I read the quote below a long time ago and didn’t realize how much affect it would have on my life today. It has formed the principles of my quantified-self system that has caused a lot of changes in my own life.

“What gets measured, gets managed.” - Peter Drucker

Let me show you one of the tools that I used to reconstruct myself and allowed me to do a triathlon in July 2012. I started my journey in 2011 when I was a bit on the chunkier side (if I consulted my BMI, it would have told you that I was 40 lbs over weight). I had gained about 50 lbs from my wedding weight (incidentally the lightest I’ve been since I was 20 years old) and I was downing oyster motoyakis at all you can eat sushi bars around Vancouver like no ones business.

Epiphany Time!

It didn’t really come like an infomercial reveal to me, “God I need to lose weight or I won’t see my kids graduate high school.” Nope, I was in that zone where I could still keep up with the kids. I had the occasional shortness of breath but overall I was fine. In an instant, Ruby died because a stray (possibly abused) pit bull attacked her while Cheryl and the kids were out for a walk. I don’t know what it was but a certain instinct kicked in. While I generally do well with providing for them (financially, shelter, food, etc), physically protecting them was a problem. (I personally also think that reading Neil Straus’ book also had a lot to do with mypost-apocalyptic mind set during that time).

I needed to be physically fitter and drop to an ideal weight. I also needed to be successful at it. I needed to adopt a protocol (an exercise regiment, a diet); this much was pretty obvious but how do I increase my chances of success?

Back to the quote: what gets measured gets managed. Enter: Quantified-self, data tracking and self-knowledge. Onward to physical prowess and zombie killing.

What is a Quantified-Self? Is it a cult?

Wait, no. It’s not! Think of it as a nice label for us data obsessed people who seem to obsess with measuring every little detail in our lives. Quantified-self is really about self-tracking which usually leads into self-hacking / self-experimentation. In other words the philosophy of quantified self is to create self awareness to create improvement. The quantified-self system is the collection of tools that allow you to collect data to allow you to draw meaning from it. People tend to track different things, and looking through the quantified-self site people have tracked their learning, brain patterns and even snoring.

Over time you develop this pattern of developing hypothesis, asking different questions, tracking the data, making changes (seeing the changes), and asking more questions.

I’m sure there is some psychology behind the reason why people who take pictures of their food have a higher chance of succeeding in their diet. Or why the people at Nike+ say that upload your data 5 times and you’re hooked. I just took the same principle and applied it. If I got some questions answered in the process, great!

My Quantified-Self System

In the list below, I’ve broken it down into a few categories and picked a tool / app to accommodate. Some might think that there is a certain over engineering / over-paying in some cases, like the DailyBurn Tracker. Especially when I could’ve purchased a writhings scale and have it automatically tracked.

However, I chose to leverage tools and apps that have social networking capabilities to help accelerate my progress by using the communities available to me. I tend to be a bit of a loner when I train but having a social network gives you the ability to compare yourself with other people doing similar things. Another criteria was the ability to extract the data (a manual extraction of data would be less preferred but still somewhat acceptable).

You’ll also notice that I’ve patterned it as tool (where precision is important) and app (where we track the data gathered from the tool).

Body Composition

I started incredibly simple: Body weight (like most people) but reading the 4 hour body lead that you really need two numbers: Body weight, and fat percentage. Weight loss plateaus, but that doesn’t mean that your body transformation has halted  Your percentage of body fat could be decreasing, while you’re gaining muscle. It also depends on the type of exercises you’re doing and the food that you’re eating (inputs). To understand how your input affect your output, you need to track the right number of outputs.

For body weight, I use a highly accurate weighing scale: HealthOMeter 349KLX Digital Medical Scale. For body fat, I follow the 4 hour body and an Omron Fatloss Monitor. I enter the data into the Daily Burn tracker and extract the data once a week.

I also use the DailyBurn Tracker to track my food. They have a pretty good database of user submitted food and when in doubt I use the USDA version of the item (even though I’m not in the US). I tend to keep rough estimates of the food. I’ve never been good with weighing / measuring food to exact size. For me, I’d like to know the relative sizes of my meals compared to previous days. Their community is nice, they have good articles and a good set of exercise programs to follow.

