walking and walking and walking, etc...

So we went to Wallyworld and purchased this semi-cheap-o ped-o-mom-meter, which I have been faithfully wearing: except for the time (in the first 24 hours) when I put it in the washer, and dropped it on the bathroom floor. Not exactuly off to what I would call an illustrious start. But it seems to be keeping up with what I've been doing in spite of being dropped on it's wee little head more than once.

The washer incident happened on the evening I went to walk, waiting till late in the day with the hope it would be somewhat cooler. And it was: due to a roaring thunderstorm that blew in, lighting flashing, clouds banging together and producing a torrent of rain... and me getting completely soaked. I could not have been wetter if I had jumped in the pond completely clothed. I was a little concerned about my phone in my pocket, and never thought to worry about the step-counter. When I got home, as soon as I stepped inside the back door, I stripped down and put my clothes in the washer to spin, to get dry enough to put in the laundry basket... and thought about the wet ped-o-mom-meter when I heard something hard as I was taking the still damp clothes out of the washer. whoops....

I'm sure you remember the old joke about the man who had a time piece that was not be working well, and took it to be repaired. The repairman, (who was hopefully not a professional watchmaker) opened the back of the time piece and a little dead bug fell out. Whereupon he said: 'I know what's wrong with this thing, the engineer died!'

Those little inexpensive step-counters can't be that complicated, so I am thinking I should just pry off the back of the several I have that don't work and see if I need to resusitate the engineer. There can't be much technology squeezed inside that small plastic case, and might even be a little family of bugs in there, industriously counting,  keeping score off steps taken, miles walked and calories burned. From inside this little gadget, with a plastic case about the size of  a silver dollar, there comes a sound each time I take a step, sort of like a couple of dried peas in a jar. A little rattling sound, like there is a tiny fulcrum with a bead or wee ball-bearing that rolls to-and-fro, with each step, keeping up with distance traveled.

But it sounds faintly like what you might hear if you were out walking in the woods and stepped over a fallen tree without looking where your foot would land. So all the time I am walking, I am thinking I am being tailed by a toothy rattle snake. Which is why I had to go to the library and get a talking book to put in my CD player and read while I walk, with plugs in my ears to keep other sounds at bay.