Frying In My Own Fat Weight Loss Challenge Update Week 11–New Calorie Counting App on the Horizon

[This article was first published as Week 11–New Calorie Counting App on the Horizon on Technorati.]

Unfortunately all of Week 11 of the Frying in My Own Fat Weight Loss Challenge was spent recuperating from what I now refer to as my "Mike Napoli World Series Incident."

Napoli, as you may recall, injured his ankle in Game 6 of the World Series. I injured my ankle after Game 6. The similarities of our lives pretty much stops there.
So this week left me sidelined with my foot propped up, a bag of ice and the new owner of one very unfashionable black boot. All of that meant, no exercise. No exercise translates into eating less. Eating less translates into grumpy.

And all of the above translates into no weight loss. But at least, there was no weight gain either.

With this extra couch potato time, I spent more time reading and searching for tips on losing weight or new stuff related to losing weight. It seems there's a new app on the horizon for counting calories called PlateMate.

Here's how it works: You put food on your plate. Take a photo of it and send it off for analysis.

According to articles which appeared in the Boston Globe and the New York Times,  "PlateMate uses a more complex crowd-sourcing tool, involving sets of individuals — getting small payments to analyze photos on a website — who analyze parts of the food photo, with some identifying the food and others estimating portion sizes. The trick is to have five individuals estimating portion sizes on each plate and then averaging those guesses."

Supposedly, all of this gives a fairly accurate count of calories. Of course, one dietitian who was interviewed pointed out, “You can look at a photo of a quiche and have no idea what’s really in it. Is it made with regular cheese or low-fat? Skim milk or whole milk? You’ll only be getting a guesstimate of calories.”

She's got a point. Still, I'm looking forward to PlateMate which is suppose to be available sometime this year.

I'd love to be able to try it, but in addition to being stuck with a sore ankle and an very unfashionable black boot, I am also stuck with a dumb phone until my phone carrier decides to give me an upgrade.

I bet Mike Napoli doesn't have that problem either.

Carol: Deadlines, Birthdays & Carrots

Calm down. 

No, I haven't whittled or withered away into skinniness.

If only.

Instead, I went out of town and am up against a multitude of deadlines—newspaper deadline and yearbook deadlines. (You can read about that here on my other teacher blog site) as well as deadlines to turn in next year's budget and my fourth six weeks grades.  

So here is just a brief update before I have to move along…

In short, I have been B-A-D.

Let's just say there were numerous desserts involved (resulting from my birthday). In fact, a newly made Barefoot Contessa carrot cake sits on the counter even as I write. 

See what all that sugar has made me do? Why, I've turned into a diet saboteur by including the recipe link for that rather delicious concoction.

Shameless, I know. 

On the plus side—and I'm not just talkin' about dress sizes either—I have maintained some level of exercise attending my yoga classes. However, I have not kick boxed my way into the garage for a week. Instead, I have been going to work at 7 a.m. and not returning until 5:30 or 6 p.m. working on  that darn tootin' yearbook.

Oh, before I forget, out are the Pilates Torture Time classes. 

Yep, Doomsday Becky and I have sort of struck again.

Our yoga teacher has left the new exercise place that we started going to. Since Missy Chrissy Pretzel is a former yearbook editor of mine, we are following her to her brand new yoga studio which will open in April. Sadly, gladly, she will not be teaching Pilates at her Yoga studio.

Doomsday Becky and I don't believe we will jinx Missy Chrissy Pretzel since we are following her instead of just appearing on her doorstep.

So the update is… while no additional pounds were lost, none was gained either and only a bag of carrots were hurt in this endeavor. 

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Joel: Favorite Wii Fit Plus Workouts

So my workout schedule is here. It's not a distance thing as much as a time thing, which works well for my analytical/logic-based mind. I started on Sunday by walking 15 minutes. Then I went out yesterday to Walk 5 minutes, Run 1, Walk 5, Run 1, Walk 5. But I only glanced at the schedule quickly and forgot the "Repeat 1x" thing, so I only Walked 5, Ran 1, and Walked 5. So today I went out and did yesterday's workout right. Tomorrow and Friday, I'll Walk 15 and do today's workout again Thursday.

In addition to the walking/running, I am trying to do a little bit on the Wii Fit each day. I actually have Wii Fit Plus, which has some additional exercises that the original one didn't. So far, I really am enjoying the Rhythm Boxing and Driving Range workouts. I started playing golf this past summer (see post), so the driving range is great in that it helps me with my stroke, and also counts as exercise. The rhythm boxing is cool because it's sort of like step aerobics stuff, and it involves both arms and some somewhat involved footwork. The step aerobics thing is also kinda fun. The cool thing about these is that they don't require a whole lot of intense coordination, so they fit my style just great!

Note to Carol: Set a goal that is specific, realistic, measurable, and written. It will work wonders for your motivation. Also, tell people about it. Nothing's worse than the guilt you put on yourself. Personally, I'm more interested in telling my friends who already run about my goals. I hate running, but they motivate me. My lazy friends say stuff like, "cool!" My active friends say stuff like, "Awesome! You can do it! You'll love it!" I'll take that one any day.

So we haven't gotten any comments yet. I know people are coming here and reading...so feedback time. What are your Goals for the New Year? What are you doing to make your goal be more than a wish?

Cardio Yoga & My Avatar

Day 2–Well, I’m glad a little bit of shame worked for Joel. What I didn’t figure though was that shame is a double-edged sword. This bloggeroo challenge thing kept my paws out of the Emergency Chocolate drawer today and away from those gingersnaps this evening.

I also decided that tomorrow I would bebop down to the nurse’s office for my official weigh in and fat checker. Maybe I’ll even come up with some goals like Joel to keep me on track.

After reading Joel’s first post on our blog challenge, I’m really, really glad I coerced cajoled him to to do this. Tonight I announced to my yoga class about my new mission. My yoga teacher, who in a twisted bit of fate is one of my former yearbook editors from a gazillion years ago, got a tad bit too enthusiastic about all of this and decided that we needed to do some cardio yoga.

Who knew there was such a thing? My glutes certainly didn’t. When all was said and done, my cobra pose looked more like an inch worm, my high mountain looked more like an ant hill and my downward facing dog resembled road kill.

Tomorrow while Joel wrestles with his Wii, I will be in my cold garage smacking my kickboxing bag. At 5:30 in the morning.

And I don’t even get to have one of those cute little Wii guys. My student-turned-yoga teacher-Chris said I could come over to her house, and she would make me a Wii guy with her Wii.

But then I’d probably have to do some sort of extra special cardio yoga. I politely declined. Instead, I’m going to use my little stick figure guy from my book as my I’m-too-poor-to-have-a-Wii-guy avatar.

Hey, my stick figure guy may not be as cute as those Wii guys, but my guy is already skinny.