Walking Week
Posted: Sun 8 February, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Health, Weight Loss Leave a comment »This week has been my best week of walking/steps in a while, and I’ve covered 44km (just under 27½ miles) – which I’m pretty pleased about, needless to say.
It’s mainly been facilitated by a weekend with a lot of walking – Friday with a couple of village circuits, plus some stuff in Milton Keynes around going to the cinema, Saturday with a lot more Milton Keynes walking between tasks (haircut, bank, office paperwork, and other stuff) and today a big dollop of walking while revisiting a couple of places I used to live. Indeed, just today has covered 11km all told.
So yes, a good week for getting out a bit – although in other ways it’s been a lot flatter and less motivated. But more on that another time.
Shit on the Sidewalk
Posted: Thu 5 February, 2015 Filed under: 1BEM, Animals, Domestic, People, Sweary, Thoughts Leave a comment »I’ve come to the conclusion that in some circumstances, I bloody hate dogs. Well, more the dog owners, rather than the dogs themselves. Let me explain…
Every time I walk around the village in daylight (which I do a fair amount, due to an increased rate of exercise etc.) there are areas that are just covered in dog shit. Particularly in the area where it’s footpath across fields, any time you step off the pavement (for a cyclist, or other people) you’re at risk of stepping in shit. It’s even riskier in the evenings, because you’ve no chance of seeing the fucking stuff.
There are shit bins at either end of this particular footpath, but no, these people just allow their dogs to shit and leave it. They also let it happen in the alleyways between houses – as a houseowner there, I’d be debating CCTV and/or violence. I wonder how they’d feel if I went and took a dump on their doorstep one day?
As a prospective dog owner (or indeed an actual dog owner) you must surely understand that picking up dog shit is part of the deal. I always understood that, and would pick it up wherever possible – obviously if they’ve run across miles/fields and there’s no-one ever going to go in that direction, you’re less likely to pick it up – but if it was ever near/on somewhere people would regularly walk, I picked up after Hound.
The facilities are there. Fucking use them. People piss me off.
Snow Day
Posted: Tue 3 February, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Driving, M1, Weather Leave a comment »Last night it snowed in the area I live in. I’d been in the cinema for the evening, and came out to find the car covered in snow. Not lots – maybe a maximum of two inches all told. But it meant slower driving (well, except for BMW drivers, who were still their usual dickwhistle selves) and just generally being sensible.
Of course, at this point I know that various friends in different areas of the country/world are pissing themselves laughing (as usual) at Britain’s shitness with snow and inclement conditions. The only excuse is that we don’t have enough dodgy weather to invest in the infrastructure to deal with it. Canada, US and Scandinavia are all used to feet of snow, and have the machinery and infrastructure to deal with it. Here? Not so much.
Anyway, it made driving home a bit more cautious – although still not bad at all – and also made me thankful I was driving at midnight, rather than in peak hours. Even at midnight there were still plenty of idiots driving too fast for the conditions, and making things interesting.
And I’m very glad I was working from home today, rather than travelling on the M1 in either direction…
A Measured Year
Posted: Sun 1 February, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Old(er), Health, Weigh Less, Weight Loss 2 Comments »Oddly enough, while I was writing about the new Fitbit ChargeHR, I got an email from Fitbit about my activities of the last 12 months.
According to them (and who am I to argue?) in the last twelve months I’ve walked a total of 873 miles, through 1,763,045 steps. That’s not bad, for someone who didn’t/doesn’t get out as much as I should…
That adds up to an average of just under 2½ miles walked every day, just over 4,800 steps a day.
OK, it’s not the recommended 10,000 steps a day – but that wasn’t really my goal in the first year (or possibly even the second). However you look at it, 10,000 steps is a lot, coming in at around 6 miles a day. But it is better than I did the previous year (due to being more aware of it, and more determined to get out more) and I’m happy with where it’s at. I know plenty of others will say “Is that all?”, but that’s fine too – it gives me plenty of options.
So I’m happy – and it’s also good to know those details, rather than just thinking I’ve walked more etc. And this year’s target will be to comfortably beat those totals. Maybe 1,000 miles in a year? Who knows.
