Friday 6/11/10

Exercise:45 minute walk after dinner (239 cal)
Weight: 214
Net Calories:1285

Ah, the frustration of doing everything right and not seeing the scale move the direction you would like. According to this blog I've gained a pound since starting early this week. But my weight the day before I started was 215, highlighting the variability of daily weights (I didn't lose 2 pounds overnight that night, nor gain a pound last night). I prefer to use the tool at hacker's diet that calculates your weighted 10 day moving average, a technique that takes most of the daily variables of scale weights out of the picture (how hydrated were you that morning, weight pre or post BM, etc). Trouble is that it's going to take a week or two for my moving average to recalibrate since I've only recently resumed tracking my weights on Hacker's after having been at a lower weight the last time I logged there... once it's normalized I'll add it to my reporting here. I'm going to use Mondays to check in and change my sidebar stats, rather than focusing too much on daily weights.

Good day today. Went to work with Rich (I often do this and spend the day at the local library) so I packed all my food for the day, less room for temptation when there's no kitchen/fridge. Went to Whole Foods for a quick grocery run and not only did they not have the usual minefield of samples out, I also managed to avoid the frequent trap of getting a poor choice of snack and instead got about a cup of fresh cherries (87 calories). It's a small step, but that felt really good to have stuck to my guns. I sometimes feel that eating wisely and focusing on weight loss is sort of a habit you get into, and I'm a little out of the habit of avoiding some common pitfalls. The more one practices the easier it gets.

MFD thinks I had too few calories today (they think I should never go below 1421), but I'm not hungry, I've eaten well and had balanced foods, and considering that I've been a little over my goal the last few days plus tomorrow is likely to be a bigger eating day (potluck) I'm okay with being a little under. They're right that it's important not to eat too little in order to avoid slowing down the metabolism and going into starvation mode, but they're a little more rigid about it than I think is necessary. It's not really that exact of a science anyway and many portions, exercise calories etc are estimates, I figure as long as I'm pretty close things are good.