driving Archives - hungry and fit

It’s the new age. The age of technology always at your fingertips. The age of constant connection. The age of instant communication. The age of obsession of knowing what’s going on. Where we don’t want to leave our smart phone for five minutes because someone commented on our profile. The moments that you swore you felt it vibrate so you just have to check it. Did you ever hear of a guy driving a buggy and cart and writing a letter at the same time? I didn’t think so. Even though this technology is great, awesome, and a big boon to our society, it’s also causing a heavy amount of distraction on the road.

Always appreciate Hungry’s distraction-free and skilled driving

I’m a fairly careful driver. On the highways, I’m always hitting 55mph (yay for saving gas!) and I don’t get infected by road rage. I’ve heard enough about texting and driving crashes that I don’t even want to stray on that road (no pun intended 😉 ). And let’s emphasize on the word crash instead of accident. Crashes are caused by intoxication, speeding, or distracted driving. Even though you obviously don’t want to get into a crash, it’s not an accident if you’re distracted or being careless. That’s the hard truth.

In Colorado, we get all kinds of weather–in ONE day. It could be 30 and snowing when you wake up and be 65 and sunny during the day and then give you some rainfall at night! This makes for seriously precarious roads and conditions to drive in. Despite these very dangerous conditions, every single day on my way to work I will see bowed heads, eyes floating towards that little screen of light. It makes me sad and also scared! Even if I’m the most careful driver in the world, it won’t matter if the person behind me doesn’t see me stop and ram right into my bumper. That’s scary! I feel more and more anxious about getting crashed into because of the increase of smart phone usage of those around me. Several of my clients have been rear-ended by someone who was on their phone. It’s a shame and it needs change.

Weather makes it critical to focus on the road!

That’s why I’m reaching out to you alongside the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons and the Auto Alliance to make a difference. Encourage your friends, your siblings, your children to Decide to Drive. It’s easy to slip and just check that one message, but that one message could lead to a crash. Take part of the Decide to Drive campaign (seriously, click on the link and learn more about it, it’s really cool!) and end unnecessary crashes, injuries, and deaths due to distracted driving. This program drives to encourage the conversation about this issue and speak up about the distracted driving you see. This is something we at Hungry and Fit are incredibly passionate about.

I’ll leave you with this scary statistic: “According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), of the nearly 33,000 roadway fatalities in 2012, there were 3,328 fatalities and approximately 421,000 injuries in distracted driving-related crashes.” Are you willing to step up and help end these unnecessary deaths? Join Hungry and I in the Decide to Drive campaign and help American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons and the Auto Alliance make a difference in the lives of millions. And as always…stay hungry and fit!

Question of the Day: Have you ever had a run-in with distracted driving? Comment below!

I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls Collective and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.

Although we love our gadgets and gizmos, we don’t often write a post about them or review them. However, there are some that are exceptions to this and one of them is Waze. I had downloaded this app about a year ago, but only recently started using it after my brother’s trip here. Waze is a travel/map app and it is incredibly useful and fun.

We all have been through the frustration of Google Maps. Perhaps it led us in the wrong direction or forgot to tell us a turn. Hey, I’m a big supporter of Google Maps–more than most folk anyhow–but I’ve got to be honest, Waze has it beat. Let’s start with a little description so I can show you why it’s better than Google Maps. So you start Waze as a noob, an amateur with an avatar that has a pacifier. This is motivation to use the app more and more to gain points and discard that rookie-telling pacifier. For the avatar portion, once you get enough points, you can choose what “mood” you’re in which is basically your avatar. I’m pretty sure mine was “sleepy” yesterday (no surprise for a Monday, huh?). And there are leaders in each area in terms of points, so there’s always motivation to use it!

Thaaat’s meeee

So how do you get points? It’s pretty easy. You gain points simply by having the app on and driving. You can also gain additional points by reporting different things, which is getting to why Waze is so great. You have the ability to report hazards like stopped cars, accidents, weather, traffic, and even hidden police officers. Everybody works together in a community-like setting. As you are driving along and Waze is open on your phone or tablet, you can see all the hazards or traffic coming up on your route. This is really nice not only to be able to avoid it, but for safety reasons to. You can even see the other “Wazers” on the road which makes it feel even more like a community. I love that part. All working together to help one another.

This app is also excellent at setting routes. First of all, you can input your “Home” and “Work” addresses so it’s easy to plug in. When you type in whatever address you are trying to get to, it will give you several routes, their mileage, length of route concerning time, and ETA. And for each route, it shows you all the “reports” aka the hazards, traffic, accidents, and so forth. In addition, along the route, if traffic is slowing down, it will show you the average speed at which traffic is flowing. Pretty neat.

Vroom vroom, night mode

To sum, this app has Google Maps beat with its sense of community and foresight with traffic and planning routes. Hungry and Fit gives Waze a big thumbs up. Use this smart traffic app to stay hungry and fit!