A Declaration

Running a Marathon wasn't on my radar 2 weeks ago. But here I am, signing up for one today. Victoria's post was a good kick in the butt. In the end it will come down to the training and shape I am come May, but a collegue at work was quick to suggest I sign up now and that the hardest step is the first. So, I figure what else will make sure I actually go through with this.... Post something on my blog. So there. Did I just make a horrible decision?

Obligatory Gaming Post

So, as promised yesterday, I'll give you a update on my gaming happenings as of recent. First off, I was happy to receive 2 1600 microsoft point giftcards for Xmas, so that slingshot me into the world of XBLA (Xbox Live Arcade). My first purchase was N+. This has been highly spoken of by Assailant 9, my trusted gaming nemesis. He was not lying. The game, albeit simple, is addicting after the stages get more complex. The idea is you get coins to increase the time you get per level, you progress through levels, 5 levels per episode. Once you begin a new episode your time resets. Each level provides a new unique challenge in either opponent or terrain. You have a analog stick and an A button to jump. It's easy at first, but the things that keep you coming back are the levels that take some thinking and a little finesse to conquer. Thanks Assailant.

My next Xbla purchase with this new plethora of points was yesterday, Geometry Wars Retro Evolved 2. It was a hard decision between the new GW and the old original version. I looked around online and the 2nd version has actually been getting rave reviews and contains new gametypes, and multiplayer. So with that, purchase completed, and I am very happy with it after just one night. Reminiscent of my father's video game era, this plays a lot like asteroids in a contained box. Maybe it's my ADHD, but the bright multicolored laser graphics of the game are one of its most enjoyable traits. The basic gametype is as you would expect, running around trying not to get destroyed whilst shooting everything in sight. Multiplier shards, called geods, now drop from fallen enemies and are a requirement to reach those high score boards. Other gametypes include no-shooting-allowed escapism, waves of enemies, stage completion mode, and another where you can only shoot from bubbles which quickly disappear and reappear at different locations. An interesting callout to the oldstyle arcade games is the highscore of your xbox live friend list post on the top right of your screen as you play. Just a little something to keep you playing.

Lastly, I was a latecomer to The Force Unleashed. I heard not-so-good things from this much hyped game, so, I just didn't purchase it. Recently I did a little tradesies with known gaming accomplice, away went my Mirror's Edge, in came TFU. I must say, now that all hype had been obliterated I was very happy with my playthrough. This mainly because I am an avid Star Wars fan. I loved the connections this game made between the Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope movies. I followed the plot in-game as if I was in fact playing out one of the Star Wars movies. Also, since I stick closely to FPS's, it was a great change to be able to run around in third person throwing special forces and lightsabers around. Overall I enjoyed the first playthrough and I am currently making attempts at a Master Sith difficulty playthrough.

Also, a last image as a teaser for next week. I plan on doing my Injury Themed Blog Week. Where I speak to the numerous adventures I have had which leave me with, well, souvenirs(read: scars).

Nike+

Sorry about another running post. I promise I'll talk about gaming or something tomorrow. I wanted to speak on this yesterday but was overan by that year in review post. . . So yeah. I got a nike+ sensor for Christmas and a little pocket so that instead of buying the $100 shoes it will just tie into the laces of any running shoe. I didn't think much of this thing until I logged onto the website for the first time. Woah, I should have realized that when Nike and Apple get together you will end up with something pretty cool.

You start out by selecting or uploading a very small profile picture. You choose a user name and login and are thrown into your main page. From here you have many options. Your latest run is graphed out by pace and distance. You can look at many stats such as your history of runs by date and distance. This was all to be expected. The COOL things are the challenges, distance club, and Nike+ mini.

