WW: Driving addicts

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives. According to the SO its the local
weight watchers weigh in at the chapel. She and the neighbours have been
complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently none of the
attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and have no qualms
about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

Can we borrow Helen to show them there is another way please?

Tony

Any chance you could offer to give them a talk on the benefits of cycling?
Maybe there'd be a chance you can slip in an anecdote or two that will show
the irony in driving to minimise walking.

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005 19:09:32 +0100, Tony Raven <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives.

Aren't you entitled to call plod to get the obstruction moved?

Quoted message said:

According to the SO its the
local weight watchers weigh in at the chapel. She and the neighbours
have been complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently
none of the attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and
have no qualms about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

Can we borrow Helen to show them there is another way please?

Tony

Al C-F said:

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005 19:09:32 +0100, Tony Raven <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives.

Aren't you entitled to call plod to get the obstruction moved?

Is that the cars or the weight watchers?

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives. According to the SO its the local
weight watchers weigh in at the chapel. She and the neighbours have been
complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently none of the
attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and have no qualms
about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

Can we borrow Helen to show them there is another way please?

Tony

If they are obstructing access to other properties, then plod needs to be
having a word with them and issuing a few tickets. Of course, a word in the
shell-like of WW head office might do the trick, as WW is very protective of
its image. Anything getting it a bad press is not likely to be viewed in a
kindly light, I would have thought. WW can be contacted at

Weight Watchers UK Ltd
Customer Services Department
Millennium House
Ludlow Road
Maidenhead
Berkshire
SL6 2SL
[email hidden]

I wonder if WW HO had a word in the ear of the meeting leader, it might do
the trick.

Cheers, helen s

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005 19:09:32 +0100 someone who may be Tony Raven
<[email hidden]> wrote this:-

Quoted message said:

She and the neighbours
have been complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently
none of the attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and
have no qualms about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

There is an obvious reason for this:-) Perhaps they should be made
to park in sensible places and then roll along the pavement to the
chapel. It may encourage them to loose weight:-)

Cycling may help, but it also has a tendency to increase the
appetite out of all proportion to the energy burned.

--
David Hansen, Edinburgh | PGP email preferred-key number F566DA0E
I will always explain revoked keys, unless the UK government
prevents me by using the RIP Act 2000.

"LSMike" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Any chance you could offer to give them a talk on the benefits of cycling?
Maybe there'd be a chance you can slip in an anecdote or two that will
show the irony in driving to minimise walking.

The topic of discussion each week is pre-set as it ties in with the
literature given out each week, so I doubt a talk on cycling would be
possible, plus I've never known an "outsider" ever give a talk unless it's
someone already linked to WW in some way. There are regular talks on the
benefits of exercise as part of the WW programme, but it seems to be going
over the heads of the attendees down Tony's way :-( Even in the group I go
to, I'm a bit of an oddity (so what's new I hear you say...), there is one
other cyclist, but she cycles a matter of a few hundred yards to the
meeting, and will not consider cycling much further. The other week when I
mentioned I'd cycled to Norwich & back (50+ miles along the lanes) there
were audible gasps of amazement. Now I know that in cycling terms, 50 miles
isn't a lot, but to those who don't exercise, they can't get their heads
round that figure. Even though I have said that when I first got back on a
bike I couldn't cycle 5 miles without getting off several times to get my
breath and built up mileages & fitness gradually, I am seen as some sort of
freak ;-) One thing that I am pleased about in terms of cycling & fitness,
I'm more toned and look slimmer than several at the meeting who weigh
significantly less than I do and I reckon that's down to cycling. I get
quite a few "But you don't look as if you weigh that much." and the "I don't
believe you weigh that much!" so I show them my card with the "official"
weigh-in figures on it. Exercise is a wonderful thing ;-)

Cheers, helen s

wafflycat said:

I wonder if WW HO had a word in the ear of the meeting leader, it might
do the trick.

Worth a try (thanks for address) but local residents having a word in
same ear hasn't made a blind bit of difference.

Tony

On Mon, 11 Apr 2005 21:21:42 +0100, "wafflycat"

wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk said:

to, I'm a bit of an oddity (so what's new I hear you say...), there is one
other cyclist, but she cycles a matter of a few hundred yards to the
meeting, and will not consider cycling much further. The other week when I
mentioned I'd cycled to Norwich & back (50+ miles along the lanes) there
were audible gasps of amazement.

At my WW meeting, people are amazed that I cycle there - it's nearly a
whole mile from my house! And I even do it in the rain!

David Hansen said:

Cycling may help, but it also has a tendency to increase the
appetite out of all proportion to the energy burned.

Depends where you start from. If you comfort-eat far more than
is good for you, then some good exercise will reduce that to
a much healthier level.

--
Nick Kew

Tony Raven said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives. According to the SO its the
local weight watchers weigh in at the chapel. She and the neighbours
have been complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently
none of the attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and
have no qualms about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

I just mentioned this to DW and she told me about the cars that she's
noticed blocking the end of our road at a certain time of day.

