Well, my crazy plan to try and slim down a bit is working Friday 25th saw 182.5 pounds on the scale, which is reasonably impressive drop in the two weeks that I have been watching my calories.

Actually, I haven’t been watching very hard at all, just trying not to blatently overeat, and trying to avoid snacking on the evenings.

I was planning to be a bit more involved with this, but work has intervened, and I’m struggling for time, even on weekends.

I’ve decided, at the ripe old weight of 190 pounds, to try and lose a few, 15 or so, pounds. So my target weight is 175 pounds for now.

As of this morning I’m at 186 pounds.

My method is basically to try and consume less calories than my body requires, so I’m going to try and cut snacks out, and try and eat a bit less at meals.

I read somewhere that a pound of fat is pretty much equivalent to 3500 calories (kCal), so if I cut my calorie intake by 500 a day, I should lose about a pound a week. Basically, eat half a burrito rather than the whole thing, etc.

I’m planning on weighing in every Thursday or Friday morning. Here’s my first two data points.

01/03/2008 189 pounds
01/10/2008 186 pounds

Wish me luck!

This article on PC World lists the 10 Worst PC Keyboards of all time.

I’ll try not to spoil it but, the ZX-81 and Mattel Aquarius are represented. For those of us with long memories, where is the Sord M5?

There’s an interesting discussion going on Slashdot about programming languages.

Check here for the post about assembly language programming that made me stop and think.

My somewhat flip response was “If it generates x86 code, I refuse to look!!”

More seriously, I started assembler programming at the tender age of about 14 with 6502 code on my BBC Micro, then 68000 on the Amiga, then did a bit of (paid) ARM3 programming, but I just have never, since I owned a Speccy, been able to look at Z80, 8080 or 8086 up. I suspect the oddly named registers and vast panoply of addressing modes are the scariest things…

But tell me, is x86 code as scary as I’m treating it? Because I feel bad that I’ve ignored it for so long, but maybe I’m at the point where I’m just being dumb.

What do you think? What do people do with assembly language on these chips anyway?