Travel & Leisure Magazine Names Vancouver Island A #1

Well, in the Continental United States and Canada anyway according to Travel & Leisure Magazine’s 2014 World’s Best Awards but that’s still pretty good. It’s too bad the secret about our beautiful, quiet, temperate weather island is getting out. The nearby San Juan Islands came in 2nd in this category with the #1 ranking going to Santorini, Greece. Still, Vancouver Island made it into the Top 10 in the world at #9. It should be noted that Hawaii placed 4 islands in the world’s Top 10.

Travel & Leisure Magazine 2014 Best Islands – Continental US and Canada

Apparently, Travel & Leisure has been ranking the World’s Best destinations for close to 20 years now. As I understand it they conduct an annual poll of their readers and use those votes to come up with their rankings. It’s interesting to note that I’ve read quite a few blogs about the San Juan Islands, Prince Edward Island and also Mackinac Island in Michigan and they are all definitely beautiful spots so maybe this magazine is following our blogs to help them rate places! Ya think?

We ventured into Vancouver Island’s rainforest yesterday morning

There’s nothing like going for a hike in our nearby rainforests on a warm, sunny, fall day after a few days of heavy rainfall. That’s exactly what we did Wednesday morning when we took the short drive over to Glenora park on the Cowichan River.

The morning temperature was close to 60F but felt quite a bit warmer when in the sunshine. Unfortunately for us after we entered the forest with its high canopy of trees blocking out the sun it became quite a bit cooler. Luckily, we dressed for it with warm jackets.

Our first sight of the raging Cowichan River was really something. It’s really wild right now as the heavy rains have done wonders. The salmon are eagerly swimming upstream and we were able to see lots of them jumping out of the water as they swam against the current. I wasn’t able to get any clear enough pictures of the salmon though as they refused to jump when I wanted them to.  Dumb fish!

The paths and boardwalks were covered in wet, slippery Maple Leafs so we really had to be careful while walking. A soaking wet leaf on top of a wet, slippery rock is an accident waiting to happen but we made it through our 90 minute hike without one slip and fall.

These Maple Leafs are very slippery to walk on

I’m not sure how much longer we’ll be able to go deep into the rainforest for hikes this year before the wet conditions make it too difficult. We’ll keep taking advantage of days like Wednesday though for as long as we can. It was perfect as we were able to get home just a little after 12 noon.

Looking down at Holt Creek from the old Railway Trestle high above

The only sour note for me Wednesday was that since the sun was shining and the grass in the back yard was about a foot long, I had no excuse to put that job off for another day. After mowing the grass I’m not even sure if that will be the last time this year. A few more days of warm weather and sun and it’ll be up around my knees again!  Just in case, I went and filled up my plastic container with gas.

Thanks for visiting!

Correcting A Fellow Blogger’s Use Of A Strawman Argument Regarding My Photo Preferences Blog

Last evening, after I had just finished writing my blog, I paused for a bit to read a few newly published posts while watching the World Series and was absolutely fascinated and somewhat bemused to read the following in a post by Nan Talley (Trippin With the Talleys):  

Nan: “Someone wrote in their blog today that fifteen photos should be the limit………If I post too many photos to suit you, feel free to scroll right past them.  I use as many photos as it takes to tell my story/stories.  I will continue to blog in that format.”

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Nan was referring to my post from a couple of days ago titled Lots Of Nice Comments And Q’s About My Photos Lately, In that post I included a section titled My Own Personal Thoughts About My Blog Photography and stated the following at the end of my bullet points:

The above points are not suggestions, recommendations or guidelines for anyone other than myself. They are simply points I try to follow with respect to blogging.

I guess I mistakenly thought that by twice using the word ‘my’ and once using ‘personal’ that everyone would get it. But, apparently not.

In explaining about how I approach photos for my blog, I included the fact that I like to limit my photos to 15 per post. 

• always try to keep the number of photos to 15 or less 

To her credit, the one commenter on Nan’s blog who seemed to be able to read what I actually wrote was Judy (The Bird Lady of Blogland) who said:

Judy: I believe that Rick stated that the 15 photo standard was strictly written for himself as a guideline. 

The simplest way to correct what I initially thought was a simple misunderstanding  was to leave a comment on Nan’s blog restating that I was only speaking for my blogging thoughts and practices and that nowhere in my post did I ever indicate that 15 photos ‘should’ be the limit for any other blogger. Nan uses comment moderation and did not publish my comment. I watched the World Series game and later checked and saw that my comment still wasn’t published. What?

