When you think of wool clothing, what comes to mind? Cold weather? Bulky sweaters? Scratchy socks? Well, there’s a whole category of wool clothing that wants us to change our minds about wool – how it feels, how it looks, and when to wear it.

Case in point: Icebreaker’s line of merino wool activewear. I’ve been wanting to try Icebreaker’s running clothes since I first heard about them, so when natureshop.com contacted me to ask if I’d review some of their stuff, they didn’t have to ask twice. I sent them a list of the stuff I was interested in, and they kindly sent me three items to review: The SS Ace Crewe Tech T, the Tracer Run Short, and the Boxer Anatomica. Here’s the required disclaimer – they gave me the stuff for free to review, and I got to keep it.

I live about as far as you can get from the beach and still be in Los Angeles. It gets hot in the summer, so my typical running outfit is a Tech T and running shorts. That’s about it, not counting my GPS watch, heart rate monitor, hat, sunglasses, Road ID anklet and hydration pack for long runs. Although I often run barefoot, I’m not really a minimalist in any other respect.

I’ve done several runs now in my Icebreaker shirt and shorts. The boxer briefs I mostly just wear for daily wear. They could be worn under other shorts for running, but the Icebreaker shorts have a built-in liner, so they don’t really go together. Here are my thoughts on this novel approach to active wear.

This stuff looks and feels really good. The biggest thing I notice right away is how light, soft, and smooth it all feels. I’m wearing wool directly against my skin, and there is not a hint of scratchiness. It has a distinctly different feel to it than the synthetic tech clothing I usually run in. For lack of a more apt description, it feels more “natural.” It’s got slightly more texture to the cloth, and a tiny hint of “fuzz,” though it’s not actually fuzzy. It’s more like a slight nap to the cloth. Nap like suede, not like sleeping.

My favorite of all these pieces is the shirt. The SS Ace Crewe they sent me is a vibrant blue with nice details. I don’t look as smashing in it as the hot Kiwi they got to model it on their site, but it’s definitely one of the more attractive pieces of running clothing I’ve seen. It feels great on. There is a slight hint of the possibility of itch, but it never quite happens. And once I’m running, I almost don’t feel it there at all. It wicks moisture very well. The only thing I would say it doesn’t do quite as well as my synthetic stuff is dry quickly. When I’m done with a long run, the shirt is wet with sweat, and stays that way longer than some of my poly stuff. The shirt also has a cool little integrated pocket in the side that would hold a key or a couple gel packets.

The shorts are less visually interesting, being basically black running shorts. But they are simple, fit well, and look fine. There are two things about these that I like a bit less than some of my other shorts. First, they don’t have any exterior pockets. I don’t like loading up my shorts with stuff, and I usually run with a belt or hydration pack that I can put stuff in, but a pocket or two is nice. The biggest thing, though, is that the built-in liner is briefs instead of compression boxer briefs. I have two other pairs of running shorts – one from New Balance and one from Asics – with integrated boxer briefs, and now I either want those or to wear my own underwear instead of an integrated liner. On the one longer run I did in these – 10+ miles – there was some chafing. Enough said.

The underwear are really comfortable. As the name – Boxer Anatomica – suggests, they’re more, uh, fitted than what I sometimes wear, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. They look AND feel good. Second disclaimer – that is NOT me in the photo.

The one area where this gear wins hands down over anything else I own – odor control. They don’t smell bad. When I wear them, even after a 14+ mile run, they still don’t smell bad. I cannot say this about ANY of the other running gear I own. Usually when I finish a long run, I’m not fit to be around other humans until my clothes have been put into the laundry and I’ve been through the shower. My wife insists I put my running clothes directly into the wash because, in her words, she doesn’t want the bedroom to smell like crotch. But with these, it doesn’t happen. I can get home from a run and actually be around people without feeling guilty or clearing the room. I can hang them up to air out and wear them another day before washing. My wife even gives them the OK.

So, overall, I give this stuff high marks. There are two other things, though, in the “con” column. First, the underwear and the shirt have both had bits of stitching start to come unravelled. Nothing catastrophic, but having only had these pieces for a few weeks, I wouldn’t expect to see signs of them starting to fall apart just yet. And all the moreso because of the second negative – price. I got these pieces for free, and I’m very grateful. But even with natureshop.com’s discounts, these items are quite a bit more than the stuff I usually run in. The shirt is $63, the shorts $70, and the underwear are $50. I can’t really say what their long-term durability is. If they hold up well, I might say they’re worth the price, but I’m not quite ready to say that yet.

