Scaling the differences

Why do you do this to me Mr. Scale?  Why is it that at 8:20:01 AM you report X, and then I step off and back on at 8:20:10 AM and it reports Y?  Nothing has happened between those two points in time.  But you decided I magically weigh an extra pound.

Between those two points in time I did not drink anything, eat anything or pick up anything.  I did not cough, sneeze or otherwise lose any temporary weight.  Oh and btw, don’t even pretend you don’t play the same trick of visiting the porcelain god before stepping on the scale, because I know you do – you know you do!  It’s like the greatest natural weight loss tool evah!

Back to Mr. Scale though; it’s like it hasn’t ‘woken up’ yet sometimes, like it’s saying to me: ‘My bad, I wasn’t quite awake yet the first time – let’s go for a mulligan!

I think I need a new scale.  My first scale that I had about a year ago was much the same way.  It was something cheap from CVS that only read digitally in pound increments.  At the time I decided to ‘upgrade’ my scale to something cheap at Target, perhaps in the $20 range.  I figured that would get me into the ‘less than pound increment’ range.  A technological leap of scale-kind.  And it did.  But it only displays in .5 pound increments.  Which isn’t that big of a deal, except if you’re talking 165.5 and it decided to go up to 166 instead of doing to 165 – then that’s really a pound off.  Which, in and of itself isn’t a deal breaker since I look more at trends than daily weight.

I get on the scale at the same time every day (morning, right out of bed) and record it in my mother of all logs.  The weight log in turn produce pretty graphs that help me determine (in part) if I’m overeating – under-eating – relative to the exercise the day before. It’s very hard to eat ‘just right’ where my weight stays exactly stable, especially as the training load increases or decreases on a weekly basis.  But it’s a good swag.

Which…gets me back to my scale.  My scale needs to be retired to the little bathroom cabinet (where the other one currently sits).  It’s getting old (ok, a year) and seems to forget stuff (like how to measure my weight).  Anybody got any recommendations?  I’m looking for something not too expensive, but functional and predictable.  I want it to read the same value if I step back on 15 seconds later.  And it’s got to be digital, because there’s too much ‘fudge factor’ available when I’m trying to read an analog scale at 6AM.  Other than that, my requirements are simple: I just want it to work.

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6 Comments

  1. I have one of the funky one thats does body fat calulation and stuff. However, it is 6-8 lbs different from the simple, cheap and old one my wife has. The simple and cheap one is consistant and is range with the one at my Doctors office and the YMCA. So three that are similar is a good triangulation to me.

  2. i have a super cheap one from Bed Bath and Beyond. It has served me well in .5 increments. Though the first time I used it my weight matched the weight on the box so I thought it was broken…but it was just a coincidence.

    What I really want though is one of those fancy ones lazy triathlete has. I don’t want one for my apartment though-just occasional access to one. So I don’t make myself (more) crazy.

  3. I went the Tanita scale route. With body fat measurements and fluid percentage, it may give me a bit more info than I need, it does record the changes, which are what I really monitor.

  4. You know you’re a triathlete when your scale gives you more data than your Ironman watch.

    I have the Tanita Body Fat Scale which gives you everything short of the weather. However, it thinks I have 34% body fat. Which I don’t think is possible. Even the people on The Biggest Loser don’t have numbers that high.

    Thnk you Bed, Bath, and Beyond and your neverending stream of 20% off coupons.

  5. Tanita over here as well, with the good old 20% coupon for Bed Bath and Beyond. Serves me well an I like that it tells me only 15% body fat, I would love it if it told me 12% and take it out for a steak dinner if it said 10%!

    FFT; I did read that weighing yourself first thing in the morning is deceptive as you are dehydrated from the night so you’re getting the “dry” weight…just a thought?

  6. I’ve got the Tanita as well and it is very consistent. You can get them pretty cheap. The most useful “extra” is the water percentage, that tells me whether or not I am hydrated. I usually see a correlation between how hydrated I am and having effective workouts. How it works, I have no idea…it just knows.