I sent Nan an email asking her to publish my comment so that readers could see what I actually wrote. I told her that if she would not do that then I’d just explain this curious incident in my blog the next day. To my amazement and continuing belief that blogging is always fun, Nan copied and pasted my personal email to her in her blog but still refused to publish my original comment. How very strange?

To make this even more bizarre, Nan then replied to her own ‘cut and paste’ of my email to her admitting this: “But we all know that he was referring to those of us who occasionally use a lot of photos.”  Earlier, in response to Judy’s comment Nan replied “I did not say that it was rick”. At least now I knew for sure she was in fact talking about me. I don’t mind that at all as I don’t mind criticism as long as people don’t put words in my mouth. I can get in enough trouble on my own, thank you!

Hi, I’m a Strawman and I make up stories

This all leads me to believe that Nan is engaging here in a Strawman Argument. In case you’re not familiar with the term Strawman here’s a definition:

A straw man is a common type of argument or statement and is an informal fallacy based on the misrepresentation of an opponent's argument. To be successful, a straw man argument requires that the audience be ignorant or uninformed of the original argument or statement.

In its simplest definition, it means that if you carefully dissect the argument or statement, it’s not only false it doesn't make sense. The term straw man derives from the use of scarecrows for military practice, such as charges. In reality, a scarecrow is far easier to defeat than an actual person. Well, Nan, I have news for you – I’m a person and not a scarecrow. Even though, sometimes, being a scarecrow would be a lot more fun!!

What Nan wrote in her blog is a classic case of the Strawman argument and it’s a total fallacy. I like Nan. In fact, I have often used TeamViewer to take remote control of her computer to help solve computer problems she may be having. Our political views are 100% opposite but we still talk and may even get together at a neutral site this winter for lunch or dinner. Each of us may bring food tasters along.

Here’s another example of how a totally false Strawman argument can be made and used against someone. I mentioned that one of the Picasa 3.9 edits I use is called Graduated Tint. I said I often used it to darken the top 1/3 of some of my pics. Last night, in his blog, Al of the Bayfield Bunch added this to what I wrote:

Here’s a little tip for you Picasa 3.9 users.  Some of you may know you can darken light skies & clouds by clicking on your ‘Graduated Tint’ button but did you also know you can use that same button to lighten either the left or right side of your photo plus the bottom. I think you may like the results.  Just a suggestion for you to try.

The Strawman Argument below would be as totally false as saying that I said bloggers should limit their photos to 15:

Al says we should all use Graduated Tint to lighten the left or right side of our photos. I like my photos just the way they are and it’s my blog so I can do whatever I want. If he doesn’t like my washed out photos then he doesn’t have to read my blog. Who is he to be telling me how to edit my pictures!

I just clicked over 1,000 words for this post which goes against my own guidelines of 750 words per post. Go ahead – make my day!  Just say I’m telling you that your blog should never go over 750 words!!

Thanks for visiting!

Idiot’s Of The Day–Toronto’s Ward 2 Voters Elect Rob Ford

You’ve got to be kidding me! OMG! Those were my first reactions on Monday night when I heard that the crack-smoking, drunk driving, scandal-ridden Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, had been elected to City Council by the dim-witted voters in his Ward 2 riding.

My next reaction was “well at least he will no longer be the mayor of Canada’s largest city and the 5th largest in North America.”  But, still……really, Toronto?  C’mon, man!

Rob Ford bowed out of the race to be re-elected mayor in September after being diagnosed with a rare and aggressive cancer, He has said he intends to beat cancer and I sincerely hope he does.  I wish him well with that as I do for anyone who is battling such a terrible disease. I’ll say this for the man – he has shown incredible stubbornness and determination in fighting back against scandals that would have destroyed most politicians. Let’s hope that will help in his fight against cancer.

When he decided to drop off the ballot for Mayor, Rob Ford tapped his equally obnoxious brother, Doug, to run in his place. Thankfully, the voters in metro Toronto rejected that idea by electing another candidate John Tory. Tory will be sworn in on December 1st and finally, I hope, the Ford Circus in Toronto will end for good. But, I somehow think my hopes may be in vain. Rob Ford on city council will always be a clown show and he is sure to make more headlines - bad ones!

