Some Stupid Weight Loss Tricks

I’m a sucker for anything on the Web that has screaming headlines with lists.

You know them: "5 Simple Steps to Improve your Love Life!" "Top 10 Diet Blunders!" "6 Sure Signs He’s Cheating!"  "20 Meals That Won’t Kill Your Cholesterol."

I don’t know why I’m so lured by them. Sometimes I don’t even care about the subject matter ( "The 10 Top Financial Tricks  of Millionaires!" - I think number 10 turned out to be "Be born to  rich parents." )

Part of the attraction, I think, is just the fun of seeing how silly some of these can be. Sometimes I just want validation for some of my life choices (Sadly, no rich parents, but yes, I have a 401k, thank you very much #6).

So you can imagine my excitement when I saw this online a few months back: "50 Ways to Cut 500 Calories a Day."
"Whoa," I thought, "Now that’s a list I gotta see."
 

I mean, 500 calories a day? That’s like, a lot more math than I want to do right now to figure out how many pounds a week you could lose, but it’s a lot, I think.

Some of the items on the list made perfect sense. Some were just obvious and simple.

But clearly, at some point in compiling this list, the writer must have run into a wall because some of them just got really goofy. He should have just stopped at say, 25 or 30. My guess is some dumb editor said "Give me a list of 50, you never see that in an online list!"

Editors do dumb things like that.

Whatever the reason, here are some of the goofier suggestions from the list:

5. Limit dinner guests. Eating with seven or more other guests can make you eat 96 percent more food, says Brian Wansink, Ph.D., author of Mindless Eating. That’s like doubling your dinner! Dine with fewer guests to save 500 or more calories.
Sorry Steve, sorry Sally, but I’m on a diet and you’re the first thing that’s gotta go!

8. Don’t clean your plate. Leave 25 percent of your food on the plate at every meal, says weight-loss expert James O. Hill, Ph.D., author of The Step Diet. If you normally eat 2,000 calories or more each day, you’ll cut 500 calories.
Um, wouldn’t it be easier to just take less food?

9. Use smaller plates. Swap your 12-inch plate for a 10-inch one. You’ll eat 20 to 25 percent less — and save up to 500 calories. You won’t feel any less full, either, researchers say.
So if you use the smaller plate, do you you still have to eat 25 percent less food from it? What is 25 percent of a 12-inch or 10-inch plate. God I hate dieting. It involves so much math.

15. Step away from the nuts, especially if they’re in a big bowl.
I think this is good advice for life in general.

21. Get out your knitting needles. An afternoon of knitting can burn more than 500 calories (at a rate of about 100 an hour).
So I’m gonna sit on my butt and knit for 5 hours. Wouldn’t you burn about the same amount of calories blinking for 5 hours?

31. Help a friend move. You’ll burn more than 600 calories in one hour of carrying boxes and furniture up and down the stairs.
What if he doesn’t want to go?

32. Shovel snow. Clearing the driveway and sidewalks for one hour and 15 minutes will torch 510 calories.
Unless it’s in July. Then it’ll just amuse the neighbors.

34. Tap your foot. Your skinnier friends are probably fidgeters, who burn up to 350 calories a day just by tapping their feet or being restless.  
These skinnier, fidgety, friends are also high strung. Don’t imitate them.

39. Head to a county fair or amusement park. You’ll slash 612 calories in three hours from the casual walking and standing in lines. Subtract 105 calories if you have cotton candy.
That’s right, because the best part of this idea is all the healthy food at fair and amusement parks. Add 1,500 calories if you have The World’s Greatest Hot Fudge Sundae, or that damned fried doughnut cheeseburger thing that was all the rage at the Big E last year.

50. Cut down your own Christmas tree. Hike out, find the perfect tree, cut it, and take it home. Put it up and decorate it for 1 hour to burn 519 calories.
See comment on suggestion #32 above.