There's a secondary school about 500 yards from my house. It seems that
at school kicking out time, the road is chocka with parents sitting in
their cars waiting for their little dears to emerge from school.

What really rankles is that, following boundary changes a couple of
years ago, our road is no longer within the school's catchment area (if
we're still here in 8 years and the boundaries haven't changed again
then Jenny will have to go to a school several miles away). But our
road still gets used as the school car park.

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
<URL:http://www.speedy5.freeserve.co.uk/danny/>
"He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

"wafflycat" <wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk> wrote in
news:[email hidden]:

Quoted message said:

plus I've never known an "outsider" ever give a talk

Ah, "not one of us" in the eyes of the WW crowd.

Quoted message said:

I am seen as some sort of freak

But you're definitely one of us here on URC 🙂

Graeme

Tony Raven said:

I was at home today and noticed loads of cars at the end of the lane
blocking the exit and peoples' drives. According to the SO its the
local weight watchers weigh in at the chapel. She and the neighbours
have been complaining continually to WW about the parking but apparently
none of the attendees will walk further than absolutely necessary and
have no qualms about parking anywhere that minimises walking distance.

Can we borrow Helen to show them there is another way please?

Tony

Arrange the meeting at a weighbridge, then they don't even need to step
outside the car. Although that introduces the possibility of cheating by
throwing junk out between weighings.

"Tony Raven" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

wafflycat said:

I wonder if WW HO had a word in the ear of the meeting leader, it might
do the trick.

Worth a try (thanks for address) but local residents having a word in same
ear hasn't made a blind bit of difference.

Tony

Hopefully WW HO having a word in the shell-like of the leader might -
especially if WW HO is told that the leader has been had a word with by
local residents on several occasions and no notice has been taken? Blocking
access to properties is no joke - what if an ambulance or fire engine needed
access? The school Nathan used to go to in Swaffham used to regularly have
plod checking vheicles, as local residents complained about same parking
issue and plod used to periodically issue tickets to offenders. Same at
Litcham - on occasion plod used to occasionally turn up and have a word with
those individuals who parked inappropriately.

Cheers, helen s

"audrey" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

At my WW meeting, people are amazed that I cycle there - it's nearly a
whole mile from my house! And I even do it in the rain!

So imagine that reaction multiplied when we had to put our exercise
"pledges" on a board and I put up I'd do at least 50 miles a week. The
following week, when we were asked if we'd kept to out pledges & I said I'd
done Norwich & back which is a 50-miler in that one trip ;-) Audible gasps
of amazement round the room! Thankfully, the penny seems to be dropping as a
few have said they want to take up a spot of cycling when the summer
arrives.

Cheers, helen s

wafflycat said:

Now I
know that in cycling terms, 50 miles isn't a lot

*that* depends very much on the company you keep.
To an audaxer it's nothing, but the ability to cycle 50 miles
in a day (without thinking it a mega-big-once-in-a-lifetime event)
puts in a very high percentile of the population.

Quoted message said:

"I don't believe you
weigh that much!"

This sounds like the (well known?) muscle is denser
that fat factoid cutting in.

Which is why for some people tape measures are more useful
than scales, depending on your goal.

BugBear

wafflycat said:

Thankfully, the penny seems to be
dropping as a few have said they want to take up a spot of cycling when
the summer arrives.

*RESULT*

BugBear

wafflycat said:

Thankfully, the penny seems to be
dropping as a few have said they want to take up a spot of cycling when
the summer arrives.

Is it just me or are there a lot more bikes out and about this spring?

Tony

bugbear said:

This sounds like the (well known?) muscle is denser
that fat factoid cutting in.

Its true! I was having my weight taken the other day as part of a
health check and the nice nurse came back to ask if I knew what my
weight was, having just measured me. When I told her the weight the
scales had just measured she insisted they must be wrong as "You don't
look anywhere near that weight". I thanked her for her kind words but
reassured her the scales were working just fine.

Tony

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

but she cycles a matter of a few hundred yards to the meeting, and

will not consider cycling much further.

That's a start, though. Many people would drive that distance (WW or
not) - I know many people who drive their _children_ that sort of
distance to school! After a while the penny drops and they work out
that cycling is quicker than driving for lots of other local trips.

There's always a danger of cycling being seen as something done to keep
fit, wearing lycra, and covering huge distances, rather than a
practical means of transportation.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

(50+ miles along the lanes) there were audible gasps of amazement.

There are similar reactions when poeple ask how far I cycle to work -
it's only 11 miles, and the time taken is not much different to
driving. But they seriously think I'm mad.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I'm more toned and look slimmer than several at the meeting who

weigh significantly less than I do and I reckon that's down to cycling.

It's the old muscle v. fat thing. You will be _much_ healthier than
them, (not just fitter) because the health problems due to being
overweight are due to the amount of fat. There are plenty of people who
are not officially "overweight", but have a dangerous amount of fat on
their bodies.