This week I’ve become enamored with diet/fitness related websites. For a while I’ve been using Traineo to track how often I’ve been exercising. I’ve been pretty happy with the options available for exercise. It’s nothing too fancy, you simply enter in the type of activity, how “hard” it was and how many minutes you exercised. You can enter up to three exercises per day.

However, Traineo also has a “diet” section where users track how many calories they eat each day. The problem with this section is it requires the user to know how many calories they eat each day. Usually I don’t have a clue. Sure, they link to the USDA Food Database but that’s next to useless when you cook. After all, how would it know how many calories are in my variation of Cuban Black Beans?

Tuesday, I ran across a question on Lifehacker about how to get fit/lose weight. I briefly scanned the comments and someone mentioned that they use FitDay to track their fitness level.

I don’t like FitDay’s exercise log nearly as much as I like Traineo’s log. For example, I couldn’t find any category matching pilates (though I could just be missing it). However, their diet tool was much better than Traineo’s. It lets me search for specific foods and then add them to the “Today’s Food” section. Then it has a spiffy looking pie chart that shows what percentage of your food was carbs, fat and protein. This was much more detailed than Traineo’s offering. Yet, FitDay (at least the web version) still didn’t have a good interface for evaluating recipes.

After wandering around the web a bit I found Nutrition Data. The site feels . . . weird. I can’t quite figure out why it exists. It’s obviously ad supported but I’m not convinced anyone is making much money from it. The interface is also a little odd. You can search for food and add it to your “pantry.” The items in your pantry are stored in a cookie on your computer. Naturally, this makes keeping your data a little trickier than normal. I don’t understand why they don’t have user accounts. I almost expected there to be an option to buy a more advanced version of the software (like FitDay does) but there isn’t.

While the interface of Nutrition Data is a bit odd, I really like some of the options. I can add items from their database or create my own items. After I’ve added items to my pantry I can group them into recipes. However, the really fun part comes when you “analyze” an item or recipe. Then Nutrition Data spits out fun little charts that show:

• A Caloric Ratio Pyramid
• Nutrient Balance Indicator
• Nutritional Target Map
• Protien Quality Indicator
• Estimated Glycemic Load

So, for the past couple of days I’ve been using portions of all three websites mentioned above to track my exercise and diet. I strongly suspect that I’ve been doing this more because it appeals to my inner spreadsheet than because I actually care this much about what I’m eating. However, it’s fairly harmless and cheap entertainment

I have a problem spending too much money on groceries. At least, I think I spend too much on groceries. So far I haven’t been able to figure out how much is reasonable to spend each week for food but I always feel like I should spend less. According to the USDA’s Cost of Food at Home for a “Family of 2” aged 20-50 we’re slightly over the “Low-Cost Plan”. However, I have no idea how useful this data is. For instance, it doesn’t seem to have any way to adjust based on what area of the country you live in. Also, this is compiled based on a normal American diet, not a vegetarian diet. I don’t know whether I should adjust the amount up or down for being a vegetarian. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I always assumed it was cheaper to be vegetarian. However, at my last conference a girl sitting next to me told someone else “I’d like to be a total vegetarian but I just can’t afford it.” This conversation left me wondering why she thought a vegetarian diet would be more expensive. Maybe because those inclined to be vegetarian also might be inclined to buy more gourmet type items found in health food stores or might be more likely to buy organic products?

Today while I was looking for more information on what the average person spends per week on food I ran across this blog. It asked the question: “What is the weekly average cost per person for food in your household, including groceries, snacks, and dining out?” The responses were fascinating.

A couple months back I subscribed to About’s Frugal Living column. Most of the advice in this column is way beyond what I’d feel comfortable doing. For instance, the writer suggested asking permission of farmers to “glean” their already harvested fields (here). I know that some of you would be comfortable with that but I’m way too shy to consider it. Plus, as much as I hate this argument when Jaeger throws it at me, I’m really not convinced I’d get enough useful food to make it worth my time. I assume that each field would only have one crop and there are only so many carrots one can eat each week (though I suppose if I canned it might make it more money efficient). Anyway, one of the writer’s tips that I did like involved knowing when a sale is good enough to be worth buying more of the product than you originally intended (here). Her rule of thumb is if the item is 25% off buy twice as much, if it’s 50% off buy 10 X as much, if it’s more than 50% off buy as much as you can reasonably use (with just the 2 of us I suspect that 10 X as much is still more than Jaeger and I can use but you get the concept).

