Thinner

Oprah has some advice on how to lose weight. She calls it Zen and the art of weight loss. That’s nice. I have some advice on how to lose weight: eat less and use your body more.

Having an objective is good, too, because, well, we measure weight by the numbers. The obvious number is weight. But another is BMI, or Body Mass Index, which measures weight adjusted for height. To get your BMI you need to know your height in inches, your weight in pounds, and the number 704.5. Multiply your weight by 704.5, then divide it by your height and divide the result by your height again. For example, I weigh 185 pounds and I’m 72 inches tall. I did the math and my BMI is just over 25.

According to the NIH – the National Institutes of Health – over two-thirds of Americans are overweight and one-third are obese. Oooh, that’s heavy. Let’s look at the definitions. NIH defines overweight as a BMI of at least 25 and obese as a BMI of at least 30. Wait a sec. According to this, I’m overweight. Trust me, I’m skinny. Isn’t that what we all say?

The NIH publishes charts of obesity rates over time. The data show a dramatic increase. Just for fun I overlaid Al Gore’s global warming chart over the obesity chart. The graphs matched. Then I overlaid the USA’s health care expenditure chart over the obesity chart (by the way I wonder what Michael Moore’s BMI is). The graphs matched again. Either everyone’s using the same graphs or we have simultaneous crisis that need immediate attention.

Maybe they’re related. If everyone started eating less and working out more, we’d use less fuel – estimates are that if everyone in the US lost 15 pounds we’d save $3 billion a year on gasoline, we’d use fewer resources to make food, and we’d make fewer trips to the doctor and hospital. Our country would be healthier, longer living, more environmentally friendly, and less dependent on foreign oil. Now that’s patriotism! Oooh I gotta go, I’m late for my morning run. Oprah, are you coming?

The Waiting Game

"We have good clocks in our heads for roughly three minutes," said Paco Underhill, founder of Envirosell, a retail consulting firm. "Once we get beyond that, time expands wildly. If somebody waits four and a half minutes and you ask them how long they waited, they'll say 15."

What's Paco talking about? Purchasing groceries of course! But Americans are used to waiting; a recent study finds we spent 48 hours every year just waiting in lines, and not just for groceries.

The top five waits?

#5: fast food restaurants – I guess the line is slow but the food is fast;
#4: airports – to get there faster you have to wait;
#3: hospitals and doctor's offices – I'm sure Michael Moore has something to say about this;
#2: retail stores – even when there's no debut of the iPhone; and
#1: the Dept. of Motor Vehicles – I wonder if Paris Hilton ever waits in line at DMV.

Improvements are being made: a Pittsburgh health clinic installed kiosks that reduce wait times by 80%. Gourmet supermarket chain Whole Foods now uses a single line that cuts wait time from 20 minutes down to four. Some USA airports now offer Clear cards – for $100 a year – that enable travelers to bypass long security lines.

So you might think everyone's in the fast lane now. But not at Disney. MIT Professor Richard Larson – an expert in queue theory – says that Disney understands waiting psychology. According to Larson, "You may be waiting 45 minutes to get to the ride, but the experience starts when you join the line, because of all the distractions and entertainment around you." Right – just like the DMV!

Ultimately, psychology may be the key: in NYC complaints about long waits for elevators plummet when mirrors are installed. Or maybe Apple should just give everyone an iPhone so we can all watch Paris Hilton on Larry King.