Sizing up columnists

Paid a call on the father of a friend over the weekend.

He was expecting me.

Really enjoyed our visit. He’s a good guy.

But I’m still tickled by something he said when he first opened his door.

He exclaimed that I was a lot bigger than he expected. A bit later he repeated that observation, noting that his extrapolation from having seen my mug shot countless times was off the mark.

(Actually we had crossed paths briefly a few years ago, but one of us was standing and one of us was seated.)

Anyway, it made me wonder. Do lots of people imagine that they can infer a columnist’s height and weight on the basis of having seen his or her mug shot?