Can Clark beat champ dieter? Hah! Fat chance

Whenever talk turns to Bloomsday, nobody joins the dialogue with more pride of accomplishment than yours truly.

I don’t want to brag, but my extensive T-shirt collection contains NOT ONE shirt earned from the race that made the Lilac City famous.

It would have been so easy to cave in and join the lemmings who make up that sweaty vast cult called Bloomies. But my will is iron. And for 28 years, I have been able to follow Nancy Reagan’s advice and just say no.

It’s not that I have anything against Bloomsday. It’s just that all of my training as a despicable muckraker has taught me to be suspicious of mass hysteria whenever it occurs.

But the cliché is true, I guess. Nothing lasts forever.

So Sunday you will see me at the 29th running of Bloomsday.

Go ahead. Call me a sell-out. But I can’t help myself. I’ve been seduced by one of the deadliest of the seven sins:

Pride.

My manhood has been challenged by someone who not long ago weighed about the same as an average six-foot grand piano.

His name is Sean Spicer. And it’s true. Just three years ago this Spokane man bent the scales at a sumo-sized 719 pounds.

Then Spicer underwent dangerous surgery to have his stomach stapled. He started eating healthier foods and began a vigorous regular workout regimen.

The payoff has been extreme. Spicer lost 470 pounds.

Not able to find any friends to join him in his goal to run the 12-kilometer race, the 39-year-old decided to pick on Doug. And I would have politely said “no thanks, Sean” had his e-mail not included the following bit of trash talk:

“While I respect you as a journalist and enjoy your column I must be honest. I’m asking you because I was told you’re about the only person in old Spokaloo who can’t outrun me.”

To make matters even more insulting, Spicer mentioned that he had dislocated his kneecap last month.

Hey, I may be bald. I may be middle-aged. Maybe I can stand to lose a dozen or so kilos of flabbage myself.

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot that other factor: I don’t run.

But niggling details like a total lack of aerobic stamina doesn’t mean I’ll just lie down and let a man who once wore pants with a 72-inch waistline jog all over my self-esteem.

I called Spicer and accepted his challenge.

We met for the first time last Friday at Pitney Bowes, the Spokane business where Spicer works. Spicer, who now weighs 249, brought an olive green cotton polo shirt that he wore prior to his transformation.

This was not a shirt. This was a boardinghouse tablecloth.

“It’s a 9-X,” said Spicer, holding it up. “I had a 10-X once. You have to order them through catalogues. One of the happiest days of my life was going into a store and buying something off the rack.”

Spicer looks amazing considering what he’s been through.

The divorced father of four said he wasn’t always so heavy. He was athletic as a kid and kept his weight well within normal ranges.

In his twenties, however, the lust for Italian food and sweets like chocolate and ice cream took over his life the way a tornado consumes a trailer park.

“I’m a foodie,” he said. “I should have been born in Rome.”

Spicer describes being fat as society’s last acceptable prejudice. He endured cruel remarks and stares from strangers wherever he went. His health deteriorated to the point where he would have to stop and catch his breath three times just to get to his car after work.

Finally, his doctor gave him a blunt prognosis: shed the weight or die.

The surgery took almost seven hours, he said. It involved having his stomach reduced to about the size of an egg.

I’ve gotta stop now. Any more about Spicer’s travails and I’ll start rooting for him to grind me into the dust.

As for my travails, well, I realize getting into tiptop Bloomsday form by Sunday won’t be easy. But as I learned in college, there is no such thing as a final exam that can’t be passed by last-minute cramming.

So bear with me this week as I take you readers on a self-indulgent journey to Doug’s first Bloomsday. My next columns will deal with me overcoming the challenges like finding that special outfit that says, “Hello, world. I’m a runner!” I’ll also be exploring some innovative ways of getting in shape and trying to find a priest to give me the last rites just in case.

Oh, I almost forgot that most important pre-Bloomsday essential: carbo-loading, which I’ve already started.

Hey, bartender. Another Budweiser.