How to Know if You're Fat

If you're like me, you've probably stopped mid-bratwurst and asked yourself, "Am I fat?"

Now, that question is easily answered quantitatively. Some simple measurements and caluculations can tell you whether you are overweight.
But that is not really the question, is it? The question really is, "Do other people thinkI'm fat?" which is much more complex.

From conversations with numerous females and gay men, I have discovered a simple way of answering this question. If, when describing you to someone who has not met you, acquaintences say that you are a) really nice or b) funny, then your friends probably think you're fat, especially if the context of the description involved your love life.

Description (a) is really more of a female fat camoflauge. Though it can apply to males, it is highly desireable for fat men to be funny. We need fat men to be funny, because fat men are taken less seriously than skinny men, thus, even if they are not particularly comedic, we will use that descriptor.

Granted, this could mean that you are not fat, you are just ugly. Although skinny, ugly people (men especially) are more likely to be described as "smart" than "funny."

Pizza Hut, you enrage me

Let's start with a hypothetical. Let's say you are running a national restaurant chain which specializes in a meal most often consumed at dinner.

Consider this question as we move on: What time would you establish as closing time for such an establishment?

Further, let's say that on one particular day, you have decided to donate some of your profits that day to help in the rebuilding of a regional disaster area. You're probably expecting a larger crowd than normal, right? You've just given every indecicive person in the country an added reason to buy from you, and they'll feel good about themselves for doing it. You are going to make a killing today.

Now, after considering the quesion posed above, consider it again, only adjusting for the knowledge that on this special day, your demand will be unusually high. You will be more popular than every other similar competing restaurant on this day.

And let's say Joe Regular gets home from work at about 7 p.m. He's thinking about watching the NBA playoffs, which begin at 8 p.m., and he's thinking about having a pizza. And maybe he checks his e-mail, watches SportsCenter for a while, talks to somebody on the phone and, right around 8, decides he's ready to place his order.

Do you think it would be a good idea, a good business plan, to a) be open, b) answer the phone, and c) take this Joe's order?

I would, but I'm not running Pizza Hut. Maybe they know something I don't.

"Surviving" and "Finals Week"

This is the time of year when every student newspaper in the United States runs a series of stories and columns and news-you-can-use bits advising on "surviving" the end of the semester.

These bits invariably include profound piececs of advice like, "sleep," and "do not commit suicide." Usually, there will be an accompanying column, written by someone who maybe works 12 hours a week in the bookstore, complaining breathlessly about how draining the end of the semester is and how keeping "some level of sanity" is of utmost importance. These reports are always outrageously sensationalized, not to mention shameless indicents of self-plagiarism.

I'm adjusting for the knowledge that, by nature, I am not a highly stress-feeling individual. But I've never actually seen anybody freaking out about the end of the semester. For most of the people I know, the end of the semester means about a week or two of extra reading, writing and 'rithmatic, which can usually be basically complete by 10 p.m. if necessary. And most of the people I know have jobs.

If you don't even have a job, I don't want to hear one peep about "end of the semester stress," or finals week or "pulling an all-nighter." Nobody needs to pull an all-nighter. Nobody. Get up at 8, work until 5 and proceed to ace all your exams. That's not stress. That's having something to do besides check Facebook.

Over the last two weeks of the semester, I have, and will continue to have, a lot to do. It's annoying. But it's not "wearing me down." It just means I can't watch Conan.