One Woman's Quest for a Bodybugg

Well, if the weird title didn't catch your eye, the story of my quest may keep your attention.  Because, as usual, it's full of hijinx, starring our ridiculous heroine Kristyn.  What is she the hero of?  That part I'm not sure.. maybe hijinx..

So what the hell is a bodybugg?  If anyone watches the Biggest Loser, they already know!  It's that armband you see strapped to all the contestants (though I think they switched technology this season) that estimates the number of calories burned each day - the same thing you used to see on the Jenny Craig Metabolic Max Commericals.  It's the neatest little device!  When I was on my quest to lose weight before my wedding (a shockingly unique concept, I realize) I downed Biggest Loser episodes like a replacement for my beloved cookies.  After hearing Jillian and Bob say enough times "did you reach your burn?" (referencing the contestant's bodybuggs which were linked to watches they wore to show ongoing calorie output) I decided I must get in on this technology.  Research proved that there was science behind it - it measures moisture, temperature, heat flux, movement, and has something in it called an accelerometer (yes!) and in scientific studies it had been proven to estimate calories burned within 90% accuracy, as it also knows a bunch of stuff about you like your height, weight, age, etc.  If you're not on the Biggest Loser and can't afford the watch technology (though I think it also will output to fancier smartphones) then at the end of the day you just plug it into a computer and it tells you the (hopefully) happy news - you burned 2500 calories today - that equals another 1/4" off your butt! :)  Further research proved that it was only affordably available in the states - the cheapest one I could grab in ONLY Toronto was about $400 - ahh!  At the U.S. Costco website I found it was on sale for an incredible $129.  With a week off in the middle of March last year, determined to have a Biggest Loser Week (where I too would exercise 6 hrs a day and eat 1200 calories.. thereby dropping at least 5 lbs.. ah.. hahahahaha... let my laughter be the report on how that went!), I needed a bodybugg!  I became obsessed.  Where was the closest Costco if I crossed over in NY - no, the gas price would blow my margins.. hmmm... then wait.. a visit was planned to see Jeff's mom in Watford, near Sarnia.. perfect!  We could go early, I could pop across the border at the Bluewater Bridge, hoof it over to Costco (in some Michigan town which I swear was called Shelbyville..), and be back in time for dinner that night, bodybugg in hand!  I packed a decoy gym bag which I could stash in it.. I was ready!

Apparently an innocent looking blonde lady sitting all by herself in the huge Saturday border line up was a bit suspicious looking.  I noticed the border guards staring at me.  They had a drug-sniffing dog with them, which was an adorable German Shepherd that I couldn't help smiling at - cute doggy!!!  That was the last straw.  Next thing I knew they were knocking on my window.  "Ma'am... what's your purpose of going to the states today?"  Ok so I'm a terrible liar.. so I went MOST of the truth.. "just grabbing a bite and doing a little shopping" (both true).  "Alone?" "Well.. my fiance is with the in-laws and we have dinner plans with them.. didn't want to... you know.. spend 6 hours with the in-laws.." (mostly untrue..).  The border guard's face was stoic.  "Ma'am, can you open your trunk please.  And put the car in PARK."  Eep.  Next thing I know the cute doggy is in my trunk, sniffing around.  And the border guard began 21 questions: "Where are you from?" "Why are you going to the states again?" "How long are you staying?" "Do you have any prescription medication in the car?" (awkward answer: "uhh.. birth control..." followed by him awkwardly blushing.. I never know how to answer this and am constantly asked at the border, esp up in Minnesota when I cross for work.. am I supposed to lie to the consistently male guards!?!?) "Where is your fiance from?" (answer: "Watford, which I'm sure you, like most of the world has never heard of") "Are you meeting anyone on the other side of the border?" "What do you do for a living?" "Are you carrying any tobacco, alcohol, or recreational drugs in the car?" .. honestly.. this just went on FOREVER.  Finally my trunk shut, the guy gave me an approving "thanks, you can go" and I was off.  My awkward honesty never fails at getting me out of sticky spots!  Plus the fact that I wasn't doing anything wrong yet.. actually being innocent helps.

