This morning I woke up and there was a strange yellow ball in the sky. I’m told that it’s called “the sun.” Oh sun, I missed you.
On the Chronicle’s site this morning, a particular headline caught my eye: “At 161 pounds, Tyra Banks says ‘fat’ pictures are hurtful.” It seems that Tyra Banks, yes that Tyra Banks, the absolutely gorgeous model, has gained some weight since her modeling days. She now weighs 161 pounds, and has fluctuated between 148 and 162 since retiring from her modeling career. I find this notable for two reasons.
1) Tyra Banks is beautiful.
2) Tyra Banks, former model, weighs 161 pounds.
I’ve long said that all men — and even a lot of women — have no idea what normal weight for a woman is. People think women are supposed to weigh something like 120 pounds regardless of body shape, body type, height, or lifestyle. Which is funny because I’m 5’8″ and weigh 185. I could stand to lose 15-20 pounds because my body fat percentage is higher than it should be; at my lowest point in the past decade I was 169, and I felt very good there. Anyway, suffice it to say that I haven’t weighed 120 pounds since I was about 10 years old. To weigh what “normal” is, I’d have to lose a full third of my weight.
A third! People, that is just crazy. I wonder what it will take for people to start getting a realistic idea of weight.
I’ve been pondering this issue even more lately as I do some research on wetsuits for the Half Ironman. Sizing for wetsuits is determined via two things: height and weight. I’ve looked at many different brands — Orca, Blue Seventy, Zoot, Xterra, etc — and while my height is always in one of the ranges specified, my weight never is. For every single one of them, their specifications list the largest size as covering something like “145-163” or “155-170” or “160+” or something else that, while called “extra large” or even “extra large/Athena,” is not really extra large.
Now, I’m chubby but not fat. And triathletes as a whole are a pretty skinny bunch of people. But I do know people who do races like this who are larger than me. What the heck do they wear??
Anyway. I suppose that’s enough ranting about the absurd weight standards for women and the ineffectiveness of sizing things based on height/weight. Last night I rode 15 miles on the stationary bike. This is the first time I’ve ever ridden the bikes at Gilruth and I found one major problem — they are too close to the front wall, thus too close to the TVs. So you end up having to look up at an odd angle, which leaves your eyes feeling really strange after a while. Hmm. They also have a half-and-half bike selection — 4 recumbant bikes and 4 upright bikes. The four “good ones” (i.e. not recumbant) were taken when I arrived, so I rode 5 miles on the recumbant bike. After that, one of the upright bike freed up so I quickly switched machines for the remaining 10 miles. It took me about 54 minutes, which seems pretty well calibrated to what I would do on the road (where I average somewhere between 15 and 18 mph depending on weather and wind conditions).
Jose left this morning to spend the weekend at home, so I’m all alone. While it will be nice to get some me-time to clean up my apartment and get some little projects done, it always feels weird when he goes away. I mean, who will I eat dinner with? Who will laugh at me when I imitate the crazy dance that Stephen Colbert did on last night’s Conan rerun? Who will play the bass line on Guitar Hero II while I play lead? (By the way, that game is awesome.)
Oh well, he will be back on Sunday, and my brother will be here in the meantime. Last night I was worrying about what I would do to keep Brian entertained for the weekend (a habit that is totally blamed on my mom), especially when I need to do my long run and long bike. Then I remembered that this is the same Brian that played Burnout (a race car game) for like 10 hours straight while we were home for Christmas. Something tells me he’ll entertain himself.