Anyone who spends any amount of time around me knows that I've taken quite a shine to Pokémon Go. I've been playing since last July, and just today managed to collect all but the location-locked Pokémon from Asia, Europe, and Australia (/me glares at Snook), and Igglypuff.

One of my frustrations with the game was that you had to be walking with a vector greater than zero in order for the game to register movement. Which is to say, walking on a treadmill wouldn't work, because the movement was tracked only through GPS. You don't move according to GPS when you are walking on a treadmill.

That all changed in December when Pokémon Go linked to the Apple Watch and enabled players to use the steps recorded on the watch to track movement. Suddenly, the treadmill was an option! HOT DAMN! I bought an Apple Watch for myself for Christmas (finally a reason to own an Apple Watch, having not actually wanted one at all, why would I want a computer on my wrist?). Trot, trot, trot, walking on the treadmill, hatching eggs and gathering buddy candy, I'm in!

So, my new Pokémon Go habit became go around to enough Pokéstops to collect nine eggs, then go walking on the treadmill until I'd walked them off, and repeat. Works great! Works with my style of exercising, walking for hours on the treadmill as I worked at my standing desk. Or when I'm off the treadmill, still at my standing desk, and fidgeting as I do, totally works. Is great!

Except one detail.

When I'm working, I'm usually working with a computer. My hands are on the keyboard, which means they are stationary. Which means my wrists are stationary. Which means none of my movement is being recorded.

Bah.

So, I moved my watch. Since I'm happy with my Timex Ironman for actually telling time, I don't need the Apple Watch for anything but Pokémon Go. I want to track movement, so where better than where my movement originates from? Nowhere!

I tucked the watch into my waistband. Strapping it to my ankle and bouncing my leg doesn't record as body movement at all, so this seems to be the best place. And it works.

So delighted!

My favorite chocolate in all the world (at the moment, and has been for a couple years) is Patric Chocolate. The bars are available at my favorite chocolate store, The Meadow, in Portland, but also online. Once a month, the online store opens for a couple days, and you can buy the most amazing chocolate in the world.

The bars come sealed in a plastic wrap, and wrapped in a thick paper / thin cardboard folded envelope. I really like the paper the envelope is made of, so I've been cutting off the envelope tabs, and keeping the main part of the envelope. I have a stack a couple centimeters thick of these cards. I've sent some as postcards, I like them so much.

Recently, I've wondered how they would do as a water color surface.

Answer: surprisingly well. It isn't as good as good watercolor paper, which is fine, but is better than copier paper (oh, I crack me up).

After this experiment, I painted a few hearts on the front of another card, addressed it to my brother, and mailed it off. Won't he be surprised at the heart-cow-chocolate postcard!

Though, now that I think about it, it's from me. He won't be surprised.