The challenges are user generated. There are currently 20 thousand random challenges, you can sort by popularity or by when they were submitted. Challenges range from first person to reach 100 miles, longest miles ran in X amount of days, fastest 3k, fastest 10k. Anything you can think of and there will be multiple challenges to sign up for. You click the join button, and your screenname is thrown into the mix of runners and graphed. If you look at the image above I am in 4th place of 10 people for most miles ran in 2 days. Some challenges have thousands of people, some have only a dozen or so. There are different types of challenges called team challenges. The teams are preset and you choose the team you want to join. So, there is a huge challenge for MLB teams. It goes for 90 days until opening day, you choose the team you want to run for, and everyone's milage adds up beneath their chosen team. There are competitions like this for men vs women, meat eaters vs vegetarians, united states regions,

the list goes on forever.

The distance club is as you would expect, after 100 miles, 500, 1000, all the way to 10000 miles you get put into a different club. You also have a Nike+ mini, which is essentially your avatar. Seen left. As you complete things you get different stuff for your avatar. I got a new tshirt for doing my first run. I would imagine every tier of the distance club gives you something else too. And winning challenges and completing your goals and resolutions stacks your trophy room, mine is empty... :-/

Overall, I think nike+ has the right amount of competition matched with the right amount of a reward to get anyone to want to run as many miles as possible.

I don't know if this will get old, but I know right now its like a new video game or toy and I could just surf the site looking for new features and I can't wait to get home and run. Victoria made the amusing comment that its funny that even when I get into something active, I still find a way to spend a lot of time on the computer involved with it. Kind of a double edged sword...

Listening to: Addicted by Saving Abel

Back on the trail

Today was the first day I had a morning run since October 21st, not to mention the first exercise I've done in about 2 weeks. It felt great. I suppose this post has been a long time coming.

Mid January of last year I had began a new full time career, graduated college, and was in full glutton mode. No exercise, loved fast food. I weighed the most I had ever weighed. 215ish lbs was a big difference from my freshman cross country weight of 165. I know a couple tricks that work in motivating myself. The one that I applied then was to bring out my competitive nature.

We were at a lowriders and gangsters party at my cousin's house. We were drinking 40's all night, sippin' on gin & juice, and I ended up challenging my cousin to a bet that I would weigh less then him by Xmas of next year (roughly 11 months away). He laughed, and took out a scale. He was 177, and I was 227. Such a nice round difference, 50 pounds, which turns out to be the amount of money we placed on the bet.

I would like to say after that party I was running daily, but sadly I have a detailed records of everything I have done this year, and it wasn't till about 3 months later I actually got my ass in gear. Much like Ric's knack for writing lists, I use this power to motivate myself on the calendar. When I get into a healthy lifestyle it's nearly a requirement that I record every run on a calendar. So then if I get a week of running every day, that 8th day is that much harder to skip. It blares out from the calendar as an empty void lazy space.

So I have the calendar on my lap, and I remember starting finally, very later in March. A couple friends had brought up a calorie counter website and started tracking calorie intake along with exercises. This finally got me going, couple 30 minute runs, and I wrote down on Easter that I weighed 215. Then a fire was lit under my ass apparently. April is nearly covered with highlighted workouts. 13 two-a-days and 10 regular runs. My two-a-days consisted of getting up at 5am, making breakfast (early it was eggs, later turned into cereal), then leaving the house for the gym at 6am. I then lifted for 30 minutes, and ran for 35. After work I would then go back to the Gym, but choose to run outside for another 30-35 minutes. At the end of April I have myself weighing 209. At this rate the bet seemed lofty, but achievable.