Thanks for visiting!

Lots Of Nice Comments And Q’s About My Photos Lately

Photos are a big part of blogging in my mind. They do indeed speak a 1,000 words and anything that can reduce the amount of words a blogger writes, especially me, is a good thing in my book. Over the month of October, I’ve spent a bit more time than usual on the photos I’ve taken of all the places that Paulette and I go to for our daily walks. The results have been very pleasing to me and, it seems, to many of you who have left very nice comments about my photos – for that I thank you!

Even in the old days, photographers always enhanced their photos

Naturally, a lot of readers are curious too and have been asking me “do you enhance your photos?”  Some bloggers bristle at the word ‘enhance’ preferring to use the term ‘edit’ instead. To be honest I’ve got no problem with either ‘edit’ or ‘enhance’ with mine as I’ve always wanted to make my pics look as good as I can. So, I plead guilty!  It’s just that lately I’ve spent a bit more time doing just that. When I started this new blog back in May, I purposely put the word ‘Pics’ in the title because it was to be one of my new focus points of interest – at least to me.

My Own Personal Thoughts About My Blog Photography

• taking pictures should be fun and enjoyable
• it doesn’t really matter what type of camera you use  
• every pic tells a story so they’re all good
• don’t spend time editing or enhancing photos if you don’t enjoy it
• all photos of grandchildren are perfect and do not need enhancing
• never post a photo of your wife in a blog without express permission
• always remember that ‘less is more’…too many pics reduce their impact
• always try to keep the number of photos to 15 or less 
• try and post photos at max blog size as few folks ever ‘click to enlarge’

The above points are not suggestions, recommendations or guidelines for anyone other than myself. They are simply points I try to follow with respect to blogging.

Langford Lake ‘Fall Colors’ after I did a bit of photo enhancing

This is how the original photo looked out of my camera

While on a walk around Langford Lake last week with Paulette, grandson Mason and Rylie, I happened to look across the water and see a bright red-leafed tree reflected in the lake. The picture was nicely framed by two dark evergreens in the foreground. What a great picture I thought but when I transferred the photo to my computer I was disappointed because the light and glare off the water had fooled my camera’s sensor resulting in the red tree and reflection being overexposed.

Photos of grandkids are always perfect without editing – this is an iPhone pic

The Langford Lake picture that came out of my camera was definitely not what my eyes saw. In the old days of film processing this would have been one of those pictures that got thrown in a desk drawer never to be seen again. But, not now. Just a few simple edit’s using Picasa 3.9 enabled me to enhance this photo so that it more clearly resembled what I saw with my own eyes. Which photo would you rather look at?

Edits I Normally Use With Picasa 3.9

1. I try to keep it simple and quick – this is not a lab experiment
2. ‘Crop’ is perhaps a photographer’s best friend – use it freely
3. I Click on “I’m Feeling Lucky” – if the pic looks better I keep it
4. I Click on ‘Auto-Colour’ – if the pic looks better I keep it
5. If the top 1/3 is kind of washed out I’ll try ‘Graduated Tint’
6. Last maybe a bit of ‘Sharpening’, ‘Fill Light’ and ‘Saturation’

Generally, when I do a few quick edits as described above I end up with a better looking photo than I started with.  It takes me all of about 30 seconds to apply these edits and the best part is it’s fun. To see a very poorly exposed photo turned into one that I like that more resembles the subject as I saw it when I took it is very rewarding

Too many photos in a blog reminds me of ‘the good old days’ of torture

The last method I use for blog photography is difficult sometimes but essential. It’s having the discipline to limit the number of pics I show in my post. I’ve always felt that including too many photos in a blog detracts from the appreciation of the good ones. Once a blog posting runs more than 20 photos I automatically revert back to memories of the good old days of having to sit through a Kodak Carousel slide show of a relative’s family vacation. There surely is a room ‘down-below’ that has this.

Take lots of pics, keep the good and throw out the bad

As always, good photography still comes down to subject matter and composition. No amount of enhancing can turn a poorly composed photo or bland subject matter into a great picture. Also, how many spectacular shots have we passed up only to say later “could’a, should’a, didn’t”!  Luckily, there’s a cure for both these ills and it’s simple – take lots of pics, keep the good ones and throw out the rest!

