Preface: I want to lose about ten pounds, because about a year ago, my doctor started adjusting my thyroid dosage, and she dropped me a *lot*, and my weight reacted as you might expect, and while I've stabilized at the new lower dosage and am not gaining weight anymore, I quickly put on ten pounds (in three months) with the drop in thyroid hormone and they've stuck around.
I bought myself (well, I guess ourselves, since Kevin can use it too) that Aria Wi-Fi-enabled scale for Christmas. It felt somewhat ridiculous, given that I already had a perfectly good scale (now passed on to a friend), but Kev and I both have Fitbits, and I thought it might be helpful to have an integrated system that would automatically track weight and body fat percentages, rather than my having to remember to write them down.
(On the one hand, am I really too lazy to write something down? On the other hand, apparently, yes. #firstworldproblems)
So I've been using it a week, and while I haven't been modifying my diet at all this past week, I've been doing reasonably well on walking, averaging around 11,000 steps, despite being sick for part of it. According to the scale, that's resulted in about 1% reduction in body fat, while weight stayed about the same. If I'm understanding this right, it means some of the fat has turned into muscle, which is great. If I can continue that for another few weeks, then my clothes should fit better, even if I don't lose any weight.
(I'm planning to start mild calorie restriction and lowering carb intake as well, because in my previous experience, for my body, that's what actually makes me lose weight, which I do want to do as well.)
So, walking. It seems to do something good for health and body shape, even without changing diet. And a Wi-Fi scale that coordinates with the FitBit is motivating and makes pretty graphs with tons of data. I like data. Now if I could just figure out how to get Wi-Fi-enabled weight-lifting tracking, I'd be all set.
Note: Am not actually looking for advice; I'm comfortable with my current food / exercise plan. Just posting this in case it's informative / helpful.