A while back I wrote about Couch to 5K, an iPhone app that helped me run–you guessed it–five kilometers. I’ve graduated to a new app, RunKeeper, and recorded a quick screencast about it (apologies for the mumbling):
One additional point I should have made in the video: this app really bleeds your iPhone battery. I’m told it’s because the GPS is making a query every second or two to determine your location, and that requires a lot of power.
I don’t like reading braggy, boastful blog posts. I know I’m as guilty of them as anybody else. But when I read somebody writing about their recent award, weight loss or awesome new job, and I’m sitting at home all awardless and fat, I feel the little green Kobolds of Envy and Jealousy whispering in my ear canal. It’s petty, I know, but what’re you going to do?
This is one of those blog posts.
Today I ran five kilometres for the first time in my life. I know that five kilometres isn’t very far–for most runners it’s trivial. My siblings are all long distance runners of one kind or another–just this morning my elder sister, bless her, ran her first half-marathon.
But you need to understand what an unlikely achievement this is. I was an indoor kid, and I always hated Phys Ed class. As I said recently:
Whenever we did any kind of long distance running, I would usually come third to last in the class. I’d beat the corpulent Chinese kid and an asthmatic Brit with skin the colour of fluorescent light.
My chief torturer in Phys Ed was one Wayne Desjardins, who owned every cliche a gym teacher could. Once, after executing a particularly awful flexed-arm hang, I cursed under my breath. He made me do push-ups on my birdlike arms while the rest of the class took their turns. We did these things in alphabetical order.
I’ve always hated all kinds of exercise, except for some competitive sports and the occasional hike. I especially despised running. I mentioned running to my step-mother recently and she just sighed and said, “ah, Darren, it’s a hateful thing”. Indeed.
A little over two months ago, I wrote aboutan iPhone app that helps you get off the couch and running five kilometres in nine weeks. I predicted it would take me 12 weeks, and I was right. I blame lethargy and busyness.
It’s All For Vanity
Do I still hate running? Pretty much, yeah. Though it has granted me 30 or 40 minutes of much-needed free thinking time during a particularly busy couple of months. So that’s a plus.
Will I keep running? I think so. Frankly, I’m motivated by vanity–I don’t want to get corpulent–so that’s unlikely to change any time soon.
How is it that Ms. Hayes isn’t world famous yet? She’s a great singer-songwriter and, as you’ve probably observed, rather easy on the eyes. See also the single from her new EP.
For you kids out there, ‘EP’ stands for ‘Extended Play’. Ironically, it’s shorter than a full-length album.
For the past few weeks in Morocco, I’ve been jogging on the beach, first thing in the morning. As with most forms of exercise, I loathe jogging. However, we’re eating out a lot here in Morocco, and I must stave off the fat somehow.
I run barefoot. Not because of my last name, or because I’ve become some kind of hippie. I just thought I’d give it a try. Plus, I could avoid the difficult process of buying (potentially dodgy) Moroccan sneakers.
It’s actually fairly pleasant, as jogging goes. I run just at the waterline. The sand is both fine and firm, and there’s very little debris. I have yet to step on a crab or a broken bottle. I’m a habitual ground-watcher, truth be told, so I’m not worried about stabbing myself.
I walk down to the beach in my flip-flops, take them off, and, well, take off. Flip-flops in one hand, iPod in the other. I’m an inelegant runner at the best of times, and I must look mighty goofy.
As I mentioned, I only recently discovered This American Life. The most recent episode revolves around the subject of long marriages. The first piece features Richard Bausch reading his short story “Letter to the Lady of the House”. It is a beautifully written and read story, and feels very, well, American. I highly recommend it.
Between the second and third ‘acts’ of the episode, there’s a gorgeous version of “Someone to Watch Over Me”. On the This American Life website, it’s credited to Sting. He has a version of the song (I thought it was from this album, but it’s actually this one) but it’s not this one (nor is it nearly as good). I browsed through iTunes and eMusic, but couldn’t find anything promising. I tried a few Google searches, but unfortunately there’s another episode of TAL named “Someone to Watch Over Me”. In fact, there seems to be some weirdness, because that episode (#269) includes the same ’second act’ as the current episode. Weird.
If anybody happens to listen to it (it’s at about 45:30), let me know if you recognize the singer. I also asked MetaFilter, in case anybody there knew.
I don’t like reading braggy, boastful blog posts. I know I’m as guilty of them as anybody else. But when I read somebody writing about their recent award, weight loss or awesome new job, and I’m sitting at home all awardless and fat, I feel the little green Kobolds of Envy and Jealousy whispering in my ear canal. It’s petty, I know, but what’re you going to do?