May was similar, I had 10 two-a-days, even found time to run before my softball games. Ending the month in 202 lb. June summer laziness came and I only had 3 two-a-days, 10 regular days. I was apparently too disgusted to write down my weight fluctuations. In July I was a year older, and the fire was back. Of the 31 days in the month I ran 18 two-a-days, sadly my weight loss slowed and I finished at 204 (looking back I was probably gaining muscle from all the lifting). I wish I had my cell phone because I would take a picture of August. 20 of the 30 days in August I worked out before and after work. Ending August weigh in shows 198. September goes back to moderate pace, 12 doubles, 8 singles, weighed ending 195. October I began to lose my fire, and I only lifted 6 days, I continued a couple more doubles, mostly running from home so I could sleep in more. November was abysmal, I had 2 weeks off where I was up north hunting. We hunt in a camper with no real shower opportunities. You don't want to sweat much or the deer never show up, so I knew these weeks would provide no exercises short of hiking 60-80 lb's of gun and deerstand out into the woods. I ended November with 7 single 30-minute runs, weighing 193. And that was it, it was now December, Xmas month, and the weigh in would be right around the corner. I still couldn't dig deep enough for a August repeat, I simply ran 13 single days and cut back on my junkfood. Christmas day, a week or two ago, I weighed in fully clothed at 190. I know I took the bet a year ago telling myself "Would you pay $50 to weigh under 200lbs come next year? Yes." So paying was not a problem.

I don't really have any big insightful ending to post. I've been wanting to share my story on here for awhile, but never wanted to talk too much in case my cousin ran across this website and saw what I was up to. Well, the bets over and the new year is here. A lot of people posted about their resolutions, and what to expect in the next year. I have never been one to make a resolution, but I guess I would say that I will do 1 marathon before the end of the year. All this running has built my long distance foundation back up and I think with a good workout program I can actually get the big Marathon under my belt. Something I feel I need to conquer as a human with a Odometer tattooed on his calf.

Thanks for sticking in there readers, and thanks everyone for their strong words, workout advice, confidence, encouragement, and humor during the year. Most of all thanks for putting up with my zombie days where I had no energy to even smile or laugh during lunch.

What does one do on a half day?

(click to enlarge)

What does one do on a half day? There are so many options. All true, and you can thank our friend Assailant for the last one. I'll note that he is someone that you want on your side.

Hope everyone has a great New Year. I enjoyed my dabbling in the Webcomic world. I wish I had better skills, as you can probably tell. I'll probably try a couple more strips out here and there, if anyone thinks they have any material or a topic for another comic let me know.

Listening to: Fuck It by Seether

Turtle-Power!

Merry Xmas! Quick mobile holiday update. Recently, I seem to have been blogging about the past, and, well, it feels sort of like therapy. I arrived home for the holidays and I find myself asking my parents to fill in the gaps and holes in my newly re-hashed memories.

It's a great conversation piece, and even better when your Mom quickly goes downstairs and brings up a junk box of my old stuff and pops out the old Mikey plush I mentioned in TMNT. Guess I was wrong about him losing an eye. rofl.

Have a fun and safe holiday break everyone!

Rebel through Nerdiness?

I wanted to post this in my last Evolution of Music post, but I found I was running out of space and decided it would make a good separate post.

I was at the tip of my rebellious stage late into my high school career. Looking back it's more amusing then anything. Sadly I don't remember many of the details. I actually completely forgot about how I used to blare Mario Bros. music out of my car until an old friend reminded me at my 5 year highschool reunion. I left this out when I went through all of those music phases as mentioned in the previous post. The extreme nerd phase. I would go and download all the Mario or Nintendo related mp3's I could and burn them onto a CD mix. I would then pass out the nintendo mix to my Cross Country friends. I would also put one of the cd's into my camaro, every morning, turn the music up, and roll down the windows as I rolled into the school parking lot.

Hell, I would have kicked my own ass.

I also dyed my hair red, and had 2 eyebrow piercings, no real reason. (top picture)I didn't really hang out with any punks, or goths, or emos or anything. I was just a computer nerd and Cross Country runner. I guess I was defining the clique in Freedom because we were the first. I am glad I did it now though because odds are I will never have the job or security to do stuff like that until I am retired, by which point it would probably raise a red flag to my sanity instead of just being "rebelious" or "a kid".

Merry Christmas, you filthy animals.

And a happy New Year.