respencer

I have been a serious runner for over 40 years. The last 25 years I have used a HRM for scientific training data. Most of those years required wearing a chest strap, which I hate. They are uncomfortable, often slip, require semi-often battery replacement, and I think they may restrict breathing a little during high stress runs. Imagine my delight when Apple announced they would come out with a strapless fitness watch! I waited until series 2 came out and dropped my $400. I have been a huge Apple fan since 1985 when my first Mac Plus showed me how much more pleasant computing can be. But this Apple watch for me has been a terrible disappointment. I have found its ability to accurately record HRs is inconsistent and not at all accurate. It sometimes won't display an HR for a whole run. It is always turning on and off for any run. I don't think I ever completed one with a single string of data. For my intense physical training sessions, whenever I switch from a slower paced activity to a high intensity one, the HR goes blank. I worked for a couple of weeks with Apple Help and the technicians were very knowledgeable and friendly, but at the end of trying to get mine to work for me pretty much decided it is me and the way I work out. We tried just about every trick you can dream up to get it to work for me. So guess what. I now have a chest strap again. Even it is a little funky with how it works with Apple. I have to turn bluetooth off in my 7+ or the phone tries to take over the strap's data feed, though I don't know where it stores it. If the watch is receiving the data, it is very accurate and immediate. My Apple Watch Series 2 feels and acts like an early beta product; not something ready for prime time.

PLEASE! No more ass-ugly giant white monoliths across our natural scenes! If Apple is truly going no-carbon (of course it uses a lot of carbon to make no-carbon production devices), please stick with solar, hydro, and nuclear. So many of our beautiful western vistas are now destroyed by the need of Seattle and the I-5 Corridor down through California to have windmills to make their power (especially when we have a surplus already of hydro and nuclear).

Last month we switched from LastPass to 1Password after the LastPass hack. We (my wife and I) spent 3 miserable days changing all of our passwords. What a mess! Government and insurance company sites are the worst for changing passwords - almost impossible without a lot of clicking around and phone calls. 1Password seems to work great though we are still having occasional glitches with cloud passwords at Apple and 1Password. I wish the world would totally implement the Passkey system so passwords become history.