A post shared by Travis Sloat (@tstyles77) on Apr 1, 2017 at 7:14am PDT
It happened a few weeks ago.
“Travis, you need to clean out your closet. I need hangers.”
I laughed and went on about my business, trying not to give it a second thought. I did though, and a third, and a fourth. However, I never got around to cleaning out my closet.
Sunday though, it happened again.
“Travis, I got you these bags, you need to throw some clothes out, but if you want to keep them I understand. We’re just going to put them in these bags.”
I was cooking dinner for the family — nachos if we’re being honest — and Akeeli was helping me. I laughed again, then stared at Alicia, trying to come up with something to say. A lump formed in my throat, and I felt tears coming in the corners of my eyes. I turned back to the hamburger sizzling on the stove and busily crumbled it, hoping the situation would resolve itself without me having to acknowledge it.
It almost did.
“Daddy, why did you laugh and then not say anything?”
•••••••••••••••••
I’ve heard a lot about Stockholm Syndrome, and I’ve always wondered how it’s possible for a captive to have any positive feelings about their captor, much less sympathize with them. If someone ever abducted me, I always felt I would never fall victim to the mysterious psychological condition that is apparently so powerful, it led hostages in a Stockholm bank robbery to decide not to testify against those who held them captive.
My weight has abducted my happiness, healthiness, attractiveness, my self-esteem, my activity levels, and some of my relationships. It has taken more from me than I’ll ever get back, particularly my health.
I’ve lost weight before. Back in 2010, I went on a run where I got from around 380 down to 300. It lasted approximately 10 weeks, and then the scale was tipping 360 once again. I couldn’t maintain. I fell back into bad habits, and I got to the point where I didn’t care anymore.
However, I loved Fat Travis. Fat Travis didn’t care what people thought about him. Fat Travis knew he was fat and he took pride in that. Fat Travis didn’t have to wear compression shirts to keep loose skin from jiggling underneath his shirts. Fat Travis just enjoyed food, he didn’t count calories. Fat Travis was happier, Fat Travis was funnier, and Fat Travis took that one picture on a turtle one time.
Fat Travis was an awesome abductor. He wasn’t an inherently bad guy, he just made some bad choices. He wasn’t keeping me hostage with the intent of killing me, he just wanted to not have to worry about self-control. He enjoyed the lack of responsibility, because Fat Travis hated responsibility and accountability.
Fat Travis is a good guy, really. Don’t hate him. I don’t, and there are also days when I miss him.
•••••••••••••••••
So when my daughter asked that question: “Daddy, why did you laugh and not say anything?” it slapped me in the face and brought me back to reality. Tears threatened once again, and I fought the urge to lie to her. Instinctively though, I knew she needed the truth.
“I don’t believe it’s going to last.”
“Oh.”
I went back to cooking, and she went back to helping, and Alicia wound up knowing exactly how I was feeling, thank God. Later that afternoon, I went to play a game of basketball, and when I got home, she motioned to the closet.
“I took care of the closet. It seemed like you were having trouble. I didn’t throw all of it out though, some of it is just bagged up.”
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| There are sixteen million reasons why I love my wife. This is one of them. |
I don’t know if this will stick. I’m trying my hardest, though. If it does, then I’ll get to look back ten years from now and wonder why in the world I didn’t do it sooner. If it doesn’t…well, maybe my struggle will motivate someone to never let it get this bad to begin with. Maybe my beautiful daughter will realize the mental struggles her father dealt with about his weight, and it will help her say no to another plate of pizza and yes to a salad.
But for now, a large chunk of me is gone. Success, I’m told, is kind of like being pregnant. Everyone is happy for you, but nobody knows how many times you got screwed. The plot line of my journey isn’t something you could ski down, instead, it looks more like someone having a heart attack.
I am also taking steps to surround myself with people who support what I’m trying to do, even if it leads to me throwing out three-quarters of a brick of Velveeta.
I’ll continue to fight. I’ll continue to grind. I’ll continue to repeat.
I guess I’ll also continue to try to make space for my success. Even if it hurts.
It’s cheat day.
I’m sitting here in my recliner, listening to the children fight about watercolor paints in the kitchen, and I just had to physically move a bag of Sour Patch Kids out of my reach so I would stop eating them long enough to type this thing out.