Sue Malone (The Moho …….) who along with Erin Erkun (Two to Travel….) are, in my opinion, perhaps the 2 best photographers in blogland, said it best when she left this comment on my recent post:

Photography no matter what is a process of enhancement. The camera is doing it internally from the moment the digital data is captured…….The goal is to show an image that best approaches what your eyes saw.

So, there’s another lesson for me – Sue said in one simple paragraph what I’ve tried to explain in this entire blog. I should’ve just taken a picture!!

Thanks for visiting!

The Sun Came Out On Sunday

After an early breakfast Sunday morning, I thought I’d take Rylie for our long walk down past the farms as the skies looked o.k. even though there were some dark clouds hovering overhead. That was a big mistake. About halfway through our 1 hour walk the skies opened up and we got soaked. Figuring it wasn’t going to rain I, of course, left my jacket with the hood at home so I had no protection from the rain at all. It was not a pleasant start to my day.

The Cowichan River is back running, fast, furious and full

After I got back home, dried off and looked outside there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. For the rest of Sunday we enjoyed a beautiful fall day with nothing but sunshine.

The wetlands of the estuary are wet again

After lunch we drove down to the Cowichan Bay Estuary so that we could go for a long walk while staying in the sun the whole time. The recent rain we’ve had sure was evident the first time we saw the Cowichan River. It was flowing fast and furious and was easily as high as we’ve ever seen it for this time of year. That’s great news for the salmon who are now beginning to head up river to their spawning grounds That run should begin in earnest around the first week of November.

9,045, 9046, 9047, 9048……..

The wetlands in the estuary have benefitted greatly from the rain as well. The marshes are once again full of water and all the small ponds and streams are overflowing. It’s good to see our months’ long drought finally over.

After we got back home from the estuary, I got a ladder out and climbed it to clean out the gutters – at lest the ones one story up!  Another thing all the rain has done has been to wash all the pine needles and leaves off the roof into the gutters and they were getting pretty plugged up. I managed to get the problem areas sorted out. We usually get pros to come in November to clean out the gutters on the higher levels as I no longer think it’s a good idea for me to be crawling around up there.

9,997, 9998, 9999, 10,000……….Yeah!!!

After that job was done I got around to another one I’ve been putting off for a while. That was cleaning and packing up our Weber Q.  I don’t think I’ll need it again this year so after I got it all spiffy looking I packed it away in the front basement of our 5’er and with that the first task for our trip south is now accomplished.

A perfect end of October kind of day on Vancouver Island

Last night we spent a quiet evening just watching a few of our favourite TV shows while at the same time I was following an NFL game, the World Series and a few blogs on my iPad.

Thanks for visiting!

Stunning Sunrise Photos By A Blogger Using A Smartphone

I’ve always maintained that with today’s excellent point-and-shoot digital camera’s that it’s not necessary to own a big, clunky, expensive DSLR camera to be serious about photography. This is especially true when photos are being published to a blog for display on even the highest quality HD computer monitors. Now, you can add smartphones to the list of digital devices that allow you take spectacular photos. Look no farther than the stunning sunrise photos Erin Erkun (Two to Travel’s Phaeton Journeys) took using a Samsung Galaxy S5 smartphone.

Click on the screenshot below to see the originals on Erin’s blog

I doubt anyone could look at Erin’s sunrise photos and not be surprised they were taken simply with a smartphone. You may know that I’ve been experimenting with my iPhone 5S for taking photos. I’ve been very pleased with the results and have been using my iPhone more and more for photos on my blog. So now, in addition to small digital cameras, our always present smartphones can assist us in enjoying photography which is always better than looking serious anyway.

Hard to believe but this was taken using a Samsung Galaxy 5S smartphone

Another reason to read Erin’s post is if you are currently a subscriber to the new defunct Millenicom cellular service. Verizon bought out Millenicom last week. Erin was one of those affected and has now signed up with Verizon for a deal that gives her “40GB of shared data for the price of 20GB”. That sounds like a pretty good deal to me so you just might want to find out more about this package before cursing all Verizon ‘gawds’ past and present.

As for my day it was pretty quiet. Rylie and me went for a long neighbourhood walk in the morning which was a good thing because it just poured rain in the afternoon. That was just fine with me as I put the gas fireplace on in our family room and spent a few hours just reading and relaxing. Last night we just watched a few recorded TV shows and then a movie before calling it a night.