Wow, it’s been way too long.

Life has been so many things lately: busy, scary, fun, hectic, frustrating, daunting, exciting, painful, amazing … and more.

But none of that has made it here. For some reason I just haven’t been inspired to write, or felt I had time to do it. Even now this post is going to be very short, as I’ve just got too many things to do.

I'm not in this photo, but I did run between this huge inflatable dude's legs.

But I wanted to at least let you all know that after just over a year of running I completed my first half marathon! I did it barefoot, as planned. I did NOT do it in under 2 hours, as I’d hoped to. And I did NOT do it injury-free. You can see all the details over at dailymile. I’ve actually been much better about posting there than here lately, so if you want to catch up a little and don’t mind reading about running, have a look over there.

Until next time!

I’m training for my first half marathon. Or, rather, I’m supposed to be training for my first half marathon. What I’m actually doing is lying on the couch, where I dragged myself this morning from the bed, trying not to stand up too fast lest I get dizzy and fall on my face. It was not a pretty scene when I hauled my fever-adled self out of bed a little too quickly, sat down next to Nicholas on the floor, and promptly passed out. Good thing I was already near the ground. So yeah, I’m sick. This is day two of the great fever, sore throat and lethargy of May 2010. Thankfully, it does seem to be getting better. The fever seems to have abated, it no longer feels like I’m swallowing knives (just sharp rocks), and I can stand up for more than 30 seconds without getting lightheaded. Let’s hope this trend continues. [UPDATE: Found out the day after I posted this I have strep throat. Awesome, right? So I'm on antibiotics now, and hoping this crap goes away quickly!]

But back to that half marathon. I’m registered to run the LA Rock ‘n’ Roll 1/2 Marathon on October 24, 2010. It will be a year almost to the day since I started running, and it seemed a good milestone to hit at that point in my running life. Lots of people start running and almost immediately decide to run a marathon. I’m not that guy. Since deciding I want to run barefoot, I’ve consciously taken it slowly, building endurance and improving my running form carefully. It hasn’t actually been slowly and carefully enough to avoid all issues. I’ve had minor problems with my ankles, calves, achilles, and recently my knee, most of them directly related to pushing too far and doing too much, too soon. I guess it might be easier to start being physically active at 16 or 26 than at 36, especially since my soft choirboy history has meant I’ve done almost nothing athletic since my parents stopped making me play peewee soccer, which I truly sucked at.

But, I digress. I decided early on I wouldn’t consider running a marathon until I’d been running regularly for at least a year. So I signed up for this 1/2 at the one year mark, and figured after that I’d reevaluate and decide what’s next. I’m already thinking a marathon in 2011 might be in the cards, but I gotta get through this 1/2 first. So, I made a plan. I’ve been reading Daniel’s Running Formula, recommended to me by a sports doc friend and several others on dailymile. This Jack Daniels guy, in addition to making some kick ass whiskey, is also apparently a pretty good running coach. This book is about hard core running training, and he’s got programs for everything from 800 meters to the marathon. So, using the book, I mapped out my 1/2 marathon training schedule. Considering the way my life works, I knew I wouldn’t stick 100% to the plan. I’m sure I’ll shift a workout from one day to another and probably even skip one here and there. The plan I’ve created is more than enough to get me comfortably through the race, so I’m fine with all that. But I didn’t really expect to be taking the second week of my training plan almost completely off. Between this knee pain that cropped up last week and this knock-me-on-my ass sickness thing that started yesterday, this has not been a banner running week.

Missing a week of training, especially with the race still many months away, doesn’t worry me. What does worry me is the thought that my body may not let me do what I want to do. Until now, my running has been pretty free form. I’ve run when I wanted to, and when I could make time. I never had an an official weekly mileage goal, and I certainly never had a training plan. Now that I do, it bothers me when I can’t at least come close to sticking to it. Though it builds up slowly, the plan maxes out at 40 miles a week. I’ve never run much over 20. What if my body can’t take that kind of mileage? Though it mostly focuses on pretty easy running, the plan includes some tempo runs and speed work. What if things break down when I try to run fast?

