251 days ago
I am sure that there are many of you thin folks who will be screaming “fat bastard” as you read this. You would be right. But I am on a journey as I try, again, to tackle type two diabetes and that journey started, just after Christmas, seeing me tip the scales at closer to 17 stone than 16. Now, today’s weigh in shows that I am closer to 15 stone than to 16 stone. I am, by nature, one of life’s fatties and weight has been a lifelong battle.
1380 days ago
Fading celeb Anthea Turner has learned a valuable lesson for 2021 – never tell the truth if it might offend anyone. The poor woman tweeted out the common sense point that most of those who were not old or frail who have died from covid were largely obese or unhealthy from self-inflicted illnesses. I write this as a fat diabetic. What Anthea said is true but that is neither here nor there in 2021 Britain. She was quickly set upon by a pack of twitter hyenas, folks who sniff out folks saying anything that might offend anyone, including, natch, the Guardian’s Owen Jones, the witchfinder general of the woke legions on twitter. His supporters piled on en masse. Pretty soon, Anthea, facing the ruin of what is left of her career, was forced into issuing a grovelling apology.
2684 days ago
This is not the sort of matter that my father would consider that a gentleman should discus in public. But, as my critics often point out, I am no gentleman and, in 2017, we should perhaps talk openly about men's health. I have for some weeks had intermittent pains in my private parts and my left testicle now appears to be larger than my right one.
2704 days ago
Sadly my old GP has moved to a new practice in Devon. I regreat this as he was tolerant of my politics (though obviously a screaming Guardian reading trot himself), we chatted at length about olive trees and he always had to chide me on my lack of progress in tackling my type 2 diabetes. How I wish Dr Curry had been there today as I met up with his replacement and met up in a blaze of glory
2923 days ago
I start with the urgent matter of the weight of my three legged cat Oakley and I take stern warnings from health guru Paul Scott. But there are problems to deal with which the guru may not appreciate. Then I comment again on African Potash (AFPO) which has suffered the usual fate of those PLCs who threaten me with fascist lawyers' letters. Then I work my through Senterra (SEN), Mitie (MTO), China Africa (CAF), Arria (NLG), Instem (INS) and LXB retail (LXB).
3051 days ago
Nicola Sturgeon seems amazed that EU leaders are not lining up begging Scotland to join the Evil Empire as soon as possible. It has not dawned on her that, set to lose a major benefactor in form of the United Kingdom (in reality England plus the Celtic scroungers), the last thing it wants is to take back the welfare addicted nation of idlers that is Scotland. Heck the EU alread has the basket case that is the Real Greece why would it want the wannabee Greece of the North as well?
3131 days ago
I am not saying that all Brummies are thicker than Benny from Crossroads but it strikes me that he would probably have been among the brighter sparks in his local pub quiz team. I read today about Richella Heeking and Ben Marlow from Sutton Coldfield, who saved up £1200 to go on a lavish break in Las Vegas and turned up to Birmingham airport to find there was no plane.
Er.. slowly it dawned on these two imbeciles that they had booked a flight from Birmingham Alabama as opposed to Birmingham, the post industrial shit-hole on the southern fringes of the great Northern welfare safari.
These idiots insist that it is a common mistake. Yeah right,
ht, among folks
3717 days ago
I am feeling rather virtuous today. Just a Greek salad and a coke to eat and I have already done one hour’s manual labour in the fields. I am just off for another stint now. I am pretty sure that my Body Mass Index is back in the “normal” range and as someone with diabetes – thanks to eating and drinking too much – that is good news. I’m heading the right way. But the rest of the world is not.
One in five Americans is obese. And America – like the rest of the West – is getting fatter. This spawns numerous health issues of which type 2 diabetes is just one.
Now I reckon that weight loss is simple: “stop being such a greedy bastard and take some bloody exercise.” It is something that any individual can achieve by himself, or herself. But the zeitgeist is different.
3901 days ago
The new scales have arrived and quick as a flash I was naked and staring at the screen. As I expected I am over 15 stone (15 st 6 llbs to be exact). Maybe after my 7th day off the sauce and after going for a walk this afternoon I shall be a bit lighter tomorrow morning but however I look at this, it is not good news.
A long discussion with Lucian Miers who is dieting hard but tells me that he is still borderline obese according to his Body mass Index ensued and my own BMI comes in at 28.5 - closer to obese than normal but technically “overweight”. Tell me something I did not know. You can check your own BMI with a fun sliding calculator which I have been playing with for a good few minutes HERE
If I can get to 14 stone 6 then I am given a BMI of 27 (still overweight, but closer to normal than Lucian/Obese). My weight when I was playing rugby or training at London Irish five days a week was 14 stone 7 and so I think that as a very first stop I’d be delighted to get to 14.6. To be classed as normal I have to get to 13.11 which seems a) an awfully long way away and b) rather more embarrassingly, is what I was in August 2012.
My weight loss then was assisted by the enormous stress of having my entire life fall apart and then by spending weeks walking around the mountains of Greece & Albania. I am hoping to avoid repeating the first part of that but perhaps the stress ahead of UK Investor Show on April 5 will be a substitute. Then it is off to Greece for the walking.
First stop, pound by pound is to get back to the 14s. The good news is that (as I know from experience) in the 15s the weight slips off very quickly indeed on a regime of Spartan calorie intake and exercise and that should continue until the mid 14s. Thereafter the battle gets harder. But first stop 14.13!
