CALORIE WARS - Segment 2 (Scroll down for opening segment)   

  
     Years later, I was still trying to keep tradition alive.   One day I walked into my favorite lunch stop.  Calories saw me coming.  They prey on the weak and unsuspecting.  I was weak, but I suspected something.  1700 calories were hiding in my double meatball, marinara-slathered sandwich.   As soon as I let my guard down, they jumped me.  It was a pathetic sight.  The sandwich had to be pulled off me. 
   
    Calories, who were once my friends, were suddenly turning on me.  They used to burn so easily.  Now I couldn’t get them lit.  I was dealing with an aggressive, new strain that was burn-resistant.  I began to collect them.  Weight made a house call.  I slammed the door.  It was the beginning of the “Calorie Wars.”

    I tried to change my ways, but calories would call me in the middle of the night.  “We know where you are,” they would whisper.  “We know how to find you.” “There you are.”  I finally wrapped the entire refrigerator with duct tape. 

    If I kept putting on weight, I would have to serve the calories with a restraining order. 

  

     Finally, the day of reckoning arrived. (I hate days of reckoning.)  I had my picture taken for the local newspaper.  The photographer had to take a panoramic shot to get all of me.  I would have to start leaving food behind.  My wife agreed.  “You look much better in x-rays,” she said. 

     “Good,” I responded.  “Maybe next year we can do a family x-ray that we can send out with the Christmas letter.” 

     Not long after my wide-angle shot, I bumped into my friend, Ralph, at the mall, almost knocking him to the floor.

     “You okay?” I asked. 

     “I’m fine,” he answered, “but you should think about getting some exercise.” 

  

     “I don’t mind thinking about it, as long as I don’t have to make a commitment.”

     Ralph loved to jump rope.  One day he gave it to me while I was relaxing by his pool.   “Here, why don’t you try skipping this rope?” he asked. 

     “I think I will skip it.”

     “No, no, why don’t you jump rope?”

     “Can’t you read my t-shirt? No jumping or skipping allowed.  I might be able to step over the rope if it was lying on the ground.  But, for safety reasons, my body has banned all jumping and skipping.” So I politely declined. 

     Being a friend, he insisted.  “Listen, you just sit by the pool all day.  You never go in the water.  A little exercise would be good for you.” 

     ”Okay, okay,” I said.  “Give me the rope.”  

To be continued...check back soon