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Under The Knife

Food & Drink

I remember the day I quit exercising.

I was thirty years old, in really good shape, and while visiting my mother I went for my regular morning jog.  At the time, she lived in Umhlanga Rocks, a little seaside resort town just north of Durban, and to say that the Indian Ocean coast has a tropical climate is to understate the thing.  It’s not only hot, it’s humid — so humid that I, a Joburg boy, actually had trouble breathing the thick, moist air (Johannesburg is 6,000ft above sea level).

But I had to stay in shape, and I liked the way I looked, so off I went.  I kept the jog short, maybe two or three miles up the coast road, and then I turned around and went back, taking a little detour along the concrete boardwalk that runs past the luxury hotels and separates them from the beach.

By now, I was deeply uncomfortable and miserable:  the sweat was pouring off me, I was tired and more than a little sunburned because while I usually jogged without a shirt up in Johannesburg, it was not an issue there — but down here, in the blazing tropical sun, my fair skin was going extra-crispy, and fast.

I was coming up to the last leg of the trip, where I could make the turn and head back to my mother’s house.  At that point, one of the hotels had a patio cafe right on the boardwalk, and sitting at a table under a large Cinzano umbrella were two rather pretty younger women.  As I ran past, one whistled and called out in Afrikaans, “Nice bod!”

I waved over my back at her, ran about a dozen more yards, and stopped dead in my tracks, chest heaving and my breath wheezing like a beached whale as the epiphany struck me.  I was doing all this — the tiredness, the sweatiness, the sunburn, the aching muscles — just so a stranger could compliment me on my “mooi lyfie” ?

I walked back to my Mom’s house, and never jogged again.

All this came back to me when I read the story of how Ozzy Osbourne’s daughter Kelly has had gastric sleeve surgery and thus lost over 80lbs.

Now I’m not going to go into some stupid amateur psycho-analysis as to why she would want to do this.  She was always a plump little thing, and clearly she didn’t like the way she looked (hence all the tattoos she had inflicted on herself, tattoos which she is now having removed — draw your own conclusions).  And she looks quite fetching now (see the link above)… but that just leads me to my earlier conclusion:  why would she undergo so radical a surgery, just so a stranger like me could think she was “quite fetching”?

I know several women who have had gastric sleeve surgery, and every single one has told me that had they known what the consequences were going to be (other than the massive weight loss), they would never have done it.  You see, the weight loss may be all very well, but what the gastric sleeve does is make eating food a profoundly uncomfortable experience:  nausea, pain, discomfort and a general malaise all follow if you eat so much as a single forkful of food too many, and after a while you begin to hate the sight of food.  Any food.

And what happens next is that some of the joy goes out of your life.  Eating is such a wonderful and enjoyable experience, really:  nothing quite compares to the feeling of satisfaction, of well-being and happiness that a good meal gives you.  It’s one of life’s simple, and paradoxically one of life’s greatest pleasures.  And with gastric sleeve surgery (which is irreversible), it’s gone forever.

So while everyone — and every one a stranger — is complimenting Kelly Osbourne on how great she looks, know too that her previous unhappiness at being overweight has been replaced with a much greater one.

And frankly, I never thought she was that fat to begin with.

Chart-Toppers

Funny Stuff

Every so often, something is said or written that deserves to be memorialized in stone.  Since the start of the new millennium, I’ve identified two — one from each decade — that I think are the best.

2001 – 2010:  “Democracy — Whisky — Sexy”  (Iraq)
There is no better encapsulation of the benefits of Western society.

2011 – 2020:  “Don’t Trust China — China Is Asshole”  (Hong Kong)
Six words that can (and should) direct U.S. foreign and domestic policy, forever.

That both were written on signs displayed by foreigners means that we need to up our game.

Wisdom Of The Ages

QOTD

From the 17th century, an anonymous writer talks about coffee:

“Coffee Collects and settles the Spirits, makes the erection more Vigorous, the Ejaculation more full, adds a spiritualescency to the Sperme, and renders it more firm and suitable to the Gusto of the womb, and proportionate to the ardours and expectations too, of the female Paramour.”

I’m too old, too impotent and too infertile to worry about all that stuff.  All I know is that before my morning cuppa of Dunkin’ Donuts Regular, my attitude towards the world can be summed up thus:

Granted, the addition of coffee to my system doesn’t change my mood that much

…but I do go from murderous to simply dangerous. so there’s that.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to the Keurig.

