gearheads and toys

I am not a gearhead.
I'm the kind who wants to know the minimum capabilities of a gadget, how I get said gadget to do those things, and where the on/off button is.
I'm the terrible kind of person who never, ever learns to use all the functions on a calculator, a phone, a computer . . . or even an alarm clock. I place my hands over my ears, widen my eyes, and shake my head back and forth, no, no, don't tell me, I can't retain that kind of information.

I am not a gearhead.

but I am friends with a few.

in fact, I think "gearhead" is such a large subset of "male" that they could almost be one and the same . . .

this is leading up to the fact that I received a toy for my birthday.

from a gearhead, oops, I mean a male, the cute one named john.

it's a thingee. you know, one of those cyclometer-thingees. a gadget. the kind that keeps track of 18 million things from outside temperature to heartrate to cadence to what time it is in france. (if you want to set it to french time.)

and not only does it keep track of all these things, it will upload this information to your online database when you finish your ride, so you can view your stats.

you can name your ride.

you can see if tuesday's ride was stronger, faster, more productive or mellower than wednesday's ride along the same route.

you can compare your average and highest heartrates.

you can watch your cadence, comparing it to the elevation changes.

you can match your heartrate to the climb and descent, and pinpoint the spots where you might have opportunities.

eek.

and I'm sure there are hundreds of uses of this gadget-wing-ding that I can't imagine yet.

so far I've mastered the Power and Start/Stop button, and I'm improving my functioning with the Reset button.

I can read some of the numbers on the screen when I ride, and am learning where to look for which tidbit of information.

I haven't yet learned how to page through the different screens while I'm riding, so I can't tell the time or temperature while I'm pedaling, but I can reel off my cadence, speed, and heartrate . . .

I don't think I'll ever be a gearhead.

but if I work a little harder, I might learn a little more about my new garmin toy.

power, start, ride . . . then stop, reset. bring inside, connect to computer, upload, then stare in wonder at pretty little graphs.

grin.

okay, this is a little bit fun . . .