Thursday, February 19, 2009

138 steps

It takes me 138 steps to get from my desk at work to the restroom. How do I know? Well, I counted it a few times, as well as the number of wall panels, doors, lighting fixtures, and people I pass in the hall (usually 0). There's nothing to look at on the long march to the loo...

Now I have a machine to count for me! A pedometer was given to me during a sales pitch. What a cool little gizmo to help me connect back to my body during the hours of brain/desk work. Suddenly, I am fascinated with the movement of my limbs. Back and forth, back and forth, covering .7 miles in daily bathroom trips alone. Oh the monotony...oh the inspiration!

I'm reminded of some remarkable work by the SENSEable Cities lab at MIT and their tracking of population movement and cell phone usage during the '06 World Cup soccer game and a Madonna concert in Rome. See http://senseable.mit.edu/realtimerome/. It's a little creepy that our whereabouts can be tracked by our cell phone providers...but it also brings us a little closer together. We all go to the loo, like to follow our favorite teams/artists/heros, and we're actually quite predictable in our behaviors.

I feel more fodder coming along for the exploration into connective tissue...

1 comment:

maggy gilbert said...

I thought I was the only one who counted my steps. Do you draw the road and off shooting driveways and crossroads while driving? If yes, then I'm really scared.