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The Garmin Setting That Kills Your iPhone Battery (At Least It Does Mine)
I have dueling desires for my cell phone. I want my iPhone Mini (I’m not a fan of the notebook sized cell phones), I want the battery to last a day without recharging, and I want it to work seamlessly.
I know, those are pretty big to have all three at once.
With Garmin, I wanted my app to track my rides from my cycling computer without having to open the app up on my phone to upload a ride. The way to do this is to give the Garmin app the permission to do this, which means choosing to allow it to run in the background all of the time, not just when the app is open.
Well, the other side of that is the Garmin app has to be set to “always” rather than “only while using the app” in the phone’s permissions in order for that to happen… and I’m here to tell you, if you choose that option, your battery life drops by about 30% to 50% give or take.
I went dealt with this after a recent software update and went from a full day’s use on my phone’s battery to having to throw it on the charger for fifteen minutes twice a day to keep my phone from dying, just from that one app running in the background.
Interestingly, this time, my Garmin app was given permission to run without any other settings being messed with for two days, so I knew exactly what was killing my battery. After two days, I switched that app only back to “allow while using the app” and I went back to a full day’s use out of my battery.
To give the particulars, this post is based on running an iPhone 12-mini with a battery that was 83% that of a brand new battery. With excessive use, I have to plug the phone in to give it a bump to get it to the end of a day, but that didn’t happen too often.
So, there you have it. If your phone’s battery life drops precipitously, check that setting.
My Baby Girl’s Last High School Swim Meet…
The school year is flying by and my baby girl will perform in her last swim meet, with the sole exception of a State Cut Last Chance Meet scheduled for Monday. Today is the Flint Metro League Championships and her team is looking to break some records today.
Our daughter is ranked 1st in the 50-freestyle and 2nd in the 100 – and her team is only two-hundredths of a second from breaking their school record for the 200 IM Relay. They’re going to try to crush it today. They’ve already broken the 200 free relay and 400 free relay records.
Our little kidlin’ playing in the waves in Lake Michigan up just west of Saint Ignace in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula after the 2016 DALMAC (Dick Allen Lansing to Mackinaw City Bike Tour)
My wife was crying as we walked down the hall of Fenton’s high school for the prelims last night. Today will be the last time we walk down that hall for one of our girls who have been swimming in that school, in one form or another, since our oldest daughter was in 4th grade… she’s a Junior at Eastern Michigan University this year.
Our youngest is not done with high school sports, yet. There’s tennis season to come in the spring, but she’s only been hitting tennis balls since she was a freshman, just three years ago. With swimming, we’ve got serious time invested in that sport, and to see how far she’s come has been an absolute blessing for my wife and I.
It’s hard to believe, really. My wife and I will be “empty nesters” this time next year. Time has flown, yes, but we’ve filled it with enough great times that it hasn’t gone by too fast… and for that, I am exceedingly grateful.
Uh Oh, It Appears Coffee Is Swinging Around To Bad For You Again…
My first thought is, why? Actually, it wasn’t. My first thought was, “who looks like that after drinking coffee“?! That’s how I looked after a case of beer 30 years ago.
You know how it is, though, and this alludes to larger things; as I’ve pointed out often here, coffee is good for you. Six months later, it isn’t. Six months after that, it is again… until it isn’t again. So, to hopefully learn something new, ahem, I clicked on the link.
Hang on, this is my shocked face. Who would want to quit their morning coffee… on purpose? Anyway, yes, something has gone awry. It’s the usual, “science says this!” “No, science says that!” jockeying we’ve become to be accustomed to. Probably nobody paying attention, anyway.
Carry on, folks. Nothing to see here. Carry on.
Off to the MISCA Swimming Championships for Our Kid(s)
My wife and I are swim parents. We cheer (and cheered) our girls and their teammates as though they were ours, and have since they were just wee little ones just out of learning to swim at a handful of years-old. Our youngest daughter is nearing the end of her high school swim career.
Before last year, our hometown hadn’t sent a swimmer to the divisional championships in decades. Last year they qualified five girls in a couple of events. This year, five girls in, five events. Josie, our girl, swam four of them.
We headed over to Grand Rapids, an hour and forty-five minute drive, Friday afternoon. This year, our daughter followed behind us with all but one of her team in her SUV. The other girl rode with her mom, the team’s assistant coach. We had a late dinner with the MISCA team at a favorite burger joint, then retired for the evening.
We were up around 6… sleeping in for my wife and I. A nice breakfast and we headed over to the natatorium (pool facility) and found some seats (which means we pushed some people’s stuff out of the way who thought if they strewn a bunch of their crap on the bleacher bench, that would save their spot for the hour-and-a-half early they showed up to lay their junk out, then left and came back to find they were mistaken. Oops.
Our girl(s) did their best, adding a little time in the 200 IM Relay, then almost hitting their time on the 200 Freestyle Relay. It was an awesome race that had us out of our seats. One of the girls scratched the Fly because of a nagging shoulder – she wanted to save it all for the 400 Free Relay, the last event of the afternoon.
Much of the bleachers had cleared out and we had fantastic seats to watch the kids go for their high school record.
