Great Big Guy, Day 1001

I wrote "Great Big Guy" in the title of this post instead of "Great Big Fat Guy." Does this mean I no longer consider myself to be a fat guy? No. It means I'm no longer sure whether or not I'm fat, or whether or not I was fat when I wrote all of those Great Big Fat Guy posts.

Of course, whether or not someone is fat is a very subjective call -- and, of course, these days a lot of people think it simply isn't cool to call yourself or anyone else fat, but I'm going to just plow right ahead in spite of such people. It's a subjective call. Myla Dalbesio

has often been referred to as a "plus-size" model, which I think is cuckoo-bananas. Recently, like since a week ago maybe, I've become aware of some widespread anger at the fact that some call her plus-size. I have no idea whether this anger may have been widespread long before I became aware of it.

Let's take another case: Brian Shaw, one of the world's leading competitors in strongman competitions:

Some would call Shaw, 6 foot 8 and over 400 lbs, a great big fat guy, some would not. I would not.

But when it comes to myself, I just don't know. And for most of my life, I haven't known how I've looked. Maybe I have some sort of self-image problem similar to those people who literally starve to death because they think they're fat. Except I'm definitely not starving to death: my weight has stayed around 300 lbs for quite a few years now. Now, there's are some men who are 6 foot 3 like me and weigh 300 pounds and compete in strongman competitions, and there are some who have the same height and weight and are in very bad shape.

I exercise every day. I take the stairs instead of the elevator unless I have absolutely no choice. But do I look like one of the guys in one of Brian's Shaw's regular gyms, or more like a walking heart attack? I really don't know.

But, for example, 3 weeks ago today, I went to the emergency room with what was probably a panic attack, and one of the ambulance guys was talking to me and asking about my routine lately, and it came up that the day before, I had been doing crunches, and I did 75 before I stopped counting. One of the ambulance guys, a young slender guy who looked to be in excellent health, mentioned that that was more crunches than he had done the day before.

Given that I exercise every day, there may just be a chance that I look like someone who exercises every day, and has for a very, very long time, since I have, even though my cardio is not always off the charts.

Did I mention I'm 57 freakin' years old? Maybe I can give myself a break more often, and worry about this sort of thing less often. Maybe just relaxing in general is the sort of thing a guy who suffers from panic attacks should look into. Enjoy life more, judge myself less. Wacky stuff like that.

Great Big Fat Guy, Day 12

So, have I lost any weight yet in these 12 days? That's a good question. The place where I live tilts. This means that if you put a lacrosse ball on the floor or an orange on a counter, it will roll east. It also means that scales are useless.

I did another one of the 3-miles walks just now. I feel good. I feel fat, but I feel good.

To that person who, 30 years ago, said, as I was entering the room: "He sort of LOOKS like a bowling pin," and then there was an awkward silence as people wondered whether I'd heard, and put it together with my name -- different Bollingers from different parts of the world pronounce the name in quite a variety of different ways. My family employs the German-Swiss pronunciation, with the first 2 syllables sounding like "bowling," the g swalled, the e an unaccented schwa and the r pronounced -- if you're reading along, yes I did hear you, yes I did put it together, and I've completely forgotten everything about you except that one thing you said, and that I never thought you were as funny as you did.

As far as I know, I am related to no Bollingers involved in the invention of Bollinger Bands or the creation of the swanky champagne.

Great Big Fat Guy, Day 7

In my last Great Big Fat Guy post I mentioned that I've never been much of a runner. But last night I dreamed about running and enjoying it a lot more than I usually do, running really fast and for quite a while, and I remembered that recently, I have enjoyed some long and fast spontaneous spur-of-the-moment runs while I've been out for a walk.

But when I was awake this morning I thought: wait a minute: have I actually run like that a few times recently (over the course of the past year or so), or have I only dreamed about it a few times recently?

And the strange thing is: I honestly don't know whether I've done that for real or only in dreams. I mean: I know I've had a few short bursts of running of up to maybe 50 yards or so. But I was thinking that recently I'd run a lot farther than that at a stretch. And I don't know whether I really did, or if I just dreamed it. Isn't that weird?

My lower legs are fine. No shin splints or other serious injuries. It was just some muscles waking up and yelling, "Hey! What are you DOING to us?!" They're with the program now.

I have some aches and pains, but they're all okay. Some fitness enthusiasts who are young and lucky enough never to have faced serious injury or illness yet like to say,

"Pain is just weakness leaving the body."

