Diet Day 3 -- Strategies and Tactics

I'm not sure whether these tips are strategies or tactics, but for dropping a few pounds, I try to adhere to these concepts:

1. Keep a food diary, including a rough estimate of each meal/snack's calorie count. You can find calorie counters online, for instance here at My Fitness Pal. Even if you don't want to bother with figuring out how many calories are in your meals, plenty of evidence supports the idea that writing down what you eat provides an effective tool for keeping us on the straight and narrow.
2. Limit bread to once a day. A couple of days a week, I'll bring a sandwich to work, so that's my bread for the day. Otherwise, I might have toast for breakfast OR a piece of multi-grain French bread with dinner -- but never both.

3. Limit liquid calories. I try to do this anyway, but on a weight-loss regimen I'm especially conscious of how "empty" the drink calories can be. For me, this mostly means cutting way back on alcoholic beverages, but others may have to eliminate fruit juices and sugar-sweetened sodas -- two things that aren't in my diet in any case.