Gotta Lose Some Elbees

I hear the gym at work has been crowded this week with folks and all of their resoluteness.  I stopped doing the New Year's resolution thing years ago after I realized the only successful resolution I had was to stop making New Year's resolutions.  That and to never see Madonna's "Evita."

So it really wasn't the New Year thing that has me on my latest workout kick.  It's the fact that Navy Personnel Command will not be switching uniforms from khakis to the Navy Working Uniform (NWU).

Here I am in my khakis at a function in Korea.  I'm the brown guy second from the right.  This is before my khakis became painful to wear.  Khakis are the daily uniform at Navy Personnel Command.

These are the newer NWUs which are affectionately known as "aquaflage" or "blueberries."  It's amazing how well they blend in with the ocean if you ever find yourself blown over the side of a boat.

I really like the NWUs because they're comfortable.  More importantly, they hide my gut much better than the khakis.  At the rate I was porking out over the holidays, it's no wonder that my khaki uniform pants are now causing me physical pain around my midsection.  Yes, I'm getting red marks around my waist due to the snugness of my pants.  The pubic hair of an ant wouldn't fit in the space between my pants and my bare skin.  Now I know how David Hasselhoff felt, sucking in his gut in those later years of Baywatch.

And so with my latest uncomfortable predicament, the obvious options were #1.  Buy bigger uniform pants.  #2.  Advertise my latest look to a sausage casing company and at least get some cold hard cash for my pain.  Or #3 Lose some elbees (that's LBs for the uninitiated).  Since Carol and I spent way too much money on lavish Christmas gifts that we'll be getting rid of in a garage sale as soon as the weather heats up, I went with option #3 and started working out again.

I'm embarrassed to say that I was tempted to do the pregnant rubber band trick with my khaki pants.  That's where barely pregnant ladies (that should be the name of a rock band - BPL) take a rubber band and loop it around the button hole above the zipper and attach it to the button in order to give the belly some extra breathing room.  I hear it works great during the stage where you can still fit into your normal pants except around the waist but you're not yet ready for maternity pants.  Or in my case, where you've done your best wallowing mud mammal impersonation by chowing down non-stop on Christmas desserts, turkey, ham, buffalo wings, Bubba burgers, bratwurst, sushi, empanadas, a variety of salty meats and a single breath mint.

Speaking of breath mints, I can take a hint.  You see, the other night, Carol made us a nice salad for dinner.  Just last night, she served a delightful couscous that we thoroughly enjoyed.  Good stuff and very healthy.  But like I said, I can take a hint.  She might as well have taken a Sharpie marker and scrawled, "Fat Ass" on my forehead.  It's like when someone offers you a breath mint or when the barber asks if you want your eyebrows trimmed.  You never say no to those two questions.  Folks are politely telling you that your garlic onion breath is killing the nearby foliage and that your scary mono-brow between your eyes is beginning to look like Sasquatch's armpit, respectively.

I know that I shouldn't make a big deal out of this because relatively speaking, I'm in decent shape.  Round is a shape, right?