Here’s the funny thing: I never liked Sour Patch Kids until this recent weight loss kick/lifestyle change/diet/personal hell I’ve put myself through. Now though, now I eat Sour Patch Kids on Sundays like John the Baptist probably ate those locusts — in great amounts and wondering why they taste so good.
My close friend and personal trainer, Chris Pearson, texted me the other day and asked me for a topic for his weekly fitness blog. I gave him three or four terrible ideas to give myself time to think of a good one, and then suggested he write about “little wins,” which you can read just by clicking through that link. In fact, go do it now. I’ll wait.
I wanted to elaborate on his writing by giving you a laid-bare look at who I am.
I am someone who is currently celebrating a ton of little wins.
 |
| My driver license photographs from 2009 (bottom right), January 2016 (top right), and September (left). A total weight difference of approximately 130 pounds. |
 |
| Me at the beach in 2012 (350 pounds) and me in the gym two weeks ago (260 pounds). The bruise you see on my stomach is from an insulin shot to control my type-2 diabetes. Something I don’t need anymore. |
Since June of this year, I’ve been on a tear. I’ve dropped 67 pounds, and I now weigh as much as I did when I graduated high school. I’ve accomplished this through a lot of little wins.
Essentially, my week is a gigantic scoreboard. My day is a slightly smaller scoreboard. And sometimes, depending on the level of temptation, each hour is a scoreboard. Each win and loss is meticulously counted, and some losses wind up being wins without realizing it at the time. A perfect example of that would be my last meal at Taco Bueno versus my “Fat Travis” meal at Bueno.
Remember Chris from the blog I had you read a minute ago? Well, he wrote another one that got this whole thing started. You can find that here. Go read it. I’ll wait. Do you have a why?
When I read what he wrote, I realized that I wanted to be able to get up and play with my kids as well. I wanted to chase them, to throw things at them, to be able to run and laugh and not fall down winded or with a sprained ankle because I was too fat to move. And so I started keeping score. I won a few. I won a few more. And now here I am, and I plan to keep more wins than losses on that scoreboard until I’m skinny.
But I am also someone who is dealing with more than enough little losses.
Slowly, I’ve tried to carry each aspect of my daily life over and throw it onto its own scoreboard. Food battles. Marital battles. Student battles. Idiot driver battles. And finally, father battles.
Two weeks ago I tweeted something.
My biggest goals for this week are to not yell at my kids and to try and eat a little healthier for dinner. Both are challenges.— Travis Sloat (@tstyles77) September 26, 2016
I lost the food battle that week. But I didn’t lose the father battle. And I didn’t lose it last week either. I made it two full weeks without yelling at my kids. And then this morning…
“She gave me that hairbrush and now she took it back.”
“I told him he could use it, I didn’t give it to him.”
“You can ask mom, she gave it to me!”
So I threw away a perfectly good hairbrush this morning. Then, as we were getting dressed for church, auditory evidence of an iPad kerfuffle drifted into our bedroom, and I marched into the living room in my underwear and blew my two week streak.
I promised myself two weeks ago that I wasn’t going to yell at you kids, and here I am, two weeks later, yelling, because you all can’t figure out how to act like civilized children while we get ready for church!”
And then the words came out of my mouth before I could reign them in.
“You are horrible children! Think about that at church today!”
I walked back into the bedroom, furious at myself and them, and uttered an oath entirely inappropriate for any day of the week, and doubly so on Sunday.
“GD kids,” I said.
I am a terrible father.
I don’t need your placating words, and I don’t need your, “Oh it’s okay, everyone gets mad and loses it sometimes.” I really don’t. I need to be coached.
This is not okay.
This is not acceptable.
This is not trying your hardest.
This is not how we get little wins, this is how we ultimately wind up with huge losses.
I know people who are amazing dads with little to no effort at all. I can think of at least three right now, one has one kid, the other two have two each, and both have a third on the way. They don’t have to try. Being a dad comes as naturally to them as breathing, their love for their children exists in the minuscule space between oxygen molecules that utter the supporting words children need, that grant mercy, that give comfort.
For whatever reason, I’m missing that. For me, being a good dad requires an intentional scoreboard. A scoreboard that gets reset frequently. Sometimes it’s a week, sometimes it’s a day, sometimes it’s an hour. And I lose a lot.