The beeper went of a short second after “Take Your Mark”, exactly as they do for the swimmers in the Olympics, and they were off. Our daughter was the anchor in this one. Each girl swam their absolute best, culminating in our little one (who isn’t little anymore) besting her 100 time by almost two seconds at 56.31 seconds. They crushed the school record by just shy of four seconds that had stood for years. There were pictures, hugs and a few tears afterward when we met at the exit.
It was better than we could have hoped for our kids. We’ll be talking about that weekend for years to come, especially as the underclass girls asked out daughter if my wife and I would keep coming to meets after our daughter graduates (in May).
There’s no doubt we will. What an honor to be asked.
New Studies Show Cyclists Should Be More Invincible Than Those Falling Into Vats of Essential Oils…
Well, maybe it is a little over the top to suggest that, well… nobody would ever claim someone could become invincible should they topple into a vat of essential oils. It does make for a great punchline, though.
I read a neat little article that points to studies that show a cyclist’s body does “act” younger when compared to their sedentary counterparts, though, so I thought I’d pass it along.
Cyclists aren’t surprised by this, of course. Especially those of us who started later in life. When 40 feels like 40 but 50 feels more like 35… Or, maybe it’s better to say 50 feels like 50 to a cyclist, then you stop cycling and 50 feels a lot worse than 50 felt on a bike
I can take a week off the bike and, if I don’t stay active in another way, I can feel pain creeping in where it never existed before, and that’s only after a week. I can only imagine what years of inactivity would do!
Anyway, click the link above and have a nice read. Oh, and ride hard, lest life ride you!
The Best Sweet Potato Recipe To Go Along With That Amazing Burger
When I’m putting a huge effort into making the most amazing burger possible, sides get a little tricky. A lot of time goes into the prep of the perfect burger, so I like to keep the sides simple. I came up with a killer take on sweet potato fries that evolved more into chips for time’s sake.
So, the fries took a long time to cook and were difficult to get right because of size variations in the fries – some would cook, others were too crispy, still others were too thick to cook all the way. I needed something easier, so I started cutting them into chips. Sure enough, cook time was cut in half and consistency was vastly easier.
Coat (thinly) a cookie sheet (or two) with olive oil after you’ve cut your sweet potatoes to resemble extra-thick potato chips, 1/16″ to 1/8″ thick or so. Lay the chips out and drizzle them with a little more olive oil. Then, a dusting of your favorite Cajun seasoning. My personal favorite is currently Trade East Cajun Style Seasoning from Gordon’s Food Service (Commercial restaurant supply chain open to the public). It brings a good amount of fantastic heat without being overbearing.
With the sweet potato chips sprinkled with Cajun seasoning, bake in the oven at 350° for about 20 – 25 minutes until the edges curl up gently. The goal is chewy edges with a soft-ish center.
Now, to time this with the burgers, mine are exceptionally thick so they take ten minutes on the grill. As the grill is heating up to 600°, I pull the almost done potatoes out and drizzle them with a bit of brown sugar to cut the heat of the Cajun seasoning (they’d been baking for ten or fifteen minutes prior). Then I put my burgers on, cook them, and pull the potatoes while the burgers are resting.
They’re simple and amazing. Enjoy.
While You’re Dealing with the Narcissist You’re Married To, You Might Want To…
One of the more shocking discoveries in my recovery occurred when I began listening to Richard Grannon talk about covert narcissists and how to tell if you’re living with one…
And I found out, the hard way, I was a covert narcissist.
If you’re looking at your spouse as a possible narcissist, do yourself a favor and look in the mirror first. Or don’t, and watch your spouse point it out when you lay it down for them.
If you have a shred of decency and honesty, you’ll need a spatula to get your jaw off the floor. I did.
Don’t Compare Yourself to Others. That Guy In the Ferrari Could Be Thinking About Wrapping His Car Around the Next Viaduct Stanchion He Sees…
Some of the better advice I’ve ever given newer folks to recovery is “Don’t compare yourself to others. You don’t know what they have to give up to have what they do.”
I heard a second part to that, though, from Jordan Peterson that I really liked: “Instead, compare yourself to who you were yesterday.”
Another of his favorite tips for creating a better future for yourself is to try to improve just 1% from yesterday to today. It’s such a small, trivial amount that almost anyone should be able to do that, right?
Well, do that for 100 days in a row and see where you’re at then! I can tell you, I’ve implemented that and it works. What a difference just a month or two of sticking to that makes!
Enjoy your Thursday. It’s the only one we get.
Please Have a Look at a Friend’s Post: Just a little leak — unironedman
Hawthorn blossom in the park It didn’t all start with the failed fostering of Ernie the wonder hound. But he certainly was the actual nail in the proverbial. Ernie is a 40 kg greyhound, and we took him on a few months back with a view to fostering and possibly adopting. He didn’t so much […]
Just a little leak — unironedman
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Please have a look at my friend from Ireland’s post… The link above is the important part as he’s raising money for life savers… so they can have proper kit and training to save lives. Good stuff. Donate if you can, even if it’s a small amount.
Fit Recovery 