Another thing the Frugal writer suggested was to create a Price Book where you jot down in a notebook how much you bought each item on what day and at which store. While I thought the idea was sound it seemed like keeping track of prices in a notebook would be a bit confusing. Either you’d have to scan row after row of food items looking for when you bought the item for the lowest price or your notepad would get messy with you continually crossing out prices in order to put the cheapest price in. So, obviously the answer is to enter the information on the computer instead of in a notebook.

I looked around for some software that would work similar to how she described the Price Book. However, I wanted software that could work on both Linux and Windows and also needed to be fairly portable so I could access it from multiple computers. Nothing I found seemed to completely meet my requirements (though let me know if you find something). If I had been truly ambitious I might have written a fairly simple web interface with a database that would probably meet my needs. However, I’m lazy and didn’t want to spend too much time on the project. After a bit of consideration it seemed like a spreadsheet would meet all my needs and would be fairly easy to set up.

I set up the spreadsheet and entered as many previous grocery receipts as I could find without looking too hard. I included a vlookup on another sheet so I could enter in my shopping list and it would auto-magically fill various prices for each product (such as min, max, avg etc). I also entered a column that would calculate 30% above the normal price (I currently don’t buy organic products unless they are less than 30% more than the normal price). The main problem with my spreadsheet is I required the vlookup to find an exact match which means I have to remember exactly how I entered it previously (when I tried the fuzzy match it would sometimes come up with a bad price based off a completely wrong item). My spreadsheet seemed to be working relatively well but it was a bit of a pain to remember to transfer the most up-to-date file to whichever computer I was using (I suppose I could have put it on a web share of some sort but didn’t think about it at the time).

When Google merged Writely and spreadsheets into Google Docs and Spreadsheets I decided it was finally time to test out Google Spreadsheet. I was a little dubious because I love Excel (it’s one MS product that they got almost perfect). However, I decided that my grocery spreadsheet would make an excellent test. Somewhat to my surprise Google Spreadsheet managed to import the Excel doc almost perfectly (exporting with formulas doesn’t work as well). I’ve been having a bit of trouble figuring out how to do things with Google instead of Excel but over all most basic things seem to be functional. Also, Google spreadsheet allows me to add “collaborators” so Jaeger can easily add items to the shopping list that I routinely forget

Until another product comes along that works better I think I’ll keep my grocery list with Google Spreadsheet. If you have a Google account and are truly bored and/or curious you can take a look at my spreadsheet here (link updated 12/10/2006).

Yes, I’ve fallen behind again. After coming back from London I had just enough time to get through about half of my emails before flying off to Salt Lake City for a conference. During my time at Salt Lake City I did manage to filter through the rest of my emails but was limited in the amount of work I could catch up on. Adding to the work excitement, my husband managed to wreck our car and so we also entered frantic shopping mode. The Monday after I returned from Salt Lake we did get a new car (to my surprise we ended up with a Rav4 instead of a Forester), you can see Jaeger’s fantistic picture here.

Due to all this excitement I didn’t get around to cleaning the house until last week. I think a bit more of my mother rubbed off on me than either of us expected. I felt stressed the entire time the house was dirty Anyway, life seem back to normal which is definately the way I prefer it. I suppose it’s rather boring but I really do enjoy a predictible life.