We sat in church this morning, and Randy led us in “Good, Good Father.” I stood, trying to sing, trying to keep tears from spilling over my eyelids, making the lyrics both a prayer and a plea, “You’re a good, good Father. It’s who You are, it’s who You are.” God I am so not a good father. I suck so much at it. I want to be good, help me be good. “And I am loved by you, it’s who I am, it’s who I am.” God please help me show my kids they are loved by me. They need to know that, but I’m just so freaking bad at it.”
Then, Johnny got up to preach and the sermon was about God the Father, and qualities of God that are reflected in fatherhood. Fathers are protectors, they are proud of their kids, they want to give gifts to their kids. He used an illustration about a father and his adopted daughter attending an event, and the father sharing that the best memory he had was when they were standing in front of the judge at the finalization. Again, fighting back tears, I remembered both times I’d done that.
Surely, in that moment, my kids knew that I loved them. But I’ve learned the hard way that every day with children isn’t Finalization Day. So how are they seeing that I love them on days when it’s exceptionally hard to show them that? Yeah I feed them, yeah they have a bed, and clothes. But we all know that’s not what counts…not in the long run.
I took an L this morning. It’s there, and it’s glaring at me. I need a win to cancel it out, and a win to get better than .500, and if I can do that, then the day is salvageable. Because the great thing about having a little win system is having the ability to set the clock however you need to. My new father battle clock started at 9 a.m. Tomorrow’s food battle clock starts at midnight (somehow I finished that entire freaking bag of SPKs while writing this). Idiot drivers? Well, that one resets every single time I drive through Muskogee.
In sports, they call that “cheating.” But I happen to be best friends with the Timekeeper, so I’m just going to call it home field advantage. I’m going to call it being a good father. I’m going to call it being loved by You.
It’s who I am.
***
If you are interested in having Chris help you, I’ve included links to his website, his Twitter, and his Facebook. He is currently taking clients, and having worked with him for a while now, I can say that his system works. The pictures above prove that. Not only that, but his motivation factor is a 10/10. Give my boy a call, he’ll help you get a whole bunch of little wins.
Champion Fitness
Reformed Strength and Conditioning
It’s cheat day.
I’m sitting here in my recliner, listening to the children fight about watercolor paints in the kitchen, and I just had to physically move a bag of Sour Patch Kids out of my reach so I would stop eating them long enough to type this thing out.
Here’s the funny thing: I never liked Sour Patch Kids until this recent weight loss kick/lifestyle change/diet/personal hell I’ve put myself through. Now though, now I eat Sour Patch Kids on Sundays like John the Baptist probably ate those locusts — in great amounts and wondering why they taste so good.
My close friend and personal trainer, Chris Pearson, texted me the other day and asked me for a topic for his weekly fitness blog. I gave him three or four terrible ideas to give myself time to think of a good one, and then suggested he write about “little wins,” which you can read just by clicking through that link. In fact, go do it now. I’ll wait.
I wanted to elaborate on his writing by giving you a laid-bare look at who I am.
I am someone who is currently celebrating a ton of little wins.
|
| My driver license photographs from 2009 (bottom right), January 2016 (top right), and September (left). A total weight difference of approximately 130 pounds. |
|
| Me at the beach in 2012 (350 pounds) and me in the gym two weeks ago (260 pounds). The bruise you see on my stomach is from an insulin shot to control my type-2 diabetes. Something I don’t need anymore. |
Since June of this year, I’ve been on a tear. I’ve dropped 67 pounds, and I now weigh as much as I did when I graduated high school. I’ve accomplished this through a lot of little wins.
Essentially, my week is a gigantic scoreboard. My day is a slightly smaller scoreboard. And sometimes, depending on the level of temptation, each hour is a scoreboard. Each win and loss is meticulously counted, and some losses wind up being wins without realizing it at the time. A perfect example of that would be my last meal at Taco Bueno versus my “Fat Travis” meal at Bueno.
Remember Chris from the blog I had you read a minute ago? Well, he wrote another one that got this whole thing started. You can find that here. Go read it. I’ll wait. Do you have a why?
When I read what he wrote, I realized that I wanted to be able to get up and play with my kids as well. I wanted to chase them, to throw things at them, to be able to run and laugh and not fall down winded or with a sprained ankle because I was too fat to move. And so I started keeping score. I won a few. I won a few more. And now here I am, and I plan to keep more wins than losses on that scoreboard until I’m skinny.
But I am also someone who is dealing with more than enough little losses.
Slowly, I’ve tried to carry each aspect of my daily life over and throw it onto its own scoreboard. Food battles. Marital battles. Student battles. Idiot driver battles. And finally, father battles.
