Welcome to Another Generic Health Blog

This is a project designed to keep me focused on my goals and possibly share some experience and maybe even some knowledge.

Getting paid to lose weight is it really possible?

Eventually I would like to write a book about getting paid to lose massive amounts of weight.

Part 1

Apps that claim to pay you for exercise.

01. Achievement

I downloaded achievement on October 27th 2018.  On day 2 I had about 2,500 points.  A quarter of the way towards my first big $10 payout.

November 6 2018
After spending some time with the app I've found some more activities that add to my point total.  Entering health data like my heart rate, tracking swims, logging food with myfitnesspal.

November 28 2018
It's been about a month and I'm 4,133 points.  So not quite half way there to my big pay out of $10.  I have started entering other exercises into Strava for the points.  Manually entering an activity gives you about 6 points.  So swimming a mile and entereing it into strave gives 6 pts, entering a weight lifting session gives 6 pts, adding your weight to myfitnesspal gives 6 pts.  I believe this is to dissuade you from entering all kinds of activities for easy points.  The biggest earners so far are cycling and running.  A 2.7 mile run gave me 20 points, 7,619 steps also gave 20 points and 10 miles of cycling gave 36 points.  Cycling for 35 miles gave me 80 points.  I enjoy cycling and try to do one big ride a week between 50 and 70 miles and my commute to work these are the big earners.  Running and walking do over lap I believe.  Samsung health counts my steps during my runs adding to the step total.  How long until the big pay out?

January 23 2019

6,743 points.  The run every day in January program has been instrumental in earning more daily points.

May 5 2019
I hit the 10,000 point mark and redeemed my $10 gift certificate.  As of today October 11 2019 I am well past the halfway mark to another $10 reward.  This year due to working more and cycling much less as well as not doing the surveys in the app I am admittedly going a little slower.  However I am on track to hit another $10 jack pot.  Had I stayed committed to putting in time into the app I may have been able to get $30 this year.  Not a bad incentive to put in some work.

April 9 2020
I did it again!  Got another 10,000 points and received another $10 payout.  Unfortunately the birth of my son, a transition to a demanding new job and plenty of other stress factors set me back pretty far.  I still have issues with stress eating from time to time.  I think the new job and the covid 19 grocery scares lead me to stress eating.  Perhaps there's an instinct to gain fat when you know food may become scarce.  Either way I have rededicated myself and began working hard and counting my calories again.  I'm not proud of the amount of backsliding I let happen.

I have come up with a plan to run before work and to run after work I have a particular challenge I'm going to tackle each day.  There is an Indian mound close to where I work.  It is 65 feet tall and has around 100 steps (I will count them the next time I run) and is 800 feet in circumference.  So the plan is to run round this bad boy each day then run up and down the stairs.  Today 4/24/2020 was the first day.  I made it about two thirds of the way up to the top before really feeling it and having to walk the rest of the way up.  Originally I wanted to do the mound stairs to train for the Kaymoor mine stairs in West Virginia counting in at 821 steps.  The plan is to run around the mound then up and down the stairs 10 times.  This should get me as ready to conquer the Kaymoor stairs as I can in Ohio with what little hills we have.

I am rededicated to earning more money from Achievement!

Cycle Delivery Apps


Part 2
Actual ways to get paid for being physically active.

Start cutting grass and doing manual labor for friendly baby boomers and retirees.

Healthy Wage
Make bets and nearly double your money.

Dog Walking Apps

Run every day in January

So to get into the habit of running I have set a challenge to run every day in January with one exclusion.  No running on squat day.  Half way through the month and we are right on track.  My mile time is getting faster and my distance is going way up.  Excellent.

January 23 Update:

So far I've managed to keep up with the program of running every day excluding squat day.  The weather has been some of the harshest winter weather we've had in the past 5 years or so.  Tons of deep snow, near 0 degree weather but I have braved it all.  My mileage has gone way up.  I think I just hate running around the neighborhood I've moved to.  There isn't much variety in the elevation and there's a lot more traffic compared to where I moved from.  It really is lame having to wait at a traffic light to keep moving.

I've been taking my baby over to my Moms house to run around the neighborhood I grew up in which has been very nostalgic.  It's nice running somewhere I'm familiar with but also seeing how much its changed.

Roshi School of Training

When I first started getting back into shape I was looking for motivation and revisited what got me there the first time.  To be honest Dragon Ball was a huge inspiration.  Not the ridiculous stuff like wearing weighted clothing which would do nothing more than shredding your knees but the more grounded training.  Specifically the Turtle Style martial arts training system.

This actually did inspire a fairly lucrative form of cardio.  I was walking around for free like a chump when I began my quest to get back into super human shape.  Around this time wanting to get inspired I started reading through the Dragon Ball manga again when I got to the second major arc where Goku and Krillin train with Master Roshi.  Much of his teaching method involved doing chores and odd jobs to earn a little money while strengthening their bodies.

But how to get paid to walk?  How to make walking more of a challenge?  Put a lawn mower in my hands!  Now instead of walking for free like an idiot I was getting paid $20 - $25 an hour to walk.  The faster I pushed the mower the more jobs I could get done in an afternoon giving me an incentive and reward for working faster.

Scouting areas to pass out my business card became another opportunity for more cardio as I would scout locations on my bicycle.  Going to an area and walking around putting cards in peoples doors was another task to get me off my ass and doing more things.  My method would eventually to be named, in my head at least, as the Do more things and eat less bullshit method of training.  So far it's been highly successful and the funds earned from mowing lawns paid for most of my garage gym.

An important factor in Roshi's training is getting plenty of rest. When you're engaging in a lot of strenuous physical activity sleep is when recovery happens.  Make sure to get plenty of sleep.

Don't neglect those brain gains either.  In my 20's I read all the time in between sets, while resting and before bed.  This is sadly something I've fallen out of and need to get back into.  A new project I've been working on is practicing math in my downtime at work.  I haven't been very interested in math but I want to push myself and study the subject as far as I can take it.  

Running With a Metronome

Guys, this is a game changer.  never has a random post in my Instagram feed been so helpful.  I saw someone posting in my IG feed about running.  They mentioned using a metronome to keep a consistent cadence.  First time I ever heard of such a thing.  I downloaded an app with a metronome, read a few articles and went for a run.  Did my usual run but knocked off 2 minutes.  I wasn't quite hitting the pace I wanted but having something in my ear to at least attempt to hit a certain pace paid off.  Why don't all running apps have this feature?

According to the few things I've read it can take a few weeks to get into the groove of things.  I will keep running with the metronome and see what kind of progress I can make.  Allegedly along with keeping a consistent pace it reduces the chance of injury and helps you run more efficiently.  I would recommend looking into this if you're interested in immediately improving your running.

Long Riders! Real cycling lessons on anime

Long Riders is a manga and anime series focusing on a beginner cyclist.  It follows Ami Kurata a college student's development into a cyclist.  Unlike a lot of other Anime based on cycling this one doesn't focus on a racing club but rather a group of friends that enjoy traveling the Japanese country side by bicycle.  Along the way this short series touches on a lot of problems new cyclists will inevitably face and a lot of the rewarding joys they will experience.  I sure know I ran into a lot of these problems along the way.

Beavercreek Station Review