I'm counting calories these days. No kidding.

As I mentioned the other day when I wrote about keeping close track of my weight - I'm not terribly worried that I'm going to become fat.

At least, very soon.

But I know there's a chance that if I keep eating the way I've eaten my whole life, my metabolism won't keep up.

So I've been doing a number of 'New Things' related to my health.

As I've mentioned, I'll roll them out periodically.

Most recently, though, I stumbled upon this app.

And now thanks to its help, I'm counting calories.

It's called 'Lose It!', and I'm sure, like '4Square' and other apps I used to use multiple times a day before I quit them, it may not last long. But it's given me some information that is bound to stick with me for a lifetime.

I've always heard the term 'empty calories', but had never really thought about what it meant. Now I have a better idea.

I've been surprised at how few calories some foods can be (like chicken) and how many others can be (like, oh, I don't know - Brownie Batter Donuts).

What I like about the app is that you enter your meals each day, and then it gives you an idea of how you're doing by week. And my wife tells me it's all about calorie intake per week, not daily.

I get a little frustrated when I can't find a comparable food to enter for what I ate (this most often happens after lunch at school), but generally I've been successful matching foods I've eaten to what's in the app's database. (Including restaurants. Much of the restaurant food I've eaten in the past three weeks or so has been on the Lose It! app, and once you find the restaurant in their choices, the whole menu is on there.)

The best thing, though, is that I can also subtract calories. There are all kinds of exercises loaded in to negate the intake. I've been taking walks, and it calculates time walked into calories burned. Snow shoveling was amazing exercise, and it was in the app. Playing the piano is in there! (As you might imagine, though, it doesn't burn all that many calories.)

I was losing weight before I downloaded the app - that generally happens from January into February since late December into January is my peak weight due to the holidays. But I'm sure counting calories has helped me avoid adding more winter pounds.

I hope to keep up keeping track into the summer, when I tend to go a little crazy on the ice cream desserts...but it's also a time I do a lot more exercising when I can run outside.

If you're looking for some motivation to count calories, too - let me know. There's also a "friend" opportunity on Lose It! I haven't used that yet, and it might take a new wrinkle to keep me invested for another 4-5 months.