Two weeks ago I tweeted something.
My biggest goals for this week are to not yell at my kids and to try and eat a little healthier for dinner. Both are challenges.— Travis Sloat (@tstyles77) September 26, 2016
I lost the food battle that week. But I didn’t lose the father battle. And I didn’t lose it last week either. I made it two full weeks without yelling at my kids. And then this morning…
“She gave me that hairbrush and now she took it back.”
“I told him he could use it, I didn’t give it to him.”
“You can ask mom, she gave it to me!”
So I threw away a perfectly good hairbrush this morning. Then, as we were getting dressed for church, auditory evidence of an iPad kerfuffle drifted into our bedroom, and I marched into the living room in my underwear and blew my two week streak.
I promised myself two weeks ago that I wasn’t going to yell at you kids, and here I am, two weeks later, yelling, because you all can’t figure out how to act like civilized children while we get ready for church!”
And then the words came out of my mouth before I could reign them in.
“You are horrible children! Think about that at church today!”
I walked back into the bedroom, furious at myself and them, and uttered an oath entirely inappropriate for any day of the week, and doubly so on Sunday.
“GD kids,” I said.
I am a terrible father.
I don’t need your placating words, and I don’t need your, “Oh it’s okay, everyone gets mad and loses it sometimes.” I really don’t. I need to be coached.
This is not okay.
This is not acceptable.
This is not trying your hardest.
This is not how we get little wins, this is how we ultimately wind up with huge losses.
I know people who are amazing dads with little to no effort at all. I can think of at least three right now, one has one kid, the other two have two each, and both have a third on the way. They don’t have to try. Being a dad comes as naturally to them as breathing, their love for their children exists in the minuscule space between oxygen molecules that utter the supporting words children need, that grant mercy, that give comfort.
For whatever reason, I’m missing that. For me, being a good dad requires an intentional scoreboard. A scoreboard that gets reset frequently. Sometimes it’s a week, sometimes it’s a day, sometimes it’s an hour. And I lose a lot.
We sat in church this morning, and Randy led us in “Good, Good Father.” I stood, trying to sing, trying to keep tears from spilling over my eyelids, making the lyrics both a prayer and a plea, “You’re a good, good Father. It’s who You are, it’s who You are.” God I am so not a good father. I suck so much at it. I want to be good, help me be good. “And I am loved by you, it’s who I am, it’s who I am.” God please help me show my kids they are loved by me. They need to know that, but I’m just so freaking bad at it.”
Then, Johnny got up to preach and the sermon was about God the Father, and qualities of God that are reflected in fatherhood. Fathers are protectors, they are proud of their kids, they want to give gifts to their kids. He used an illustration about a father and his adopted daughter attending an event, and the father sharing that the best memory he had was when they were standing in front of the judge at the finalization. Again, fighting back tears, I remembered both times I’d done that.
Surely, in that moment, my kids knew that I loved them. But I’ve learned the hard way that every day with children isn’t Finalization Day. So how are they seeing that I love them on days when it’s exceptionally hard to show them that? Yeah I feed them, yeah they have a bed, and clothes. But we all know that’s not what counts…not in the long run.
I took an L this morning. It’s there, and it’s glaring at me. I need a win to cancel it out, and a win to get better than .500, and if I can do that, then the day is salvageable. Because the great thing about having a little win system is having the ability to set the clock however you need to. My new father battle clock started at 9 a.m. Tomorrow’s food battle clock starts at midnight (somehow I finished that entire freaking bag of SPKs while writing this). Idiot drivers? Well, that one resets every single time I drive through Muskogee.
In sports, they call that “cheating.” I’m just going to call it home field advantage. I’m going to call it being a good father. I’m going to call it being loved by You.
It’s who I am.
***
If you are interested in having Chris help you, I’ve included links to his website, his Twitter, and his Facebook. He is currently taking clients, and having worked with him for a while now, I can say that his system works. The pictures about prove that. Not only that, but his motivation factor is a 10/10. Give my boy a call, he’ll help you get a whole bunch of little wins.
Champion Fitness
Reformed Strength and Conditioning
For those of you wondering, I have not died.
For those of you wondering if, I am not dead, I have continued my weight loss journey, the answer is yes.
I’ve lost 25 pounds or so over the last 4 months. It has not been easy, and I’ve stalled out around the 330 mark for right now, but a recent diet challenge presented by a friend will either push me past that or kill me slowly, either way.
