Of Casio and Smart Watches

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Over the last five and a half years I have tracked every walk that I have been on, and I have tracked about five and a half million steps per year. That's a lot of steps and a lot of going around in clrcles. Going around in clrcles makes tracking walks with smart watches/gps watches less interesting. That's probably why I have been distracted by Casio watches.

I haven't been distracted by the 300-600 CHF watches. I've been distracted by the 30-50CHF ones. The simple watches that people of my age wore as children. These are simple, easy to use watches that have batteries that are meant to last for 10 years between battery changes. Compare that to one day for the Apple Watch and 30 days for Suunto and Garmin watches.

There is something cosier about a watch that doesn't speak with the world, a watch that tells the time, has an alarm or five, one or two time zones, and that familiar beep beep, that is turned off, but could exist, should we want it back.

With this watch you get 10 years of battery life, an alarm clock and you know the time of day. It fits under your shirt sleeve with ease, and you can forget you're wearing it until you need to know what time with it. For six CHF more you can get this one, with world time, and a timer. Timers are most useful when you're cooking, to know when to do the next step.

The pandemic affects us in strange ways. I didn't expect to rekindle my interest in simple casio watches but for some reason the pandemic has. For three years, over this pandemic I have walked in circles, and my interest in that data has waned, so simple watches have re-awoken simpler desires for simpler watches.

Don't be mistaken though. These are simple, limited watches and I want them to do more, but conversely I like the idea of wearing a watch for as long as I want, without having to recharge it. It doesn't nag me, unless I tell it to wake me up, or to tell me that 20 minutes have elapsed.