As explained in previous blog posts, as long as the weather remains hot, I go to “the gym” instead of walking outside. I “work out” on an elliptical machine, a treadmill, and various weight machines. The first two of those have readouts that include (among other metrics) the number of calories burned.
Yesterday I was commenting to my husband that, although I am theoretically (if the readouts are to be trusted) burning at least 200–250 calories a day (not counting whatever extra may be added by the weight machines), I am not losing any weight because I keep eating.
My husband said he had concluded that exercise doesn’t actually burn weight calories but only “brain calories.”
I asked him what he meant by that.
He said, “Well, look at it this way: Has your memory improved or gotten worse since you started exercising?”
“Why do you think I take a little notepad with me?” I said. I have to immediately record the number of minutes, reps, miles, calories, or I will immediately forget them.
“I rest my case,” he said. I think he may be right.
WalkThoughts 
My problem is: I don’t know whether or not I am burning too many calories, and adding enough other positive inputs to my body on a daily basis, or just the opposite is happening. How does one measure the calorific burn rate vis-a-vis calorific build up ratio? Is there a meter, or clip-on monitor that can accuarately give this key data to the consumer
on a real-time basis, or is it an end-point dependent statistic, which only shows up on your weight scale in the bathroom every time you have the courage to challenge the result of your hard-earned labors on the sweat and torture machines for the past week? Suzanne, I do hope you have an answer, since you are able to solve just about anything. /s/ Dick.
All I know is I somehow manage to consume at least enough food to balance whatever calories I burn in the gym because the needle on the scale just doesn’t budge from one day to the next!