Week 2: A Good Gift (For Myself)

Two weeks ago, my manager surprised me and my other Summit colleague with Best Buy gift cards for a merrier holiday. It's been an extended period of time since I've purchased anything from this fine establishment. Even my Rewards Zone account has expired. What do I do with this gift card?

It took me a good hour of aimless ambling (to get some extra steps in, too, of course) and an excruciating debate with my conscience to decide on what would be the most practical items to purchase. Zumba DVDs? Oh wait, everything is on Blu-Ray now and I don't exactly care to purchase a player or overuse Chris' PS3 to display Beto's gyrating hips. Wii Mu sports-y stuff? Nah, I don't want a new console. The newest console I have is the Dreamcast that my dearest friends bought for me. (It's still at home in LA and still means the world to me.). A cover for my phone? Nope, this store doesn't carry the appropriate case. A phone charger for the car? For $30? Sure. I can justify this. I probably won't find anything else that's more expensive and I do need to charge this phone more often than the dumb phones I've had previously.

What about the remaining balance on the gift card?

Chris had wandered into the audio section while I found myself in the aisle full of digital scales. A wall of pedometers lined the adjacent wall of the scales. The good ol' Omron pedometer was dragging by the hip, pleading me not to consider a replacement that looks more sleek and inconspicuous and wirelessly transmits data for easy tracking.

I couldn't resist this:

Image courtesy of Fitbit.
The Fitbit Ultra in Activity Mode. The more active you are, the bigger this flower grows. Flower power!

At the end of this Best Buy visit, the total at checkout exceeded the amount on the gift card. It didn't matter. I'm happy with the purchase. Look at the results from Week 1 with this device:

Last Week's Over All Results

The scale reads: between 160-165 lbs. Goal: 147 lbs.
The NEW and awesome pedometer + oldie-pedometer total for the week: 108,608 steps
Aerobic activities for the week:

• Dance Your Body Thin (30 minutes)
• Jane Fonda's Low Impact Aerobics (48 minutes)
• Jane Fonda's Lower Body Solution (35 minutes)
• Hiking 7 mi. at Huntsville State Park (3.5 hours)

Results from the first week!

What I've enjoyed so far during the first week of using Fitbit:

• Susy had told me about these fitness devices that kept track of your progress and allowed you to engage in some friendly competition with other users. This visual data and ego-boost from seeing yourself make the leaderboard is the perfect mechanism for accountability in this weight-loss (mis)adventure
• I've stairclimbed more this week alone than I have in the last month of living at my old apartment
• I've started the Jane Fonda routine again
• It helped me maintained my weight during the holidays
• I've been slapped with the reality that I'm sedentary nearly 80% of the week. Got to keep on stepping and climbing!
• I don't need to buy a replacement battery - ever! A USB dongle (haha, what an amusing word) charges it to 100% within minutes
• The clip is pretty sturdy and doesn't need a secondary clip to hold it in place like my previous pedometers
• It's so slim, I can wear anything and it wouldn't protrude out like an unsightly tumor on my hip
• It's pretty accurate with the sleep tracking
• My Fitbit profile is pretty public so random folks in the groups I've joined can hold me accountable