Personally, I like the fact that the Daily Burn Tracker has both iOS and Android apps.

Exercise

The routine started with my iPhone, the Nike app, and the Nike shoe pod to build a running base. Running was a big challenge and it required a lot of work. After a few months of running I switched over to the Garmin 910xt. I needed a watch to track a few more data points like heart rate, cadence, strokes per length. I made my decision on this watch based off this review. I also bought a few accessories: the foot pod, the bike cadence sensor, and the heart rate strap. This was probably my biggest set of purchases.

I also upload all my running and biking data to Strava to allow myself to compare my performance against their community as well.

Sleeping

Most of my friends know that I don’t sleep well. I sleep really late (usually not by choice) and I wake up really early. A good night’s sleep was really hit or miss. Sometimes, I’d get longer nights and still feel tired in the morning. Other times, I’d get 2 hours and feel great. At one point I think I might’ve had insomnia.

Improving sleep for me, really had two purposes: improving recovery time and saving my own sanity. I’d ask questions like, “Is the quality of my sleep independent of the length?” or “What dictates the ‘I feel like crap’ mornings? Surely, it can’t be just the length of time.”

In sleep’s case, the tool really helped shape the analysis, enter Zeo.

It creates a breakdown of your light, deep, rem sleep and shows when you were awake during the night. This one is probably the most fascinating data that I was able to get from this whole process.

Everything else in between

It isn’t exercise. It’s the time spent running around with your kids in the park. It’s your commute. It’s the travel between office buildings. It’s that nap that you took. It’s that brisk walk you decided to have in the morning. All incredibly important when you’re trying to derive information from your data. Let’s face it, you don’t need the depth of data that you get using your exercise equipment (I mean, I’m not dorky enough to wear a heart rate monitor under an office dress shirt). A simple glorified pedometer would do.

I started using the Fitbit and that was quite sufficient. My wife bought me the Jawbone Up for Christmas and I’ve been wearing that since. I like the Up because of the simplicity in tracking. It can augment the Zeo with sleep data, but it also tracks your naps with a simple 3 button toggle. I also use it to mark time when I use my goLite. If there is an activity (outside of exercise) that I want to mark; it’s a simple double click to start.

My one gripe with the Up is the fact that it’s not wireless syncing but that’s a small price to pay.

Post Data Gathering

I’ll probably end up writing a blog post to address the analysis of the data that I got. Even as I write through this post, I’m already starting the post for my sleep data. If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear them.

As you can probably tell (and if you’re still reading this you probably have noticed), I’ve switched to a longer format of posts. I would love to hear what you think about the new format (keep?  or go back to the shorter).

2012 theme was fear. Tackle a bunch of things that scared the crap out of me: new job, triathlon, spartan race, sun run, trip to the Philippines with 2 children below 2 (sorry everyone). Here’s the quote that kinda summed up my 2012 year:

It is not because things are difficult that we dare not venture. It is because we dare not venture that things are difficult.

– Seneca

So for the last little while I’ve been trying to figure out what 2013 should be, and I have no idea yet. I suppose I have a month to figure it out.

Yes, as you can probably tell that this post is abit stream of consciousness writing. Random things that popup in Ritchie’s head. Which you can see that is a bit on the … *squirrel* … weird side.

Chipmunks bah humbug!

Tell me what are your plans next year?

Now, let me say that I am not an expert at any of these. I use them but who knows if I’m using them correctly anyways. I’m writing it down so that I could organize my thoughts and understand my own patterns. Also, when you have a fulltime job, 2 kids and a sport time is sometimes something you have to closely manage. This is how I do it.

Here is the list of my systems and processes:

Minimalism – Ok, I’ve broken the rules with my first item but let me explain. The principle of minimalism is to keep removing until you are at the core and nothing else can be taken away. I would translate this to also do what you should be doing and nothing else. Think about that email that you’re trying to respond to and think, “Is email the absolute one thing that I should be doing at this moment?”

Getting things done – David Allen, you ask? My hero. It gives me an excuse to be uber detailed and I’m the type that could sit and file email for hours (it’s a gift). I’ve written about this before so I won’t spend too much time on this.

