Sorry, People!

For Christmas this year, my husband bought me a neat present. Of course, I think it's neat because I specifically requested it (along with a number of other items that he couldn't figure out -- like BPA-free mugs I have since bought myself).

With the running that I do, I'm really intrigued to know how hard I'm working and how effectively. I'd like to track my workouts, too, but I'd like a tool to make it easier. That and it's always fun to know how many calories you're burning, isn't it?


Now I feel like a real exerciser. A professional, as it were. I have my own heart rate monitor!



And no, I won't model it for you. Thanks for asking. And no, I have no idea why the picture turned sideways when I loaded it. It was fine on my computer.

Anyway, I finally started using the heart rate monitor a couple weeks ago. It's pretty cool and relatively intuitive. I only scanned the directions briefly to figure out how to work it. I love technology like this!

I put it on and started out. A friend of mine was at the gym with me that day doing the elliptical while I ran. As usual, I had my iPod with me, phones in my ears, listening to my podcast while I happily ran. When I finished, she was on the ab machines, so I moseyed over there to talk to her.

As I cooled down more and stopped the podcast, I realized my heartrate monitor was beeping. Eh, it wasn't too loud. I waited for my friend to finish. When she joined me, she realized I was the one who had been beeping and had distracted her from her counts while doing crunches. Oops.

Apparently my monitor beeps unhappily and quite loudly whenever my heartrate goes above or below my target rate. When I'm on the treadmill, it's not a big deal since just about everyone is listening to their iPods anyway and can't really hear the beeping.

Today, I put the heartrate monitor on to go to my belly dancing class. Except that it wasn't belly dancing because the teacher was still recovering from her surgery. Instead they brought the Soul Grooves teacher in. No problem, it's still basically dancing.

Ten minutes into the class, a slower song came on and my heartrate dropped. I started beeping. I now realized how loud that beeping was. And I'm pretty sure others in the class did, too.

I tried putting my hand over the wrist to mute the beeping to some degree, but that wasn't feasile for long. I tried pressing various buttons to try to get it to stop, but that didn't work either. On the plus side, I figured out how to show calories burned during my workout. That wasn't at all distracting.

Fortunately, a faster song came on, so my heart rate went back up. Phew!

And then it wasnt down again. Lots more beeping.

Luckily, the lights were turned way down or everyone would have seen my bright red face. I kept trying to keep it quiet to no avail. Somehow, it never crossed my mind that I could simply turn the monitor off completely. My brain doesn't always work the way it should.

It finally dawned on me that I vaguely remembered seeing a settings function when I stopped my workouts the past two times. In the middle of doing plies, I found a way to turn the beeping off.

Hallelujah!

By the end of class, I think people had forgotten about the obnoxious beeping, so no one made an issue of it. I never claimed to be a techhie. Remember, I liked the heart rate monitor because it was intuitive.

The good news is that I don't think my beeping will bother anyone going forward. And even better? I know how hard my workouts are. That soul grooves class? It burns more calories than I thought! 503 calories in the hour I spend there. Not quite the 598 I burned running the day before, but I won't complain.

Maybe I should go back and read that instruction manual, huh?