Get McHealthy!

Last updated on: May 14, 2004 at 6:51 pm by Fred Clark

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Get McHealthy! 2004-05-14T18:51:09-04:00 Fred Clark

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So yesterday I walked the 663 steps from my apartment to the local McDonald's to try the new Go Active Happy Meal for grownups.

You get a salad and a bottle of Dasani (Coca Cola's bottled tapwater — it's filtered!), plus a pedometer and a little booklet encouraging you to walk more.

First, the salad: I chose the "Fiesta Salad." It's a pile of iceberg lettuce about half the size of your head with a few lonely shreds of romaine mixed in. On top of this is a generous dollop of somewhat oily beef taco filling and a handful of tortilla strips. To this mixture I added the packet of sour cream and Newman's Own Salsa that came with the salad. The entire concoction has, the box says, only 450 calories and 27 grams of fat, but I still don't imagine this is a terribly healthy meal. (Complete list of ingredients and nutritional information available here.)

About that box — it's huge. It's roughly a 9 1/2" square that's about 3 1/2" deep with a sloping roof/handle. You'd probably have to check it as luggage on most flights.

The salad bowl is a substantial hunk of plastic. It's intended to be used once and discarded, but both the bowl and it's plastic lid seem weightier than your basic Gladware storage containers. They're hefty enough that one suspects they would be dishwasher and microwave safe. You could wash this bowl out and reuse it as a cereal bowl for months to come. You could fill it with water and some of those floating candles and make a nice centerpiece. This is a large bowl.

Pretty much all you need to know about the "Step With It!" booklet is the very first sentence: "Shopping is now an official sport." You're nothing more than a consumer, but McDonald's wants you to be a healthy consumer. So get walking:

Clip your StepometerTM to your waistband or belt and wear it all day long.

1. Calculate. Wear your Stepometer for a week. Find your average daily steps.

2. Accelerate. Add 500 steps a week until you reach your personal daily goal (optimal daily goal: 10,000 steps or about five miles). Combine with a fun six-week fitness program at www.presidentschallenge.org.

3. Notate. Log your steps daily at www.mcdonalds.com. It's a great way to keep motivated and chart your progress.

The pedometer, while not built to last like the bowl, is kind of fun and I and the crack slacktivist research staff have been playing with it.

My research assistant tells me that, at a relaxed walking pace, there are about 700 steps per cigarette, or approximately 2.5 cigarettes per mile. He plans to Get Healthy by working up to where he's walking half a pack a day. If he does that, and he cuts back on the Fiesta Salads, he may actually get himself in shape.

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