First the shoes… I talk to my boss a lot about running. Ever since my wife ran her first marathon, the Mount Desert Island, back in October, we have conversations about his races, my training and my wife’s training. He noticed that I wore Mizuno’s and asked why I had purchased this particular shoe. My response was because of my severe pronation and flat feet. His response was to try the VFFs as they have help his feet out. So like a good scientist, I did my research…

Part 1: The shoes and form!

I was hesitant to get a pair because while they may really help out my feet and running style, they may also really make me more prone to injuries, not to mention the stares of running in “toe shoes.” I debated for a bit, discussed it with my wife and I made the final decision to get a pair when my boss emailed me one night saying they were on sale. Score! But not quite yet… You see, VFFs fit very differently than regular shoes. You actually need to try them on at a store first as your toes may be “webbed” differently than anyone else. OH! And their sizes start at 40 and go to 47 so there is no real sliding scale. So, I made the trip to my local REI to try on a couple of sizes before making the final purchase (along with some toe socks). In the end, I chose the Bikila since I was planning on road and treadmill running.

Lovely aren’t they?! I wanted something different and back in high school, I had running flats that were red, yellow and white so I wanted something similar. Once in my hands, I put them on and walked around the house for a couple of hours. And thus ended the first step in using the VFFs. Now you may ask, why stop there? Well, there is a breaking in process in using these shoes. One doesn’t simply just start running in VFFs. There is a gradual progression and my first step was to wear them in the house for a couple of hours and then give my legs a break for 3 days.

Let’s take a look at the sole of the VFFs before going into running. As you can see on the right, the sole is very thin. So thin, that you’ll feel pebbles and rocks on the ground if you step right on them. With no cushion to protect your heel, your running form will change so that the balls of your feet (between your toes and your arch) will touch the ground first with your heel just grazing the pavement/treadmill below. As you can see below on my shoes, the balls of my feet as well as my toes have started to wear out first while my heel is still relatively new looking.

Part 2: The incremental run!

I don’t care how you space out your runs but I would suggest being able to run 3 miles before starting to train in any VFFs. Once you can run 3 miles easily (easy for you that is), work on this plan. One big note though, this is meant more for distance and endurance rather than speed. I started out slow and once I was finished with my increments, then I was able to work on speed. Remember to think about how your feet are hitting the ground rather than how fast and how long you are running for.

0.25 miles in VFFs then 2.75 miles in your regular shoes then take 2-3 days off

0.5 miles in VFFs then 2.5 miles in shoes then 2-3 days off

0.75 miles in VFFs then 2.25 miles in shoes then 2-3 days off

1 mile in VFFs then 2 miles in shoes, 2-3 days off

1.3 miles in VFFs then 1.7 miles in shoes, 2-3 days off

1.6 miles in VFFs then 1.4 miles in shoes, 3 days off

2 miles in VFFs, 1 mile in shoes, 3 days off

2.5 miles in VFFs, 0.5 miles in shoes, 3-4 days off

3 miles in VFFs, 1 week off

3 miles in VFFs, 1-2 days off, 3 miles in shoes, 2-3 days off [repeat twice]

3 miles in VFFs, 3 miles in shoes next day, 2-3 days off [repeat twice]

3 miles in VFFs, 3 miles in VFFs next day, 2-3 days off [repeat twice]

Please remember to take days off and by days off, I mean no running or working out. After my first 1.3 miles in the VFFs, my calves were torn up for days. I rested 3 days and ran the next still sore. But, by the end, you should have built up your calf, feet and ankle muscles to the point where you should be able to handle running 3 days in a row with VFFs. It might take some people more than 2-3 days to recover from a run but it will be worth it. I suggest lots of stretching and hydration!

Part 3: The real training

It has been about 3 weeks since I’ve been running on a daily basis with the shoes now with some soreness (which is to be expected) but nothing too serious. I’m putting in about 13 miles a week and the mileage will only increase starting today.