Thanks for visiting!

Taking Mason On His Second Big Hike

It was a rather cool and cloudy morning yesterday when we drove down to Victoria with plans to take Mason on his second ever hike with us. By the time we were over the Malahat the drizzling rain had stopped so we figured if we bundled the little man up and made sure he had a nice warm hat to wear he’d be o.k. For his part, Mason was raring to go as soon as we arrived. Carrie put a hat on him and he also had a hoodie to keep him nice and comfy. It was about 50F when we left for the park.

It’s fun to be out on the trails again with my Grammy and Grandpa

For our hike, we headed just a few km/s down the road to Langford Lake and the trail that encircles it.  This trail is flat and level for the most part but there are a few grades to climb up but nothing too strenuous.

The colours of fall across the lake

We were pushing Mason along in his 3 wheel jogging stroller until he let us know in no uncertain terms that he wanted out to walk around and explore a bit.

Mason just loves to walk everywhere but on the beaten path. We had a heck of a time trying to keep him on the straight and narrow as he seemed determined to head off into the bush for some reason. It was great fun though and he loved being chased.

A ‘pine cone’ treasure to take home for my Mom

Mason and Rylie are fast becoming great buddies. Rylie just adores Mason and is very gentle with him too which we are very thankful for. Mason has absolutely no fear of Rylie and really laughs when Rylie takes off running. I think that getting a small child used to dogs at a very early age is a good thing and is a real benefit to them as they get older.

This was a long walk and I was able to clock my entire 10,000 steps for the day. At least we got the hike in without any rain.

After getting Mason home and settled, Paulette and I headed back but first we stopped at Starbuck’s for something to warm us up. I decided to try one of their Pumpkin Spice Latte’s for the first time ever as I had a ‘free drink’ on my card. I’d give it a 7 out of 10. It was pretty good but it would have been even better if I’d remembered to ask for an extra shot of espresso as it could have used a bit more of a kick.

Thanks for visiting!

Not Our First Terror Attack And Canada’s Gun Laws Worked

Shocking! A soldier dead at Ottawa’s National War Memorial, gunfire in the House of Commons and Canada’s capital in lockdown! But, contrary to many media reports in Canada and worldwide, this was not Canada’s first experience with terrorism. That’s why I was so surprised to hear Canadian media especially talking about a “loss of innocence” and how  terrorism has “finally reared its ugly head in Canada”?  Where were they during the ‘70s and ‘80s when we endured three worse acts of terrorism?

Canadian soldier Cpl. Nathan Cirillo leaves behind a 6 yr. old son

Maybe they weren’t even born yet, I don’t know. But, for me, when reading, listening to and watching a few of the sensationalist accounts my mind drifted back to the October Crisis, the National Assembly in Quebec and worst of all the horrible Air India bombing which killed 329 men, women and children. Each of these tragedies were major acts of terror even though none were committed by adherents of radical Islam. Is Islam or Muslim now the ‘litmus test’ for terror? If so, it shouldn’t be.

For my American readers who may not be familiar with the three Canadian terrorist attacks I mentioned, and perhaps a few Canadians as well, here’s a brief recap:

	Three Previous Terrorist Acts In Canada
1970	The October Crisis began as the Front de Liberation du Quebec kidnapped British diplomat James Cross and, later, Labour Minister Pierre Laporte. Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau invoked the War Measures Act, which allows government to temporarily suspend civil liberties. Cross was released 60 days later but Laporte was found dead.
1984	Three people were killed when Canadian army supply clerk Denis Lortie opened fire inside the National Assembly in Quebec City in a bid to "destroy" Premier Rene Levesque. Lortie was convicted of first-degree murder after his first trial in 1985 but a new trial was ordered because of errors by the judge. In 1987, he pleaded guilty to reduced charges of second-degree murder, allowing him to be eligible for parole after 10 years.
1985	An Air India flight that departed from the Vancouver airport exploded in the skies over the Atlantic Ocean, killing all 329 people on board. Two Canadians were tried for the bombing, but were ultimately acquitted of mass murder. Only one conviction has been obtained in the case. Inderjit Singh Reyat, who pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the case, was convicted of perjury in 2010.

