in the gym and start dancing around doing what ballet dancers do, I guess.
It crosses my mind how cruel it is of their parents to let this happen to their kids. But the parents, mothers and fathers, also there in the waiting room, are overweight - really really fat. Currently we live in the south where they deep-fat-fry butter, so it's kind of a culture thing to be chunky. Guys! This is getting out of hand though.
I have two daughters. Neither were ever, like, overweight. My youngest is disabled and she exercises with me for about ten minutes every night. She can do thirty sit-ups with a sixteen lbs rubber weight ball in her hands. It really doesn't take much. Eat about half the carbs and walk to the mailbox and you won't get that big.
I do believe in political correctness and social sensitivity, but holy cow who's gonna take care of them when they get to be thirty and the airlines run out of belt-extensions. They're going to die from exposure in the Walmart parking lot when the little battery powered go-cart battery runs down.
Believe me, I understand, I sympathize. At my age I'm loosing the battle with gravity too. I go to the gym nearly every day and I can't brag on being tiny myself anymore. I seem to have developed the metabolism of a tree sloth. Not to lie either, it hurts. Arthritis, my knees are shot ... I feel like I need an ibuprofen I-V drip. I've noticed that these days most of the people I see there are gettin' on in seasons like me. Why is this? Where are the youngsters?
You might be against taxes, but somebody's gotta pay to fix the roads and bridges or nobody's gonna get to Dunkin' Donuts. And then the whole economy is going to crash. If all the young ones can't fit in their cubicles at work, who's gonna pay any taxes? That and the whole Art of Ballet is going to become a distant memory.
Admittedly the food the food industry is producing nowadays is mostly corn syrup and salt. Has all the nutrition of plain candy. Thing is, there is a produce section and they do sell vegetables (whoops! I didn't mean to swear. Can't help it ...vegetables!!!)
My daughter and I spent a half an hour trying to find the humus the other day. Half an hour! I finally had to call my wife. With her help we located it - in the bakery section in-between a huge rack of cakes (massive three layer cakes with enough frosting to give anyone immediate type 1 diabetes) and deli-gourmet bread.
Little boys aren't any slimmer. I encountered the information that the Armed Forces are having a real problem because close to half of the enlistees can't pass even the most basic physical fitness tests. It's going to get so bad that when the republicans send us to another war they will have to re-institute the draft. But it won't be based on age, it'll be based on cholesterol and blood pressure levels.
Which means, I'll get drafted again! Well, at least the uniforms are more in line with southern fashion - by which I mean camo. (They even camo their fishing boats down here.)
Bill Gates has a policy, I've heard, that his employes can make any criticism they want as long as they include a suggestion for a solution. So with that in mind, I say put leotards on the Moms and Dads and make them get out there with their daughters and dance. If it doesn't kill 'em, maybe it make them think about not eating every single thing on the dinner table every night.
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