In the course of my “trying to look less than that guy on the turtle” journey, I have spent a lot of time at the gym.
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| Go on. Stare. Get you an eyeful. There’s plenty to go around, ladies. |
A lot of what I do at the gym now consists of me getting on an elliptical trainer and trying not to die for an hour. Since it is a big gym, some days people don’t work out next to me, and some days people do.
I’ve found out that I much prefer it when people do, as it leads to finally getting me to post a blog again.
About a week ago I was giving an elliptical the business, and had my fat head buried up in a Mark Twain novel while I was gettin’ my sexy on.
A woman then proceeded to jump onto the treadmill immediately to my right. She was a very attractive woman, clad in the traditional yoga pants and skin tight tank that you see so often these days…out in public.
Can I just pause, just for a second, and let you ladies know that these yoga pants and leggings are NOT pants? In all seriousness, put on some pants.
No, no. Shut up, and put on pants in public. I’m trying to raise a daughter modestly, and I can’t have her thinking it’s okay to show off her fanny in a pair of yoga pants or leggings. Guys, I know you’re probably upset at me for this, but it changes when you have a daughter, trust me.
Back to my workout.
This woman gets on the treadmill and starts going at a pretty good clip. I’m reading, minding my own business, and all of the sudden I hear a noise.
A SEX NOISE.
Y’all know the one. A soft little moan. Just a little “uhhhh.”
Being practically deaf, I decided I was hearing things, and went on to my reading. Then…
“Uhhhhhhhhh.”
The lady next to me is making the sweet, sweet jogging love to that treadmill. She had her headphones in, so I guess she could have been listening to some Al Green or some Barry White, but whatever it was, she was enjoying it.
Thoroughly.
I had my hands on the heart rate monitor at the time, and I’m pretty sure I broke it.
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| My heart rate slightly increased. |
Now look. I understand we all make noises and funny faces when we work out, and some of them might even be our “O” faces. Heck, for example, I’ll cite myself.
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| My “workout” face. Also probably my “O” face. This is how I landed The Missus. |
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| My “unloading the dishwasher/pooping” face. |
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| My “surfing the Internet and blogging/looks like I’m doing something terrible to Sub-Zero” face. |
You see? I have my faces. I make my funny noises. But what I don’t need is to be sexually frustrated while I’m trying to exercise, you know? We need to tone it down with the passionate jogging and maybe sit the next couple of plays out.
I sent The Missus a text about it and got the following:
“Ha, well they did just release 50 Shades of Grey on audiobook.”
Isn’t she helpful?
And I thought this post would end right here, but since it’s me, of course it didn’t.
About two days ago I was hitting the weights pretty hard, and I put a lot of strain into a particular set on the bench press. Then it happened.
I farted. Not just a little squeak either, I’m talking people looked at me like they thought I’d ripped the vinyl smooth off the bench. I didn’t have the chance to hear it because I had my headphones on, but I sure as sugar got to smell it, and I got to watch everyone in the gym look at me awkwardly for the rest of the day.
Just desserts?
I’ll never know, but I know I dang sure wouldn’t break gym equipment if I heard the chick next to me fart instead of daydream about a BDSM relationship with a fictional character.
And at least my Facebook friends were supportive.
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| Life changes people. Life changes. |
Before we dive into the blog, I’ll update you on my wight loss/get in shape goal. When I weighed in on Friday, I was 341.9 lbs., which brought me down a total of 11.7 for the month. It’s not exactly the most drastic drop, but after speaking with my trainer, he’s reminded me that I laid a lot of lean muscle on this month and that weighs more than fat. Here’s a pic of my measurements, which came down too.
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| My biceps are evening out. Draw your own conclusions. |
***
Now on to the good stuff.
About a week ago, I had to go take the Oklahoma General Education Test, or OGET for short. I guess when you want to become a teacher, they like to make sure you at least have some general educatin’ in your background.
I am absolutely forbidden to discuss the questions that were on the test, and I signed a pretty strict nondisclosure agreement on the front page of the test that said the state of Oklahoma would take my firstborn and give me a fantastic wedgie if I told anyone about the questions.
However, the NDA said nothing about discussing what took place in the time I spent before I took the test. And believe me, things happened.
Let’s start with how early the test is. I had to report to the testing site at 7:15 in the a.m. 7:15. 7:15.