RCMP said yesterday that the Ottawa shooter acted alone. It’s likely his unintended impact will last a lot longer than his brief notoriety. All of us in Canada and the USA are already too familiar with what will likely happen next. Another of our institutions of government, in this case our Parliament Buildings, will be turned into a fortress rather than a gathering place for its citizens. That, to me anyway, is another tragedy.

Canada’s strict gun laws saved lives on Wednesday in Ottawa

Canada’s strict gun laws worked during the Ottawa shoot-out and greatly limited the number of deaths.  The shooter did not have a semi-automatic rifle with dozens of 40-round magazines. All he had was a double barreled shotgun!  Why?  Because here in Canada it’s really, really hard to put together an arsenal of guns and ammo to stage a mass killing. One soldier is dead - another was wounded. That’s correct – one innocent victim tragically dead. One!

I’m mentioning this only because shortly after the Ottawa shooting hit the airwaves the crazy right-wing gun nuts in the US were out in full force claiming that Canada’s strict gun laws did not prevent Wednesday’s tragedy. The usual nutbars asked if gun laws really worked, how did such a tragedy occur in Canada which has such strict gun regulations?  My answer: one victim dead. One. No easy access to AK-47’s!

I am by no means trying to minimize the death of Cpl. Nathan Cirillo. I just have to wonder though if gun massacres like Columbine, Sandy Hook, Aurora etc. etc. might have been limited to only one death had the assailants not had such easy access to AK-47’s and other semi-automatic weapons along with seemingly unlimited ammo. Had the terrorist in Ottawa been able to get those types of weapons there’s no doubt in my mind we would have seen a real massacre in Ottawa. Our gun laws worked.

Sgt. at Arms Kevin Vickers gets standing ovation in Parliament

Canada’s current Sergeant-at-Arms is Kevin Vickers who has held the position since 2006. He is a former 29 yr. veteran of the RCMP and that experience and training served him and others well on Wednesday.

Vickers is responsible for safeguarding the authority of the House of Commons and for the safety and security of the Parliament buildings and their occupants. He was
credited with shooting and killing the masked gunmen who was on the loose around Parliament Hill.

Moments after Cpl Nathan Cirillo was fatally shot, reports said that a gunmen was inside the Hall of Honour in Centre Block. In video shot by Globe and Mail reporter Josh Wingrove, officers appear to converge on a suspect outside the doors of the National Library around 10 a.m., just as MPs were converging for Wednesday caucus meetings. In a flurry of gunfire, the suspect was reportedly shot dead.

Witnesses said MPs and Hill staff owe their safety, even lives, to sergeant-at-arms Kevin Vickers who shot the attacker just outside the MPs’ caucus rooms  The Sergeant-at-Arms is the person responsible for the safety and security and ensuring and controlling access to the House of Commons. He did his job well.

Thanks for visiting!

How To Setup And Use Apple’s New Health App

In a blog post titled the First Batch Of HealthKit Apps Arrive For iOS 8.0.2 I wrote a bit about these health apps but never got into explaining how to setup and integrate them into Apple Health. The Apple Health app for the most part relies on health and fitness data collected by 3rd party apps  It then organizes and displays everything in one place using an easy to access Dashboard display. Some 3rd party apps can write data to and read data from Apple Health. Others may read or write only.

I use the 3rd party apps below to read/write my data to Health

I’m using 3 different health/fitness apps with Apple Health because every 3rd party app is designed for a specific purpose. Some apps concentrate on jogging, yoga, sleeping, medical conditions, walking, weight etc. After researching over 2 dozen apps I came up with 3 that enable me to track my daily steps, walking or hiking distance, heartbeat, weight, calories burned as well as vital stats like age, weight, height, blood type etc. I don’t really care about sleep stuff so I don’t track it.

Set Up These Health App Features First: Medical ID and Emergency Contact

Say you are unlucky enough to get hit by a beer truck while crossing the street. Some folks might rush to help but have no idea what to do and won’t even check your pockets or purse for ID. If they don't, any police or paramedics arriving on the scene definitely will and if you have an iPhone they will also know what exactly to do and what to look for.

The iPhone’s Emergency Lock screen bypass now includes Medical ID

The iPhone lock screen has long had an "emergency" button that lets anyone make a call from your phone using the dial keypad, but that was it. Now, with iOS 8x, paramedics or police can access primary medical information as well as the name and phone number of your emergency contact. All they have to do is click the Medical ID icon as shown above.

