Here we have two bikes (riding side by side) and me on a fairly narrow sidewalk on a busy road. So going in the street was not an option.

Given that I moved over as far as I could and proceeded to keep running.

Well, the little bastards on bikes decided they did not want to move and then yelled;

“How about giving us some room next time asshole.”

Now I could have fired back any number of rude comments, but instead I thought, “how about showing some respect.”

And I did not even yell it, I just thought it and continued running. I guess I am mellowing with age.

That said, they were still stupid punk bastard kids who need to be tough a lesson in respect.

Keep in mind, that its not because I am afraid it will get broken, but because it has become so much a part of my daily life that I don’t want to spend 8 hours without having it close by.

Pretty sad on my part.

In the past I have had an iPhone 3GS with AT&T as well as a MiFi and HTC Hero with Sprint. The MiFi and Hero have since been cancelled and replaced with a Droid Eris on Verizon Wireless. So far I love Verizon and I love my Droid Eris. Unfortunately I am missing the MiFi, but more on that in a minute.

Due to pain of paying multiple wireless bills and the joy of using a Droid Eris on Verizon I am canceling my AT&T account and turning my iPhone 3GS into a fancy iPod touch. The reasoning behind that is that its cheaper and easier to just keep that iPhone than it is to sell it and buy an iPod touch. Plus I want/need to keep an iPhone (or touch) because I really like the device, and well, I still write for a dedicated iPhone site. Plus this is not about ditching Apple or AT&T, its just about the bottom line in terms of money. Which means I am not ditching the iPhone as much as I am ditching the bill that comes along with it. I still love the iPhone, but for now Verizon has better deals on family plans. Plus I was able to get a Droid Eris for myself, my wife and my daughter — all for $20 plus shipping.

Now getting back to the MiFi, I miss it and am considering either the Palm Pre Plus or MiFi on Verizon to fill that void. Of course the Palm Pre Plus is adding another phone but it would primarily be used as a data device because it allows me to share the connection by creating a mobile (MiFi like) hotspot. In terms of prices on those, the MiFi is $60 a month and adding the Pre Plus to the existing family plan with the data and mobile hotspot only comes to $80 per month. So really for $20 extra I am getting a whole other phone. Now some, ok many will argue that its not needed, but having an extra phone can be nice at times — if for no other reason than those times when I forget to charge or overuse and drain my battery.

Anyway, that was a lot of words to say that I am turning my iPhone into an iPod touch and picking up a Palm Pre Plus to use as a fancy MiFi. Oh, and I still love my Android based Droid Eris.

• Sprint HTC Hero
• Sprint MiFi
• Zune 80 (in Red)
• Speck PixelSkin case for the iPhone 3G/3GS
• Club Penguin skin for the Nintendo DS Lite

Over the weekend I ran the Clearwater Half Marathon, which was a great race. Overall it was wonderful and I will say that it will be added to my “to-do” list of races for 2011. The course was nice to run as far as scenery to look at, it was very well marked and had plenty of aid stations and volunteers. You really cannot ask for anything more. But that is not to say the post-race was something to say was shabby — they had a nice finish line setup plus some good food. They had the usual oranges, pretzels, soda and water — but in addition there was also some hot food. A nice plus especially when the morning was a slight bit chilly.

Anyway, like I said the race was great in terms of support and all that stuff, and I also had a great run personally. The official results have recently been posted on the Clearwater Running website, but I ran with my phone which has SportyPal and tracks my progress by GPS so I have two sets of results listed below.

According to the official race results, I ran a 1:54:29 which means I ran with an average pace of 8:44 per mile.

According to my results, which you can see below (map above) I actually ran a little more than the 13.1, but I still had a respectable time. My race goal was 9 minute to 9:10 minute miles and I beat that so I am very happy.

• Date: 23/01/2010 07:10
• Distance: 13.55 mi
• Total Time: 01:54:41
• Average Speed: 7.09 mph
• Calories: 1372 kcal

• Start time: 07:10:56
• End time: 09:05:37
• Max Speed: 10.53 mph
• Max Pace: 05:41 min/mi
• Average Pace: 08:27 min/mi
• Total climb: 200 ft
• Total descend: 200 ft

Now I will continue to run and begin to think about my full marathon next month, which I am running at the end of the month as part of Gasparilla in Tampa.

The day the Nexus One became available I hit up the store website at www.google.com/phone with thoughts of making the purchase. Of course at the time reality set in and the fact that I already have two smartphones (an HTC Hero with Sprint and iPhone 3GS with AT&T) made me aware that I really did not need a Nexus One. I just wanted one, and want is different from need.

Anyway, just a few minutes ago I was looking for some Nexus One information (for a post that I was writing on Androinica) and found myself back on that store page and decided to *maybe* make a purchase. So I clicked the nice “Get your phone” button and was greeted with a strange message.