Ok.  I'm across. Time to get on the highway.  Woohoo!  Immediately a car passes me, loaded to the brim with a rickety jenga tower worth of furniture - in the open back of a pick up truck.  I remember the huge brown armchair, wobbling in the wind, very clearly.  I immediately moved into the right lane and let this speedy makeshift moving truck maniac past me.  Bungee cords and tarps are out of the question in Michigan!  Get me away from this guy.  10 minutes later I'm driving along doing about 100 km/hr in the left lane, presumably singing and chuckling about my drug dog incident, when the guy in front of me brakes wildly and swerves into the right lane.  Now, coming up quickly to the front of my car is.. you guessed it.. one large, stationary brown chair, sitting in the middle of the highway!  AHHH!!  Check my right blind spot - not clear.. AHHH!!!  Chair getting closer.. my brakes are squealing.  Luckily blind spot man speeds up enough to clear a space behind him so I can quickly get over without horrendously cutting anyone off.  The car behind me sees the chair a moment late and ends up squealing off the road into the grassy shoulder on the left.  HOLY SH*T.  A moment later, I pass the pulled over truck o' idiots and unleashed a barrage of what, to them, must have looked like the climax of a silent movie with lots of motioning and mouth moving but no noise coming out (my window was up).  There were middle fingers, a flurry of four letter words spouting from my lips and an enraged, demon-like look in my eyes.  It was two 20 something girls who actually did look horrified and regretful.  Lesson learned for them for next time: bungee cords are your friend when moving.

Back on my merry way, I navigated to where I needed to be. Shelbyville (?) Costco was PACKED!  I started panicking in the electronics section - where was the BUGG!?  I'd even called in advance to make sure they had some in stock that morning.  AH! Found it.  Line up was, no joke, 20 people.  At each cash.  WTF was going on in Shelbyville.  Lucky for me it wasn't a run on bodybuggs.  I paid with my credit card, bought some granola bars as a decoy (I really do love the reduced sugar peanut butter chip Chewy bars they only sell in the states - a Cedar Point staple!) on a separate bill, ate my extra greasy McDonalds, ditched the packaging on my bugg, stuck it in the gym bag, and headed back on my way across the border.

I usually love the Canadian border, epecially in Sarnia.  Too bad this guy was a bit grumpy.  I guess I was feeling "what else could go wrong" and had a bit of trouble convincing him I'd crossed the border for lunch, shopping and come back with only a jumbo-sized pack of granola bars.  But after only a minute (nothing compared to my morning..), I was free to go.

Status update on the bugg: it's an amazing tool!  It was the angel on my shoulder during that Biggest Loser Week, pushing me to go harder and faster on the treadmill, or bang out a few extra reps - because I'd have to answer to THE BUGG that night.  It was a great learning experience to see which of my regular exercises were calorie torchers (treadmill sprints - pictured below @ 8:45 p.m.; elliptical at medium resistance) and which were a bit weaker (rowing machine, power yoga).  I lost a total of only 1.5 lbs that week, but more importantly had a ton of fun with my week off, being active outdoors and at the gym.  Love the Bugg!  My free year-long subscription to the online service is about to run out, but truth be told I don't use it that much anymore.  I mostly just know that walking around while at work can double the amount of calories my stationary ass usually burns during the winter months; to hop on the elliptical for 40 mins if I had a free day that lasted a week; and to not expect much from power yoga except stretching and mindful breathing!!



I called this screen cap "what Jeff did to me" when I used his personal training prowess to force me through some treadmill sprints at 10 mph! I sent it to my dad, who replied, "don't let him kill you".

 I'm sure the technology has come down in price since last year, so definitely a fun tool for anyone looking to be more mindful about calories in/calories out (the scientific equation that equals weight loss :)). I lost 16 lbs last year, much thanks to my little friend to opening my eyes to efficient exercises!  I just hope you don't have to go through what I did to get it! ;)  Border tip: bring a friend and don't smile at the doggy.  Highway tip: listen to your gut to avoid certain vehicles (and don't FORGET you're avoiding them when a good song comes on the radio...).

Wondering How I'm Still Alive

I am, once again, waiting desperately for spring. Spring is the time when field biologists get to shine once again.  Early morning birding! Evening frog call surveys! Vegetation community classification (="sweet wetland!" = "this forest is very dense, I am stuck in it!" = "what the heck kind of tree is THAT?"), the ultimate gruelling educational, trying, satisfying approach to making sense of the natural world. Hikes.. what I do for fun, I'm getting paid for?  Playing with super high tech GPS equipment to navigate around, and using my compass when that fails, making me feel like a fairly awesome old timey explorer.  I eagerly await spring plants on their journey out of the ground.  I nibble at wild raspberries in the heat of summer.  I always get to eat lunch at THE most beautiful places in the world.  Yes.. spring and summer as a field biologist is FUN!  It keeps me going.  But oh my goodness.. it is rife with trouble.  Hijinx?! ME!?  But of course!  Thought I would share a few of my fave anecdotes from my 7+ years in the field of conservation biology.