Source: frugaldad.com

However, I came across this and found it very very disturbing. Source will not be revealed:

It’s not a waiting game, it’s a game of poker. Lamar Smith has a royal flush and few people know it.
SOPA may pass. It may not. He doesn’t care, and it doesn’t matter. The MPAA and RIAA started working on their legislative strategy to pass a new anti-piracy bill in late 2010. SOPA was designed to raise the noise. Everyone is playing right into the entertainment industries hand. The lobbyists are laughing manically at the ignorance of the mob. Even Wikipedia and reddit have played into it.
What people don’t know about is the ace: H.R.1981, the Protecting Children From Internet Pornographers Act of 2011 which is lying in wait. It’s not complete. You see, PCIP is not contestable because it’s about protecting children. They can, and very well might, copy and paste the full text of SOPA to the end of PCIP. That’s the backup. That’s the deal that was struck with entertainment industry lobbyists. We will try to push this anti-piracy bill. It probably won’t work. Don’t worry, we can pass it under an anti-child pornography bill.
There are two things which no Congressman will risk supporting: terrorism and child pornography. There can be no opposition, no discussion. Any anti-piracy law can ALWAYS be reframed as an anti-child pornography bill and it will pass, without even discussion. It will have the full support of the House (minus Ron Paul), the full support of the Senate, and most importantly the full support of the American people. NO ONE wants to risk being called a pedophile.
The entertainment industry has finally caught up with technology. They understand how it works. It took them 15 years, but they know what DNS is. They are going to exploit a fundamental problem with the way DNS is centralized and there is nothing that can be done to stop it. They have found an error in the very architecture of the Internet. The solution, from a free speech standpoint is not to fight it politically. The solution is the fix the error.
We must move to a decentralized system of DNS. It is not impossible. It requires some new thinking and a re-architecture of some web services, but it must be done if we want the Internet, as we know it today, to exist in 5 or 10 years.

Scary isn’t it?

I can’t tell you how frustrated I was when I joined the beta. After playing CoD:BO for months (getting to 9th prestige), I entered back into the world of PC first person shooter (FPS) gaming. The learning curve wasn’t too hard as I’ve always been a PC gamer, but the learning curve for BF3 was incredibly harder than I had imagined.

I had a couple of weeks to enjoy BF3 until Modern Warfare 3 (MW3) came out.  Like CoD:BO, MW3 was fast paced, easy and required some strategy, but not to the level of BF3 did.  And within a week of MW3′s release, I played the game twice.  The rest of my gaming December was filled with BF3.  Why?

Tanks, helicopters, jets and more tanks!

In MW3, the game is very linear.  You worry about your other opponents who are also ground forces.  Once in awhile, you’ll get the killstreak helicopter or airstrike, but those can be easily shot down with a rocket launcher.  Otherwise, you worry about those on the ground.  Fast forward to BF3!  Tanks, helicopters and jets that you as a player can drive/pilot.  You can blow up buildings, collapse them and all inside. You can destroy barricades, lay down anti-tank mines or hop in an anti-air vehicle and shoot down those pesky choppers.  In the case of BF3, you not only need to worry about ground forces (other players), but you need to also watch out for tanks that patrol, light-armored vehicles (LAVs) that can transport others to objectives, or even jeeps that can run you over!  And that’s not mentioning helicopters that can spot you, shoot you down or blow up the building you are hiding in.  Battlefield 3 adds that extra dimension and strategy that Modern Warfare 3 can’t and that is vehicles.  How do you defend or attack your opponent who is steam-rolling you in an M1 Abrams tank?

Alright, enough about the game.  I’ve spent entirely way too much time playing but I’ve had a lot of fun.  If you’d like to add me, check my stats or play with me, feel free to shoot me a message and I’ll be more than happy to join you.  I now leave you with some screenshots and a short video by jackfrags!

My Battlelog Profile

If you want to read more about SOPA, you can go here, here, here, and  here.