This last week I’ve been trying recipes out of Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. I’ve been very impressed. Not since Mollie Katzen’s cookbooks have I found recipes that consistently turned out well. This week I tried:

• Turnip Soup with Gruyere Croutons (I’ve never cooked with turnips before but this was a very good soup)
• Angel Haired Pasta and Chesese Souffle (good but very rich)
• Green Lentils with Wine Glazed Vegetables and Puff Pastry Crust (the flavor was good but it was a little too dry — probably my fault — and I would have preferred more vegetables to even out all the lentils)
• Ginger Cream Scones (uses candied ginger and has a unique taste. I was a little surprised since I thought scones were generally hard but these were light and puffy.)

Anyway, if you enjoy vegetarian cooking I’d suggest stopping by your local library (or interlibrary loan department) and trying out her cookbook. Even though my bookshelves can’t fit another cookbook I think I’m going to go ahead and buy this one.

In a little over 24 hours Jaeger and I will be on a plane heading for London. I’m excited but it still doesn’t feel real. I packed yesterday and managed to fit everything into my small suitcase and backpack. Unfortunately, it appears that our BA flight will probably not have video on demand. I’m hoping that with a combination of books and audiobooks I’ll still manage to pass the time fairly well.

A while back I bought A Scandal in Spring by Lisa Kleypas for the trip but hadn’t discovered anything else trust worthy enough to buy unread. So, I’ve been scouring the library catalog for weeks looking for appropriate reading and listening material. I was hoping that Valor’s Choice by Tanya Huff would arrive in time (via ILL) but it didn’t. However, every other hold I placed seemed to arrive today. I picked up a total of 7 items today. I was very relieved that Heart Quest by Robin Owens arrived in time. I was really hoping to take 2 romances and 2 science fiction paperback books with me. However, I couldn’t scour up enough interesting looking SF (in mass market paperback) so I’m going to have to revise my plan. Master of None by N. Lee Wood looked tempting but it’s a trade paperback instead of mass market so it’s probably too big to fit in my luggage. I’ve decided I’m going to take Daughter of the Blood by Anne Bishop. I suspect it’s a book that I’m either going to love or hate. For my final book I’m either going to take An Independent Woman by Candace Camp or A Summer to Remember by Mary Balogh. I’m leaning toward Balogh’s book because she makes every plot, no matter how old, a fun read.

I also received discs 3 & 4 of Nip & Tuck. I can’t remember if I made a mistake and placed a bib level request instead of item level or just decided that I didn’t need to start at the beginning (usually you don’t have to wait as long for DVDs if you aren’t picky about the order you watch them). In any case, I popped the third disc in for a little dinner entertainment (Jaeger’s scheduled to arrive back from CA tonight). In the 20 minutes I spent watching it, I learned that I really didn’t like it. It’s probably unfair to judge a series based on the first 20 minutes of the 7th episode but I’m doing it anyway. I’m not even sure what it was that I disliked so much. Maybe it was the complete obsession with triviality. However, I’m pretty sure that the show is suppose to be a satire (at least, I’m hoping it is). I’m curious if anyone who reads this has a different opinion. As I said, it’s extremely unfair for me to start in the middle of the season, watch 20 minutes and declare I dislike the show

Last night I downloaded about 5 GB worth of Audiobooks utilizing my accounts at Denver, Boulder and Weld. Since I only have a 2 GB Nano, I’m still trying to figure out how this will work. Among the works I downloaded I acquired Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson. When it first came out I got through about 50 of the 916 pages before giving up. I’m hoping, though am not optimistic, that my audiobook experience is different. The audiobook is around 20 hrs long so I could spend the flight to and from London just listening to the one book. However, that might be too boring. I like a little variety in my life

I just finished reading Susan Carroll’s newest book, The Silver Rose. It is the third book in the Cheney women series (The Dark Queen and The Courtesan being the first two). I enjoyed it more than The Courtesan and a little less than The Dark Queen. However, I’ve noticed that I tend to like the first book I read by an author the best so my preference in this series might just be due to chronology.