But that's not always true. Sometimes pain is a broken bone or a kidney stone, to give just 2 examples with which I am personally familiar.

But the aches and pains I'm having now are just weakness leaving my body.

Always remember to stretch. A lot. How much should you stretch? If you can, go and watch a high-level track team stretching, see how long it goes on and on. Stretch a lot, do it carefully, stop when it hurts.

In conclusion: Katy Perry remains very, very, very pretty. To be painfully honest about it, I don't know if I like any of her songs besides "Firework." But there's never been any law against watching a music video with the sound off. Thnk yu verr mutch pleez! Ah still thinkz that Katy iz sooper awesumz!!! (I'm a tiny little kitten!!!)

Great Big Fat Guy, Day 3

The story so far: day before yesterday I walked 5-10 miles, farther than I'd walked in -- I don't know, a while. Yesterday I felt really tired and sore, but went for a 3-mile walk anyway, and got a second wind mid-way through the walk, and finished it feeling great.

I included the video to Katy Perry's "Firework" on my previous Great Big Fat Guy blog post, because I like the song, and because I want to spread that sort of positivity. Also because I had happened to surf onto the end of the documentary How to Dance in Ohio, about a group of autistic teenagers in Columbus, Ohio, having a dance, and Katy sang an acoustic version of "Firework" over the closing credits. And it was super-awesome.

Here's Katy crushing it live:



And today I read in the Hollywood Reporter's review of the documentary that "Firework" is

"the unofficial anthem of the disability rights movement."

And I suppose that if there's a disability rights movement, I ought to be supporting it. Especially if we've got such a cool unofficial anthem.

This morning, as most mornings, I did a bit of exercise and stretching as soon as I got out of bed. My shins and calves hurt. In 2008, I was having a very difficult time exercising, and I got shin-splints from walking not very much at all, and I eventually found out that I had a malfunctioning parathyroid gland which resulted in, among other things, too little calcium getting to my bones. The malfunctioning gland had to be surgically removed. (There are several parathyroid glands in the human body. They are not related to the thyroid except for being located near it.) I felt much better as soon as the malfunctioning gland was removed. I'm hoping that the minor pain I'm feeling today is not indicative of some other chemical imbalance of deficiency, and that it'll get better as I get thinner. I'll continue with the exercise as planned (gradually increasing walking distance, then maybe eventually adding running or cycling or basketball or something like that) unless the pain in my lower legs becomes severe.

I've never been much of a runner, I don't know why. 2 examples: in the 9th grade we had gym 3 times a week, and in every gym class we had to run 1/2 mile. That is, we had to run 5 laps around the gym and we were told that 5 laps was 1/2 mile. (It probably was.) Once during the year we raced the 1/2 in groups of a half-dozen or so and were timed. I thought I was going to to pretty well in the race. I remember looking at a little pudgy kid in my group as I waiting for the starting whistle, feeling a little sorry for him, assuming that he couldn't keep up with me. Then the whistle sounded, and it honestly seemed to me that the little pudgy kid and the rest of our group were somehow 5 to 10 yards ahead of me before I'd finished my first stride. I was amazed by the pace they were setting, and they didn't let up for the entire 1/2 mile. I literally ran as fast as I could in an unsuccessful attempt to catch most of them. If I recall correctly, I and one other boy (not the short pudgy one) were in a very close race not to finish dead last. I don't remember whether I finished last or next to last. I remember that my time was 2:52.

In 11th grade gym class will still were doing the 1/2 mile 3 times a week, and we went outside once during the year for a 1 1/2 cross country race. This time the whole class raced together at once. I remember that I and a few other walked part of the way. I remember that at the end, once again I and another boy were running for all we were worth in our own private duel. I don't remember whether or not the 2 of us were dead-last in the whole class. If not, we were definitely toward the back. Many other boys, who'd finished, were crowded around the finish line, and I knew they were no longer winded, because they were loudly shouting encouragement to both of us. I don't remember which of the 2 of us won our private race. I remember that my time was either 13:13 or 13:31.

In 8th-grade football, I was timed at 7.4 seconds over 40 yards. In full pads and helmet, but still.

So I don't know whether there's something physically wrong with me which hampers my running. The thing is, I don't think I was really unathletic altogether. Among other strenuous activities I did a lot of bicycle riding, and played basketball rather well, played baseball rather well after blossoming as a hatter in the 10th grade.

