Calibrate.

Since I’ve now finally passed on support duty to the next guy on the list, I can run with the Nike+ kit. To work well, the shoe sensor needs to be calibrated so I spent half an hour at Bislet Stadium yesterday to do it properly. I was a bit surprised to find out that the main stadium is actually open for the public parts of the year, to use for free.

Now the sensor is calibrated correctly, during the one test run I did around the track it measured exactly 400 meters, like it should. Now I can find check how long the routes I’ve been running so far really are. Excellent.

I had my first hands-on experience with an Apple iPhone today. One of the guys at work is sort of a cell phone nerd - which is a good thing since he is pretty much working with cell phone related tasks all day - and he knows a guy who knows a guy and so on until some guy is living in the US of A and that guy sent one over.

It’s thin for sure, but way too large if you - like me - sometimes have your cell phone in your pant pocket because you need both hands for something else. The phone is surprisingly fast, but then again I’m used to the sluggish Nokia and Sony Ericsson user interfaces. Still no real reason to really, really want one.

Nike + iPod.

Both the iPod Nano and the Nike+ kit arrived yesterday, days ahead of schedule. Rather surprising since stuff I order usually arrives days, weeks or even months after it should have.

The Nano is tiny, has a large (at least compared to the casing) screen, great sound and lots of space for tons of motivational tunes. I quickly tested the Nike+ sensor and a couple of features and everything looks as expected, but I didn’t bother to calibrate it since I can’t use the kit until Wednesday anyway.

What has not arrived yet is the information I need to connect to our new internet connection. It’s now been 14 days since someone was here and checked the connection between the apartment and the company’s network equipment. Now I need the static IP address, gateway IP and other relevant information. If that’s not happening soon I’ll just use the information my 3COM router guessed and see what happens. I have sent 5 e-mails to their support department without a reply.

Yes, of course I should call them, but I really don’t like to talk to people on the phone. I have no idea why, that’s just the way it is. It’s a good thing, then, that I have a job where I have to talk to people on the phone every day. Or maybe not. In the end I guess I have no choice, and have to call them and ask for the information. Or else we won’t have an internet connection and that would more or less be the end of the world.

What is also somewhat interesting is that the ISP hasn’t sent me any bills yet. Maybe they are out of business. That would be a bummer.

One Step Forward.

I’m impressed.

Only one week left now and I’ve been running every other day for a month. The most interesting thing is that I’m actually seeing some progress. I run the route faster; I’ve cut the time down by around 40 seconds - not much, but I’m only running a mere 2.5 kilometers each time. My average and max heart rate is also decreasing, and for some reason I’ve gained about a kilogram.

In a world where you see talk about the dangers of obesity every day and where the average American is getting so fat there is a real chance the world will tip over any minute, you’ll probably think that gaining weight is not what I wanted in the first place. But I’m a bit underweight, of all things, and gaining weight - in the right places - is a good thing for me. No, I’m not hoping I get bigger breasts. Continue reading "One Step Forward."

We All Mac.

Apple had their summer Mac product press conference today - actually it’s still happening as I’m writing this. Not much interesting so far, a new iMac, a new keyboard and a lot of talk about iPhoto focusing on the integration with .Mac right now. Since I’m not and most likely never will be a .Mac subscriber, it’s not really relevant.

The new iMacs, available in 20-inch and 24-inch versions, have new hardware specs and they look slimmer. I never really like the iMac design anyway, they should’ve crammed the necessary hardware behind the screen instead of under it. The new keyboard looks nice, but from the picture I saw, it looks like it comes without a numeric pad? That can’t be, probably something with the picture. Continue reading "We All Mac."

Sum.

I was right, last week at work was hell-on-earth. The below screenshot is from my time tracker and was taken Saturday night at ten past ten. If you’re not normally spending your time in a sweat shop, you should easily find four things wrong with it:

I also punched in about six hours on Sunday, making this a new personal best - or perhaps worst. If you also spent last week in a bubble, mostly cut off from Real Life (TM), here are a few things that happened you should know about:

• The Metropolitan Police in London disarmed two car bombs.
• Apple released their iPhone.
• Matthew Goods 7th studio album, Hospital Music, was made available on his site a month before its release.

I also included some other things, but before I was able to save the document, my MacBook decided to lock up completely. Again. So, does anyone want to join me in a class action lawsuit against Apple for false advertising?