Fitbit ChargeHR
Posted: Sat 31 January, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Old(er), Getting Organised, Health, Technology, Thoughts, Weigh Less, Weight Loss Leave a comment »Over the last year or so, I’ve been using the FitBit Flex wristband to keep track of my daily steps, sleep statistics and so on. I’ve been generally impressed with its ease of use and so on, as well as the integration/communication with the FitBit App.
As it worked out, the only thing I wasn’t too impressed with was the strap itself – in that year-ish, I got through two straps, and had just ordered a replacement for the second. That’s not ideal, and is something of a design flaw. (I’ve let them know about it, so we’ll see what happens)
At the time I got it, I was a bit annoyed by a perceived lack of functionality within the Flex, so I was interested to see that they’ve released some more wearable things with more functionality – the Charge, ChargeHR and Surge (which is almost a smart-watch in its own right) – and I ended up getting a new ChargeHR.
Because I’m exercising more and so on, I was wanting a device to track heart-rate and so on as well, and the ChargeHR does that. I don’t need the full functionality of the Surge (plus I didn’t want to be taking myself up to that price point) but this one does pretty much what I want, particularly in combination with the phone.
The strap on this is a bit more obtrusive than that of the Flex – I can feel it as I’m typing this, for example – but all told I’m so far impressed with the device. And it has some of the extra things I wrote about a year back – and the Surge has built-in GPS as well, which was another.
It’s interesting seeing how these devices improve over time. It’d still be nice to see more innovation, but at least they’re doing more, and still maintaining a decent battery life and so on.
I’ve only had it a couple of days so far, but will probably write more about the ChargeHR in a couple of months’ time, as I’m more used to it.
Service Reward
Posted: Fri 30 January, 2015 Filed under: Commuting, Cynicism, Domestic, Driving, Finances Leave a comment »As I said last week, the Slab passed its MOT with flying colours. So I decided to give it a treat – as well as the service it was due for, I sorted out a couple of things that’ve been annoying, and all is good.
Since I got it – and obviously before that too – one of the information displays has been pretty dodgy. It’s an old-type thing with a dot-matrix screen, and there were obviously some borked connections, so it never displayed the entire screen at all. Depending on any number of random factors, it could be 75% working or 25%. It didn’t affect the functionality of the car, but it got annoying on occasion.
Anyway, with having had to spend Not Much (actually, nigh-on Sod All) for the MOT, I asked about getting a replacement (or in this case, reconditioned) display module. I’d thought about it before, but didn’t bother at the time.
The service was done yesterday, along with the new display module, and replacement of various fluids that were OK-ish, but got flagged up as “could do with being replaced”. (Brake fluid and the like)
The display now is ace – indeed, it’s taking me some time to get used to it being as bright and clear as it is. The service had a couple of small bits that also needed doing, but it’s been worthwhile, and still Not Much for a car as comparatively old as the Slab.
Of course, with new bits and now it’s all sorted and taxed for the next year, something major is sure to go wrong with it in the coming month or so. That’s just the way these things go…
Jammed
Posted: Thu 29 January, 2015 Filed under: BMW Drivers, Commuting, Domestic, Driving, M1, People, Thoughts, Weirdness 1 Comment »At the moment, I’m doing regular drives on the Northbound M1, which is currently subject to no less than 15 miles (Fifteen Miles! For fuck’s sake!) of roadworks in one stretch replacing the central barrier, and another stretch installing ‘smart motorways’, in a similar way to how the Southbound M1 was screwed over a couple of years back.
Through both of these stretches, we’ve got the 50mph speed limit and ‘average speed cameras’, which seem to also contain some kind of mind-control that turns the majority of drivers into zombies who can’t see an empty lane, but can see a speed camera and slow down for it. (The phrase ‘average speed’ is utterly beyond them, of course)
It amazes me how bad the driving standards are in these roadworks zones – it’s as though people stick to the lane they were in when they entered the roadworks, and aren’t able to move from it. They don’t move in (or even pull out to overtake) despite any available space, or someone else driving even slower ahead.
I don’t know what can be done to change it – it’s just a human nature thing, I guess – but dear God, it’s bloody annoying to be surrounded by that many dickwhistles.