Go Daddy has a long history of supporting federal legislation directed toward combating illegal conduct on the Internet. For example, our company strongly supported the Ryan Haight Online Pharmacy Consumer Protection Act of 2008, the Protect Our Children Act of 2008, and the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act of 2011 (PROTECT IP). Go Daddy has always supported both government and private industry efforts to identify and disable all types of illegal activity on the Internet. It is for these reasons that I’m still struggling with why some Internet companies oppose PROTECT IP and SOPA. There is no question that we need these added tools to counteract illegal foreign sites that are falling outside the jurisdiction of U.S. law enforcement. And there is clearly more that we could all be doing to adequately address the problems that exist.

But it is more than just theft of IP in this situation.  It is about complete censorship.  For a company like GoDaddy to support a bill of internet censorship when its main business purpose is to allow people to create their own sites is ridiculous.  There are even more companies who support this bill.

But there have been dozens of large companies that are speaking out against SOPA.  Ben Huh of Cheezburger, has vowed to move over 1000 domains from GoDaddy over the support of SOPA.  Will this matter to GoDaddy?  Of course not, but news is spreading!  There have been support from a number of hosting providers including our own sponsor HostGator.  It is nice to know that our sponsor sides with us!

So what can you do?  Move from GoDaddy to another registrar or hosting provider.  Here are a list of codes that you can use [Reddit]

• Name.com Use “NODADDY” for 10% off transfer ins (COM, NET, ORG, TV, INFO, IN, US, CO, ME & TEL) and also receive 40% off any of our hosting plans. They also oppose SOPA:  http://blog.name.com/2011/12/getting-on-our-sopa-box-and-saving-you-money/
• HostGator.comis doing 50% off Shared / Reseller / VPS first month. Coupon code: NOSOPA http://blog.hostgator.com/2011/12/22/sopa-must-die/
• Namecheap.comIf you use the code “BYEBYEGD” Namecheap makes a donation to Save The Elephants or use“SOPASucks” for $6.99 transfers.

So what next?  That is up to you!  For now, there may be some interruptions in services here but it will be temporary!  Just until I migrate my domain from GoDaddy to another registrar.

[Wired] [Reddit][TechCrunch]

Happy Holidays!

More info to come in this placeholder post!

Week 4:

1 really large Tomato
3 Summer Squash
3 Corn
1 Cucumber
2 Eggplant
Basil
1 quart blueberries
1 bunch kale
1 bunch watercress

This was a good week! We’ve already gone through the blueberries, 1 squash, the tomato, 2 eggplant and some basil. The cucumber and watercress will be for salad later this week and the rest of the basil went into the freezer for future use. The corn and squash will be made into a side later this week with some leftover onions from last week.

I think I’ve had enough of kale though…

Original post

As I wait here in the media room, I look around at a lot of people who represent different blogs and companies, trying to report what is going on in the video game world.  People have some high-end cameras, video cameras and a crew of 2, 3, or even 4 people.  But what if you are only a 1 man crew? You carry everything with you, your laptop, netbook, camcorder, voice recorder, shotgun mic, camera, 2 additional lenses, back up cables, chargers, portable media storage, food and water.  Is there a bag big enough for all of this without hurting your shoulders?  No way!

If you are a 1 man crew, how do you manage to do it?  What gear do you bring?  How are you carrying it? And does anyone know of a good chiropractor?

Week 3:

1 large Tomato
3 Zucchini
1 Cucumber
4 small Onions
Basil
1 quart blueberries
1 head Iceberg Lettuce

Wasn’t much this week as we’ve already gone through the blueberries, 1 zucchini and 2 onions. The lettuce, tomato and cucumber will be next so this week will be pretty good and we shouldn’t waste much (due to the fact that we’ve had so much food every week).

Week 1:

1 large Tomato (1/4th of it was already punctured)
2 Summer Squash
1 Summer Savory
Green Beans
4 small Onions
Basil
2 Kohlrabi
1 head Leaf Lettuce
Kale
Cheese (Hannahbells Classic French by Shy Brothers Farm)

Week 2:

2 Zucchini
4 small Onions
1 pint Raspberries
Basil
1 head Romaine Lettuce
Kale
3 Corn
1 Tomato
Mustard