Fat Chance

My self-delusion at this point is so rock-solid you could climb up it and plant a flag.

Are you a couple? Are you a FAT couple? Would you like to win £ 50,000? WE want to hear from YOU! Stream FM is looking for six overweight couples between the ages of 25 and 65 to take part in our fabulous new competition: ‘FAT CHANCE!’ Over a six-month period, we’ll find out which couple can lose the

Why do people automatically think that because you’re carrying extra weight you don’t feel the cold? I’m not a fucking walrus. My blubber is not that beneficial when it comes to staving off cold temperatures.

How on earth can we ever expect our society to get thinner when no-one is making any effort to make the healthy food cheaper than the toxic, fatty stuff that’s creating a nation of tubby fuckers with too many fillings? The

Ten minutes later I’m more confused than a Tory politician in Lidl.

In the past few days I’ve been lard-arse, jelly-tits, jiggle-puffs, porks-a-lot, the gutmeister, flabbington, Jabba, wide-load, Nelly the Elephant—and most bizarrely, Captain Love Handles.

You are kidding, aren’t you?’ I lift up one arm. ‘You see how much that’s shaking, don’t you? I look like I have early-onset Parkinson’s.

How many times over the years have I substituted standing up for myself with chocolate cake?

Tea strainer and a gardening fork? Framed picture of two elephants and a cheese board? Bottle of insecticide and super king duvet cover in an odd shade of milky green? You can find them all, right in IKEA—if you’re prepared to tackle the incomprehensible floor plan and are wearing your best walking shoes.

vulnerable when I met up with Elise at the Costa Coffee near the radio station for our regular mid-afternoon natter. Both being Stream FM employees, this daily time-out is much needed, and as far as I’m concerned, the only thing that keeps me sane. Working in local radio is rather like trying to herd cats, while someone

you a FAT couple? Would you like to win £ 50,000? WE want to hear from YOU! Stream FM is looking for six overweight couples between the ages of 25 and 65 to take part in our fabulous new competition:

I doubt the vision of me with my legs kicked in the air and Greg pumping me hard enough to knock several third-years’ paintings off the wall did much for our prospects that year.

that’s

The weight gain we’ve both allowed in the last decade hasn’t broken us, but there are some mighty big cracks showing.

One does not simply ‘pop’ into IKEA. One plans the visit like a military operation

There’s a lot more pressure and friction going on, and if you’ve picked a pair of trainers that even the impoverished Bangladeshi children who make them wouldn’t stick on their feet, you know you’re going to have a really bad time of it.

lard-arse, jelly-tits, jiggle-puffs, porks-a-lot, the gutmeister, flabbington, Jabba, wide-load, Nelly the Elephant—and most bizarrely, Captain Love Handles. I thought she’d run out of insults mid-week but by first thing Saturday morning she’s still going strong. ‘Come on Mr Plump! Get

It’s a little hard to be on edge when you’re walking through the rich English countryside on a warm late summer’s day.

I wish I was thinner . . . but if wishes were horses then beggars would ride them. Until they were made into burgers. Which I would then eat.

It’s the small victories that count the most. They tend to add up to big ones if you give them half a chance.

How on earth can we ever expect our society to get thinner when no-one is making any effort to make the healthy food cheaper than the toxic, fatty stuff that’s creating a nation of tubby fuckers with too many fillings?

onto my size eighteen frame, but the victory is a hollow and shallow thing unless I can get that zipper all the way up. Luckily, it zips to the side rather than the back, so at least I have a fighting chance. I suck my chest in, mentally cross myself, and pull the zipper up. It gets almost halfway before the laws of physics assert themselves, in no uncertain terms I might add, and refuse

By the time I feel tired enough to go up to bed, I could easily have told you how long you need to cook a three-bed semi in the Lake District to get the right consistency, and exactly how large a mortgage you should be paying on a chocolate and maraschino cake with excellent views of Windermere.

if wishes were horses then beggars would ride them.

largely confined to the website and

There’s only so many times you can eat salad and walk five miles on a treadmill before your will to live starts to dribble out of your ears.

Like the circles of Dante’s Inferno, IKEA descends through several floors towards Hell itself (or the checkout, as people with no imagination insist on calling it). Unfortunately for the unwary traveller, you must venture through every floor no matter what item you wish to procure, whether you want to or not. For example, should you wish, like me, merely to purchase a wok and a couple of bookends to stop Greg’s huge hardback rugby books from falling over all the time, you must also look at every other sodding product IKEA has on sale. You must make your way along the circuitous and tortuous route that the sadistic Swedes have laid out between you and the exit. No one in human history has ever said the following: ‘I’ve just popped into IKEA and picked up some meatballs. You fancy a spag bol?’ One does not simply ‘pop’ into IKEA. One plans the visit like a military operation. Make no mistake: shopping there is not to be taken lightly. Not if you wish to retain both sanity and a healthy bank balance.

The woman obviously has no comprehension of the term ‘gentle increment.’ One minute she’s jogging along next to me; the next she’s doing her best impression of Usain Bolt with a firework up his arse.

Wilfred looks more glum than Birmingham.