I took Yoda in today for service and spent way too much money on her. I was told it would take between 4-5 hours to work on Yoda so I decided to wander around Boulder while I waited and ended up walking around 5 1/2 miles. During my excursion I managed to snag an advanced copy of Magic Study by Maria V. Snyder. A couple of weeks ago I suggested the library purchase it (it’s coming out in October) but since I don’t actually work in collection development I never know whether or not my suggestions will be bought. Luckily now I don’t have to wait I greatly enjoyed Snyder’s first book in the series, Poison Study, in which Yelena narrowly escapes execution by agreeing to become a food taster. I’ve only read a couple pages of the new book but so far it’s very interesting.

Pseudonyms are out of control in the book world. At one point I think there was a legitimate reason for using a pseudonym. For example, women authors use to fear their works wouldn’t be taken seriously if it was known the author was a women so they would use male names (or publish anonymously). Sometimes authors, in order to make a living, would write racy or otherwise objectionable books they didn’t want attached to their real name. I’m fine with this. I can even handle authors who use pseudonym for genre seperation (i.e. S.L. Viehl writes Science Fiction but Rebecca Kelly writes Christian Fiction). What horribly confuses me are authors that originally write a book or series under one particular name and then later the book is published under the author’s real name. Okay, I guess there are reasons for this too. But it still briefly confused me.

Last night I finished reading An Accidental Goddess by Linnea Sinclair. In order to provide a handy link for you to search your local library, I searched for it on WorldCat (Lincolnites, I am distressed to inform you that the closest copy of this book appears to be in Kansas). Imagine my surprise when three entries show up. One entry for Linnea Sinclair (the copy of the book I checked out) and two entries by Megan Sybil Baker. Normally I would have just assumed that the Ms. Baker’s books just had a similar title. However, I noticed that one of them said, “a far-future sequel to Wintertide”. Wintertide is another book I recognized as written by Sinclair. Initially I was incensed by how confusing this is and thus started my rant above. However,after researching a bit I found Linnea Sinclair’s website where she explains that she use to write under the name Megan Sybil Baker because she was a private investigator and thought her clients might be a little nervous if they knew she wrote fiction. I’ll acknowledge that as an acceptable reason. However, I still think pseudonyms are out of control. Intoducing books as “Nora Roberts writing as J.D. Robb” is just silly.

Back to talking about An Accidental Goddess. This is the first Linnea Sinclair book that I’ve read. At one point I checked out Wintertide from the library but never got around to reading it. In An Accidental Goddess Captain Gillaine Davré, a Raheiran, has been given the task of advising and protecting the Khalarans. She ends up sacrificing herself to destroy a group of nefarious Fav’lhir mages. The book begins with Gillaine waking up 300+ years in the future. Gillaine discovers, much to her distress, that in the intervening years the Khalaran’s started a religion with her as a goddess. Fortunately no one seems to recognize that Captain Davre bears a startling resemblance to their goddess. She strikes up a relationship with Admiral Makarian and deludes herself into thinking that she might be able to settle down and blend into the crowd. Her plan works great until Fav’lhir mages start reappearing. Gillaine fears that once Admiral Makarian discovers she’s a “goddess” he’ll abandon their relationship to worship her from a distance.

While An Accidental Goddess is primarily a romance, Sinclair doesn’t insult the space opera genre with a poorly imagined future (unlike some romance authors who try to write science fiction). This is a good book if you’re looking for a fun read. However, I’m not sure I liked it enough to recommend people buy it without first checking it out from the library. Remember, ILL is your friend.

Content has been demanded so I will try to oblige.

This summer has been very busy. I imagine most of you have seen Jaeger’s run down of what we’ve been doing. This month is the first since April where I’ve had several weekends in a row just to myself (though Jaeger’s currently away in OK visiting family so it feels a little strange).

