Pedometer Not Required

So I thought I can use a pedometer. It's supposed to be some gadget that can measure distance. I went into a Modell's knowing only that. The salesman said it's only good for walking, not for jogging, even though the devices' packaging did mention jogging. Over at Target, there are even more options for pedometers - they not only measure the distance you cover, the calories you burn, heart rate, light the way, play MP3, and so on. All that from hanging on your hip. According to Wikipedia, a pedometer is basically a pendulum. You tell it your standard stride in feet or some unit of distance then it senses your motion and in the end tells you how many strides you have made. I thought it would be more hi-tech than that. Perhaps there's something you can strap onto your sneakers. It won't last too long that way though. For my purpose of knowing how long the block that I run around, a pedometer is overkill. Good ol' Google Earth's measuring tool told me that the block is about 0.6 kilometer or 0.29 mile. In the picture, I measured only half the block. That kind of distance sort of jive with my rough estimate of more than a quarter of a mile, 0.25 mile. In an attempt to go metric, I'll pretend the distance is 0.5 km so that 4 times around the block will be 2 km. It's better to think you can run 2 km but the distance turns out to be 2.5 km, instead of the other way around.

Sans pedometer, I made my 2k this morning. I forgot to set the alarm on my cell phone, but luckily I was wearing a watch, so I got up around 6:15am, instead of 6 sharp. I stretched at the park, to minimize the chance of being interrupted from getting out of the house. Like yesterday morning, I left the house with only a cell phone, some cash, one piece of ID, and the house keys. It's still Brooklyn, early in the morning while most people are still sleeping, so I was prepared for the unfortunate event of being mugged. Hopefully the cash would satisfy the mugger(s). From what I saw the past two mornings, it ain't all that bad. There were four or five elderly Chinese people doing exercise, a few women speed walking around the park, and a bunch of guys waiting for the MTA school to open, so the place wasn't totally deserted.

The U.S. should go metric - it's so easy to go from millimeter to centimeter to meter then kilometer and so on. Multiply by 10s is so easy. Let's see - 12 inches equal one foot, 3 feet goes into a yard, but how many yards does it take to get a mile? Similarly, I find pint, quart, and gallon all pretty confusing. Not to mention the word pint doesn't rhyme with anything.