Are your houseplants overweight?
Obesity was once believed to be a problem primarily for the animal kingdom, but new research shows that vegetable obesity is becoming more and more of a problem. Super-sized plant life is especially abundant in suburban neighborhoods.
One of the biggest problems for scientists working in this area has been coming up with a relevant way to measure plant obesity. The familiar BMI, or Body Mass Index, simply isn’t appropriate for plants, since they keep growing throughout their lives and can’t easily be weighed.
Scientists eventually devised the VOR, or Vegetable Obesity Ratio. This measure looks at the ratio between the average height and girth for plants of a given age and species, multiplied by the Obesity Constant, defined as 12.872 Kilocalories per square meter. The VOR also takes into account the average rainfall and insolation for a given location, and the number of Twinkies® eaten within a two mile radius of the plant’s primary abode.
In order to help curb the rapid spread of vegetable obesity, Pfizoid Pfarma® has developed a new diet pill specifically targeted at plants. Tentatively called Vegelipex, this pill works by reducing a plant’s appetite. Vegelipex is expected to be part of an effective vegetative obesity cure when supplemented by vigorous exercise and a generally healthy lifestyle.
![By Lauro Chieza de Carvalho(adaptação) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons](https://flying-news.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Malha_espaco_tempo.jpeg-120x120.jpeg)
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Man, you should have seen this totally obese oak tree I saw yesterday. I was out taking a walk, and I stopped to take a breath–I was totally out of breath. So I stopped to lean against this oak tree, and I thought: “Dude, this tree is even fatter than I am.” Wow!
Are you a kill joy? Don’t you think plants enjoy eating too? You’re nothing but a Jansenist. I fervently hope that the next potato you eat will be shriveled and your melons will be poor and weak.