My kids don’t even have to be at school until 8:30 and that’s not even on the weekend.
Of course the night before, I woke up at 3 in the morning and couldn’t go back to sleep for an hour, so when my alarm went off at 6, I was dragging more butt than a dog on a freshly washed carpet.
In my desire to reach the testing site on time, I forgot to bring “several #2 pencils, sharpened.” I wasn’t gravely concerned because I figured I could pick some up on the way.
I stopped at two places on the way in, neither of them had pencils.
I arrived at the testing site sans pencils, late, and sat down at a table with 5 other very tired people, all of whom had freshly sharpened pencils, industriously laid out, ready to be used.
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| Essentially what the table looked like. Image source |
I looked at the three young ladies on the opposite side of me and said, “Do any of you have a spare pencil I can buy?”
I crap you not, all three of them looked at me, pursed their lips, shook their heads primly and did their best Elaine Benes “I can’t spare a square” impersonations.
“I’m sorry, no.” “I just don’t have any extra.” “You really should have brought pencils.”
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| Excuse me? |
The two gentlemen on my side of the table witnessed this transaction, laughed openly, and then one of them said, “Here you go man.” The other one said “And here’s an extra, just in case.”
When I reached for my wallet to pay the blessed men, they both politely refused.
Chivalry, it would seem, is not dead in the male species.
*side eye at the women*
Pencils in hand, I walked down the hall to the testing room. I realized I had been worried about something in the back of mind, almost unconsciously, all morning long.
When I walked in the room, I saw what it was.
The desks.
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| Never has such an innocent memory of childhood wrought such terror as in the heart of fat adult. |
As a portly person, I live in constant fear of standardized desking. I walk into classrooms and immediately look for the “fat kid desk” or even a table and chair. When I have a new class at the beginning of the semester, I have to get there ten minutes early the first day, just so I can lay claim to the most comfortable seating arrangements, anyone else be danged.
Sure enough, the testing room I was in contained a desk.
A small desk.
My thought process went something like this.
“Dude. You can’t fit in there. No way.” “I totally can. I’ve been working out.” “For a month you fat sack of flan, no way you’re getting in it.” “Watch me.” “What?” “WATCH ME!”
I may have screamed that last part out loud, which got me a few strange looks, but I got to the desk. What happened next can only be described with a gif.
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| This is actually scary accurate, including the sort of bracing hand grab and wedge technique. Image source |
It was rough, and it even hurt a little bit, but I made it. I felt like a beach ball being squeezed between two pieces of flat wood, but I was in there.
There was but one tiny problem.
I couldn’t breathe.
Well, not normally.
I was taking these sort of breaths that were causing other people to look at me with various stages of concern, all of them I’m sure convinced I was having an infarction.
So when the teacher came around and asked for my driver’s license, the following conversation took place.
Teacher: “Sir, I need to see your license.” Me: “The other lady already looked at it.” Teacher: “Well, you have to keep it on the desk, in case you go to the bathroom and try to come back as someone else.” Me: “Oh, you mean someone who can fit in desks better?” Teacher: “Oh! Are you uncomfortable?” Me: “Yes, ma’am. I am very uncomfortable.” Teacher: “Would you like alt…”Me: “YES I WOULD LIKE ALTERNATE SEATING ARRANGEMENTS.”
So the teacher yelled into the hallway.
“EXCUSE ME MR. GUY! YES, CAN WE GET THIS GENTLEMAN SOME ALTERNATE SEATING? HE’S TOO…UMMM…UNCOMFORTABLE.”
For the love of God. She was going to say fat. I know she was going to say fat, and she was about three letters away from giving me an automatic passing grade on the OGET, because I can promise you this, if you call Travis Sloat fat at a party we’ll laugh, but if you do it when I’ve been woken up at 6 a.m. on the weekend to take a test that measures nothing but my common sense, well then sister, you’re sued.
So Mr. Guy went traipsing through the school, looking for seating arrangements large enough to accommodate my industrious bulk.
He brought back a desk that looked as it belonged in a kindergarten classroom or under a meal in Japan. It sat about 3 1/4 inches off the floor. With it, he brought a full size chair.
I spent the entire test bent over, finishing in just under two hours, and leaving looking alarmingly like this:
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| That’s the face I make when I get up at 6 a.m. on the weekend. |
I’m still waiting on the scores. If I don’t pass, do you reckon I have a legitimate case for a redo? Maybe next time they’ll let me bring in my own seating arrangements, an easy chair and one of those hospital desk things they put people’s food on. I think that’s the ticket.
