Wordsley, Stourbridge, England: 2 degrees, bitterly cold, grey, dark and damp, and it is throwing it down.
Saturday has been a quiet day, but I did receive my present, the new Google Watch 2 that I bought yesterday, and it came today.
I already own a digital watch, which I bought when I moved to Copacabana over two years ago. I wouldn’t call it a smartwatch, a generic smartwatch at most. It has an app to track your progress or adjust its settings, but the app spends more time being unresponsive or frozen than actually functioning.
What I liked about it is that it has a pedometer that accurately counts your footsteps. That’s all I need, just telling the time, counting footsteps, and knowing approximately how many steps I’ve done during a specific period of exercise or throughout the day.
Again, when I was living in Copacabana, 10,000 steps was my daily goal for a morning exercise session, which I nearly always achieved. A day without exercising could still be reasonable if I reached 10,000 steps. An average of 10,000 steps daily is more than good, and in Rio, I managed to keep up with it; here in England, I only manage it when the weather is suitable.
This old watch, which I have had for over two years, has been worn and battered to death from excessive use. Two years of daily exercise, being hit on the floor, walls, and trees, have left it scratched to death, but I still love it. It is also a reasonably good-looking watch; what catches its attention is the orange rubber strap. Some men wear dark and dull-coloured suits or clothes, but pair them with a vibrant tie in intense colours.
I wear dark, dull colours with the same black UV shirts for at least 10 years. My old watch, with its orange strap, had added a little colour to my otherwise bland appearance.
My new watch, which arrived late this afternoon, bears a striking resemblance to my late one. Naturally, being much more sophisticated and costly, the quality is considerably higher, and it’s genuinely a smart watch, comparable to an Apple Watch. Not just a pretend one like my old trusty, now beaten to death, orange one, which, even though I love, admire and will probably miss.
Steve Jobs understood that the joy of unboxing something you’ve bought is just as vital and powerful as the pleasure of making the purchase. It came in a well-packaged box, complete with a charging cable, minimal instructions, and nothing more.
Within 20 minutes, it was ready to use on my wrist. It is relatively intuitive, thanks to various apps on my phone, which I downloaded to manage functions, settings, and exercise sessions.
The watch is beautiful and very functional; let’s see if it lasts as long as the old, battered, beaten one. It’s like comparing a Pedigree dog and a mongrel. There are daily things that only a streetwise mongrel would do, but for a pedigree, it’s more difficult.
I’m pleased with my new gift; I deserve it. The truth is, I deserve much more, but many others deserve as much as, if not more than, just me.
I am grateful for what I have and what I will possess in the future.
My mother cooked a nice dinner, and I finished off the wine; I was in bed by 11:00 p.m.
Thank you.
Thanks for reading this blog post. Please explore my other posts and share your thoughts in the comments section.
Richard
