One Step, One Mile, One Pain In The Ass

As most of you know, I walk. I wouldn't classify myself as a walker, because I don't enjoy those laps around the track. I don't enjoy exercise, but I know I have to do it, lest I get too comfortable in enjoying my favorite activity, sitting around, and end up as large and out of shape as I once was. The only exercise I like is swimming, and I could swim from now on, from B'field to the Caspian Sea, and be happy. But it's not always feasible, and there's a walking track near where I live, and, well, so I walk. I've thought up many, many new curse words, and new combinations of curse words to fuse into one huge swear, while I'm walking. For that, I guess I am grateful. Most of all, I'm grateful for my iPod, which keeps me walking that extra mile.

Mile? Well, that extra something.

See, here's the thing. I walk at the track at our town's middle school. It's a track set up for track meets, with numbered lanes and all, but I don't really know the dimensions of this track I'm huffing and puffing around. Town lore says that four laps around the track equals one mile. That sounds just fine to me, but I don't know that it's true. I don't know of anyone to ask who'd actually know. I don't know the school track coaches, and the nephew runs Cross Country, up and down hills and dales for miles on end, so I'm just left believing what I've been told.

And that is, if I walk four times around that track, I've walked a mile. But walking and listening to music, and, well, being me, who has the time or inclination to count? So I don't. Instead, I start on the inside lane, and with each lap go outward to the next lane. Which means that with each lap, I'm walking more than I did last lap around. Because as I go outward, each lap is longer. You know, being outward.

And so I've been thinking that when I hit the outermost lap, which is Lap Number Six, and then go to the outer ring of the laps, not a numbered lane, but that would be Lap Number Seven, that I'm walking at least two miles. Makes sense, right? Seven laps, each longer than the first lap, of which four supposedly make one mile.

It's logical to me, but then again, I'm a pod.

And as a pod, I of course started thinking about all this just a little too much.

As most of you also know, a few months ago I came into a little pedometer courtesy of TheCompanyIWorkFor, because they think their employees and clients are Big Fat Fatty Fat Fats, and that we'd enjoy a pedometer and some diet tips. I took one of the free kits sent to our office, the kits we accepted because we were begged by TCIWF to do so, because they weren't moving off the shelves so quickly, because no one wants to be told by TCIWF that they are indeed a Big Fat Fatty Fat Fat. I opened up one of those free kits, discarded the CD of diet tips, spat on the picture of the diet doctor, and stuck the pedometer in my pocket. And for about the first four days after doing that, promptly forgot to take the pedometer on my walk. I remembered the iPod though, which is all that matters.

But I finally remembered, and have clipped that little red and white TCIWF pedometer onto my pants every day since.

On a bad day - well, wait, if I were more optimistic, I'd say no day I walked could be considered a "bad day" - I will have walked about 3600 steps. On most days, I'll have walked 4600 to 4800. Again, sounds good to me. Four figures of steps. But then again, what do I know? Not much, I just know my feet hurt and I'm tired.

So I decided to do a little internet research on all this. The first site I went to contained both the good and the bad. The good was that there was a little chart with steps-to-miles conversion estimations, and it said that 3000 steps were about a mile, 4000 were about two miles, and 5000 were about three miles. So I was indeed walking about 2 1/2 miles if I was doing 4600 steps. The bad was that optimum steps in a day was 10,000, which I couldn't reach if I sat in my chair all day at work and pitty-patted my feet up and down with each keyboard stroke, and so I tried not to fret about it.

But you know me, I'm never satisfied. I thirst for knowledge, even if that knowledge is going to open up a can of worms I'd just as soon not have crawling around on top of me. Therefore, I went to a few other sites containing information on the steps-to-miles thing.

Most of them began the same way. And that way was to put on the pedometer and walk a 440. Count how many steps you have afterwards, multiply that by four, and you'll have the number of steps in your mile. I was right there on that theory, understood it completely, but since I don't know any of the track measurements, I wouldn't know a 440 if it walked up and slapped me in the face. So that one was out.

Then I hit a couple more sites, and this is where I started getting hinky. Because these sites went by some sort of steps-by-strides-equal-miles equation. I had to figure out what my stride was. I took a step and said, "Oh, 11 inches." And I should have just left it right there and I'd have been as happy as if I had good sense. But I couldn't do that, I went through the steps of determining stride length, which involved measuring out 30 feet (and I had a by-damn yardstick for that), walking the 30 feet, and seeing how many steps I took.

I did that very thing, and when I started putting my stride length into the steps equation, my 4600 steps were barely coming out at a mile walked.

And I got all pissy.

And here's why.

Now, I'm no fool, well, not much of one, and I know that if you have short legs like I do, that your 4600 steps are going not going to cover as much ground as Mr 7 Foot Tall's 4600 steps. But if I'm walking a prescribed length of pavement, say, seven laps around a track going outward with each lap, I'm going to have the exact same mileage as if Mr 7 Foot Tall walked seven laps around the same track. We've covered the exact same distance. Sure, he'll get there quicker, with less steps, because he has big ol' 7 Foot Tall legs and I don't. But we've covered the same distance.

And in fact, wouldn't I be walking farther, by virtue of the fact that I have these 5 Foot Three Tall legs peddling around the track, taking step after step after step to cover those seven laps? Well, apparently not, because if I change my stride to something longer, something in the Mr 7 Foot Tall range, and key it into the equation, I've walked miles out the wazoo.

It made my head hurt, and my feet already hurt, and I was still all pissy.

And I did the only thing I knew to do, well, the only thing besides quit walking altogether, I bought a pedometer that calculates miles for you.

Kind of.

I mean, it does, but for it to do that thing, you have to key in a stride length. Walk 20 feet and key in your steps. So sure, it's going to tell me how many miles I've walked, but it's going to tell me my 5 Foot Three legs aren't walking as many miles as Mr 7 Foot Tall's legs, and we're all assuming here Mr 7 Foot Tall is walking the same number of laps as I am. And so I'm back where I started from.

I guess I have to be happy in the fact that I walk 4600 to 4800 steps, or that I walk seven laps around a track, each lap longer than the last. And I guess that's going to be hard for me to learn.

Maybe I should just drive 2 1/2 miles from my house, park, get out of the car, and walk home. But then I'd have to walk back to my car, get in it, and drive back home. That's five miles, some really sore feet, and I may not find a parking space.

Of course, for Mr 7 Foot Tall, it would be about eight miles.

I don't like Mr 7 Foot Tall.

Betland's Olympic Update:
* Acrowinners, we have acrowinners. Your speech, "Fellow students, parents, teachers, administration, and honored guests...."
- Honorable Mention goes to Mr M, not that he even entered the competition, but no one else did either, and maybe this will get him off my back for a while.
- Runner-Up goes to LilyG, with her, "Neener, homies. (Extremely ridiculous noise now)" Because all graduation speeches should begin, "Neener, homies."
- And this week's winner goes to Kellie (with an ie), with her "No Hating. Everyone Reminisce. Nuzzle Neighbor." I like that - all graduations should have more nuzzling.
- Thanks to all who played - you've all done very well!