Part One of my two-part Fat Old Guy Diet, nicknamed
the “Not Gonna Be the Fattest Guy at my Son’s Wedding Diet” has ended in
success. (Pt. II, the "Not Gonna Be the Fattest Guy at my Birthday Party Diet" has begun)
The diet was launched two plus months before the wedding, after I caught
a glimpse of my profile in the mirror and hit the scales to assess the damage.
I weighed 245. I pledged to lose 25 pounds by wedding day, come Hell or high cholesterol. Two months later, I reached my goal weight by my
goal date. So I canceled my forklift stretch-limo. I stopped worrying
about my overstressed pants popping a fly-button and eviscerating a wedding
guest.
Tummy deflated, Ego inflated. Happy camper time.
What could go wrong? I soon found out.
When I went to be fitted for my Tux, things went south with with
one, cruel, word.
Here’s a letter of complaint I sent to the CEO of the tux
company.
Dear Mr. (name redacted)
I have a bone to pick.
Not about the tuxedo I rented from you. As rental
tuxes go it was just peachy. No soup stains, no unseemly seam rips, cigarette
burns or malevolent odors. It held its press. Zipper zipped. No lint in the pockets,
no hint of frayed lapel or shiny bottom.
I would wear it as Father of the Groom, so I really wanted
to look good.
A couple of months ago, I noticed I was
fat. Not superfat fat, but large
enough to risk being the fattest guy at the wedding. I had the fat old guy’s
deadly combo of skinny legs, no ass, and a beer gut. I looked like a pair of
toothpicks smuggling a bathtub.
So I began a crash diet. I am not inexperienced at such an
event.
A week before the wedding I hit my goal. I’d lost 25 pounds,
from 245 to 220. At 6’0”, that’s not a bad weight for a man of my age and
willpower.
I went into one of your stores for my tux fitting. Tailor was competent, all business, and kept his hands off my business. I thought
I looked pretty good in the tux. I
almost looked svelte. Okay, semi-svelte.
Then I was handed my receipt/claim check. Name, claim
number, sizes--all listed correctly.
But there were six additional letters that knocked the wind from my
sails, stripped the gild from my lily and sucked the gas from my bag.
My cheeks flushed as I read the insult. The pangs of earlier
weight related affronts returned, my self-worth plummeted, my confidence caught
the last train for the coast.
I was not a valued customer nor cherished client to you
guys. Nope.
I was a “46 Portly.”
Portly? Portly!!! Port-freakin’-ly???
Who the heck calls somebody portly these days?
In an instant, I was no longer a proud father who had busted
his rear end to look his best on a most important family occasion. I was just
another fat guy.
Why would anyone with a lick of sense, humanity or
desire for repeat business do that?
Unless…. Perhaps the word “Portly” had mutated meaning—like the word
“Bad,” which can now mean “Good.”
Yeah, that’s the ticket. The receipt was actually sending me off with a jaunty
“Devilishly Handsome” designation. At that point I’d have settled for
“Stylishly Stout” or “Not as fat as you’d think.”
So I looked it up. Sadly, “portly” still means “rather heavy
or fat,” or “corpulent” according to my Funk & Wagnall’s
I waited until I returned the item to point out the insult to a manager . Did he
apologize? No, he said, “It should
have read Executive,” adding, “It didn’t refer to you as Portly, it referred to
the suit as portly.”
How about that, I was not only Portly but too stupid to
interpret a receipt.
I thought you really ought to know about this. And I do hope
this letter wends it way up the chain to your desk, and doesn’t result in some
customer service rep sending me “Idiot Letter # 5” and a $5.00 coupon for my
next purchase of Argyle socks.
Sincerely,
John Corcoran
