Girl About Globe | Do my cells look fat in this?

Linda Kennedy

‘You’ve lost a trillionth of a gram’. One day, our bathroom scales may report this weight loss goal. And we will be happy.

For years, I’ve had old scales. I didn’t have to sit inside a basin and have balancing brass weights placed on the other side but it wasn’t far off. 

My scales and me have been together a while. We’ve been through some ups and downs. Until recently.

I now live in a home which has fancy scales in the bathroom. They measure weight, body fat, mood, sebum presence in facial complexion, chance of rain. Some people might note such scales make weight tracking more acceptable in blokes (‘slimming? Course not. This is mass and density tech’). I call them Star Wars scales.

Everything about the person who stands upon them is recorded as a profile. Water. Muscle. Heart rate. All they lack, in my view, is additional female functionality. If it’s humid, I’d like to know what percent hair frizz I am.

So, scale-wise, I have stepped up. Or stepped on, which is when I learn that Star Wars scales communicate.

‘Hello,’ it says on the screen between my feet.

Conversation? I step off, imagining with horror the kind of fat chat ahead.

Scales: ‘Did you have a great summer, new profile?’

Me: ‘Yes, thanks. And yourself? Did you indulge on holiday? A cheeky wee battery with extra energy? 

Scales: ‘No. ‘

Me: ‘Oh.’

Scales: ‘So, new profile, what are we dealing with here, in pina colada excess? Two extra pounds? Half a stone?’

But very quickly, I learn Star Wars scales are the new smartphone and social media combined. They’re addictive. I check them often. Sometimes I learn I have put on 2% body fat overnight and wonder if I was dreaming of cake. I’ve heard of the tooth fairy but the fat fairy? 

Next night, I wake up at 4am and have lost 2% muscle. I look under the pillow. 

I wonder if there are scales with more and better detail. I pass through the bathroom department of a store, and see nothing but digital gauges with names like ‘Ultra Slim Glass Analyser Body Fat Scales’.

Is it all an extension of selfie culture? A view of oneself which is more than skin deep?

Or are these scales more like a therapist? Is a‘Body Analyser’ really Freud for the physique?

Then I read something which makes me think – yes! – these scales are about to feed our desire for yet more information (which is handily lacking in calories).  It is this: researchers have developed a method to weigh individual living cells – normally the kind of discovery to titillate biologists but, given current trends of weight monitoring, could have wider impact. We are all made up of cells. We could learn the weight of our cells! Are we big-celled? Do my cells look big in this?

The researchers, in Switzerland and London, track weight through cell cycles and division. They can measure to a trillionth of a gram. That’s a million-millionth.

I don’t have much up top (although the weight of my brain cells is within reach) but couldn’t manufacturers of scales get in touch with these researchers and add this capability, creating Body Fat And Cell Analyser scales? Who, every day, wouldn’t want to learn they’d lost a trillionth of a gram and, come on, that is a weight goal anyone can attain.

For your further information, cells usually weigh two or three nanograms, which are each one thousand-millionth of a gram. Forget fitness gurus. Nanogram loss is going to be all over Instagram.