Sunday, March 15, 2015

It Knows When You Are Sleeping...

TAKING SOME BIG STEPS!


After everything I've been through, the last thing I'm going to apologize for is my paranoia. - Richard Finney


My ??th reunion is coming up in August. (No way I'm dishing on that number! I might as well just tell you how much I weigh!) Time is getting short and I have to at least resemble my Facebook photos by then. AGH!! 

I recently read an article that rates activity level based on the number of steps taken each day. Since I registered somewhere between a sloth and a stalactite I knew if I was to get in shape it meant more activity. Since they don't count key strokes or aerobic snacking it looked like changes were inevitable.

To that end I decided I needed the one thing I hate more than anything else in the world - accountability!  Enter the fitbit.

As you may or may not be aware, there are a lot of varieties of these gadgets and they increase in features as the price goes up. After checking them out and discovering that even the high end one still does not do windows or laundry I opted for the basic model (the flex).

I brought it home one day but waited till the end of the next to set it up. (I told you I hate accountability so I procrastinated.) Besides, it asks such intimate questions as your weight! I felt that was pretty forward for a device I'd just met.

During our "get to know each other" phase it came to my attention that this little critter can monitor my sleep patterns and report each morning how much rest I'm actually getting for my hours in the sack. Funny - I thought my mirror was doing a fine job of letting me know but this is the electronic age.

Now MOST people might think - that's AWESOME! Just a little more bang for their buck. I am not most people so of course I instantly became suspicious. I think it's creepy enough that an overweight guy in a red suit knows when I am sleeping and when I'm awake and that the Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy both have open access to my private sleeping space and also seem to have the goods on my sleep patterns - now this??

At least the other three don't also connect to the internet! After watching the first few episodes of CSI Cyber and finding out that even my toaster could be spilling its guts to some backroom hacker about how I like my bagels, how can I trust this new device not to green light burglars when it's lights out at my house?

On top of that I'm sure one day insurance companies will gain the rights to have the entire population tagged with these things so they can monitor our activity levels and use them to deny claims or coverage. Are they listening to me even as I type? Did I just give them an idea they might not have thought of yet?

Yes, I have my "concerns" about inviting yet another potential spy device into my life. It gives me the heebie jeebies, but heebie jeebies can't hold a candle to reunion anxiety so I decided to throw caution to the wind and fire this puppy up! Stay tuned for the continuing adventures!
  

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