Dropping 100 pounds? Yow.

Dropping 100 pounds is what came up when I clicked "next blog" on my blog. Not sure if that's just a coincidence or if Blogger is just that way. But to clarify, this is not a weight loss blog. Actually I'm more interested in the physics of it than anything else. Figuring out how many calories per pound of body weight and such. I did some calculations on the distance I could exert a certain force over, starting from how much force is needed to overcome the gravitational pull of the earth against my mass, and how many calories (and thus kilocalories) are needed to do it. It's pretty cool: if I converted a pound of fat into pure energy instantly and exerted it downwards as pure kinetic energy, I could leap tall buildings in a single bound! Practically flying.

calorie counting

OK, so I weigh about 234 pounds. I'd like to lose some weight.

According to this calorie calculator I have a Body Mass Index of about 33.6 and I need 2993 kcal (kilocalories, which are inaccurately called calories in everyday dietary terms) every day just to live. I had to punch in some other data about myself to get those numbers but I'm not going to post it here. I'm sure if you're clever enough you can guess :-)

A BMI of 33.6 is towards the lower end of obesity. I'd like to have a BMI of around 29, which means I need to lose about 30 pounds. That's still towards the upper end of overweight, but there is some evidence that overweight people may live longer, and I think around 200 pounds is a good long-term weight goal anyway. I'll take it slowly and see how sustainable and reasonable it is, especially with my sedentary geek lifestyle.

The point is to be healthy, not skinny. The way I (and most peoople, especially men) carry weight around my belly just isn't good for long term health. Plus there is also evidence that obesity may increase the risk of dementia. Needless to say, I'm not interested in being a test case for that.

OK, so let's say I want to lose about 1 pound each month. Let's do the math.

There are about 9 calories (really kilocalories) per gram of fat, which means a pound of fat contains about 4082 calories in pure math. But the dietary wisdom seems to be that it's more like 3500 calories per pound, so either there are other factors to be considered or 9 calories per gram is a rounded-up number (probably more the latter than the former, if I had to guess).

So let's assume 3500 is the correct number. That comes out to about 115 calories per day in an average month.

Like I said, I'm doing this for better health, so I think getting more exercise is more important than eating less. That said, I am trying to eat healthier food and reduce portions to more reasonable levels. I just don't believe in "dieting" or using fake substitutes. It's just silly, and potentially dangerous in the long run.

Which brings me to exercise. It seems that I can pretty easily burn at least 115 calories a day just by walking and climbing stairs for at least half an hour every day. Of course that has to be on top of my average daily activities, since I'm not losing weight right now as far as I can tell. I'm also not gaining in cardiovascular fitness - if anything I'm losing it. But if I work up to it gradually I know I can do this.

There's plenty of room to walk around at work. There's even a big walking track in one of the buildings. And there are stairs that I can take instead of using the elevators to go everywhere.

I should also be stretching more often. I had a cervical radiculopathy not long ago which kept me from being as active as I would've liked to be. Which isn't saying much, but still, now that I'm doing better there's no excuse not to try to be more physically fit. It'll keep my energy levels up even when I'm just sitting at the computer, so I can be more alert and functional.

OK, so while I recognize that I'm probably talking to no one right now, if anyone is actually out there, go ahead and let me know what you think.

I believe I'm pretty good at doing research, and I have a fairly broad store of knowledge built up, and I'm a decent writer. My wife is an incredible writer and a genius in her own right. So if you have any topics you'd like me to look up and write about, spark my interest and I'll do it. That's sort of the point of this blog, after all: to act as an outlet for my (pseudo?) intellectual rants.

first post!

OK, here it is. I'm officially the last geek on earth with a blog.

Regarding the name: I believe the universe is fundamentally made up of information. In one frame of reference which I'll call "mine", there are four basic facets or aspects of information which appear to exist:

1. Space - everything seems to have a position in three "dimensions"
2. Time - events seem to occur in a linear framework
3. Matter - some things appear to have mass and volume (substance)
4. Energy - things seem to change position and interact with each other causing changes

And then, of course, there's... well... UNIX. Yes, UNIX. I'm a UNIX systems administrator for a large corporation in the St. Louis, MO, USA area.

OK, that's about it for now. More later.