One of the scariest moments of my life occurred last summer while visiting a local waterpark with a few friends. It suddenly occurred to me that Adam was nowhere in sight. I last saw him swimming near his father so I walked away for a minute, but when I returned he had disappeared. Tom thought he was with me the whole time so he didn’t think anything of it until I started frantically asking where he was.
I went into some kind of trance-like mama bear crazy-lady mode, and just started running around asking for help. The teenaged lifeguard seemed clueless and had me standing there while he calmly called different people to ask what to do. I screamed ‘Thanks for nothing!’ at him and ran around looking in different pools and in lines for slides hoping to catch a glimpse of my baby, imagining what might have caught his interest and caused him to wander off. Then I started imagining all of the worst scenarios possible, probably as a result of the years of watching 20/20 and Dateline missing persons specials with so much enthusiasm. Tom was running around as well, and all of our friends got in on the search too.
Then I had a strange instinct, a feeling that he wanted to go back to the entrance where they had some baby animals in a mini petting zoo. I dashed over there and on my way, a lady asked me – are you looking for a little boy with a green swimsuit – I must have cried and laughed yes! at least 10 times while nodding my head up and down fast.
They found him, just like I thought, searching for the animals (which were no longer there) and they had him waiting for me with some waterpark staff members. He seemed scared but more apologetic than anything else, like he knew he had been a naughty boy by running off alone. The tears in my eyes were all joy though, and I squeezed the life out of him while half-heartedly scolding him.
What does this have to do with Tile you say? When I was first approached to review this product I thought – brilliant! This would have been the perfect device to have had that day. I actually thought of a similar concept myself, and I even shared it with friends, family, and a guy I met on a flight who thought it was fantastic. *Sigh* I’ll just add this to the ever growing list of great ideas I had that some one else executed…
The Tile is a small 1×1″ square device that you can attach to anything and keep track of its whereabouts via its mobile app, The Tile App (available on Android and iOS).
What I think it is also great for, what it was actually more likely meant for, is finding things that you constantly lose like: your keys, remote, or cell phone – which is what I am currently using it for. I use the sticker to attach it to the back of my phone, but you can also hang it off of a key chain or clip it on to an expensive accessory that you want to be sure you don’t lose. You can buy several tiles and designate them for different things, all controlled by you via mobile app.
Tile uses bluetooth technology to pin point the location of your missing item, sounding a tune while you search so you can follow the sound. You can also view it on a map so if you aren’t close enough to hear it you can still find it. When you look at the app on your phone, you see that there is a circle that gets green when you are getting closer, sort of like when you played the “hot” and “cold” game as a kid.
Tile also has a sharing function, so you can add any friends of family to your tile (ahem, if you and your spouse both want to keep track of one child…). Also, If you are out of range and have lost something completely, there is an option to set it so that any other member of the Tile App community will be alerted when they are within range, and you will receive a notification, further increasing your chances of recovering your item.
The price of one tile is $20, but if you buy packs with more, you save per tile. I think this would be a cool gift for the dad who loves technology, or even for the dad who has it all!
Get $5 off your purchase with code TDZS15 the 4, 8 and 12 packs now until Father’s Day!
Note: This post was sponsored by Tile. All thoughts and views are my own and 100% honest.
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