Monday Funnies

Funny Stuff

Aaaaargh…

I hate being woken up by the alarm clock on Monday mornings.

So to give me time to pick up all the pieces off the floor, a little of Teh Funny:

Sounds okay.  And on that topic, a few women who may or may not be intoxicated:

Right… time for that second gin.  It’s Monday, remember?

Off The Shoulder

Beauty, Grooming

In today’s post I’m going to sing the praises of an article of women’s clothing which alas seems quite unfashionable these days, whereas it should be as perennially popular as blue jeans:  the loose, baggy, off-the-shoulder sweater.  Here’s an example:

The wonderful thing about this garment is that it looks sexy:  that slightly impression of wantonness  coupled with (in some cases) a tantalizing glimpse of the breast whenever the lady leans forward makes, for me at least, a hugely-erotic sight.

It’s completely ruined by the appearance of a bra strap, by the way;  the whole essence of the thing is near-nudity, even under so large and thick a garment.

Now I know that Not All Women Can Go Braless… but actually,  a loose floppy sweater does an excellent job of concealing loose, floppy breasts, for example, so what would be unthinkable with any other garment top is not at all out of the question with a wide, loose-topped sweater.  Here’s one with a very loose neck:

In each of the above cases, the model has a fairly modest bust — but a larger one would make the garment quite sensationally sexy.

While I quite like the Victorian “below-the-shoulder” (i.e. both shoulders uncovered), it’s a little more overt (albeit also very sexy too):

…but this one is definitely reserved for the Young ‘N Perky Set because of its tightness.

But a big ol’ floppy sweater falling off one shoulder?

Have mercy.

 

Gratuitous Gun Pic: Beretta 686 Silver Pigeon (20ga)

Gratuitous Gun Pics, The Gun Thing

As I grow older, I find myself torn between holding onto what has always worked for me, yet often having said experiential wisdom undermined by pesky things such as facts.

Take shotguns.

As Loyal Readers all know, I prefer side-by-side shotguns to over-and-under shotguns, illustrated by my own maxim:  “Shotgun barrels should be side by side like a man and his dog, and not over and under like a man and his mistress.”  (Yes, I coined that phrase.)

Actually, it’s bullshit.  While I yield to no man for my love of fine side-by-side shotguns, the plain fact of the matter is that when it comes to sustained usage, the old SxS just doesn’t cut it.  No matter how costly the gun, or how hardy, they all break after thousands of rounds;  the much-maligned over-and-unders, much less so.  (Ask yourself why Olympic shotgunners like Kim Rhode have always used over-and-unders — in fact, nobody in serious shotgunning competition uses a side-by-side, and that’s for good reasons.)

Which brings me to today’s gun under discussion, the shotgun which is pretty much the international gold standard for the ordinary shotgunner:  the Beretta 686 Silver Pigeon.

 

From a pricing perspective, it’s always difficult to pin the 686 down, because the addition of different Roman numerals makes the price shoot up faster than the options list on a Porsche 911.  The one in the picture is the bottom-of-the-range “Silver Pigeon I” in 20ga, and it typically retails for around $2,000.  This, by the way, is common in the shotgun business:  adding a couple inches to the barrel can double the price, as can asking for superior wood for the stock.

The dirty little secret about the 686 is that it probably represents the best value for money of any O/U shotgun.  (Its closest rival, sales-wise, is the excellent Browning 725 Citori, which typically retails for nearly a grand more.)  I use as an example Mr. Free Market, who each year shoots thousands of rounds through his 686 (he actually shot out his earlier 686 to the point where it would have cost more to repair than just buying a new one), and despite my constant needling, he steadfastly refuses to change to another brand.  (This post was in fact triggered by me saying to someone that we should learn from others’ mistakes or equally, by the example of others, and in the matter of O/U shotguns, I therefore bow to his experience.  If you wish to do the same, feel free to browse here.)

Where I will not change, however, is in the matter of barrel length.  I’ve always though that the longer the barrel, the better.  A 29″ or 30″ barrel will add many yards to the effective range of a shotgun over a 26″ barrel, and the increased range (and efficacy) far outweighs the weight and handling disadvantages.  Save short barrels for the self-defense pump-actions;  field guns should have longer barrels.

This doesn’t mean I’m going to run out and buy an over-and-under shotgun, by the way.  I don’t shoot clays often enough to warrant a change over to an O/U, so I’ll stick to my side-by-side companion.  Yes, I’m preaching form over function, which should surprise precisely nobody.

But if I was looking to buy an O/U, the 686 would get a very close look.