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"  Over the years I&amp;#039;ve made a few unsuccessful attempts to track what I eat. I&amp;#039;ve been told meal logging is beneficial to maintaining a healthy weight, and who doesn&amp;#039;t want to be healthy? The problem is that my initial excitement about food logging usually wanes after the first week or so, when it becomes tedious to figure out the nutrition content of all my meals. However recently, my interest in the meal tracking process was renewed when I downloaded a really cool app on my iPhone called DailyBurn that allows me to scan the barcodes of foods that I eat. Once the barcode is scanned, the nutrition content of the food is automatically uploaded on your phone and you can log it into your diary. This app changed my world.... or so I thought! A new system called the BodyMedia was about to make an even bigger impact on the way I keep track of my daily caloric consumption. The system uses a BodyMedia FIT Armband monitor, a data collection device that you wear around your mid upper arm. During the day, the band tracks your activity and at night, it monitors your sleep. All of the information it collects can then be downloaded to the BodyMedia website. The Activity Manager on the site shows you the calories you burned throughout the day and your sleep efficiency. There&amp;#039;s even a meal log section on the site that also allows you to input the foods you&amp;#039;ve eaten. What&amp;#039;s great is that there&amp;#039;s a drop down menu that has the nutritional data on commonly eaten foods or foods close to ones you eat. There should be no more guessing! When setting up your account, you can also enter your initial weight and then track your progress over time! The best part about this system is that in addition to my diet, it tracks how much I exercise and sleep, other vital components of a healthy lifestyle. I have to say my armband is now a part of my daily outfit. I go to bed with it on and it&amp;#039;s the first thing I put on after my morning shower. Over the next few weeks both my director Birnur Aral and I will give you updates as to how to the system is working, so stay tuned! Also read our earlier story on the Best Fitness Websites. And if you&amp;#039;re looking to get in shape and reduce your carbon footprint, check out the Daily Green&amp;#039;s article, Walk Around Town. To see how we test products here at the Good Housekeeping Research Institute, sign up for a tour today. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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