I’ll choose the ‘Irish’ route to health and happiness as tech doesn’t ‘Fitbit’ my lifestyle ...
I’M inclined to take a belt and braces approach to most things. So when I decided, like most of the rest of the universe, to ‘get fitter’ in 2018 it clearly needed supervision – otherwise the Hobnobs would run the show.
There’s so much conflicting advice out there filtering it is hard.
I’m not terribly unfit. Nor do I need to lose a ton of weight but as age creeps up those pounds have a nasty habit of hanging around. Usually the middle.
I was gifted a Fitbit which I eyed suspiciously from afar, then discovered Laya Healthcare offers a one-to-one health coach assessment for its customers so it was a double omen to get up off my backside.
The studies on wearable technology are mixed. Most users simply stop wearing it (it is ugly), but in my case it is the passiveaggressive messages that will probably do it in (“Feed Me!” it implores regularly like a needy child).
It’s also not giving me credit for my (bloody hard) twice weekly Pilates classes. The yoke prefers to count ‘steps’, so walking to a takeaway gets me a higher score. It’s a bit thick, in other words.
The Laya assessment was done by a human called Gareth who tactfully ignored my wheezing due to pegging it after getting off at the wrong Luas stop.
We chatted while he weighed, measured and stuck a needle in my finger. We pretended I wasn’t a complete baby. We agreed, all things being equal, that I was going to see my next birthday. It was almost fun. When I bade him goodbye, little did I know he’d become a permanent (and perma-happy) fixture in my life. “You’ve won a badge!”, “You’re doing great!”, “Your food diary misses you!” he pops up on the app to tell me. He doesn’t rate the Pilates either since I don’t have my phone when I’m in plank, but disappointing him is proving disturbingly motivational.
All in all, the biggest incentive is actually having the things on.
Am I moving more? Perhaps, but now I want it recorded when I do. Inputting food is easier on the Laya app because it’s “Irish”, so they’ll take Tayto sandwiches (oops) while the Fitbit is American cups and gallons.
It’s fascinating to see lunch converted to calories as I’m munching away and – once the experiment’s over – maybe I’ll eat less too.
... but go Dutch for first-class hospital care
SPEAKING of health, prevention is always better in Ireland than cure, mainly because we’re all so terrified of entering A&E or waiting list purgatory. Sometimes you get a utopian glimpse into how things could be, which can make you both wistful and disproportionately angry. My daughter, living in Holland, needed a procedure. Not an emergency, but important.
She has no health insurance there as only citizens can and must purchase it, so I prepared the credit union for a bailout. Referred by a local GP (cost: €20) to a modern, sleek hospital (wait: two weeks), she was seen by a consultant, another, tested, diagnosed and procedure booked. Cost: zero. Time: under an hour.
The Universal Health Insurance scheme (Hey, Fine Gael – yes, the alleged one you campaigned on), means all Dutch citizens pay a quite hefty insurance premium.
In some cases the Government pays if they can’t.
Doctors and hospitals have no idea who paid/has it paid and don’t care. If you’re an EU citizen, well, you get treated under the EHIC in the same way. It’s properly funded, quick and comprehensive.
I’m saving up my illnesses for my next visit over.
Requiem for a musical passion
FROM the age of six, I was plonked in front of a piano and expected to pummel it for the next 11 years.
I did so diligently, right up to the Grade VIII exams and then taught for a few years.
My home from home on many Saturday afternoons was Waltons music store.
You could poke your way through thousands of boxes of sheet music (“got the latest Mozart?”) and buy something contemporary without your classical teacher knowing.
It’s closing now, because you can get everything online – even the pianos.
Downloading scores takes seconds and costs pennies.
What you can’t download is atmosphere and the passion of staff thoroughly engrossed in their job. A win for the internet, but a loss for music.