A Peek at Norwescon Through Apple Watch Data

Just for fun, here’s a little peek at going to (and being rather heavily involved in the production of) Norwescon as recorded by my Apple Watch.

For each graph, I’ve set it to display a month’s worth of data to make the variations nice and visible.

Overall Activity

An actvity graph showing fairly consistent movement, exercise, and standing trends for most of the month, nearly doubling for the past four days.

My standard goal for a day is 400 calories burned through movement. Most days I at least get close, many I go slightly over. I more than doubled that goal for each of the four days of con.

My exercise goal is 30 minutes, which, admittedly, I haven’t been regularly reaching for quite some time (though that’s something I intend to work on now that the weather is improving again). Hit that easily all weekend without even trying, and more than doubled it on one day.

My stand goal of 12 hours is one I usually hit pretty easily, but though not as visible, there is an increase here as well.

Flights Climbed

A graph of flights climbed over the past month, showing regular spikes on Sundays, dwarfed by the jump over the past four days, with the highest day reaching about 37 stories climbed.

I live in a three-story condo, so I do get a few flights of stairs climbed every day, and walking around the college campus where I work, which is on a hill and where I do intentionally take stairs fairly often, helps. But at Norwescon, I get a room on the third floor of the tower, and as the elevators are often quite busy and I’m still fairly able-bodied, it’s usually faster and easier to take the stairs. Looks like I hit about 37 flights climbed on Friday this year!

Sleep

A graph showing very regular sleep trends until this past weekend, when there is a sudden shift to much later bedtimes and slightly later wake up times.

Most of the time, my wife and I are on a pretty set schedule. Since we both work a pretty regular 8-5 schedule, we get up between 4:30 and 5 a.m., go to bed at 8 p.m., and turn out the lights at 9 p.m. (I joke sometimes at how disappointed 20-something me would be at 50-year-old me…but 20-something me was working swing shifts during the week and DJing dance clubs on the weekend, so it’s not really a fair comparison). At con, though? Somewhere between 2 and 3 a.m. to bed, and though my body tried to keep my 5 a.m. schedule in the mornings, I’d stubbornly doze as long as I could. Most days I hit my goal of a minimum of 5 hours of sleep, supplemented by one or two naps during the day (without which I would not be able to function).

Steps

A step graph for the past month, usually around 5,000 steps per day, but hitting between 11,000 and 17,000 steps for each of the past four days.

I’m not particularly sedentary (most days), usually getting around 5,000 steps per day. Could certainly be more, but it’s okay. And then suddenly I’m getting a minimum of more than 10,000 steps, peaking at somewhere above 17,000 steps (and that was on Wednesday, as I was packing, arriving, moving in, and then helping with setup). Norwescon weekend is a pretty constant “go” weekend, and I’m always on the move.

So there’s a bit of a data-driven look at the past four days. I’m definitely ready to rest now, but I’m also looking forward to doing it all over again next year. :)

Year 50 Day 334

Me in a hotel meeting room with a few people around chairs behind me; I'm wearing a black button-up short-sleeve shirt with large colorful Easter eggs on it.

Day 334: Norwescon day four is done! A fair chunk of the day was taken up by either packing or end-of-con web duties (awards posts, site updates for when the con is over, etc.), but there was also enough time for chats, goodbyes, and hugs from friends (and plenty of compliments on the Easter-themed shirt that my wife found for me). Another good year in the books! Next year, Norwescon 47…and Seattle Worldcon 2025!

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Year 50 Day 333

Me wearing a shirt that says 'yes, this is me flirting with you', standing in front of a group of convention photographers with their cameras aimed at me.

Day 333: Day three of Norwescon is done! While I had much less on my schedule today, it was still a very full day, with a mix of socializing, helping out here and there where I could, and some very well-deserved mid-day napping. Both of today’s shirts got a lot of laughs, and though I certainly wasn’t costumed, I got hauled into having my photo taken in the evening photography area, which seemed an obvious opportunity for a good selfie. Then a night of floating between the dance and the parties until it was time to fall over.

