Re: particular capture method for a diet .. ?

[Jason Earl <jearl@notengoamigos.org>]

On Fri, Apr 22 2011, Christopher Allan Webber wrote:

> So I've been meaning to put something up on this in worg for a while.
>
> I've been dieting using orgmode, basic calorie tracking, and something
> resembling the ideas out of "The Hacker's Diet" for the last year
> (actually 2.5 years with a 1.5 year "break" in which I continued to
> weigh in mostly but didn't follow my calorie goals ;)) and have lost >
> 60 pounds so far (originally was 275, not all that's recorded in my
> files during the first few weeks of dieting, anyway at 210 now), going
> from morbidly obese to just overweight, and I'm still losing weight
> (soon enough, being a fat guy will be far behind me).  Here's the
> org-babel generated gnuplot graphs to show it (regenerated and pushed to
> my site every morning):
>
> http://dustycloud.org/tmp/weight.png
> http://dustycloud.org/tmp/weight_month.png

Congratulations!  I have been doing something similar for just over a
year.  Unfortunately, I made the mistake of using Simple Emacs
Spreadsheets for my spreadsheets (I didn't really know about org-mode
when I started).  This means my spreadsheets can hold about a month's
worth of data before they become too big to be usable.

I switched my weight spreadsheet into org a while back so that I could
use gnuplot to make graphs, but my food log is still in SES.

> Here's a screenshot:
> http://dustycloud.org/tmp/org-diet2.png
>
> Roughly in the terrible amount of hacks that compose "org-diet" I've
> wrapped together these ideas/tools:
>  - calorie tracking
>  - recipe calorie calculation
>  - weigh-in via org-capture
>  - calorie "clocking" (clock out at the end of the day to verify you've
>    got accurate numbers for that day)
>  - habit tracking of whether you've met your calorie goals
>  - weight graphing with 10 day moving averaging to remove some of the
>    "noise" from a daily weigh in/out
>  - bmi calculation
>  - a really shitty calories-per-day-to-lose-to-meet-your-goals estimator
>
> It's really nothing complex, and mostly it's not software, just a
> methedology with a *slight* amount of poorly written software in elisp
> and org-babel, but the system works great.

It sounds more feature complete than what I am currently using, and I
actually *like* what I am using.

> I planned after meeting my diet goals (hitting normal weight) that I'd
> release the whole thing (including my present diet file for reference)
> under GPLv3, document it in worg, and put my own diet file out there
> under CC0, but maybe I should do it sooner... problem is I don't have
> time presently while trying to work on http://mediagoblin.org on
> weekends to make a "proper" release, but I could at least bundle
> together everything you need to have a full system using my hacks for
> now if you want, with really terrible but usable documentation,
> without taking up too much time. :)
>
> Interested?  I could probably throw together a terrible tarball this
> weekend if you want to use it and post it to the list.
>
> One thing that's clear from the diet I've collected: whenever I've
> followed the system, without fail, I've lost weight.  When I've
> deviated I've stayed level or I've gained weight (the no-movement
> middle of the diet graph I linked to).  Follow the system, use habit
> tracking and stuff, stick to your calorie goals (I shoot for a lower
> occasional-goal of 1300 calories and an absolute minimum goal of 1600
> calories), and it *fucking works* without any support of the bullshit
> diet industry.
>
> I've heard a few people saying they have interest in the stuff I have
> so maybe I should just do that crappy release for now; better than
> nothing?

I would at least be interested in taking a look at it.  No promises, of
course, but if I ended up using it, I would at least be willing to help
you package (and possibly document) what you have.

> Hopefully being useful while making embarassing admissions about my
> body,
>  - cwebb

There is nothing embarrassing about losing over 60 pounds.  The
mediagoblin.org thing looks interesting as well.

Jason