Speaking of walking
Speaking of walking, my mom got the wifey and me pedometers for Valentine's Day. Most people we tell this to think it's pretty silly. I'm not sure why, maybe people think they are for people who are worried about how many calories they're burning or something (a category that the wifey and I don't belong to) but even then is that silly? Anyway, these pedometers are awesome!
Now, I complain a lot about how inactive I am these days, and some of you might be thinking that I'm just complaining. But now I can give you some cold hard facts. There were two days last week where the wifey got home from school (usually around 3:30ish) and she'd ask me how many steps I had so far and the number was less than 300 steps. 300 steps equals a little more than 1/8 of a mile. In one day, I hadn't walked more than 1 or 2 blocks. That's a couple trips to the bathroom!
Think about your day, think about going to work or going to school, or whatever it is that you do, and I'd bet money that you take more than 300 steps. Count them some time!
But then last Tuesday, (the day I posted my last blog about walking more) I had 16,108 steps. Now that's more like it! That's closer to 8 miles.
Anyway, I recommend to everyone that they get a pedometer, it is such a great way to qualitatively gauge how active you've been. And it really is a great motivator, looking down at that number.
Plus, I love statistics (and who doesn't, really?), so when this month ends, I'll be able to tell you how many steps I had each day! Isn't that cool? Maybe one day I'll be organized enough to gather statistic like this guy (keep clicking the big infographics).
Also, the pedometer is a major motivator to you know, actually get dressed. I need to have something to attach my pedometer to!
So far today, and I've already got my walk in by walking with Keri to school, I have 3,376 steps, So far, so good!
3 March 2011 03:12pm UTC • 189 views • 9 comments
Tagged with walking, pedometer, activity, inactivity, statistics
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9 comments
Erik the Redish-orange
3 March 2011 04:07pm UTC
300 steps! That's an impressive number. Some day you should plan ahead (have food, your computer, etc. nearby, go to the bathroom lots the night before, etc.) and see if you can be at zero when Keri gets home. That would be super impressive! But 300 is still hard-core sedentary in my mind!
I'm glad you have cold, hard numbers to look at to motivate you away from your apparent occasional comatose-like state.
Carpenter Courtney
3 March 2011 05:13pm UTC
I've been thinking of getting a pedometer for a long time now--I bet I take a lot of steps (I move to procrastinate--work on dissertation? Nah...let's take another bathroom break...). Do you know of reliable brands? I'd do the research myself but...look at that, I have to pee again. ;)
Dread Pirate Benjamin
3 March 2011 08:44pm UTC
The pedometer that my mom got us is made by "New Lifestyles" and is the NL-1000.
It is a little more expensive than other pedometers, I'm sure you could get some for pretty cheap, but this one saves the last 7 days worth of numbers and also keeps a total of "active minutes" for each day. It has 9 activity zones (measured by level of activeness) and you can configure the zones you want it to log, so you can make more specific goals about how active you are in a day.
Here are my last 7 days, starting today:
So far today: 3,739 steps — 23 minutes
1. 4,288 — 23.5
2. 16,107 — 106
3. 8,804 — 50
4. 3,303 — 6.5
5. 9,472 — 42
6. 3,010 — 8.5
7. 4,261 — 22
As you can see, if I get around 3 or 4 thousand steps in a day, all I've done is gone on a 20 minute walk with Keri on her way to school. If my activity minutes are less than 20, then I haven't even done that.
As far as how accurate they are, who knows. They can't be completely accurate for steps because they are just recording the movement of your hips, and sometimes you move your hips when you aren't walking. Or you take it off and it logs a few more steps in the process. But looking at the data, it is really pretty accurate at capturing how active I've been.
The goal is to get 10,000 steps in a day. Recent studies have been showing that it might be more beneficial to your health to be mildly active throughout the day than to be really active for short periods of time (like, running hard for thirty minutes in the evenings isn't as good for you as just being active).