- This past summer I got to survey the interior of an amazing island property in the middle of nowhere.  Only problem is, this island is 5,000 acres, of the toughest terrain I've ever walked.  Trying to make it 1 km inland, my coworker declared: 20 minutes, tops!  2 hours later we finally hit an inland lake, our destination, and looked at each other in fear.  Trying to pick our way out, spruce and fir trees bitch slapped us across the knees, the arms, the face.  Their stabby limbs which grow from ground to crown and point out at sharp angles from the bark were like thousands of angry intertwined knives, pointed straight at me for days on end.  The whole team did an impressive job of each taking a branch in the eye at some key moment on the journey.  Sometimes a branch would slyly hook its curled brown finger under a loop on your backpack, causing you to reel backwards into its waiting, pointy arms when you tried to move forward. The moss covered interior of the moist coastal environment was a maze of green carpet that felt like walking on a cloud. Sometimes, a moss covered fallen tree was the perfect balance beam.  Sometimes, it was  "non-tree", eaten away by moisture and natural decomposition processes.  There is nothing weirder than suddenly finding yourself up to your knee in a tree stump.


Moss carpet

 Just moving around these thick conifer forests was a workout - I likened it to my hardest 40 minute workout tape.. times 6.. times three days...  My legs came out looking like this:


Ewwww.....



My spirit, if I could photograph THAT in my hotel room, would probably have looked similar.  But when this is where you get to eat lunch, and what you get to boat around, and how you're spending your Tuesday afternoon, you sort of just shut up about it and take it all in.





Shoreline View

- Also this past year I had the pleasure (?) of surveying a property that was entirely wetland habitat.  But not so much that you could just say "it's a wetland, see ya!" - there were swamps.  Marshes.  Open water pools. Fens. Occasional pockets of upland forest, just to dry off your feet.  At one point in this 100 acre wetland I found myself knee keep in an alder swamp (a tall shrub that tends to grow in thickets - so picture that dense forest I described, but covered in standing water and with thinner branches growing even more tightly together).  I was holding on to branches above my head, and feeling my feet sink deeper in deeper as they hopelessly searched for a branch or root to hold on to.  My backpack full of electronic field gear moved closer and closer to the water... my coworker tried to point out places to stand, but if I let go of my hands, tightly clutching other alder branches above my head, I would surely fall backwards, and my rubber boots were sinking swiftly and deeply into muck that didn't seem to have a bottom.  We managed to find our way out of the thicket, only to enter an open marsh.. which my coworker decided to explore.. and began sinking.. pack of electronic equipment sinking closer and closer to the surface of the water.. she took a step forward and was up to her hip.  Why was her instinct to take ANOTHER step forward.  I performed some sort of fireman rescue, hooking my feet into sturdy branches on dry land and we got her out of there.  This went on for about 2 days.  I love wetlands.. don't let anyone tell you differently... ................

- One summer I was tasked with taking a super high up, government head honcho lady out on an inspection of a property.  She wanted to experience "a day in the field".  Back in 2009 before I carried my emergency satellite messenger which sends check in/check out messages and can contact police and local rescue groups with the push of a button; before I had an electronic GPS; and on a day I didn't bring a compass... I followed maps.  Rough hand drawn trail marked out on a map of a 200 acre property.. got it!!!  We started on a jaunt that would take about 1 hour.  2 hours later we were wandering hopelessly around the backwoods, dense, isolated forest of this property and the head honcho, I think, perhaps, was starting to lose faith in me.  I could make out a building in the distance - could it be... were we back at the house?  No way.. we were way too far north.. that much I knew.  We came upon a house buried in the MIDDLE OF THE WOODS, that a shirtless man made his way out of and squinted at us: "can I help you?".  We gingerly explained our situation.. he eyed us up warily and explained just how far off course we were.  Not wanting to end up in a Gretel and Gretel situation, we hightailed it out of there, backtracked the way we'd came and made it (the LONG way) back to the front of the property.  Sure am glad that dude wasn't in a murder-y kind of mood that day.. would have been tough to explain to the feds... (the federal government that is...)  GULP