An example of what’s in the Primary Medical ID display

Even if you don’t plan on using the Health App it still might be a good idea to enter this information anyway. It could help save your life especially if you happen to have any Medical Conditions like allergies or if you are taking certain prescription drugs. Your blood type is always a good thing for emergency responders to know as well. To enter this info, simply click on the Medical ID icon at the bottom of the Health app and then click on ‘Edit’ in the top right hand corner. You can also elect not to display this Emergency Data when the screen is locked but I’m certainly o.k. with it.

 These are the 4 icons at the bottom of the Health display

Health has four tabs: Dashboard, Health Data, Sources, and Medical ID. I’ll explain briefly the purpose of each tab:

Dashboard: The dashboard view lets you scroll through your most important charts and toggle easily between views that plot the data from a single day, week, month, and the current year. You can choose which charts to display on your dashboard by clicking on the Health Data tab.

Health Data: Clicking on the Health Data tab provides a list view and lets you control which data points appear on the Dashboard in chart form.  I’ve highlighted Steps in the left image as this is a good place for everyone to start as the iPhone motion sensors have been tracking your steps in the background since you downloaded iOS 8.x. Clicking on ‘Steps’ displays a new Steps screen:

Show All Data:  For Steps, this shows the start and stop time activity
Add Data Point: Allows for manually entering data like blood type, vitamins etc.
Share Data: Don’t worry about this for now – I’ll deal with it in a later post
Show on Dashboard: Click to “Green” to show chart on your Dashboard

Sources: The Sources tab is where you can find the 3rd party apps or services currently streaming your health information into and from the Health app. As you install 3rd party apps they will be automatically added to Sources if they are compatible with Apple Health. I’ll explain in the next section (Connecting Apps) how this works.

Medical ID: This was dealt with earlier in this post.

Connecting Apps For Automatic Reading and Writing With Health App

This is the fun part where you will actually get to see how Health works and get some great results showing in both the individual 3rd party apps and on your Health Dashboard. In my particular case I’m using the 3rd party apps shown at the top of this post.  Each of these apps can read and write data to Health.

First, of course, you have to download the app from the Apple Store. Argus and Human are both “free” while MotionX costs a whopping 99 cents!!  After installing each app, find the “Settings” and enter the setup information as you would for any normal app. To show how Sources work I’m going to use MotionX as an example.

Sources as shown in the Health App

As shown in the above image, after clicking on Sources in Health a new screen displays all 3 of my installed 3rd party health apps. I can now edit and manage these apps so that they both read and write the information I want for Health.

Here are the settings I’ve chosen for MotionX

Allow MotionX To Write
Heart Rate (YES)	When I use MotionX to measure my Heart Rate it will write that data to Health and display the data on my Dashboard
Height (NO)	My Height was entered by me directly into the Health App
Steps (NO)	Steps are calculated by my Health App
Weight (YES)	I enter Weight daily using MotionX and it writes it to Health

Allow MotionX To Read
Biological Sex (YES)	Allows MotionX to get data from Health App
Date of Birth (YES)	Allows MotionX to get data from Health App
Height (YES)	Allows MotionX to get data from Health App
Weight (NO)	Weight is entered daily directly in MotionX

If you follow the same connectivity process for both Argus and Human (or any other Health related app you use) then all of your health and fitness data should begin to flow back and forth along with MotionX as well.

Source Data settings I use for Argus and Human   

IMPORTANT NOTE Re ARGUS APP:  The Argus app requires one additional tweak for it to read and write data to Apple Health.

1. Open the Argus App and click on the 3 bars (top left) to open Settings
2. Scroll down and click on Devices and Apps
3. Click Connect next to Apple Health Data and that’s it.

You may notice in the Source settings I use that there appear to be some duplication with more than 1 app writing the same data to Health. You can see an example of that above as both Argus and Human are set to write Active Calories. Don’t worry about that though as the Health App will determine by itself which data to use from which app. Share Data (one of the 4 Tabs on the Health app) does allow you to prioritize these uses yourself but like I said, for now, lets just let Health do it.

The best way to get started with Health on your iPhone is to simply try it. There’s no real harm you can do and you can always change anything and start again. It took me a day or two to get the hang of what was going on so you might want to start by setting up Health first and then adding 1 3rd party app at a time.  

As always, if anyone has questions please let me know and I’ll be happy to try and answer them

Thanks for visiting!