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A weird thing keeps happening to me and my friend (who also happens to pay attention to calories in vs out) at some of the local coffee shops that we frequent. I routinely get served MORE food than I order.

Love these things, about 60-80 calories each! Effin' awesome

As many of you know my only rule for weight loss is calories in vs calories out, and the way I lost all of my weight was to stick to this one rule (37 pounds lost so far).

Half of this rule requires me to have at least an educated guess at my calories in. So when I order a coffee with a milk and sugar I have a pretty good idea how many calories are in that coffee. And I like to have something sweet with coffee so I order 3-4 timbits to go with it (which are about 60-80 calories each). And this is where it gets weird.

Even though I’ll only order 3-4 timbits, the person at the counter will give me 4-5 and sometimes even 6. This doesn’t sound like a big deal and they probably think they’re doing me a favor, but in reality their effing up my weight loss progress (because I can’t resist eating them all…which is why I only order 3-4 in the first place)

Each one of these little balls of heaven are between 60-80 calories so I pay close attention to how many I have with a morning coffee so I know how many more calories I can consume at lunch/dinner or whenever I eat again.

Every time the server gives me an extra 2-3 timbits I end up eating an extra 100-150 calories I wasn’t planning on.

This brings up an interesting thought experiment about what is socially acceptable when it comes to eating and food.

So far you and I and most people would agree that it’s perfectly fine to serve someone MORE food than they’ve ordered or paid for (getting stuff for free is almost never a bad thing)…But imagine if someone did the reverse.

Picture this:

You walk up to the counter and place the following order: “I’ll have a large coffee with 2 creams and 2 sugars, and 5 timbits”

and the server looks at you and says: “how bout I give you a small coffee with no cream and a sweetener and 1 timbit”

This obviously would be completely unacceptable (even tho it might actually help you lose weight)

Ironically we live in a society where it is perfectly acceptable to help overfeed people who are overweight or trying to lose weight (and thus make their weight gain worse and crippling their chance to ever lose weight), but it would be completely unacceptable to deny serving food to people who clearly could afford to drop a few pounds.

Messed up.

John

Today is one of the biggest eating days in north america. It’s the super bowl celebration Eat-a-Thon.

I’m going to one our favorite local sports bars with some buddies where we will indulge on all you can eat chicken wings, pizza, nacho’s, beer, and all other forms of sports bar/pub food.

Tomorrow and Tuesday will be a lower calorie days to keep me right where I need to be.

Nothing special, just accounting for today’s overage with a couple days of lower calorie eating.

The key thing is to pay attention to the degree which we can all overeat in one day vs undereat.

Obviously the lowest amount of calories I can eat in one day is zero. Since my 24hr BMR is about 1900 calories, that means it will take me a full day of fasting to compensate for overeating by 1900 calories.

I’m guessing I’ll eat about 3500 calories today, so that’ll put me about 1600 above what I needed for the day. So tomorrow and Tuesday I’ll shoot for an 800 calorie deficit both days and by Wednesday I’ll be back to even.

John

Food is one thing all people have in common…let me re-phrase that…EATING food is one thing we all have in common…and the similarities seem to end right there.

What Are You Eating Over There?

It’s very hard to find two people who eat exactly the same diet. These are all the factors that make up your diet:

1. # of Meal per day (meals, snacks…feedings whatever)

2. Beverages

3. Alcohol or not

4. Cooking style and habits

5. Food selection (limitless combinations of food)

6. Time of each feeding

7. Location (country, city, region)

8. Social events

9. The company you choose to eat with

10. How Much Food You Eat

As you can see there are many factors that go into your daily eating pattern and it’s impossible for a nutrition ‘expert’ to tell you how to structure all of this.

One of the major shortcomings in most popular diets is a set of unrealistic rules that usually ask you to control all of these variables (and probably more that I haven’t listed)

It is simply impossible for most people to change all of these things, and you shouldn’t have to. It is entirely possible for you to lose weight and reach your body shaping goals without radically changing this entire list, except for item #10.

In fact, #10 is the only one you’ll ever have to pay attention to for weight loss. And for muscle building you don’t have to pay attention to any of them.

This is why I find it odd that people are so curious as to what other people are eating. I’ve had many people ask me what I eat. And the answer is pretty boring. There just isn’t any magic to food…it’s just food. It tastes great, it’s great to share with friends and family at social events…but after that, there isn’t much it can ‘do’ for you.

Just remember it’s not what everyone else is eating that matters, it only matters what you are eating and if you’re happy with it.

In the spirit of the title of this post I will throw it out there….”What are you eating?” Please answer in the comment section, and be honest.

I’ll start:

Last night I had 12 chicken wings with half bbq/half suicide sauce, after that a friend of mine brought over some home made pizza (awesome) and I had a few slices of that (mini slices)…I had a hot chocolate and italian wedding soup as well (for lunch)…this morning I’ve had a coffee with milk and sugar and 4 sprinkled timebits (so effin’ good)

John

A friend of mine (Ali) just got back from the grocery store and told me a great story that illustrates how our external environment influences our food choices. It also shines a bit of a light on how guilty and ashamed many of us are with our food choices.

So at the check out counter Ali has a mix of fresh vegetables, some fruit and a package of chicken breasts.

Two girls waiting behind her inline noticed her food selection on the counter and mentioned to each other (trying to do it under their breath but ended up being totally heard by Ali) that her order was “so healthy” and they also mentioned that “she doesn’t have anything in a box”.

The two girls behind Ali actually took one of the food items they had in their hands (a bag of chips) back to the isle where it came from and said “I don’t need them”.

This is a great example of how much other people can influence what we eat. After all, Ali doesn’t know these girls, and they don’t know her, why in the world would Ali’s order have anything to do with those girls?

What if Ali had 3 bags of chips on the counter, would those girls have gone back and picked up two more bags of chips instead?

The reality is that Ali is in great shape and these girls may have looked at her, then looked at her food choices and put two and two together and got a bit of inspiration from her and aspire to look like her. This is an example of the positive effect of hanging around, or even standing next to a person who knows how to take care of their body and eating habits.

John

And I’m sure I don’t even need to point out at this point that Ali is also an Eat Stop Eater!