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Year 50 Day 332

Me wearing a black cap, black suit jacket with grey pinstripes, black shirt, and Star Trek bow tie, in front of a stage with a screen showing a slide that says 'Welcome to the 2024 Philip K Dick Awards'

Day 332: Norwescon day two is done! (Yes, once again, posting this the next morning and backdating.) Today was all about the Philip K. Dick Award. I wore my now-traditional Friday morning/day “electric sheep” t-shirt, and attended the readings for each of the three attending nominated authors. The afternoon was a bit more hectic than expected due to tech demands requiring us to move the location of the ceremony from one ballroom to the next on four hours’ notice (physically, not much of a move, but arranging logistics and getting set for the needs of the new location kept me very busy), but in the end, the ceremony went off quite well, and it was kind of fun to have it on the main stage this year. The rest of the evening was dancing and then watching a Rocky Horror Picture Show shadow cast from the back of the room (because I didn’t have enough energy to be very participatory). All in all, another good day!

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Year 50 Day 331

Me wearing a t-shirt with a parody of the famous Joy Division image, this one says 'Nimoy Division' and the imge shows a Vulcan salute. I'm standing on a stage in front of a large screen with graphics showing turntables, wave forms, and my DJ Wüdi at Norwescon logo.

Day 331: Norwescon day one is done! (So done, in fact, that I’m actually posting this on Friday morning, though I’ll backdate the post so it shows up on the right day on my blog.) Most of the day was running around, socializing, and helping out where I could, and then the evening was me DJing for the Thursday night dance. The dance went well for a Thursday night (since it’s the first night and still in the work week, it’s always a little more sparsely attended), and as always, I’ve recorded the full thing and in a few days will have it posted for anyone who wants to listen to four hours of music (with only a few fumbles).

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Year 50 Day 330

Me in a hotel lobby wearing a shirt that says, "'That's what.' She". Behind me are a few people setting up tables.

Day 330: It’s day zero of Norwescon! Wednesday is when a bunch of us show up to do all the setup…and it takes a lot of setup to run a con like this. Lots of running around and Doing Things, with breaks to say hello to people, some of whom I see at the con meetings, and some of whom I haven’t seen since last year. Lots to do, but a good time is being had by all.

Year 50 Day 326

Me sitting in a chair by a sunny window with my laptop open on my lap.

Day 326: Just a nice afternoon sitting in the spring sunshine and working on Norwescon bits (making sure the website schedule is up to date, getting as much music as possible on the laptop for the Thursday night dance, and preparing the social media posts that will get posted during the weekend).

Year 50 Day 324

Me walking on the school’s sports track, wearing a hoodie and hat, and with AirPods visible in my ears.

Day 324: It’s a week before con, and I have only 10 messages in my con email inbox, half of which are song requests just waiting for me to have a chance to find the songs. I’m either doing things very right or very wrong.

Year 50 Day 323

Me, wearing black t-shirt and hoodie, in a hallway at home, smiling.

Day 323: Got my “don’t forget you’re checking in for Norwescon in a week” email from the hotel today…not that I’d forgotten. It’s officially one week from con! (At least, it is if you’re one of the people who show up on Wednesday.)

Year 50 Day 312

Me wearing a black t-shirt with the Norwescon logo in green, standing in Maxi's Lounge at the DoubleTree hotel, holding three old Star Trek LPs.

Day 312: Today was the final planning meeting before Norwescon 46 kicks off in just about two and a half weeks! Lots going on, but this is looking to be another good year.

Plus, more Star Trek goodies being passed my way from friends! (Gotta say, I’m definitely enjoying being the person people think of when they dig up old Trek stuff.) Three old LPs (1976’s Inside Star Trek, and two of the Star Trek Story Records, Record 1 from 1975 and Record 8 from 1976) and a neat little “Star Trek Lives” commemorative medallion from 1974 that I don’t have any further information on…yet.

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