Alison's Zip Line Adventure

My wife is very brave, I have known this, she will often be challenged with different things, and handle them with grace and courage. But she generally avoids stupid risks... so when Lupita mentioned the zip line at the falls we visited in Chiapas, and Alison said she would do it with her, I was pretty shocked and amazed.

We were set for disappointment at first when the practice zip line was closed as we walked up the falls, we figured maybe it was closed for the season or something. But once we got to the top, and saw that is was open, we broke out 300 pesos and the ladies were on their way.

Now as the ladies would tell the story, Tim and James are too scared to take the zip line... but the reality is that Tim and James are TOO FAT to take the zip line... and most other men are too. The weight limit on the zip line is 70 Kg, so even at my peak of physical fitness my junior year at Kings Point, I still would have probably been just over the limit, so it has absolutely nothing to do with 10 years of sloth and gluttony... at least that's my story.

So without any further delay... here is Alison's Zip Line adventure.

Corporate Fat Camp

In many regards, I've been very successful in my early career, and in life in general. I went to a great school, made great friends, found a great job, a great woman to settle down with, and now we have a great kid, a house that needs some work, and a crazy dog. Life is good.

In other respects, I haven't been as successful. I was a fat kid in High School, I managed to lose enough weight to get into the academy, I struggled physically for a while, as a plebe, since I wasn't really prepared for the rigors of the twice daily PT, Tattoo, the push-ups, flutter kicks, and other punishment exercise for stepping out of line, or failing to achieve some regimental development milestone. Thank goodness I could at least run, I can never repay my brother for making sure I could run... if I had been one of the guys that dropped out of every run, I never would have made it. During my sophomore year, I really kicked it into gear, dropped the rest of the extra weight I was carrying around, and started running great distances all over Great Neck, NY and other places. I kept in shape while during my sea duty, and graduated fit as a fiddle.

Well... the last 10 years, have been another story, living on my own with a never ending supply of beer, junk food, cable television, baseball games, xbox, sitting behind a desk all day at the office... things have slipped a bit. When I say a bit, I'm being charitable to myself, I have really let myself go. I've flirted a few times with getting back in shape, tried some of the fad diets, they worked to some extent, but once I got off them, everything came creeping back, and always even worse. I tried to lose some weight for the wedding, and failed, I tried to lose some weight before the baby and failed.

Now, almost certainly as result of the drastic increases in insurance premiums cause by recent healthcare reform, our company is requiring participation in a wellness program to get people to quit smoking, drop some weight etc. I had to go do a biometric screening the other day, Alison came with me, since the last few times I have had blood drawn it has not gone well... I knew my weight was a disaster... but let me say something about pant sizes. What a false sense of security these manufacturers give you with their "Vanity Sizing"... I was shocked at some of my measurements, that's all I'm going to say about that.

So we've hit the high water mark! It's been a lot of hard work to get this out of shape, and it's going to take a lot of even harder work to undo it. I'm enrolled in this "naturally slim" program, which I'm not certain will be helpful, but we'll see. I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately we're on our way to Mexico in about a week, so I'm going to have to moderate things a bit on our vacation. That's fine... at least we are not going on a cruise.

Here is a photo of my corporate fat camp identification bracelet.

So wish me luck !