Begin Rant...

I'm going to make a slight detour on Rick's Blog Tour of Paris, to comment on something. I was planning to write about this later, but the news story linked to this blog was just too timely to resist.

The French are all in all a lean people. In my week there, every French person I saw there was slim. There were no fat people that I could see. Well, that's not entirely true. I did see fat people - American tourists. It was amazing. I could easily play a game of 'Spot the American' by just looking for the 'beer belly'. I was riding the subway one day, surrounded by a bunch of anonymous, slim French people. Then I see this guy with a huge gut get onto the subway. Before he says a word, I know he's an American. Then he starts speaking to his daughter, who was getting on with him and he's speaking English. Yep, I was right. An American. Fortunately, I'm not a 'typical fat American' so I think I blended in a bit better.

This realization is very sad. Americans are getting fatter by the day. This means their health is getting worse. Obesity is one of the biggest causes of death in the US and it is completely avoidable without any nasty drugs (which are a whole other blog in itself). My concern, after a week in Paris though, is that soon the French are going to start getting just as fat as us Americans. Why? McDonalds and KFC are everywhere in Paris!

McDonalds is at least one US corporation that has obviously been able to gain a very good foothold on the French market. The menu in the restaraunt is largely identical to American menus. This food is absolutely horrible for your health and very fattening. Don't believe me? Go out to your video store right now and rent a documentary called Super Size Me. This documentary tells the story of a guy who wanted to prove how unhealthy McDonalds food is. So, to prove it, he got a complete check up, then proceeded to eat nothing but McDonalds food, 3 meals a day for 30 days. It was absolutely amazing how badly McDonalds food affected his health in this time. The documentary is also filled with many very enlightening facts about the bad quality of their food. This is a must see documentary.

Fast food is literally killing Americans, and now it's going to start killing the French. This is just wrong. This corporation is single-handedly responsible for killing thousands of people! They are just as bad as cigarette companies. Americans need to be made aware of this and avoid these places like the plague. The French are much earlier in the obesity game. They are where America was perhaps 30 years ago as McDonalds was only rising to power. All they have to do is look at the size of Americans to see their future, if they don't stop themselves from developing the fast food habit.

End of Rant.