It is great because you can look at my data and see that unless I make an effort to get active, I lead a really unhealthy lifestyle. And now I have a way of measuring it, so I have something easy to aim for. I don't have to become as active as I'd like to be, I just have to get this little gadget on my hips to say 10,000. That is quite a bit less daunting of a task.
Though, like I talked about Tueday, my goal is to just get outside walking once a day, and I think that will slowly get me to where I want to be.
The other really great thing is that my mom, Keri and I all have the same model of pedometer, so we can be reasonably sure that when we compare numbers, they are recording the same thing. I don't know how much variance there is across different pedometer models (it would be fun to wear two sometime and see how they compare) but now we don't have to worry about it.
Usually both my mom and Keri beat me big time in the numbers. Maybe if they're feeling brave they'll post their numbers for the last week!
Dread Pirate Benjamin
3 March 2011 08:45pm UTC
Oh, and to answer your actual question, Courtney, I know nothing about reliable brands. But I like the one my mom got me!
Seamonster Mom
4 March 2011 02:00am UTC
I'm totally shocked that you did not talk about my nifty log on Google Docs. I can give you data from 2 months! These pedometers are New Lifestyles NL 1000 at http://www.new-lifestyles.com/content
These are a good brand; you can get cheaper brands and simpler ones than the NL series, but the accelerometer feature does give more accurate results. And the minutes of intense activity is an interesting measurement. However, I had to readust my settings so it would quit showing reports of ~3 minutes of intense activity per day. That was depressing and NOT motivating! My "intense activity" is not the traditional 10 minute miles, but more like 20 minute walking miles. I am thinking that intensity of exercise will get me up to 13,000 ft at Dead Woman Pass. Encouraging name, huh!
Erik the Redish-orange
4 March 2011 02:38am UTC
Boy, Martha, that is a super encouraging name! I'm sure you'll have no problem, though!
Sailing Master Keri
4 March 2011 05:44am UTC
Here are my stats:
Today: 12,291- 65:04 active minutes
1. 15,174- 73:40
2. 7,797- 30:12
3. 8,707- 32:48
4. 8,017- 33:04
5. 4,776- 14:40
6. 4,948- 9:40
7. 6,137- 23:20
Wow, it's pretty amazing how un-active I was last weekend! You would think it would be the opposite, but I think that's generally true for me (I'm more active during the week when I have a routine than during the weekend). Also, it's crazy how much of a difference running makes (I ran today, yesterday (1), and Sunday (4)).
Martha, your spreadsheet is awesome. I'm using the actions feature of the scruffypirate.org organizer tool. I really like it! Although, I have quite a few suggestions for the developer to implement, but he's always too busy to work on it. Maybe if a bunch of tsp users start using it, the website might become more of a priority. So check it out! It's a lot of fun! And you can keep track of anything--not just your exercise (diet, homework, bowel movements, etc.)
Seamonster Mom
4 March 2011 07:11am UTC
The organizer tool sounds neat, but I can't get it to open up. Tell me how to get on it!
Dread Pirate Benjamin
4 March 2011 05:16pm UTC
Well, that is a project that I did in the month of December in 2006 and it hasn't really been touched since then. So, it has bugs and could definitely use some love, but I don't have time to give it love. I did change the color scheme last night to have more pink, for Keri.
It was originally written as a subset of TSP, so you had to use your TSP username and password. But then I wanted to make it it's own thing, so I copied the database over so it was separate. Then, logically, didn't add a signup form. What this means, is that the only user accounts on the thing are TSP accounts from 2006. So, if you want to log in, you have to use your TSP username and password that you had in 2006. Now odds, are your password hasn't changed, but the username might be harder to remember. So, if you go to your profile on this website and look in the url, you will see a number at the end, that is your user id. You can use that as your username. So obvious! What idiot made these websites?
That said, if you'd like to give the Actions thing a try, and you didn't have an account back then, shoot me an email and I'll hook you up with an account.
And mom, if this doesn't help, call me up, and I'll help you get in...