Toggl – Recently discovered app for time tracking! I’m a firm believer that what doesn’t get tracked is not getting measured and therefore not improved upon. For example, if you want to cut TV out of your life. You need to understand how much time you are actually spending infront of the TV and why. Toggl helps you track your time to help you understand what you’re actually spending time on.

Remember The Milk, MS Outlook, Evernote and MS OneNote – Apps that help me organize my todo’s and references. I generally divide my world into work and non work. I keep all my “work” in the MS apps (because that is where it will stay) and my nonwork items in Remember the Milk and Evernote. Mostly, I use categories and tags to manage my projects and contexts (and a series of search folders).

My Google Calendars – I have google calendars that are all connected to one another. For example, I have my Remember The Milk todo items as a subscribed calendar to my Calendar, so that when I look through my day I can also see the todo items that are due that day. Simple reminders, but I schedule everything in my calendar. I’m a forgetful guy and this allows me to keep track of  birthdays, appointments, and bills. More importantly, I schedule a weekly time slot to review everything and I abide by this like my life depended on it.

In all seriousness, I picked it up today and couldn’t wait to get it home. Sorry for the lack of unboxing pictures. I just opened the box and took everything out. Now, people say that their packaging design is a lot like Apple’s. I’d like to disagree, they transcend Apple’s. Tightly packaged, but very easy to open and everything was just so incredibly logical. I was so mesmerized that I forgot to take some unboxing pictures. *sorry*

Installation? I was ready to call our contractor to have him install the thing for me but I thought I’d give it the ‘ol try before I did. I have to admit, because I was intimidated I read through all of the instructions before hand and once I did that it was a matter of following the tips (e.g. take a picture of the wires, use a pencil to keep the wires from sliding back into the hole, etc), looking through the website for the wiring guide and boom! I didn’t even need a level because these guys built a level into the mounting base! (Sorry I didn’t bother with the screw driver and went for the electric drill because well…. I’m lazy.

Note: Follow the tips, because if you’re anything like me you didn’t bother with the stickers and labelling the wires. So I had to go refer to the picture that I took of the old unit with the wires connected. Also while I was installing it, there was a portion where the wires could’ve slipped back into the wall except I followed the tips and wrapped a pencil around them. Smart guys these Nest folks.

Once the base was mounted, I clicked the unit in and was done with installation.

Logged in, created an account on the website (downloaded the apps) and set up the unit. Yea, thats a short paragraph because it was THAT easy.

If you think about it, installing a thermostat is one of those things that sound daunting and it probably is but Nest really made it easy. I didn’t even have to know what the ‘R’ or ‘W’ wires did all I really needed to know was that these wires clicked into this part of the base. Talk about great User Experience design!

Now excuse me, I have to go fix the holes left by the old ugly thermostat otherwise Cheryl will keep giving me the evil eye every single time she adjusts the temperature unless she just starts doing it on the iOS apps / website.

Actually, if you’re wondering why it’s taken this long to post about Chyler; let me tell you. 2 kids? Close to impossible to do anything remotely productive. If you’re not changing diapers, or entertaining, you’re running around chasing after one of the two.

For Chyler, Cheryl got to pick his name (Mackenzee was my doing). Interestingly enough she picked a name that was an anagram of “Cheryl”. So we do have a naming pattern. Mackenzee’s was a palindrome, and Chyler is an anagram. Incredibly dorky? Yes.

Chyler was born Oct 25, 2011.

As you can expect, boys are different from girls. I found this hard to believe, but his personality is very different from Emcee. He’s a lot more laid back, but he’s a lot more daring. For example, the other day we took our eyes off him for 2 seconds and he was well on his way to scaling 1 flight of stairs. He’s climbing up and down things and isn’t afraid to take a bit of a tumble here and there.

Mackenzee is enjoying having a little brother. Although she’s having a bit of challenge adjusting to the “sharing” concept.

1 year ago today. Chyler was born. Our sleep has decreased. I have less time to play with shiny toys but I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

I mean, look at him. You can’t really say no to this guy.

You know what? I can’t even say that I’ve neglected you because in some states if you were a pet. I’d probably be hunted down by the SPCA! But you can call the police and stop the search party because Ritchie is back! I mean… I’m back!

