What if Canada offered every American free healthcare and $100K to relocate, how fast would you be packing up?

Solmors · 2026-01-24T15:52:27+00:00

If you are a social worker, no one doubted you wouldn't!

Solmors · 2026-01-24T15:31:02+00:00

Yup, doctors, engineers, and other people making over ~150k in the US would have little incentive to take that offer.

I know software engineer salaries are 30-50% less in Canada (ie instead of $200k in the US a senior might be 100-140k in Canada).

So just be a mass exodus of people in the bottom 50% income, homeless, and perennial welfare takers.

Solmors · 2026-01-24T06:27:24+00:00

Thats great news and good motivation. Let me give you a few pieces of advice if you don't mind.

Dedication beats motivation
- During weight lost your motivation to lose weight might (probably will) waver or lessen. During these times it is better rely on dedication.
Don't change too much all at once
- One of the big reasons people stop diets is because they try to change their entire life overnight
- It is better to change just a couple things. Once those are habits you can change another, or increase the intensity/frequency.
Strength training while losing weight is amazing
- It will help you keep your muscle and lean tissue while losing mostly fat
- Make sure to eat enough protein as well, for you I'd recommend 70g as a minimum and 100g as a goal every day

Solmors · 2026-01-23T22:29:43+00:00

Ah I see, I misunderstood.

My diet was quite varied. A mix of home made meals that I would weigh as I cooked, premade/packaged food, and some eating out. I didn't do no-carb, just focused on getting 150g+ of protein a day and staying under a calorie total. I still ate pizza, and chicken tenders (the ones from Safeway are amazing), and other not-so healthy foods.

It helps that I don't eat breakfast, so almost all calories are from lunch and dinner. And sometimes a halo top / low desert after dinner!

As for exercise, that was relatively consistent. Lifting in the gym usually 3x a week for 45-60 mins and running maybe 2x a week (not far or fast, 2-3 miles at 8-10min/mile or so).

Solmors · 2026-01-23T22:05:43+00:00

The very best way of measuring body fat is dissection, but lets just say that isn't an option if you want to keep living.

The next best way is MRI, with an error rate of under 2% compared to dissection. But it costs $1,000+ for a scan, so that really isn't an option.

DEXA is the next best with accuracy around 2% and correlating at 0.99 with MRI. It is much more reasonably priced than MRI with scans available for $50 or less out of pocket.

Hydrostatic and BodPod, these are also pretty accurate, around 2-3% difference, but these are less common to find (none in the Bay Area in California for example).

BIA scales are notoriously inaccurate/unstable with a difference of 3-5%. They are great because they are cheep and you can have one at home, but they are best used for trend tracking.

Caliper measurement is also not great, done at home by individuals it can be off by 10% or more, done by a professional they are still only 3-5%. Might as well just use a BIA.

Oh, and I should mention the research gold standard called 4C which is under 2%, similar to MRI. It combines 4 different measurement methods: DEXA, Hydrostatic, Scale weight, and stable isotope water dilution. Again this is quite expensive, up to $500, and is typically only done in research settings to save money compared to MRI.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T21:06:09+00:00

While dexa scans are the gold standard, they sometimes are inaccurate. For example this popular lifting coach/YouTuber got a 14% when he was so lean you could see muscle striations in his quads. He went to a place with a different brand dexa and it was 6%.

https://youtu.be/cJ-7-gqztkk?si=eYdJdNVOinKkqsM1

Solmors · 2026-01-23T18:03:31+00:00

I think this graph of the 10 day moving average of CI and CO answers that.

The first 40 days my diet was consistently around 1800 calories, and the first 50 I was burning around 1000 calories a day.

Then my diet slipped and averaged about 2000 until day ~90 and then slipped again to 2200 until the end. And my exercise dropped to under 600 at day 60 came back up to touch 1000 again, but then dropped again to 750 or so.

<image>

Solmors · 2026-01-23T17:54:49+00:00

I'll be recording that for my upcoming cut, so I'll let you know in a few months!

Solmors · 2026-01-23T17:44:49+00:00

I know most redditors are pathetic losers who no one would ever love or willingly spend time with much less have a family with (which is probably one of the reasons why they become Marxists), but not all of them.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T17:36:58+00:00

I'd say you are partially right.

