Experimenting with Fitness Tracking

2021-01-08 7 min read

Over the last few years, the general population has become increasingly more interested in fitness tracking, health metrics, and other associated smart wearables. Whereas heart rate monitors were once the realm only of fitness enthusiasts and professional athletes, it is now common to see the average individual tracking their heart rate, blood oxygen, and daily steps.

My Early Experience with Fitness Metrics

I first started counting my steps back when it was added to the iPhone 5s, around 2013, mostly as a curiosity. I didn’t pay attention on a day to day basis, but would occasionally look to see how many steps it estimated I had taken on particularly busy days. I continued to track steps through my switch to Android in 2015 (mostly in the background), and I would occasionally check my heart rate and blood pressure using a wrist cuff at home, but never really paid much attention to the results. I also picked up a smartwatch (Android Wear) in the 2017-2018 timeframe, but again, I never really paid attention to the information it could collect other than to note it when I was bored and looking at health information on my phone.

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2021 New Year's Resolutions

2021-01-01 5 min read

January 1st. The first day of the new year. Normally a cool, snowy (or icy) day where I live. And also, the day when people traditionally plan out or begin to implement their New Year’s resolutions.

My Thoughts on New Year’s Resolutions

I have an interesting relationship with New Year’s resolutions. I vaguely recall that, during my childhood, I somewhat embraced the idea of setting goals for myself: things that I would quit doing, start doing, improve, etc over the course of the next year. However, try as I might, rarely did a resolution stick. I would perhaps start out strong, but slowly, over the next few weeks and months, I would eventually give up, and settle back into my normal routine.

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2020 Year in Review

2020-12-31 7 min read

December 31st, 2020. In some ways, it’s hard to believe that I’ve already reached the end of this year. In others, it seemed like this year would never end. Although 2020 definitely didn’t end up looking anything like what I had planned, there have been so memorable moments. And so, as is my tradition, here’s a look back at the last 12 months of my life.

The first few months of the year looked pretty standard, for those that have read previous iterations of these posts. I kept busy with work throughout most of January and February, along with my usual volunteering at church, and hanging out with friends for birthday parties, SuperBowl parties, and various small-group-related activities.

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2020-12-12

Saturday mornings are for…

  1. workouts.
  2. coffee.
  3. upgrading DigitalOcean droplets.
  4. all of the above.

If you selected 4, all of the above, you are correct.

😁

Context: Originally posted to my Fosstodon (Mastodon) account

2020-12-05

Me: attempts to install app on MacBook Pro

Sorry, that app only works on the latest version of the OS.

Apparently I have to update Mac OS now. πŸ˜•

Sometimes I wish everything worked like Linux. It feels β€œsimpler” in many respects…

Context: Originally posted to my Fosstodon (Mastodon) account

2020-11-23

For some reason this THROUGHLY amused me. Probably because it’s so true… πŸ˜‚

Impending Zoom

Context: Originally posted to my Fosstodon (Mastodon) account

2020-11-23

Spent part of the afternoon rebuilding my little Z-Wave network with a new Zooz USB Stick and my Home Assistant running on a Raspberry Pi 4. I’d been having issues with my old Z-Wave stick not being detected properly (ever since migrating to the RPi4), and after reading through the workaround/“fix” over the weekend, I decided to just upgrade to a better-supported adapter.

Now I can once again reliably control my lights (including Christmas lights) from my phone, as expected! πŸŽ‰

Context: Originally posted to my Fosstodon (Mastodon) account

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