Do you play with the numbers on your food tracker before you eat?

Do you mean you fudged the numbers? No, i don't do that because it might look good on paper, but my body still gets those calories.
For pre-planning? Yes. If I cook for several days then I put all ingredients in MPF, and then look at how many days I could get out of it if I add x amount of my pasta/rice/couscous/etc of choice.

Yeah i always do it. I will often give me more or less carbs in my meal based on how many calories i have left.

I try to plan my food for the day ahead of time. It is certainly easier to plan ahead than to trust myself to do the right thing in the moment. My daily routine is to get to work and spend a little time planning my meals before I eat some trail mix to hold me over to lunch (I'm not a huge breakfast person). Once I plan my meals then I plan my snacks as well just so I know what my options are at night. I don't always eat all the snacks, but at least they are there if temptation or hunger strikes.

I'm a big proponent of pre-planning meals, or even whole days in advance. However, I prioritize the accuracy of my data above everything else so even if I'm missing my targets by a large margin it's documented as precisely and accurately as possible.

I do, all the time! I pre-plan and pre-log my meals generally, but I also want to be flexible. If there's something I really want to eat, I just eat it. Then I take a look at what I have left for the day and adjust appropriately.

When I was early on in the process (like the first few months) I did a lot of this. That was kind of the exact way I learned to adjust what I was eating to fit my calories and also keep me full and be food that I liked and food that met my nutritional needs.

Like I’d start with what I thought I wanted or what I thought would work, then start changing things around until it worked. Then look back to yesterday/last week to see what worked on a similar day or when I didn’t have as many calories as I needed or whatever.

It’s been many years now so I don’t do so much of that anymore. I have a pretty good idea what fits and what works and that’s just what I eat. I may tweak portion sizes a bit here and there.

But I definitely did a lot of swapping things in and out when I was learning what worked for me.

I try to start with what I am having for dinner so that I can change up what I eat throughout the day. Dinner is still whatever my hubby and I eat together. Makes it easier!