Ever heard the term Quilting is a fat girl sport …

I have. 

On Instagram, there is a gal who does work-out challenges for quilters.  #sweatnsew or #sweatandsew  she gives out prizes for working out and sewing!

Everyone is posting their Polar FT4 heart rate monitor watches with how many calories they’ve burned and these quilters have been getting skinny since January. 

Maybe it’s time to jump on the band wagon!   So, I research calorie counting devices.  I decide on the Polar FT4 like everyone else.  I haaave to have it!

I wait past my birthday, I decide on something a painting instead.  But then weeks later I neeeed it!!!  So I decide to just spend the $.  Of course I don’t want the cheap one that my brother can get me thru his work for $60, b/c it’s not cute.  I haaave to have the white one!

I call my friend who is a platinum Amazon shopper.  She says she still has the free 2 day shipping and asks what I want.  I tell her over text while shopping at TJMaxx and within 3 minutes, she’s found the lowest price on Amazon and ordered it up – 2 day delivery!

Wha-hoo!!  (This ‘cute’ version is of course NOT $60 but $100).  Can you say snob! 

2 days later, (Friday) as promised she calls and says it’s arrived!  Yeah!  I rush over after work, give her cash and open it up and play around.  Do I go to the gym right then and there? 

NO.  So Saturday I get it out and set my personal settings on the watch and watch some tv and… who knows.  But Saturday night I think, ‘hey, I had this 2 day delivered I better get going to the gym!’  This is what I’ve been waiting for.  But… I can’t find the strap and transmitter. 

I search everywhere.  Car, bag, box, purse, floor, couch, room, garage, driveway… no transmitter.  I text my friend and say, ‘hey, did I leave the heart rate transmitter and strap on your kitchen counter’.  She says, ‘I don’t know, we’re in Utah for 5 weeks!’ MAYDAY!  I beg her for a hidden key and alarm code.  No go.  No key.  MAYDAY again!

I just had this RUSH delivered so I would be motivated to work out!  And now… I may not have access to the band for 5 weeks?!  This called for some recon.  I immediately drive to her house, scale the fence to the backyard, peek in the kitchen window that the blinds are up about 3” and, there is the band and transmitter!  Shizzards.

So depressed.

The next day she texts me that her hubby has a meeting in AZ on Thursday and he can put it on the porch for me!  Hoorah!

Sadly, it’s impossible to work out without said transmitter bc working out without the calorie burning counter means I’ve burned no calories and my efforts are fruitless.  This is the lie I tell myself.

Thursday she texts me that he’s home and the strap and transmitter are on the pillar!  Yeah!  I promptly drive over and pick it up! Joy!  Do I work out Thursday night.  No. 

Saturday morning I think, ‘Today is the day!!’  Can I find the stupid transmitter and strap… NO.  not in the car, my purse, the garage, the bushes… I retrace all my steps from the last 2 days.  I drive everywhere I went in the last 2 days looking on the ground in case it fell off my lap when I got out of the car.  Nada. I check every purse I’ve used this month and NO transmitter/strap!  Holy WTH! 

I go eat fries at my frustration. 

So, the next week I google the strap and transmitter and bid on a couple on ebay and can’t win.  I am SUCKING at this working out thing all because of a stupid device!  Finally, I email Polar and tell them my dilema.  They promptly email me back and direct me to a site where I can purchase the transmitter and strap for $48.  $48!!!!!!!!!!!!  No way!  Gasp.  I peruse the site and find the pink watch and transmitter and strap for only $17 more!  The whole shabang!  I think, ‘I’m going to find that damn transmitter at some point, why not just have 2 sets and I can sell one’.  So I order the pink set and BAM $65 later….

I anxiously await the delivery of my new fancy calorie counting watch because life will begin when I know how many calories I burn during a regular work day.  Losing weight is all about the math right?!  3800 calories = 1 lb.  They say we burn 1500-2500 calories a day in our daily activities and if I eat 1200 calories a day then I’ll lose…. Blah blah blah a week.  I NEED this device to MAKE me do extra activity!  My life will be complete when I have this and I. Will. Get. Skinny!!!

The day I open the mailbox and find a key in it to the larger boxes I squeel!  Um, the key is jacked and it takes me 15 minutes to figure out which box the key opens and I wrestle with the box b/c NOTHING IS EASY.  Opening the mailbox burns 60 calories I bet!  I jaunt home and toss the new pretty on the counter and lay on the couch.  At 9 I think, ah, too late to work-out, I’ll go sew something. 

I mosey upstairs to the craft room and think, this joint is a pig-sty!  I start picking up and cleaning and putting things I’ve dumped in there away.  Hey, there’s a bag w/ scrapbook paper in it – when did I buy scrapbook paper and why…. Why is this sack of paper so heavy…

HOW DID MY HEART RATE TRANSMITTER AND STRAP GET IN THIS SCRAPBOOK PAPER BAG???????????????????????????????????????????????

Wow!  Am I blonde or whaaat, say wahhhat!  Ya.  The. Day. The. New. $65 pretty arrives in. the. Mail!!!!  Ding-Dong.  Sweet, I can return it unopened!

Now, you’re wondering if I strapped that thing on and did a work-out riiiight???? 

Yes.  The next morning I strap it on, hoist it up under my bra, set start and head to the car.  I’m so excited to see how many calories I burn sitting at work J

Start the car.

Beeeeppppp

Beeeeepppppp
HRM watch says, CHECK TRANSMITTER.
WTH!

Get to work, go in the bathroom, wet the strap down, try again.  3 min. later – CHECK TRANSMITTER!  You have got to be kidding me.  At lunch I run to staples and buy a new battery and stick it in – so excited!  Beeeepppp  CHECK TRANSMITTER.

Ya – this thing BITES!

That night, I call my friend who has one and say, meet me at the gym I need your help.  She jiggles the watch and transmitter around and I get a pulse!  Finally – I’m breathing, I’m alive!

Then, I notice our heart rates are the same…. I’ve heard that if you’re too close to another monitor, it will pick up the other person’s info.  She runs to the bathroom and… BEEEEPPP  I’m dead again.  No pulse, no heart rate. 

So I take it off and stomp on it.

Not really.  I just cry.  I walk home after our pitiful work out and cry all the way home. 

The next morning I open the new shiny pink watch and strap that transmitter on and it works like a champ!  Turns out, I burn 110 calories an hour at work while sitting, standing up, going to the bathroom and getting the mail.  Getting the mail in 109 degrees does raise my heart rate and burns 15 calories!  Sweet!

So my friend who so sweetly ordered my white watch and monitor is back from her 5 week vacation…. Day one of using my new watch!

Now to figure out how to return the original POS transmitter….

18 weeks till Hawaii. 

Lbs lost:  0
Lbs gained since I planned on working out and made a chart of how much I'm going to work-out: 7