I like weighing myself on Fridays as a means of keeping my eating in check over the weekend. I figure, if I’ve gained during the week then the weekend’s a good chance to spend time making healthier meals and exercising. If I’ve lost, then I want to keep that momentum going by avoiding opportunities to pig out.

Somehow, I managed to lose 2 pounds this week.

I’m not quite sure how it happened. I haven’t been any more active than usual: the ragweed and mold count are still high enough that outdoor activity is out of the question thanks to my severe allergies.

One thing I did do last week might have helped. I sat down and made a spreadsheet of my normal day-to-day activities, together with a running, hour-by-hour total of how many calories I burn in an ordinary day.

Thanks to that approach, I realized I’m only burning 60 calories per hour while I sleep at night, and a mere 80 calories per hour while I sit at the computer. That shed a whole new light how to make proper food choices while running a calorie deficit throughout the day.

For instance, 8 hours of sleep gives me a 480 calorie cushion by breakfast. So I’ve been opting for a 250-calorie breakfast to keep that calorie deficit going.

Between breakfast and lunch I’m mostly at the computer, burning perhaps another 320 calories. If I want to maintain a calorie deficit, I’ve got to keep my lunch choice around 300 calories.

Since I do manage a little housework between lunch and dinner, I typically burn around 500 calories by then. Even so, to keep my ratio of calories in to calories out in proper alignment, I’ve got to have a much lighter dinner than I’d grown used to having.

That hour-by-hour calorie burn is so small, in fact, that I realized I had to cut out snacking altogether if I wanted to enjoy anything large enough to be considered a true meal.

Sounds obvious, I know, but until I’d sat down and charted how very few calories I actually burn each day, I’d never really grasped just how many excess calories I was eating each day.

And in other announcements: I will be attempting to go without alcohol while my in-laws are in town this weekend. Wish me luck.

And, yes, I could increase my food intake if I’d increase my physical activity. Which I do plan to do at some point — I’m just not sure how to find the time right now. Besides, I think the best way for me to start is to first get control over the amount of food I’m consuming — and to get comfortable eating less food, less often. Which I’ve been doing, and I’ve got two missing pounds to prove it.