There’s been a steady climb since 2000 in the obesity rates for adults and children across our nation.

According to the most latest statistics available from the website operated by The State of Obesity, nearly 40 percent of adults and 20 percent of children are overweight in America.

It’s certain that overindulging in all the wrong types of food (especially fatty foods) and binge eating (no doubt while binge watching hours of TV) are among the leading causes of obesity.

But there’s another contributing factor that we must address. While I’ll be the first to admit that I do not exercise like I should, Americans are getting lazier in my humble opinion.

And why? Because we keep investing our hard-earned money in items/technology that increase our level of laziness.

Here are just a few examples I’ve recently witnessed.

Last week, while taking a break from work and, of course, doing absolutely nothing but sitting in my recliner and watching loads of TV, I saw an ad for a coffee table that comes with a built-in cooler. Yep, now instead of walking your lazy butt all the way to the kitchen for a cold beverage and a snack, perhaps even a bowl of vanilla ice cream covered in chocolate syrup, all you have to do is open the handy cooler located next to your chair and have instant access to satisfy your cravings.

Gee, what’s next….a vending machine that dispenses high-calorie snacks in your bedroom?

Also last week I received an email announcing that a company in the Bay Area of California has, pardon the pun, “rolled” out a device known as a Snackbot. That’s a self-propelled robot capable of delivering snacks to hungry college students. The “Bots” are being tested at the University of the Pacific, located in Stockton. Students can use an app on their smartphones to place an order and then designate a delivery area (one of 50 located on campus). I guess those students do have to actually walk to meet the Snackbot, so they do get some exercise in the process.

And don’t get me started with all these Al devices like the Echo Dot. It performs tasks like we use to do manually….simple things like cut on the lights in your home, open/close the garage door (and even your electric blinds), turn on the sprinklers in your yard, and even direct the coffee pot to begin the process of making that morning nectar. All you have to do is offer a voice command and “Alexa” is ready to respond to your wishes.

Thanks to the advent of online shopping, you can now totally skip the task of actually driving to a store to purchase merchandise. I mean, really, who needs the exercise….just sit at home in your underwear, grab a high-calorie drink from your coffee table cooler along with a honeybun and let your fingers do the shopping on a computer keyboard.

And, for those with a ultra case of laziness, you can even shop for groceries while at home. You can order online from sites such as Amazon.com or Alice.com and have groceries shipped to your house, usually within a few days. Or you can order online with a local supermarket, either for delivery to your home, sometimes on the same day if you order early enough, or (God forbid) hop in your car and drive to the supermarket for curbside pickup.

With technology advancing at such a rapid pace, soon we’ll robots to perform all of the tasks we typically do ourselves. By that time we’ll all be so overweight that we will struggle to take care of those simple things on our own.

 

Cal Bryant is the Editor of Roanoke-Chowan Publications. Contact him at cal.bryant@r-cnews.com or 252-332-7207.