Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
With Halo device, sleep lost in effort to get good 8 hours
My first night with Amazon’s $65 Halo fitness band was hilarious. I kept waking up to see if I could improve my sleep score. I couldn’t stand to see a “poor” grade. I kept trying to go back to sleep until I got a “fair.”
The next night, my sleep score went up to “good,” with 8 hours and 6 minutes of sleep but slightly less rapid-eye-movement than ideal. It also told me how long I took to fall asleep. Last night, it was zero minutes, compared with 14 the night before. I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. The funniest thing happened when I took a nap. The app changed my score to “poor” and said I’d been in bed for more than 15 hours! Turns out I shouldn’t have worn it on my ankle. It only works on your wrist.
Halo is much more than a sleep scorer, however. It monitors activity, heart rate, body fat and a somewhat mysterious item called “tone” — which has nothing to do with fitness and everything to do with personality. Concerning the activity monitor, I was pleased to discover I got credit for leg lifts and other floor exercises, instead of just walking. I can even swim with it. But all analyses take place on your phone. The band is just a strap with the computer gizmo underneath where you can’t see it. More stylish bands are supposedly coming soon.
The heart- rate monitor seems much more accurate than other wearables. It correlates with another monitor I have. But “tone” needs work. On a day when I felt joyful all day, it said I was neutral 55% of the time, happy 6% of the time and energetic for 1% of my day. My most negative moment occurred at 4 p.m. That’s when I was playing a Pachinko-like game called Peggle, and cried out after missing a shot.
You get voice analysis, body fat measurements, health tips, exercise videos and extensive sleep analysis for six months for free. After that, it’s $4 a month. I was pleased to discover that my body fat percentage put me in
the athletic category. The voice analysis seems gimmicky but might be good for those trying to improve on a negative personality.
The Halo is $65 during a discount period, then it rises to $100. If you want one, go to Amazon.com, search on “Amazon Halo” and click to request an invitation after explaining why you want it. I said I was a huge Amazon fan and had previously owned fitness wearables. That did it. It arrived the next day.
WEBSITE TIP
If you find yourself going to the same website on your phone or tablet, why not add an icon to the home screen to get there in one tap?
Here’s how to do it in Google Chrome. Launch Chrome, then go to the website you want to save. Tap the three vertical dots in the upper right corner. Choose “Add to home screen.” In Safari, go to your favorite website, click the “share” icon in the bottom of the screen and choose “Add to Home Screen.”
DISCONNECTED
I kept losing my connection to the internet at a friend’s house. Then I tried unplugging the router for 30 seconds. That worked. Alternatively, I could have pushed the reset button.
Just as a computer can often be fixed by powering it down, so can a router. According to HowToGeek.com, a router is a kind of computer with a central processing unit, memory and local storage. Just like a PC, mysterious things can happen inside. For instance, a bug can cause a memory leak, the central processing unit (CPU) can overheat, and who knows what else goes on in there. Maybe gremlins hold hands and dance. When you turn the router off for 30 seconds, the capacitors are drained and fully reset.
YOUTUBE TIP
If you’d rather read than watch a lecture on YouTube, look for the three horizontal dots to the right of the word “Save” underneath the video. Click “Open transcript.” Now, when you click the play button, the transcript will run along the right side of the screen.
INTERNUTS
“People on dating apps are more likely to exhibit dark personality traits.” Search on that phrase to see an article in ZME Science. A new study, using 555 German volunteers, indicated that most people using three major dating apps were more likely to be scheming narcissists, according to the article. However, I have a friend who is very happily married to someone she met through the site EliteSingles.com.
Archive.org, which also bills itself as the Wayback Machine, brings you websites as they used to look, even a decade ago. PetCoach.co can answer your pet questions 24 hours a day, every day. For more resources, search on the phrase “Chat with a Vet.”