When I was younger, I ate nothing but fried food. Everything was fried, from oysters to chicken to potatoes to vegetables. When you die in New Orleans, they deep fry you before they put you in the coffin. When we baptize children in New Orleans, we baptize them with a bordelaise sauce; we don't use water.

I'm 64, but I act like I'm still 12. I go to schools. At colleges, they come out in droves, they almost scare me. I think it's just to see if I'm still alive. After I work them out - and it's not easy - I sit them down and we have a serious talk. Are they eating? Working on their body? I can say things parents won't say. No matter where I go, I talk to each one individually after I teach. They tell me things like, 'I'm starving, guys like girls thinner.' I give them concrete advice about self-image and self-worth.

Ninety percent of people who lose weight gain it back. It's very sad.

When I go to teach, that's not my workout. It's my show. I'm 134 pounds - I'm a teeny thing. I work out 11/2 hours a day and eat 1,600 calories. I can't stray because I have to fit into these Dolfin shorts!

When you gain weight, for every pound that you gain, it adds four pounds of stress on your knees. So if you gain five pounds, you've got 20 pounds of stress on your knees. So that's why I'm extremely careful with my portions and my workout, because I can't be overweight.

My persona has always been what a man was never supposed to be. Outrageous, gregarious, crazy, silly, funny.

No one can make fun of overweight people in front of me!