Our car Lyta, is working on 230,000+ miles and I expect that she will permanently go to sleep some day soonish. I’m hoping she can last another year or two so we can save money for another car without stealing from some other budget area. This time around Jaeger wants AWD so we can navigate the unimproved mountain roads. Even though we aren’t planning to buy the car right away, I got sucked into used car research. Give me something to research and I disappear into a fog of research for days, even if it isn’t an urgent problem. My current favorite vehicle is a Subaru Forester. I was originally looking for a wagon but they don’t seem to make many with AWD. Subaru of course has it’s Outback but the Forester seems to get similar gas mileage and has more room in back. The Forester seems to have pretty good crash results but I’m a little disturbed by the mileage (though with AWD, I really can’t expect it to be terribly good). I also looked at the Toyota Matrix/Pontiac Vibe. Pre-2007 the models are available with 4wd and it had better gas mileage than the Subaru. However, from the reports I read it sounded a little slugish. I don’t know, when I’m actually ready to buy I’ll probably try to hunt down a 4wd version to check it out. I also briefly looked at the Toyota Rav4. However, I really don’t like the look. Also, Consumer Reports mentioned that it’s difficult to install car seats (no, we’re not planning on having children soon but I’m hoping our next vehicle will be around for a while).

Okay, enough on cars. in addition to obsessively researching cars, I’m also still working on figuring out what we want to do in London. My conclusion is that the trip is going to cost way too much . However, it doesn’t make sense to spend the money to get there and then avoid all the attractions there. Also, it’s one of those trips that is much easier before one has children. Anyway, I’m looking forward to it. However, I have a sneaking suspician that I might be enjoying the planning as much as the actual trip. I really hope that by the time we leave (mid-September) British Airways allows carry on items again. I know international flights usually have entertainment systems but I doubt they’re good enough to keep me occupied for the entire flight time. Not to mention I’ve been saving up books to read during this flight!

Speaking of reading . . . Last June I decided that I didn’t read enough non-fiction. So, my goal was to read at least 1 non-fiction book a month. My first book was The Harvard medical School guide to healthy eating during pregnancy. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not pregnant I’m just an overplanner. I figure it’s probably a good idea to try changing my eating habits before I’m pregnant. I imagine pregnancy comes with enough issues of its own without adding diet change to the mix. It was a pretty interesting book but the author was a little down on the vegetarian diet while pregnant. Later I’ll probably want to hunt down a pregnancy nutrition book specifically for vegetarians.

July wasn’t a good month for non-fiction. I scanned through several recipe books but I suspect that doesn’t really count. I’m still a little unclear whether or not audio books should count. I listen to audio books almost every day on the way to work but somehow that feels like cheating. It doesn’t help that most non-fiction audio books are abridged. I just finished listening to The money book for the young, fabulous and broke. In general, I’m not a huge Suze Orman fan. One of her books I stopped listening to during the first CD because she kept going on and on about stupid financial decisions she had made early in life. I suppose she was trying to empathize with her audience. It wasn’t working for me. So, when this book came out I ignored it for a while. However, I was running low on audio books and so decided to give it a try. It was okay. Suze Orman reads the book herself and her intense voice can be a little trying sometimes. In general her advice seemed to make sense. I don’t think I learned anything new but it was interesting to get her persective on various situations. I was fascinated by her view on credit cards. Most personal finance authors I hear say, “credit cards are evil.” I don’t agree with this. Credit Cards are easier to abuse than other forms of money. However, if you pay your balance each month there are some distinct advantages to using credit cards. Plus, if I have cash I can spend it all without knowing where it all went but I never lose track of my credit card spending. Anyway, Suze Orman is very pro credit card. Some of her statements about them made me a tad uncomfortable. For example, she suggested that when you’re young it’s okay to use credit cards to fill in the gap in your income until you make enough money to live on. She does stress that you should use the credit card only for essential items, not wants. However, the whole thing seems like a slipperly slope.

The most recent fiction book I read was The Bride Finder by Susan Carroll. Previously I head two of her newer books The Dark Queen and The Courtesan (both were very good). It’s obvious that The Bride Finder is an earlier book. The depth of her later books is lacking. However, it was a very satisfying read. My last book that I enjoyed that much was The Marriage Spell by Mary Jo Putney. All of these books are romance with a touch of fantasy.

Oh, in a previous post I mentioned that I had started reading Crystal Soldier again but had trouble getting through it. I think the book just required a little bit more concentration than I usually have after work. During the 4th of July weekend I finish Crystal Soldier and Crystal Dragon and found both of them to be excellent books. They have a different flavor to them that is sometimes hard to digest but very interesting. This series is a prequel to several other books set in the Liaden Universe. However, these books feel different to me than the earlier books. Anyway, if you enjoy space opera and romance (in varying proportions in the different books) I highly reccomend this series.