In the meantime, I’ve designed a new logo for OGET.
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| Accurate and efficient. |
Will you look at that?
This post isn’t titled “The Road.”
I seriously want to thank those of you who made the five day journey with The Missus and I last week, and if you haven’t had the chance to read those, go ahead. I’ll wait.
Back in 2010, I know I wrote a post about being somewhat of a germaphobe, but I can’t find it. I’ve searched through my archives, and I’m getting nothing. It was about a cashier at Walmart who practically refused to clean raw chicken juice off the scale/scanner before they rang up my banana and apple. There was a slight altercation, the scale was halfheartedly cleaned, which resulted in me having to disinfect my fruit with 91% alcohol before I ate it.
My fear of germs hasn’t always been consistent. Growing up, the thought of germs couldn’t even rent a studio apartment in my brain. I would lick, eat, smell, touch, or roll around in anything. But I’ve noticed that as I’m getting older, and through the addition of kids, thoughts of germs and germ related paraphernalia have started tilling these hundred acre farms in the fertile fields of my faculties. I cite the towel post I recently put up.
You also have been briefed on my new efforts at weight loss. I’m trying here, folks. It’s slow going, but I’m going to give it the business.
However, I think it might be going too slowly for some of the folks I work with. You see, I walked into my office the other day and found this on my desk.
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| Dear Travis, Lose weight. Sincerely, The Office |
You think someone is trying to tell me something?
In addition to the six pack, there was a loose bottle of the stuff, almost as if someone had said, “You know, I want to keep this other six pack for myself, but Travis really needs a whole week’s worth. I can make that sacrifice.”
After finding the culprit who had left me such a generous gift, I asked him why. He said that he had gotten the stuff at a garage sale, and he’d heard about my weight loss efforts, and wanted to assist. I thanked him, if a bit gruffly, and I continued back to my desk to check the stuff out.
After examining the side effects and such, I decided to give it a shot. It actually looks a lot like Five Hour Energy, and I love those, so I cracked the loose bottle, noted the small amount of liquid, made a remark about how they must sell this product by weight and not volume, chugged the contents of the bottle, and went on about my merry way.
Fast forward to the next day.
I come in, and I’m excited about my new weight loss product, and about the changes it will bring about in my life. I sat down at my desk and cracked open a second bottle, only to discover this.
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| Yep. A safety seal. And under that seal, a completely full bottle of liquid. |
A safety seal that was missing from the first bottle I drank the day before.
The bottle that had half of the liquid inside missing.
The bottle that had been given to me by a coworker.
The bottle that had been purchased at a garage sale.
*shudder*
I really don’t even know what I should do at this point. I’m stuck trying to find out how much testing me for every known disease to man is going to cost, and wondering if I want that many needles in me. I could have induced vomiting, and almost did involuntarily, but I didn’t figure I could retroactively vomit up anything that had been in my digestive system for twenty four hours.
My singular hope is that the sheer volume of hot sauce and peppers I eat on a daily basis will have somehow incinerated the terrible unknown germs that I received from ingested a half used bottle of garage sale purchased mystery weight loss product. If not, I fully expect to die within the next few days.
I’m also looking to get rid of the other five bottles.
Any takers?
Just a real quick note, if you glance down, you’ll see a Facebook “Like” box. This box lets you like this post, which makes me feel crazy happy. I get a little notification, and my world is complete for the day. It also gives you the option to “Become a fan” of my blog, which will seriously lead to me hugging you awkwardly the next time I see you. So feel free to use the box.
I started taekwondo last Thursday night.
I weigh 300 pounds.
Really, that should be the end of the post, and y’all should ideally be lying on the floor in fits of laughter that might actually cause you to have a small stroke, requiring a minimal hospital stay but no permanent damage to any speech patterns or facial muscles.
But I’m going to keep telling the story.
I walk in to a room approximately the size of a bathroom in a really small Wal-Mart. In this room are about 50 people, most of them 5 year olds who are busy kicking the dog crap out of each other in a sparring ring. Behind them are parents yelling things like, “HIT HIM, TOMMY! HIT HIM! HIT HIM!
They were a classy bunch.
I pay for my lessons and am issued a uniform.