Things that you haven’t heard in a timely manner but are now getting caught up on because Ritchie is back.

I know it’s been a while. Lot’s of things have happened. First of all, we’ve had our second child: Chyler. Poor second child. Doesn’t even have his own blog post. I’m a horrible parent. I promise you that it’s already in draft.

I’ve taken up a sport. Triathlons! Yea, you heard me! I didn’t just pick 1 sport like running or swimming. I picked 3 to do all the same time! I’m nuts I know… I just heard a collective, “What?! How? Don’t you have 2 kids?” Short answer: yes! 4:45am. Long answer. To be continued in another post (that could at the point of publishing be already in draft)

I also took a new job! I’m officially in management. Counting my blessing that I have an awesome team who makes me look good. Especially when I wander into a meeting where I look more lost than in control. I just start bragging about what they’re all working on. Sssh don’t tell them!

I’ve adopted a more “focused” lifestyle. Half minimalist, Half consumerism and 1/4 sports science. I call it miniconsumerscience of sports.

I’ve also ditched the iOS devices. No more iPhone or iPad (still yes to Macbooks and Macbook Airs). But I’ve made the switch to a Samsung Galaxy S3 and a Nexus 7. I’m really liking it but I suggest going with the Jellybean version of Android. It definitely gives Apple a run for it’s money. More on this in another blog post.

Did I mention that Ritchie is back to writing (in a somewhat regular fashion) in this blog?

Ritchie

ps. Did I mention that I changed that custom wordpress skin to this “minimalist” theme? Tell me what you think and how much you missed me!

Photo by B Rosen

I’m sorry for making my first post in a while a rant.

I just spent a few hours driving around Vancouver trying to figure out an upgrade for Cheryl’s iPhone. Let me sum it up: When buying or upgrading iPhone hardware with Rogers in Vancouver, you have 3 options:

1. Go to a Rogers Plus store
2. Go to the Apple Store
3. Call Rogers and have it shipped directly to your house

Now that I’ve given up the ghost, let me tell you a story that led me to this conclusion. I got a call from Cheryl this morning and said that she had called “Rogers” and that this particular store had a stock of white 32Gig 4s’. So I get in my car, drive over, enter the “Rogers” store, and ask the clerk. The guy looks up my account and says, “No problem” at which point he goes to the back and gets the phone. He starts processing the order and then whips out a contract.

He then proceeds to explain that this is a contract to say that if I cancel my contract 7 months from now or reduce it to a rate below $50 then they’re allowed to charge my credit card $500. I asked, “Is this Roger’s contract cancellation policy?”, to which he replied, “No, this would be a charge on top of the cancellation fee to the franchise that owns that store.” Apparently this is a CellMart policy to prevent customers who have been buying iPhones, cancelling and selling the phones overseas.

So I decline and walk out of the store. Cheryl (still hopeful and excited) calls another store, and I go. Only to be met with exactly the same contract (at least it happened 3 seconds after I sat down)! I sit in the car, a bit defeated and call Rogers. They advised me to go to a Rogers Plus store which is their store (they direct me to the one in Brentwood mall). I explained my experience in the two stores to the Rogers agent. He said that he has never heard of this happening with any of their partners. At the same time Cheryl calls Apple, and they said no problem, come in and they’ll handle it and they were pretty baffled at what was happening.

The challenge in my particular case is really around the perception of the store. In both cases, I walked into a “Rogers” store. Meaning, it had a Rogers sign in the Rogers red displayed quite prominently without any other logo. It was my own assumption that I was entering in a Rogers establishment and dealing with Rogers.

Also, shouldn’t there be policies for Rogers partners to prevent this type of double hi-jacking of customers? I mean, really if I cancelled my contract with Rogers; I expect them to charge me (whatever crazy amount we agreed on in my contract) but not a 3rd party who just happened to be involved because I so happened to walk into their store and definitely NOT for an extra $500 dollars.

Shame on you Cellmart!

Update: As you can see below in the comments Melanie from Rogers contacted me and we’ve sent a couple of emails back and forth. Roger’s has been incredibly responsive. I’m actually pretty impressed.

Photo by josef.stuefer.

