Happy, happy, joy, joy! There is staggeringly good news this week on the health and fitness front.

Are you sitting down? I mean, if you're like me, you're almost always sitting down, which isn't such a bad thing as you're about to learn. According to just-released results of a 12-year study in Denmark, women who have skinny thighs have twice the risk for heart disease of the rest of us.

Can I hear a "Nah, nah, nah, NAH, nah"?

In your FACE you supermodels with your spaghetti stems. Somebody please pass the pork fat and let me get on with the very serious business of avoiding a heart attack.

The study followed 2,800 people and discovered that the portion of that population with thighs smaller than 23.6 inches in circumference had twice the risk of heart disease.

Frankly, I thought 23.6 inches sounded like a LOT of inches but then I got out the old tape measure and guess what? My thighs, which are actually kind of thighnormous, are exactly 23.5 inches. TMI? Yes, I know, but it's all in the name of science, Gomer, try to hang.

The study doesn't explain why thicker thighs make a healthier heart but researchers speculated that it could be because thinner people (hereafter referred to as "the damned") have less muscle mass to "initiate the metabolic breakdown of lipids and glucose." Swoon. You had me at "metabolic."

There were caveats, of course. Caveat is a Latin word which means "dead person" or "funny neckerchief," I forget which. Anyway, the big caveat is that people who have thighs quite a bit bigger than the delightful and healthful 23.6 inches in circumference (in other words anyone who has ever eaten a turkey leg at Disney World) aren't healthier by nature. They have gotten themselves a bad case of an "overhealthy heart" I suppose.

Scientifically speaking, the study finds that a woman who is barely over 5 feet tall and weighs 135 pounds is half as likely to have heart disease as, say, Heidi Klum.

Now before all you supermodels get your Versaces in a wad and accuse me of wanting you to have heart problems, let me hasten to say that nothing could be further from the truth.

Scurvy maybe, but not heart trouble.

This on the heels of a "Time" magazine cover story titled, "The Myth About Exercise" in which a very learned scholar writes that, while it's good for you, exercise won't make you lose weight. In fact - and this part cracks me up - exercise can actually lead to weight gain because of the notion that you're entitled to a treat after 30 minutes on the elliptical or whatever.

Your chickens have come home to roost, you diet-obsessed handwringers. And I want mine fried with a side of tater salad.