- In 2008 I finally learned how to hop fences.  After doing it wrong for the LAST TIME.  I never got the concept of putting my foot down on the other side of the fence equal height to where the first foot was on the starting side of the fence.  I always wanted to "go big or go home" and stretch that leading foot onto the ground.  On my way to watch a prescribed burn, with a total stranger who I'd met 5 minutes before, we realized we'd have to hop a fence to get to where we needed to go.  I boldly led!  This story ends with me dangling by my leg upside down, my calf hooked on the top of the fence.  I swear I haven't done that since.. I swear!



Fence Dangling Was Worth it..



- 2011 was the year of ticks.  I came home from one field visit literally crawling in hundreds of deer ticks (oh yep, the ones that carry Lyme disease).  I'd somehow walked into a NEST of them on a property on Georgian Bay and no amount of flicking and picking would get them off my field clothes!!!  Also that summer, in northwestern Ontario, a local resident picked one off my neck ("oh Kristyn, you had a wood tick on you.. watch out").  I went back to my hotel that night with a sinking feeling.  Tick searches involve stripping down naked in front of a mirror (or a loving partner.. and hopefully not ever a coworker) and inspecting every inch of yourself for dark spots that look out of the ordinary.  Wood (or dog) ticks are a little easier to spot, they're about half the size of your pinky fingernail.  Very very easy to see when you peek behind your ear and find one buried half under your skin, sucking your blood. AUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Yes - that was my reaction.  In my thin-walled hotel.  No one even came to see if the girl who was being murdered was ok.  I managed to remove my attacker after several attempts (he was IN THERE!) with a sharp flick of my fingernail.  I learned another lesson there - don't put ticks in the garbage can.  FLUSH THEM.  I was revisited by my ear-loving friend and several of his brothers for the remainder of my stay in that place.  My apologies to whoever checked in next......



End of Day in Deer Tick Country





Lunch in Wood Tick Country



- Conducting research for my master's project in 2006 was SO COOL.  I was alone in the field, left to my own devices, my own boss, and I was going to SAVE this forest!!!  Of course I had to put one of my experimental plots on a hill with a 75 degree slope.  It was a balancing act and calf workout not for the faint of heart.  And at least three times I ended up losing my footing and tumbling down that hill head over feet, like a cartoon character, winding up at the bottom with the wind knocked out of me.  As I said I was alone, with only ME to laugh at me.  But don't worry.. I did. And so did my roommate Jay when I'd make it home at night.. and for several years afterwards.



The (beautiful) plot of terror



- Working as an undergrad research assistant on a master's project in 2005 was a summer of awesome experience.  It was the year of the roses.  Literally, I was working with a few species of roses, and trust me when I say every rose has its thorn... After a particularly gruelling week of desexing and tying tiny labels onto roses, up to my elbows in prickly bushes, but "manning up" and going with it, I looked like I cut myself recreationally.  Under flourescent lights, the cuts up and down my forearms were nearly glowing in contrast to my pale skin.  My friend Jay ditched me in the liquor store "ah! Kristyn, I can't look at you! You're disgusting!" The cashier took one look at my arms and gasped.  I ducked my head, took my money and my four pack of Keiths (that's how we rolled that year) and my emotional cutter arms to the bar, where it was a little dimmer at least.

- In 2010, while walking into a site to apply pesticides to a population of invasive Dog-strangling Vine, I noticed a big steaming pile of black bear poop.  Uh oh.  It was bear cub season as well = angry moms.  But the DSV had to die.  So I sprayed.  At one point I heard a distinct low growling noise.  My coworker was a few hundreds meters away from me, outside of the forest I was working in, so I was essentially alone.  I couldn't see anything, but my survival instincts kicked in.  What are your survival instincts?  Mine, apparently, are to sing at the top of my lungs.  I had Drake's "Find Your Love" in my head... so out it come.  "I BETTER FIND YOUR LOVE... I BETTER FIND YOUR HEART...." <-- in a shaky, terror-voice.  I saw another pile o' poop on my way out that day, but decided the bears had been sufficiently terrified with my singing to stay away.  Let's hope that keeps happening!

So what was I saying about looking forward to field season..........? Let's hope I come out alive again in 2012!