Yea, I’ve been a bad blogger lately. I haven’t really been keeping up with things here at macapinlac.com.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve thought about it (on a few occassions) and felt a little bit guilty that I haven’t been writing. The reality is that I’ve been a bit preoccupied. With what you ask? Well, it’s been a great life and I’ve really been trying to enjoy the tiny things that make it up. As corny as it sounds, trying to be as “in the moment” as I can be.

Less TV! I’ve minimized television. Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to completely remove TV from my life but since Cheryl still needs it and Mackenzee enjoy’s Barney and Super Why; I don’t think I can completely cut it out. The trick is to ignore it, be with them and enjoy their company rather than immersing in the show. In the last fall season round up, I allowed myself to look through the different shows and choose 1 that I’d enjoy on a weekly basis. Queue up the recordings and marathon through it at some point in time.

Less social media! Social media, includes the following: Facebook, Twitter, Email, SMS/Texting, Meetings and Blogs. Take a page from the Low Information gurus, it clutters the head and prevents progress. I know that I get stuck executing because I get distracted with checking twitter / Facebook. I get discouraged when I read about information on a blog about someone who executes better than I do. Now, I’m not saying cut this out completely! No, no, no! I’m suggesting manage it so that it takes an hour a week (total). Also, don’t even think about installing those apps on your phones.

Learn something new. Lately, I’ve been obsessed with exercise, nutrition and the art of fitness. Reading everything that I can get my hands on, asking people and trying to hone my own style and tweak what works. I worry about my exercise momentum and how to keep it going through these dreary months (the perils of starting a fitness program in the late summer). I’ve also been trying to hone in a new programming language and get reacquainted with an old favourite.

Get a system. Look, there will be times when you’re out, enjoying life and an idea comes to mind. That one great blog post that will change the world. Trust me, having a system that you ultimately trust (trust and system being the keywords in this sentence) is key. I use GTD and carry my iPhone around which acts as my InBox for anything. I do my weekly reviews religiously and trust that I won’t miss anything.

So there you go. Now go out, stop reading this and find the sun!

This last weekend a few friends and I went into the Dirty Apron cooking school / shop and gave our culinary muscles a flex. Cheryl and I haven’t really done much and it was very much a date thing. The class started at 11am and went on for a few hours. The goal was to learn and cook brunch for ourselves.

Our friends Aileen and JJ picked us up. On the trip there, JJ issued the challenge of presentation and taste. Me thinks JJ has been watching too much Top Chef.

Once we arrived at our destination, we noticed the restaurant beside it was packed and people were overflowing. I suppose if you don’t want to cook your own brunch you could make a reservation at the sister restaurant and just eat (instead of cook and eat).

At the class, we were given a folder with the day’s recipes, told to wear the given apron and Chef David told us to find a seat in the demo area. One thing that Cheryl noticed was that each station had top of the line equipment: Wolf appliances, nice knives and top of the line ingredients. Off to the demo, 4 pans going off the bat for the Eggs Benedict with Sun-dried Hollandaise. Not to mention the stove top and oven. Have to admit, palms were a bit sweaty for a second there. Nice and awesome tips on how to poach eggs, how much water to use and how hot. You’ll have to try it out for yourself I’m not going to give away any of the lessons here. Let me just say that if I was able to poach 2 eggs and get consistent results; that speaks loads for itself.

After cooking the eggs benedict, we brought it to the eating area, took some pictures and wolfed it down like homeless kids getting free McDonalds.

Back into the demo area for Brioche French Toast with Grapefruit Sabayon. French toast was simple; but really who can screw up french toast. The challenge was making the sabayon (sidenote: did you know that sabayon is a linux distro? now you know, thankyouverymuch) which required a lot of whisking which my arms are not made for. Thank god Chef Takashi was there to help out (although he did catch me off guard earlier with his ninja-esque skills).

Have to admit, didn’t think I’d like the grapefruit french toast. It was great! It wasn’t too sweet, and I wouldn’t think I’d ever order it off a menu so bonus for expanding on my experiences. Overall, the class was really great. We’re thinking about doing it for our annual friends Christmas party but it definitely isn’t our last time.

So here are some pictures that we ended up taking of our food. You can decide who had the best “presentation”