By: Ed Creamer

Last Christmas my for better or worse decided it was time for me to get back into the gym and see what I could do about passing another PFT. And to help me, she produced this little watch kind of thing to wear. It was a “fit-bit”. She seemed to think it might help me see the results of all my activity at the gym. So, to humor her, I strapped it on, put on my best pair of sneakers and matching Marine Rotor Head Drinking Team Tee shirt and headed for the gym.

One of the first things you need to do is study the very small booklet that comes with it. The first part, setting the time of day was pretty easy. All you needed to know was which time zone you were in and adjust it. Only I’d never studied time zones before. But I set it. If I ever I need to know what the time in London is, all I have to do is look at my Fit-bit.

After that the word EXERCISE appeared. But, I already knew why I was in the gym, so, I said YES and touched the screen. This nice young lady in a skin tight exercising type of outfit informed me there was no reason to yell at the watch. “It had no audio functions”, she said rather rudely. I told her I knew that and went over to the closest weight machine. Somebody had left what seemed like 5,000 pounds of weights on it. So, I stood there as if I had lifted that amount and pretended to be wiping away the sweat.

For some reason my Fit-bit has this little pulsating heart on it with some number next to it. With that number were the initials BPM which I took to mean Beers Per Month. Never was able to find where I was to enter a number. Another thing I still don’t understand is why that BPM reading starts climbing higher and higher when that same young lady passes by me. You think it was counting her Beers Per Month?

Now the damn thing wanted me to get on a treadmill. You do understand this was after I had spent all that time setting my watch AND had worked out with 5,000 lbs of weights. Regardless, to humor it I headed for the only open treadmill which was next to that same young lady. Not to be out-done with her speed setting, I cranked mine up even higher. I then got on it. Listen, just for your information, if you ever decide to use a treadmill, get on the damn thing BEFORE it gets up to speed. Then hit the STOP button BEFORE you get off. You got that? Regardless, I still received a grade of 8.5 for my dismount.

I truthfully believe my days of using a Fit-bit at the gym are now a thing of the past. But, if there is anyone out there that knows how to set that Beers Per Month reading, let me know.