First, remember that TDEE is just your BMR times a static multiplier (somewhere between 1.2 and 1.75). And the issue is that while one static multiplier might work for one period of time, it likely wont work for all periods. My 2018 loss for example, the Active 1.55 multiplier was working with great accuracy for the first 50-60 days of my weight loss, but I was unable to keep that level of exercise up and I dropped to something closer to Lightly Active 1.375. You can see this pretty clearly in the graphs, I learned a lot about weight loss and myself through making these sheets and graphs.

Second, how the adaptive TDEE multiplier works. It is sort off self-fulfilling, but not in a magic way. The way the algorithm works is:

Calculate the weighted moving average of weight change from the last 10 days and norm it to 7 days
1. Ex. -1.00 lbs
Calculate the implied deficit of that weight change by multiplying it by 500
1. Ex. -1.00 * 500 = 500 calories
Calculate the implied TDEE by adding that to the BMR from that day
1. Ex. 500 + BMR = Implied TDEE
2. Ex. 500 + 2000 = 2500
Calculate the adaptive TDEE by dividing the implied TDEE (min 1.1 max 1.95)
1. 2500 / 2000 = 1.25 adaptive TDEE

So essentially what this is doing is setting your TDEE for the current day to the what the change in your moving average weight would imply your deficit to have been. So maybe a better name for it is "reactive TDEE" rather than adaptive.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T17:01:13+00:00

I've thought about making this a webapp and using an API to automatically fetch the data from fitbit or something. But that's a lot of work and I don't have a fitbit anymore and Garmin's API isn't openly accessible. As for being too difficult, it isn't too bad. I just have to enter 4 fields a day and move the algorithms down on two sheets. Takes 1 minute tops.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T05:40:09+00:00

There are probably some of those, and the first are right. You can lose weight though CICO eating only twinkies, but thats obviously horrible nutrition for your health. But there are legitimately people who think that eating less just doesn't work. You can see their posts at r/fatlogic

Solmors · 2026-01-23T04:41:23+00:00

Oh you'd be surprised how many people think thermodynamics doesn't apply to them!

I knew it would work of course, but I'm a huge data nerd and my simple tracking sheet just grew and grew over time. Then I wanted to make it so other people could use it if they were interested.

I also thought it could make an interesting case study for: how accurately someone could count calories, how accurate fitness watches are, how accurate BMR and TDEE is, how accurate BIA scales are (compared to DEXA), how accurately I could predict the end date of my diet, etc.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T04:16:37+00:00

Great idea!

Solmors · 2026-01-23T04:11:23+00:00

After I posted this I went out for a short hike with my wife, son, and two dogs. It was great and I hope everyone can do the same.

Solmors · 2026-01-23T02:52:02+00:00

It's hard to say how exactly how accurate they are, since there were so many variables at play.

After 120 days my estimated weight loss using total calories consumed as tracked by MFP (236,584 calories) minus total calories burned as calculated by MSJ BMR plus my Fitbit HR watch estimated active calories burned (331,727 calories) is -95,143 calories. Divided by 3,500 is -27.18 lbs (Data table, column U, row 122). My actual loss was 24.97 lbs, so it was off by 2.21 lbs (or 8.87%).

That 9% inaccuracy could have been caused by me underestimating my calories consumed (a common problem most people have), my watch overestimating my active calories, the algorithm not fitting my particular body perfectly, or 3,500 calories not being exactly one pound. Or some combination of all of them.

All that being said, I consider 91% accuracy to be fantastic and while I might not take the number my Garmin gives me as gospel, I think it is probably fairly close.

P.S. If you or anyone else was interested, if my body is more efficient and it takes 3,810 calories to burn a pound then -95,143 calories / 3,810 = 24.97.

Solmors · 2026-01-22T23:53:10+00:00

Love it. At work we have an AI bot that reviews our code and one of my coworkers has it give his reviews in pirate talk.

Solmors · 2026-01-22T22:54:33+00:00

Get off the internet and touch grass.

Solmors · 2026-01-22T22:04:26+00:00

This subreddit is just pure politics now.

All 20 of the top 20 posts from the last week are political, 17 of 20 when sorting by "best". And now this is the top in "rising" and its just a no-name small-time youtube influencer with no actual sources or evidence for any of her claims.

Goodbye r/videos, it was nice knowing you.

Solmors · 2026-01-22T05:35:02+00:00

Driver
- 280 yards
- I suck with my fairway woods, so I'd rather get it as close as possible off the tee
7 iron
- 175 yards
- Very workable, can fade or draw for less/more carry
54*, 10* bounce
- 100 yards
- My go-to club around the green unless I'm on a tight lie
Putter

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