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July 18, 2006

I'm Not Dead Yet!

I knew in the back of my mind that I'd been sort of neglecting this blog recently - work has been crazy busy, and I've been lucky if I've been able to keep up with my running, never mind blogging about it. However, I didn't realize just how bad it got until jeff IMed me this morning to make sure I was still breathing.

Oops. Work is still busy, but at least the general stress level has come down a bit. This does two things: firstly, it makes me a far more pleasant person to be around and secondly, it frees up some valuable mental energy and motivation to tend to my poor nelected blog. Hello, blog. I missed you! I did! It was The Evil Man who was keeping me from you lo these many days...

Anyhow, while I may still be alive and kicking, I cannot say the same for my beloved Forerunner. I turned it on and put it on the windowsill while I got ready for my 12-miler on Saturday morning. Usually by the time I'm ready to leave, its found a satellite signal. Saturday, however, it was asking me if it was indoors or not, since it was having trouble. Hmmm. I turned it off, then back on again once I got outside. Nothing. Nada. After a few minutes, it asked if it was still indoors. Grrrr. I went through the motions of confirming it wasn't indoors, I hadn't moved hundreds of miles since I last used it, and yes, today was the 15th of July. I figured I'd just start my run and it could pick up the signal later - I knew where my turnaround point was from previous runs, so at least I'd have an accurate time total.

A little over a mile from my apartment, it finally found a satellite signal and then commenced to do something best described as "freaking out." It logged an autolap (set to 1 mile) every 5 seconds. Umm... not quite. I stopped, turned it off and back on again. It picked up the signal OK, I started it and resumed running, and everything seemed to be OK. When I got to the lake (about a mile later), I looked down and saw that the display was totally blank. Huh? I tried turning it back on. Or off and on. Something. Anything. It seemed I had two display options: upside down and backwards, or completely blank. Eventually I just gave up - I knew where my turnaround point was and I had a vague idea of what time I left my house so I'd just finish the run and guesstimate the time. It'll be close enough.

Based on the beeps and boops coming from the 201, it sounded like that it was still functioning fine, although the display was dead. Hmmm. When I got home, I stopped the watch (I'd left it running) but left it turned on. My plan was to run the battery down, recharge it, and then see what happened. Sunday morning, I plugged it into the charger. When I checked on it again Sunday evening, the display was still out - no "Battery Charging Complete" message floating around as usual. I didn't even try to turn it on, but instead pronounced it dead.

I'm a little bummed out about it - in addition to feeling sort of lost without it (I'm pretty familiar with how far the landmarks on my routes are from my house, but it's just not the same!), I kind of miss it. My parents got the 201 for me almost 2 years ago, when I was training for the 2005 Disney half. That was the race that started this whole crazy running thing - I was undertrained going into it, it was a horrible, awful, painful thing, and I came out of it saying, "If I can be undertrained and finish a half, I bet I could totally do a full if I actually trained for it..." A small thought, simple enough, that somehow changed my entire life. My 201 has seen me go from someone who could barely string 2 or 3 miles together without a walk break into someone who can go out and knock out 5 or 10 miles without even thinking about it. We have a history, the 201 and I, and I'm sad to see it go.

Since the 201's way out of warranty, I'd have to pay Garmin to fix it. Ten minutes of online research showed me that for just $100 more than it would cost to fix the 201, I could buy a new 301. To be honest, I've been wanting a 301 for kind of a while now, but couldn't justify the purchase while I still had a perfectly good 201. Maybe this is the universe's way of telling me it's time to move on. The 201 was there for the beginning, to get me started, and now it's time for the next step. Really, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little excited about the prospect of a new gadget.

Until then, though, I'll be rocking it old-school - just me, a rough guess as to where my turnaround point is, and a plain old-fashioned watch to track my time. It's something that my mildly obsessive self finds a little unnerving (was it 5 miles? Or 5.25? Or 4.75? I need to know!), but I think it'll be good for me.

Posted by Dawn at July 18, 2006 12:22 PM

Comments

Posted by: jeff at July 18, 2006 03:08 PM

Posted by: Nicole at July 18, 2006 07:58 PM

Posted by: Full Metal Lunchbox at July 19, 2006 08:42 AM

Posted by: Dianna at July 19, 2006 12:28 PM