I’m feeling peaceful already…

Over the last week, some random ideas have come to me that I think might help America and the obesity epidemic.  I’ve long stated that we are eating ourselves to death, and I am no exception.  Case in point: I’m too ashamed to admit how many ribs I’ve ingested in the past week.  Let’s just say it’s MORE than 1 rack.  And by “more than 1”, I mean…maybe more than 2, but I digress.

I’d like to propose some solutions:

(1) Take all the drive-throughs off the McDonald’s and stick them on Subway instead.

(2) Close down the Cheesecake Factory (I hear the outcry….shhh, just hear me out).  The Bistro Shrimp Pasta dish has 2,285 calories.  Rub your eyes and check again…over 2 THOUSAND calories on one plate.  That’s more food than you’d need in an entire day, not including drinks, apps, and dessert…which by the way…will be cheesecake. The cheesecake alone will give you another 1000 calories, so it’s possible to walk out the door having eaten nearly 4000 calories at one sitting.  After eating that much food, it’s less of a “walk” and more of “fart-propelled crawl”. That’s.just.horrifying.  Our pancreases are screaming for mercy.  Greg and I both agree that hell must look something like the front waiting area at The Cheesecake Factory.  You sign in, the Devil gives you a pager, and it simply NEVER buzzes.  Never.  Why does it take 2 hours to get a table at The Cheesecake Factory, you ponder, while sipping your 2nd daiquiri?  Because the employees move like people who do nothing but eat CHEESECAKE all day!  If you ate a slice of cheesecake every single day, how quickly would you move through the world?  I’m guessing sloooowly.

I love you cheesecake, but I love me more.  Well, more love. Less of me.  I’d like to eat less cheesecake and therefore, have less of me to love. It’s an inverse relatio…OK, I hear you…no more Lori Math in our World Peace lesson.

(3) Figure out a way to make soup and salad ingestible in the car.  We don’t really want fast food.  We just warm bellies that feel full in a hurry.  Um…hello…soup?  Problem solved.  Except for the pesky problem of eating it while driving.  Salad is equally problematic.  Salad on a stick?  But no iceberg lettuce is allowed, because only Peter Rabbit needs to eat that stuff.  The rest of us should eat dark green and leafy, which tastes better anyway.  This part of the plan would only work if the restaurants would agree to stop super sizing everything.  I can see a future where we are eating massive portions of chowder out of a trough.  This could go very badly, very quickly.  Who knew soup would be the riskiest part of my plan?

(4) Fill every gym with large screen TVs that play nothing but Justin Timberlake singing and dancing, and videos of Mark Wahlberg cheering us on, saying things like, “Keep going…you look AMAZING!  Want to grab a smoothie after that run?  Because you are AMAZING!”  And while I’m on the subject of Mark Wahlberg, it bears some discussion.  A) Mark Wahlberg is attractive to both males and females, and is quite possibly the only male that straight men are allowed to adore without crossing the gay/straight boundary.  It’s true.  I’ve done a study.  The findings were definitive.  B) What in life isn’t improved by more Mark Wahlberg?  Let me insert a quick clarification: when I say “more”, I don’t mean sex.  It’s so American to think if something is great, we must have more of it, all of it…now, if not sooner. If the media tells us soybeans are good, we’ll find a way to elevate them to great, overindulge in them, and make ourselves sick on soybeans.  SICK?!  Let’s swing the scale and vilify soybeans!  Bad soybeans, bad! I grew up on those nasty little things, and knowing an entire country made themselves sick on soybeans makes me want to move to an island just to escape that level of stupid. Let’s not do such an abhorrent thing to the one person we have going for us as a nation: Mark Wahlberg.   He is a symbol of sex, not sex itself.  And for that matter, America has even ruined sex with over-indulgence, so for our purposes here, we’ll say that Mark W. is a symbol of vitality. Moving on: I think we should take large posters of Mark W. to our enemies.  We could hang it up during peace negotiations, and the discussion would go something like this:

Enemies: Who is this?

Us: Mark Wahlberg.

Enemies: He is a fine specimen of a human.

Us: It’s OK to be attracted to him.  He’s universally attractive to all humans.  We’ve done a study.  He can sing, dance, and act, and well, this is embarrassing to admit, but even the best US Scientists can’t figure out how he keeps getting better looking, the older he gets.  It’s mind-blowing, really.

Enemies: How is that possible?  So much talent and good looks contained in just one person?

Us: We know.  It’s statistically improbable, but it’s true.

Enemies: He’s simply incredible.  Do you have some of his movies?

Us: Actually, as a matter of fact, we have some right here.  Would you like to break for some popcorn and a movie?

Enemies: Would we ever!

(Awesome coated awesome Mark Wahlberg movie break.)

Enemies: Well…I think we can all agree that more Mark Wahlberg is a good thing.

Us: YES!  We agree too!

(Round of laughter as we all realize that we have something we can all agree upon.)

Enemies:  Let’s get these negotiations going and signed so we can get back to our Mark Wahlberg movie marathon!

Us: AGREED AGAIN!

(Second round of raucous laughter, followed by arm punches and back slaps, followed by someone looking up the number for Papa John’s Pizza.  Oh yes, and followed by World Peace, so there’s that.)

Photo courtesy of GQ, who apparently thinks of JT what I think of MW. They make an excellent point.

Back to Justin Timberlake: should his music ever play and I NOT immediately feel the need to dance, please start an IV and pump me full of adrenaline and hormones, because I am certainly near death.  I’m not sure if that much rhythm will help my horrible coordination at the gym, but it can’t get much worse.  My whole life it’s the same story: I walk into the gym; I get side way sneers from people which communicate the message, “You are skinny.  I hate you.”  Many people have said it right to me, which has always astounded me.  Our culture states it’s OK to be completely rude to skinny people, because clearly, we have it all?  I’m just floored every time it happens. Then, I get on the treadmill, and sometimes, I fall right off.  Those looks change to pity, and I can hear, “OH…oh.  Well, now…that’s just sad.”  Yep, nerd in life = nerd at the gym.  No one has it all people.  Except Mark Wahlberg.

Let’s sum up the “Lori Plan For A Healthier America”:

Our world would be at peace.  We’d eat yummy flavorful soup and crunchy salads covered in fresh veggies for lunch.  Our gyms would be packed with people working out and having pop up dance parties right in the middle of lifting weights.  There would be more Mark Wahlberg, which is similar to more cowbell, but just so much better.  We’d have more time to go to the gym because we would no longer have to wait for tables at the Cheesecake Factory.  I’d still fall off the treadmill, BUT, I’ll be grabbing a smoothie after with you know who, so wha-A-A-t-ever.  Are you with me?!