Olympics ready for fat city

Organizers of the 2012 London Olympics have agreed to a designers’ recommendation that seats in the new 20,000-seat Aquatic Center should be four centimeters wider and five centimeters deeper than originally planned, the British tabloid the Sun reported.

The reason: increasing girth. The total population of the United Kingdom is less than 61 million, yet the number who are, by definition, obese, is expected to reach 27.6 million by 2010.

Among the reaction posted by British readers online:

“EXPECTING A LOT OF AMERICAN TOURISTS.”

Trivia time

What football coach was born in an Arkansas community known as Moro Bottom on this date in 1913?

Gilbertology 101

The Washington Wizards’ Gilbert Arenas might be the best athlete-blogger in the crowded athlete-blogger world.

Besides a hilarious account for NBA.com of how he used to be intimidated by Gary Payton, he is hysterical on the topic of relationships, describing an argument with his girlfriend about children’s yogurt spills and trash in the car.

“So I’m thinking to myself, ‘Man, this car is filthy!’ But instead of thinking it to myself, it slipped out and I said it out loud.

“So now the cat was out of the bag and I was like, ‘Are you ever going to clean the car?’ And just like a woman with kids is going to do, she hit me with, ‘I take care of the kids all day, and I don’t have time to do this, and do that, and do this and do that.’ So I’m like, ‘OK, but this is my dad’s car and my dad keeps his car clean. . . . ‘

“It was about her registering her car, because she didn’t register her car. It’s been sitting in the garage for two months with no tags. So I’m like, ‘If you register your car, then I can get my dad’s car back and my dad’s car would be spotless and there would be no problem because you could have a party in your car if you want to. If you want to have a party, you and the kids, and y’all want to have a party and throw drinks around, hey, be my guest. That’s your car, you have to live with that mess, I don’t go in there.’ ”

More Gilbert

As Arenas can tell you, even NBA stars sometimes get tossed.

“So we was on 16th and Constitution and she kicked me out of the car and I had to walk all the way to the gym. It was probably a mile, but I had on smaller shoes. You know, I wear 13s, but I had on 12s because they matched the outfit I was wearing so my feet were hurting and I didn’t have any cab money to take a cab and that all played a part.”

Update: They made up, Arenas said -- but not until after he voluntarily slept at the gym for a week.

Analyze this

USC football Coach Pete Carroll says he sees everything as a competition.

Here’s proof: While being interviewed by Lindsay Soto for an “In My Own Words” show that airs tonight on FSN Prime Ticket, Carroll said, “I’m competing to do a nice interview here.”

Foul!

The wife of disgraced NBA referee Tim Donaghy filed for divorce in Florida last week after the New York Post published a picture of an Arizona woman who is reportedly Donaghy’s girlfriend.

Insert the ref joke of your choice here: Personal foul, traveling, hand-checking and illegal screen are some of the ones we can print.

Trivia answer

Paul William “Bear” Bryant. He died at 69 in 1983, less than a month after his final game as Alabama’s coach.

And finally

The America’s Best Football Tailgating Cities Index, a ranking of the “tailgating friendliness” of the 31 NFL cities plus Los Angeles, rated L.A. 24th -- meaning L.A. beat eight cities that have NFL teams. (The L.A. ranking was based on the Coliseum and Rose Bowl scenes.)

The top tailgating city was Baltimore, followed by Denver and Houston.

What got us: Oakland was No. 15.

The sheer spectacle, we suppose.

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robyn.norwood@latimes.com