Big Boned
Image: Yogi Madhav
“Ah, young Mr Stone: do come in!”
“Thanks, Doc!”
“You look good.”
“Thanks! I feel great!”
“Indeed. Do take a seat. Now....um.....your mother tells me you’ve lost six stone in two months?”
I grin at the doctor, uncross my legs and lean back in the chair like some sort of Weight Loss GOD. “Ha! And THEN some.....I’ve actually lost nearly seven stone in total! Seven STONE!”
“In two months?”
“Damn straight.”
“That’s amazing, Mr Stone. What are you eating?”
“Tuna.”
“Right....and what else?”
“Just tuna.”
“For breakfast?”
“Tuna on toast.”
“Lunch?”
“Tuna sandwich.”
“Dinner?”
“Tuna jacket potato.”
“You’re eating THREE portions of tuna each day?”
“Yep. I’m brushing my teeth more, because of the fishy smell and stuff....but I’ll tell you something amazing: I think eating fish stops you farting. I haven’t farted in nearly three days.”
“Hmm....personally, I’d be a bit concerned about that. Can you please show me the exercises that you’re doing? Your mum tells me they’re quite special.”
“Sure thing, Doc!”
I get down on the floor in front of him, and show him the one I call ‘Evil Spider’.
When I look up, he isn’t smiling. In fact, he’s looking at me with deep concern. He folds his arms and says: “Mr Stone – I don’t want you EVER doing anything like that again, please. It’s very, very dangerous.”
I’m REALLY upset, and not just because I’m looking at his upside-down face through a weird crook in my arm....but because this new weight-loss video, imported from China via the USA, is doing loads for me. Besides, I haven’t even shown him ‘Wicked Cockroach’, ‘Drunken Rabbit’ or ‘Sloth in Trouble’. The problem is that, when I describe them all to him, he tells me I’m putting myself in MORTAL danger. I didn’t even realise that you could put yourself in mortal danger with a stretch. Apparently, you can. THREE DEAD IN YOGA MASHUP is a headline you might actually see, one day. Prepare yourselves.
I struggle back onto my feet and collapse in the chair. “The fact is, Doc, I used to be a fat little ginger bastard....and they aren’t MY words: they’re the words of my closest friends and my nan. Well, now I feel like I’ve beaten all that! I’m still ginger, but I’ve taken one hell of a vacation from Fat Land!”
The doctor taps away on his computer, and then clears his throat.
“Do you want to die, Mr Stone?”
“No, Doc.”
“Then please start eating a wide variety of foods, and no more Evil Spiders or Sloths in Trouble. Why can’t you just go for a walk?”
Looking back, I always remember that appointment purely because I completely ignored it. I only STOPPED following the instructions from those three crazy little monks when I actually tied myself up in a knot that my NAN had to get me out of when she came in from shopping one day.
These days, my routine tends to consist of a couple of half-hour bursts on the cross-trainer and going for a few long walks. I do wonder sometimes if there’s a monk out there somewhere, halfway up a Chinese mountain with his head stuck between his buttocks, gasping for air because the Sloth really did get into trouble…
