Giant Straw & elevated pulse

My wife ordered some kind of "mint mocha" (or similar) frozen drink thing at a Bento Box Asian Eatery while we were out tonight (on our "Monday night date" which usually is just coffee at Starbucks, but we had to take our daughter to Rooster's for a church student leadership meeting, so we had dinner at the neighboring Bento Box instead). Included with the frozen drink was a giant straw - see the pictures (the one with her pinky in the drink is to demonstrate the monstrous size of the straw). It was rather unique... I'm not sure I've seen anything like that since some of the "spoon-straws" used with Icee drinks. It wasn't a spoon straw, though... just a large-diameter straw (it did have an angled tip down in the drink, I assume to prevent the massive suction required to pull the drink up the straw from locking the straw to the bottom of the cup). The food there is very good, by the way - and very reasonably priced. (A bento box is a Japanese food container often used for packing lunches; I saw these frequently while I was in Japan last year.)

After we returned home, I decided to hop on our elliptical (exercise machine) to try to work off some of the calories I'd just intaken. (!? is "intaken" a word?) We haven't been using it recently, much to the joy of my lazy muscles. Anyway, after about 3 minutes I put my hands on the pulse reading part of the machine and, after it settled, it was at 152 beats per minute. I think that may be slightly high for my 36-year-old heart... especially since I don't regularly exercise. I slowed the pace a bit and got it back down around 140. I quit after 9 minutes and 61 calories... not nearly as much as I'd taken in (or intaken, a word I apparently created in order to not end a sentence in a preposition). I guess I should spend more time on that thing, or out walking the neighborhood, eh? For a while, about a year ago, I got to where I could do the entire 30-minute program, even with the resistance set to a higher level. I suppose I should get back to that regularly... the numbers on the scale have been getting bigger recently, and I'm afraid it's probably not a faulty scale.