The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

The mizzus just bought herself one of those gizmos that keep track of how many steps she takes. Our friends kept shining around with theirs, forever mumbling about 6500 already or need to make 2000 more, about as interesting to a guy like me as it was when she got interested in computers back in the Dark Ages and the first ones got semi-affordable. Not enough beer in the entire world to make those conversations interesting to the guy who swore he wouldn’t own one until it could talk to him, steer him through its intricacies and pat him on the back when it had taught him some new program. Course, instead of getting simpler, they got way more complex and I realized if I waited much longer I might as well reconcile myself to the life of a caveman living in the Bronze Age. Ugga bugga meets the Flintstones. Yabba dabba do!

This fitbit contraption straps on her wrist and needs to be worn all day if you want an accurate count. Don’t ask me who came up with 10,000 steps, no doubt the result of extensive studies and only coincidental it happens to be a nice round number. The average joe has a stride between two, two and a half feet, so 10,000 steps comes to, oh, 5 miles, give or take. Doesn’t matter to the fitbit if you walk all of it at once, maybe get some aerobic benefit, or just waddle out to the kitchen for another snack. You just need to hit 10,000 of em.

Now, I don’t want to be too dismissive of this technological wonder. If it gets folks off their tush and makes them feel guilty when they only get to 8000 steps that day, I guess that’s progress. Gotta be better than looking at a computer screen or a TV all the livelong day. And it’s not like the thing starts to administer shocks in increasingly painful feedback when you fall short of the 10K goal. Although I suspect the next generation Apple version will have that app built in. For your own good, you understand. Impose a little discipline to the lax.

And I expect my health insurer will want those records before another year goes by. Average 8500, premiums go sky high. And you thought smoking was problematic for those folks. Why not? The lazy bastards who refuse to keep themselves in tip top shape ought to pay more than us fitbitters, don’t you agree? Stick a GPS on that device with a built in transponder, the data goes to the HMO in real time, 24/7, save you the trouble of emailing. After all, could add a few steps to your day with those kind of savings….

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