How Far Do You Walk?

I haven’t written about my current, temporary work with New York Cares’ Winter Coat Drive.  I’ll write about that soon.  What I want to write about is a great new gift for the Christmas/Birthday season.  I was so excited about my Mom’s pedometer, that she bought me one when she returned to Virginia Beach.  I’ve worn it now for about eight days.  

How does it work?  I’m not exactly sure about my model, but there is a weight and a spring that react to the vibration of you stride.  The movement of the weight is counted as a step, then converted to a distance by multiplying by my 30″ stride length.

Today was my biggest day – 21,000 steps.  How far is that?  It’s about 10 miles.  Who knew?  I figured my job had me walk quite a bit during the day, but 10 miles?  OK, today is an anomaly.  I walked from work to NYU’s bookstore, then down about 10 or so blocks to Canal St to go to Pearl Paint Shop for some book binding stuff.

An average day for me is about 14,000 – 16,000 steps.  The number varies depending on how lazy the security guard at the loading dock is.  If he decides that opening the loading dock doors is too much effort, I have to walk up and down a ramp to the street to pick up and hand out the coats.

Amazingly, even on a Saturday where I left the house around noon and came back by 7, I managed to get 10,000 steps in.   That’s about 5 miles.  When you’ve got one of these nifty devices keeping track for you, it’s amazing how much you have to move around when you live in the city.