The message read;

Your session has expired. Since buying the Nexus One requires your personal information, we want to make sure it’s still you behind the keyboard.

Still me? Of course it’s still me, I am still logged in under the same Gmail account. How could they not know that it was me? And then I did the natural, re-clicked the “Get your phone” button and was again greeted with the same message. I then logged out of my Gmail account, closed my browser, went back to the store, logged back in and once again hit the “Get your phone” button. Only to be given the same message.

Bottom line, I am sure this is a simple fix, but instead of trying to figure it out I wrote something about it here and figure that Google just saved me a bunch of money. Thanks Google.

I have talked about this race before, and had hoped to run it this past May (in 2009) but timing was wrong and the finances were not available for a undertaking like this. So it was put on the back burner for a while. Now the timing is better and with some advance planning it should be easy to at least make it to the starting line. What I do from there will have to wait, but at least I know I can go in with a good plan, good support crew and most importantly plenty of supplies and plenty of training.

But in reality this post serves as a way to make my intentions public. And I am doing that because the more people that know, and the more people that I talk about my goal with, the harder it will be for me to chicken out.

Yes, attempting to run a 100 miles makes me nervous, but its a big challenge and honestly I am more afraid that I will finish and then want to do something harder, longer or crazier. But more on that after May of 2011.

In the meantime, I will continue training using my current plans, which will accommodate both my regular marathon and summer triathlon plans. I am also doing research into supplies that I need, and trying to read anything and everything that may help me in regards to ultramarathons.

But the first order of business, I need a new pair of running shoes.

Earlier today I went for a run, which by itself is nothing special as I run often. But today I found myself in another place, back to a time when running was the BEST or most relaxing thing that I could do. Now this is not to say any of my other recent runs were not special, but today it was done in less than ideal conditions.

I went running, I had my shoes, shorts, a thin but long sleeved running jersey, and my phone to track my progress and provide me with podcast entertainment.

I started out running, it was about 60 degrees (and yes for Florida that is chilly) and very windy and overcast. Not typical Florida weather, and about 1/2 mile in it began to rain, first a sprinkle then it was pouring. I thought about turning and heading back home.

But before I even made it to 1 mile in I realized that I was smiling. I have having FUN, serious fun. Like a kid playing out in the rain. And I mean I was smiling so much that the passing cars probably thought I was crazy. A mid-30 year old running in the rain with a big old smile on his face.

But it was fun, and with that I ushered in the New Year with an 8+ mile run. And then came home to a wife and two daughters that once again confirmed (in their minds) that I am slightly crazy.

My running for the year will hopefully take me back to this place many times. As for goals, other than keep this feeling — I want to run at least 6 marathons with one of those being an ultra (50K). And on top of that I plan to do four sprint triathlons in Clermont Florida over the summer.

Given that, my wife and I have come up with a little trick that allows us to watch the current season in a fairly timely manner and at the same time not have to pay all that much. It does however require a little time.

All we do is wait for the season to end, then once its over we subscribe to Showtime just before the weekend begins, we also make sure its a weekend when we know that we will have plenty of time. Basically, we subscribe, then watch all of the episodes using On Demand.

This means we subscribe on Friday afternoon, watch the season over the course of the weekend and then cancel Showtime on Monday morning. That means your typical $15 (approx) monthly fee is down to paying for just about 4 days worth, which is much cheaper than buying the DVD or even renting it.

The nice part here is that when you call up to cancel, just tell the agent you were not really watching the channel. I would also suggest to be nice and polite (and ask if they have any special offers) when you cancel, because you never know what you may be offered.

For example when I recently called to cancel Showtime I was offered 3-months of HBO for free. Which means now I can also watch the latest season of Entourage.

Bottom line, this means we got to watch both seasons for just 4 days worth of service.

I do have a need, well maybe not really a need, but it is something that will get used. I can, and have been getting by just fine without a MiFi, but at the same time I like to write from outside of the house from time to time and it would be nice to not to have to worry about finding a location with Wi-Fi available.

That said, I consider it strange because I was once a happy Palm.net subscriber which for the unlimited plan used to cost me $44.99 a month. Sure, that $44.99 is cheaper than the $59.95 that I will have to pay Sprint, but at least the MiFi offers full Internet access, which is unlike what the Palm.net service on the Palm VIIx used to offer.

The Palm.net service offered unlimited access, but only offered access to web clips which were known as Web Clippings. Basically the service allowed you to visit only certain pages that were formatted to fit nicely on the Palm VIIx display.

Given that, why can’t I justify a purchase of the MiFi? (and yes, that was really just me asking myself that question) It will get used, most likely at least 2-3 days a week. Maybe I have just gotten cheaper with age, or possibly it just seems a little more normal to me to depend on pubic Wi-Fi now.

[Palm VIIx image courtesy of Wikipedia]