And I played ping-pong so well that I did not lose a single game for a period of years. My unbeaten streak would have been even longer except that between 2 unbeaten streaks, I happened to play the only player I've ever faced who played ping-pong better than I: my high-school guidance counselor, a grim-faced wiry 6-foot-5-inch monster of a man, a former Indiana state champion. Whether he'd been a high school champion, or won some sort of professional Indiana open, or what exactly, I don't know. The two of us played one day when I was 15, he won every game, and those were the only games of ping-pong I lost from the age of 13 to the age of 20.

They called me King Pong. Yes, they really did.

My point is, my remarkably poor performance in running doesn't seem to match up with my athletic performance in general. I have a right bundle-branch block, an abnormality in the construction of my heart's valves. The doctors say it's nothing to worry about, it's just unusual. I wonder if it has something to do with my having been good at basketball and awesome at ping-pong but terrible at high-speed running. (As a kid, I was even a way-above-average base stealer in Little League: my ability to get a good jump more than compensated for my slow running.)

I'm A Great Big Fat Guy, And I'm Not Okay With That!

Not okay with the fat part, that is. For long periods of my life I've been lean and wiry -- the term "like a greyhound" was heard now and then -- and for long periods I've been overweight, and thin is definitely better. I want to get thin again.

And it occurred to me that if I blogged about my exercise program, it might encourage me to do better, because some readers might take an interest, so that if I do well, more people will be fired up about it -- cue Katy Perry singing "Firework"



-- and if I get lazy, more people will be disappointed. I don't know why I didn't think of this before, but whatever, I thought of it today.

I'm fat, but I'm not in the worst shape I've ever been in. For years now I've been doing push-ups and crunches every single day. Most days I also do some calisthenics and stretching, but I realized that I have to do more to get my heart rate up and some sweat flowing if I'm going to lose weight. So yesterday I did some walking. I don't know how far I went. More than 5 miles, probably less than 10.

And the way I could tell that I was in better shape than I've been recently is that as I was nearing home at the end of the walk, I wasn't in agony. Fairly recently I've been in bad enough shape that a much shorter walk than that could get me hurting all over and pouring sweat and cramping in my legs and back and feeling like I would much rather lie down flat on my back and not move at all, than continue walking. Sometimes when I got home from a walk, the first thing I would do when I got inside was lay down flat on my back on the floor and stay there motionless for quite a while, breathing very heavily, my heart pounding.

Willie Mays described feeling like he didn't want to move after having collapsed during a game in September 1962. I read about that in the 1972 edition of My Life In & Out of Baseball, by Mays as told to Charles Einstein.



As it's described in that book, Mays passed out on the field, and when he woke up he was lying on his back on the field, and his manager asked him how he felt, and he said that he felt like he didn't want to move -- he could move, but he felt like he'd rather not.

I suppose I was 11 or 12 years old when I first read that. That description of how Willie Mays felt at that moment after having passed out and then come to again -- like he could move but he'd rather not -- made quite an impression on me. At the time, I definitely had never felt that way.

I don't know if I ever felt that tired before I was full-grown. I don't think I did -- and if I did, it would have been near the end of a 50-mile hike, or after having played basketball literally all day, or something like that.

In the past few years, I've felt that way quite a few times, sometimes after having walked a distance as short as 2 miles.

So: what I did yesterday, walking 5 or 10 miles and feeling pretty good at the end of the walk: I realize that that wouldn't be a big deal for a world-class marathoner. But for a big fat slob like me, it was pretty good.

And I want to build on it. Although I felt fine at the end of yesterday's walk, when I woke up this morning I felt sore and tired. I thought it would be good, if I'm going to do this instead of letting hard work make me quit, to take a brisk 3-mile walk -- there's a place which according to Google Maps is 1 1/2 miles from my place. So there and back = 3 miles.

As I started off on today's walk I felt terrible. Long before I reached the 1 1/2 mile mark I felt like I would much rather lay down flat on my back on the sidewalk and not move, than keep on walking.

But then, shortly after I got to the halfway point and turned around to return home, I felt much better. A second wind! Wow! If I ever had a second wind in my life before today, it was long enough ago that the memory has faded away completely.

So. Rinse & repeat a couple hundred times and have some discipline in my diet, and I might be greyhound-like once more.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. One day at a time. One step at time.

Tony Mangan, watch yr back! (Is that endorphins talking?)