a final farewell from Fat Ryan -OR- my plan to lose the equivalent of a 10-yr old
By Ryan Byrd
personal, humor, general life, family, children, christen, food, popular culture, weight loss
5 Comments
hello friends,
Fat Ryan here. yes, this is the same ryan that’s been bringing you this stunning blog content since the year of our lord 2007. yes, this is the same ryan that you see every day or that you interact with on twitter every day or that you think longingly of each day. but i’m now referring to that guy as Fat Ryan.
Fat Ryan is saying farewell. as a handful of you know, i received a bit of a wake-up call several days ago at the doctor’s office. while we’re still waiting on the full results of some testing, the doctor feels “almost 100% sure” that i have obstructive sleep apnea and reactive hypoglycemia. in essence, i’m either gonna die in my sleep or die after shoving down a pile of rigatoni and garlic bread. either way, not a bad exit from planet earth, but i’m not sure if exiting planet earth, at this point, is a good plan.
so, i’ve come up with a bit of a plan to lose some weight—basically the equivalent of a 10-year old child. yes, i’m losing a 5th grader. that amounts to 70 pounds. Fat Ryan—as of a weighing a few minutes ago—is 280 pounds. *now, i just had a blue bell mooo bar, so that, of course, factors into my overall plus or minus girth quotient.* the doctor told me my optimum weight is about 195. being that the last time i was sub-200 was about the last time somebody legitimately wore parachute pants, i have a hard time processing that number. after talking to a couple dietetics/fitness friends of mine, we agreed that low-200s was a more appropriate weight for which to strive. so, i’m locking in on 210. 70 pounds. an average 5th grader.
i’ll “officially” begin that journey on monday, but in the meantime, i thought Fat Ryan should have a chance to address some of the people in his life worth remembering.
to my 5th grade friend winston: winston, you were there with me on that gifted & talented field trip where we had lunch at pizza inn. while most of the kids had a few slices of pizza and sucked down a hawaiian punch, we decided to have a pizza-eating contest. 27.5 slices of pepperoni pieces later, i rolled out of that booth a loser. you won, winston. but much like other losses, you inspired me to be better. to be great. to shove down that pizza. to get that 28th piece of pizza to slide down my throat with little resistance. you’ve truly been an important part of my life.
to the sexually-repressed-yet-pragmatic gym coach at some point in history who invented shirts-vs-skins: you scarred me man. you gave me a deep wound. i mean, it was bad enough the first time i heard this concept in 6th grade p.e. with a bunch of dudes, but then there was that time we had to share half the basketball court with the girls p.e. class the day it rained. that was cold, man. yeah, it was great for that one freakish dude who somehow had a little chest hair in 6th grade and looked like he invented “p90x pre-adolescent version”, but for Fat Ryan, that was a bad moment in sports history.
to chunk from the goonies: come on man, the truffle shuffle was a great cinematic moment, but you clearly set a precedent in the mid-80s and beyond for fat people exposing their folds for others’ pleasure.
to those who witnessed me puking in the hallway at my 5th grade valentine’s day party: ok, first i apologize. i realize what you saw that day has probably haunted you for the last 20 years. my bad. but, you were probably the same moms who thought it was a good idea to let our class make the “world’s longest banana split.” first of all, who were you fooling? i’ve seen subway footlong sandwiches longer than that banana split. second, whose idea was it to give the burgeoning fat kid the job of stirring the melting caramel pot? there’s a good chance that about 32% of my body’s 57% water content that day was replaced by that beautiful, thick sugary ice cream topping.
to my grandpa that-one-time-i-think-he-was-making-a-point-but-might-have-just-been-creatively-hungry: my grandpa was a great, great man. i can’t underscore that enough, honestly. but then there was that time. that time he was hungry. that time there happened to be a skillet with a half-inch layer of leftover grease in it—you know, when it sits out and gets sorta gelatinous. that time he told told us about growing up not having much. that time that he then got up, scraped the grease in a bowl, walked to the fridge, got the mustard, squirted it into said bowl and stirred it up. that time he sat down at the table in front of us kids and ate the entire bowl of mustardy grease. yeah, that time. it’s a searing memory for Fat Ryan.
to miss piggy: you were my childhood crush. i shit. you. not. i was in love with miss piggy as a child. now, understand this: the girl i chose to focus my pre-pubescent quasi-lustful thoughts toward was an animal. and not just any animal, but the quintessential fat-joke animal. thank you jim henson for dressing up swine in high heels and lipstick.
to jared from the subway commercial: ok, i don’t have much to say to you, but really?? you’ve been holding up your size 57 jeans on t.v. for literally a decade now and we’re supposed to believe you got that way from sucking down 12″ meatball marinaras and oversized chocolate chip cookies? no doubt, the american people are slow, but even this fat guy knows better than that.
to oprah: i’m not sure why, but it’s probably prudent for me to give you a shout-out. and you’re probably watching me right now. oh wait, there was this.
to morgan spurlock, the creator/star of supersize me: i genuinely like you morgan spurlock. and i genuinely liked your documentary. and i genuinely learned something from your movie: skinny, almost-vegans shouldn’t wholly switch to a mcdonald’s diet. man, that was good news to me. not skinny: check. not an almost-vegan: check. whew… no doubt, i honestly did quit super-sizing my combo meals, but i equally felt empowered to consume those new, all-white-meat chicken mcnuggets with the extra-30-cents thing of sweet and sour sauce. thanks morgan!
ok, a few others to add to the let’s-not-forget-about-these list: the fat boys, weird al yankovic for recording “i’m fat”, the goofballs who came up with the taco bell diet commercials, that 9th grader who made fun of me for being fat despite the fact that he probably dropped out of school in the 10th grade and my childhood next door neighbors who had a refrigerator in their garage dedicated to only ice cold cans of coke to which they gave me full, 24-hour access.
so, Fat Ryan is bidding you farewell. he was a good man, but he’s got to go. Healthy Ryan needs to live. he has a beautiful wife, 2 incredible little girls and another on the way. he has great friends and a church that’s just about to blossom and be fully realized. he’s a good dude. very few of you have ever met him. give him a chance.
signing off,
Fat Ryan