Well, half of a uniform. You see, I’m still too fat for a top. So I’m given a pair of pants that would have made MC Hammer jealous, and…
…a 12 foot long belt that is as white as the driven snow.
12 feet long, y’all. 12 feet. I know because I measured it. All I’m sayin is, that belt could probably be helping with the oil spill in some way.
*idea!
Go dip that belt in the gulf, bring it back to me, I now have a black belt AND some of the oil is out of the ocean! That’s win, win folks.
So I get out on the mat and very quickly become reacquainted with my toes. Stretching. So much stretching. Everyone is yelling and saying “YES SIR!” to this 15 year old kid yelling back at us in a voice that I’m sure he borrowed from Michael Clarke Duncan, telling us there needed to be more yes sirs. Then he moved on to knuckle push-ups, and I decided I really hated him.
Finally, the group of experienced kids (yes, I’m in a teenage class. Put the phone down, Chris Hansen, it’s legit) moved on to the sparring ring, and left me all alone with a 10 year old ginger kid. (phone. down.) This kid reminded me of the little boy from Calvin and Hobbes, only Calvin would have totally whipped this kid’s butt.
The instructor starts yelling at us to do stuff, mostly punching and kicking. Since this is exactly how I throw a fit when The Missus doesn’t give me my way, I was pretty good at it. The whole time, she’s yelling at us to yell when we throw a punch or kick, which I don’t really understand. I thought she was saying “KIA!” so at first it kind of went like this.
Instructor: KIA!
Me: ?? *clumsy punch
Instructor: KIA!
Me: Spectra! *okay punch
Instructor: KIA!
Me: Optima! *really in a groove punch
Instructor: KIA!
Me: Sorento! *this punch had the force of a Sorento driven at 50 MPH into a brick wall
We finally got it lined out when she explained that I didn’t have to yell out car models, all I had to do was make a noise. Apparently, when you strike someone, if you yell a lot, it scares them, causing them to run away and call their mother. Cussing and farting don’t count as noises though, so I was a tad disappointed, because I’m really good at both of those while doing any kind of strenuous exercise.
I DESTROYED this little kid when it came to yelling, y’all. He didn’t even know what to do. He just stared at me, and I’m pretty sure my yelling made him cry a little bit and he looked over at his mom a lot. Guess the instructor was right. I’m also pretty sure I could have taken him in a fight, and I was wicked upset that I didn’t get to spar with him.
What? We’re the same color belt! It’s allowed!
We did a few combos, and although I wasn’t given a bow staff or numchucks, I think I did alright. I didn’t split those pants, the belt only fell off twice, and I didn’t hear anyone laughing about the fat guy out on the mat scaring the piss out of a 10 year old. I think it will get easier, and I think I’ll eventually have a lot of fun with it.
The taekwondo, y’all. Not the ginger kid.
*Editor’s note: Last night was my second night, and the ginger kid showed back up, so I guess I didn’t scare him off. It was MUCH easier, and I totally learned how to do a proper knife chop to the throat with a spinning knife chop turn. I’m like E. Honda, y’all!
A lot of you probably remember this pic I posted from September of last year when I was complaining about fat people shirts costing more:
Folks, I have no idea how much I weighed then, but I’m guessing it was probably around 380 or so. My weigh fluctuates, but I settled at 370 for a long time. That shirt is The Missus’, and you can see how well it fit me.
The good news is that I’ve been making some huge changes in how I live. I refuse to call it dieting, because a diet has an end. What I’m doing has no end. It is a lifestyle change that leads to the ultimate goal of a healthier Travis. For those of you following me on Twitter and Facebook, (which you can do a little further down on the page) you know that I’ve lost about 47 pounds in the last 5 weeks.
I was sitting on the couch yesterday morning, and I looked at The Missus and said, “We should take a picture of me in that shirt.”
And it came to pass:
I’ll be the first to say, it’s still not the prettiest picture in the world, but folks, I feel damn good about it. You should know that I’m not sucking in, I’m not stretching the shirt, and I have not altered this in any way.
I’m pretty proud of myself.
However, my pride was quickly deflated when I showed Kid Funk these pictures and he said, “Your hair is longer.”
Bastard.
I’m going to continue my healthier way of living, which includes massive amounts of exercise, and my ultimate goal is to weigh 200 pounds. I currently weigh 323, and I have an alternate goal to be at 320 before TAR, which is this Friday! Wish me luck.
And that is my own personal journey through the X’s.