Fat Face

"You've gotten fat since the last time I saw you"

"Really?"

"Well, not your body, but your face."

I ran into a girl I hadn't seen in a while and that was the first thing she said when she saw me. I probably would have let it get to me if it wasn't such a glaringly accurate observation. I've learned the hard way over the last couple of months that a diet plan revolving around pizza, pasta, empanadas, and a whole bottle of wine every night of the week isn't exactly a shortcut to eliminating body fat and burning calories. In fact, the consensus opinion is that it's actually unhealthy. 

The problem is that there are only four things to eat in this city, and I've already named three of them. The other is steak, and combined with the other three Argentine food groups you have a pretty potent -- and potentially lethal -- diet. I guess I could only eat salads and nothing else, but then again, I could also shove a goddamn railroad spike in my eyeball and get the same satisfaction.

The girl remarked that my bloated features were mostly concentrated in my face, but that's kind of misleading. My panza (gut, as it translates to in English) is swelling to a fairly respectable size. I actually look like Damon Wayans in "The Great White Hype" except only slightly less black. Before I left for Argentina there was about a month or so where I was fairly svelte. One night a girl at a bar actually told me I looked like Peter Pan. If that was true then, now I am more like Peter Pan's older fat alcoholic brother with bags under his eyes.

In an effort to curb my expanding waistline and engorging jowls, I actually picked up my jump rope for the first time since I bought it over a year ago. I've heard from reputable sources (like YouTube) that jumping rope is the most efficient way to burn calories, even more than jogging. That's a good thing, because running for no other reason than to run is the apex of stupidity. Not that I was really excited about the prospect of skipping rope most days. I hadn't had one minute of exercise since middle school -- almost twenty years of complete muscular atrophy -- so I was more than a little out of practice.

Over the course of a couple weeks I got used to jumping up and down with the rope, which is more difficult than one might imagine. There's a rhythm involved that means the difference between a smooth, rapid workout or tripping over the rope for ten minutes straight while screaming "fuck" at your wall. But once I did get the hang of it, things only got worse.

Jumping rope isn't fun. Working out isn't fun. There's nothing enjoyable about any form of exercise. A friend of mine once told me that a lot of people actually enjoy the rush of working out, the juice you get from pushing yourself to the physical limit. I know that's true, but I also know that those people are morons. They have systematically destroyed their brain cells over the course of a lifetime spent in the gym and way too many protein shakes. A guy may be able to deadlift a few hundred pounds, and that is impressive, but ask the same guy what his favorite movie is and the answer will likely be somewhere between "Kickboxer" and "Big Momma's House."

But I guess the rage I direct towards exercise is only a smokescreen to hide the fact I'm just not any good at it. Most days I only get about ten minutes through a jump rope workout before I collapse on the floor with my lungs on fire. If my calculations are correct that means I burn about 100 calories in a session. That isn't even one cup of the bottle of wine I consume nightly. And if it's beer I'm drinking? Well then I manage to work off one beer out of the eight I will inevitably have that day. And the pizza and sausage sandwiches I've eaten before the drinking even gets started? Not a dent.

I know where this long road of fatness will end: my father. People who knew him have pointed out that I look more and more like him as I get older. And that is more frightening than one could ever begin to imagine. He was overweight in middle age and now, well into his sixties, his physical appearance can only be described as "snowmanlike."

One day -- assuming I'm unlucky enough to live that long -- I too will be obese and without an identifiable neck. All the marathon 10 minute jump rope workouts in the world won't be able to change it. Which is why I guess it was always important for me to travel as a young man rather than an old man. At this phase of my life I can meet women in Latin America and there will be the very real possibility of mutual attraction. But when I'm older I'm sure they'll just look at me and want to roll me in flour. 

Or I could always just give them a gold bikini, wrap a chain around their necks and tether them to my fat leg while I stuff my face with empanadas in my nightclub.