The Lazy Girl’s Guide to Cutting Calories!

“My friends often joke that if they were to look up the word ‘lazy’ in the dictionary, it’d be accompanied by a picture of me in a Homer Simpson T-shirt. And they aren’t too far from the truth. My idea of a strenuous workout involves swirling in my chair at work, and I’m pretty sure I’m allergic to the gym. But ‘lazy girls’ need toning, too, and I was happy to try anything as long as it didn’t involve treadmills and raw vegetables. Hence, the Cosmo weight-loss challenge.

The idea was to spend 10 days doing small, easy, cal-burning stuff like trying on clothes (yay!) and playing games at the pub (yay, yay!), which don’t involve major lifestyle changes, but promise results. Using caloriecount.com, I was able to estimate the number of calories I was cutting with each activity, and here’s how I fared...

1. Host a get-together

I started my experiment by inviting friends over for dinner. This required grocery shopping and, nearly 45 minutes browsing the aisles and pushing the cart. According to caloriecount.com, I burned 160 calories, and I wasn’t even tired! I got home and re-arranged furniture in the living-room for 20 minutes and, burned another 137 calories.

2. Try on 50 outfits

I’d read a lot of articles that claimed trying on different outfits actually burn upto 11 calories per change. I had to try this, of course! So each morning, for five days, I tried on nearly 10 different outfits before settling on a winner. Total calories annihilated: 500!

3. Add a little chilli

I love spicy food, so this little trick seemed right up my alley. I treated myself to extra chilli for one meal every day. Adding a few hot peppers (they contain capsaicin) to your meal, causes the body to start spending more energy as heat, therefore increasing your total calorie burn. If you can’t handle the heat, cayenne pepper works the same way.

4. Hit a gaming pub

I planned a game night with a group of friends at a local pub that has a bowling alley, plus other games. According to fitday.com, you can burn upto 150 calories per hour while bowling. Later, we played a couple of games of darts, and that helped cut another 70 calories. Plus, it worked out my arm muscles, which rarely get any exercise.

5. Take the stairs

My office is on the third floor and that means using the elevator every time. I changed things up by taking the stairs once a day during my lunch break. That 10 minute walk (going up and down) aided in burning almost 300 calories! Encouraged, I tried doing it twice a day, and the habit stuck! Total calories spent: 600!

6. Sing with the stars

I’m a closet singer, and I love musicals. Luckily, caloriesperhour.com says singing for 20 minutes while standing burns 45 calories. So, I honed my (hopefully undiscovered) singing skills during several Glee re-runs over the weekend. And, when they weren’t singing, I switched to Comedy Central for a good laugh that torched another 60 calories.

My Report Card:

When I began this experiment, I weighed 65 kilos, and at the end of 10 days and many fun activities, I managed to lose 1.5 kilos. Not too bad for a lazy girl, eh?