Hm, enough content for now? I’ll try to update again sometime before next year

For the past couple of days Jaeger and I have been at Megafest 5.0. To make sure I could keep occupied at all times, I brought along 27 books. Don’t worry, I don’t/didn’t intend to read all the books. I just wanted to make sure I had an adequate reading selection regardless of what mood I was in. So far, I’ve been relatively pleased with the books I brought along.

I started reading Owls Well that Ends Well by Donna Andrews. I’ve found the Meg Langslow series to be quite amusing. However, I didn’t get more than a chapter or two in because I could only get my hands on the large print version. Ironically, I have a hard time reading large print books, all the words seem to swim together. When I get back home, I’m going to have to put the normal print version on hold at the library.

The next book I tackled was The Little Lady Agency by Hester Browne. It’s chick-lit but I found it fairly amusing. I liked Melissa’s practicality and lack of obsession with shoes. However, the romance completely failed for me. For more fun fluff, I read Second Sight by Amanda Quick (one of Jayne Ann Krentz’s pseudonyms). Amanda Quick’s books were one of the first romance novels I ever read. However, they don’t really inspire me. They are usually set in either the Regency or Victorian time period but Quick adds a paranormal aspect to her books that often seems a tad silly to me. While I enjoy romance novels, I’ve noticed that I prefer fantasy novels with romance in them more than romance novels with drops of fantasy. I’m also exasperated that the second chapter in each of her books always seems to includes a “proper” young lady having sex. Could we not wait until at least the middle of the book?

Feeling in need of a different genre, I switched to fantasy with Elantris by Brandon Sanderson. This novel begins with one of the best opening lines I’ve read, “Prince Raoden of Arelon awoke early that morning, completely unaware that he had been damned for all eternity” (no, this is not another vampire novel). The novel is written in the third person point of view following three main characters: Prince Arelon, Sarene and Hrathen. I especially enjoyed reading the sections dedicated to Sarene’s point of view. Sarene is a princess who agrees to marry the prince of Arelon. She arrives in Arelon to find that her fiance is “dead” and because of the way the marriage contract was written, she is now the prince’s widow. The story was very intriguing.

No Man’s Mistress by Mary Balogh was next. I think I’ve enjoyed every Balogh novel I’ve picked up. Even if it’s a similar plot to another book I’ve read, Balogh makes it feel original again.

If I’m lucky, I may get through another book or two before the fest is over. However, I’m not sure how likely that is since it ends tomorrow.

After months of having the new Pride & Prejudice in my queue both via Netflix and at the library, I finally got it from Netflix. I’m really not sure it was worth the wait. However, I am quite glad I didn’t watch it in the theater. To borrow from Jaeger’s vocabulary, I though it was “. . . meh.”

Speaking of movies, several weeks ago Jaeger and I went and watched V for Vendetta. I about had a heart attack when I saw how much common Saturday night movie tickets cost these days and remember thinking “If this isn’t a really good movie, I’m going to be very upset.” Fortunately, it was a very good movie. It’s probably going to make my list to buy.

I also did finally watch Aeon Flux. This movie had all the elements I typically love in a movie yet somehow it didn’t quite work for me. While watching the movie, I did find it mildly enjoyable it but afterwards nothing stuck with me. Maybe Aeon was a little too unstable for my tastes, I don’t know.

I’ve started reading Crystal Soldier. I think the first time I read this book I must have been half a sleep because only the first couple of pages sounds familar.

A couple of days ago I finished Enchanted, Inc. by Shanna Swendson which is fantasy chick-lit. Normally, I’m not a big fan of chick-lit. My last attempt was The Givenchy Code by Julie Kenner which had a promising plot but suffered from too much shoe obession (a common problem with chick-lit). However, Enchanted, Inc. was a nice amusing read.