None of this is worth losing a lot of sleep over, I know. If it turns out running 20 miles a week is as much as I can take and stay injury-free, well, that’s a hell of a lot more than I was running a year ago (0 miles a week). And if running distance races isn’t for me, that’s OK too. I like running, and I’d keep doing it even if I could rarely make it into double digits in a single run.

The reason all this bothers me as much as it does, I think, is that for the last few months,  running has been the part of my life that’s been going really well. It’s fun, my friends are inspired by it, and it’s helped me get really healthy for the first time in a while. Other aspects of my life, particularly on the work front, have not been so great. There have been some glimmer of hope there in the last few days, but it’s still a source of worry. So, to see a crack in the plaster of the thing that has really been helping me hold it all together, that worries me. But I’m not gonna let it stop me.

I’ll get over this illness, I’ll work out this knee thing, and I’ll get back to running. And working. For actual money. And not worrying so damn much. On that note, I give you a photo from the XTERRA Malibu Creek Trail Race a couple weeks back. It was a tough race, and I ran it well. Despite the fact I think it was the beginning of my knee woes, I was certainly having fun when this shot was taken. I’m sure I’ll get back there soon.

I missed my own blogiversary. This blog is now one-year old. Yay blog!

I started badassdadblog on April 14, 2009. That first post was titled “stuff that’s hard,” and in the 12 months since, I think I’ve done my share of that sort of stuff. I’m not sure a full recap of the last year is worth the time to read (or write), and much of that you could get by going through the archives, if you wanted. But I do want to share a few things on this auspicious occasion.

March for Babies 2010. Photo by Megan Hook.

I’m very proud to have walked in last weekend’s March for Babies with Heather, Mike, and Annabelle Spohr (who is clearly slacking off by not having her own blog. I mean, you’re three months old, kid! What are you waiting for?). This blog was largely inspired by the amazing courage, resilience, and support I witnessed from and surrounding the Spohrs when they lost their first daughter, Madeline, just over a year ago, because of complications related to her premature birth. I discovered many wonderful things through those events. An amazing community of parents and others, an enjoyable and valuable outlet in writing, and the power of social media to bring people together in very real ways.

Another thing I’m proud and happy about is my health and fitness. I’m in better physical shape than I’ve been at any other time in my life. I’m wearing pants the size I wore in high school, and I ran 10 miles last week. In a row! That’s huge for me. I’ve been running regularly since October 2009, and the benefits have been amazing. Weight loss and fitness are definitely among them, but so has been finding yet another wonderful online and real life community: runners. Much of that has been through dailymile, which has been a constant source of motivation, support, and inspiration for me as a new runner.

Here’s how many miles I’ve logged so far:

Better yet, here’s how many donuts I’ve burned:

Other areas of my life have been less rosy. OK, to be fair, there’s really just ONE area I have any reasonable right to bitch about: work. Or, more specifically, lack of work. Or, if we’re being REALLY specific, lack of income. I’ve certainly been busy for most of the last year. Between working with a close friend on his startup business, building web pages for small businesses with a former coworker, and many days being full-time dad, there’s been no shortage of WORK. There’s just been a shortage of monetary compensation. I think one day I’ll look back on this year, a year where I have been able to spend more time with my boys and my wife than ever before, and think how lucky I was. But that will be much easier once I am again gainfully employed, and not worried about the steadily sinking waterline of our savings.

I’ve written less often here recently. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, or whether I plan to do more or less in the future. I intend to keep writing, and I expect I’ll go through periods when I’ll write a lot, and others when I’ll write less. Whatever the case, I want to sincerely thank you. All of you who read, comment on, and share this blog with me. It’s been a really exciting, challenging, fun year. How about we go for two?

I run for me.

To be healthy. To feel better. To look better. To live longer. To be able to eat and drink more of what I want and still be fit. I run because both my grandfathers and my father had heart attacks before they turned 60. To paraphrase Christopher McDougall in Born To Run paraphrasing George Bernard Shaw, “You don’t stop running because you get old. You get old because you stop running.”

I run for my wife.

To have more energy. To be hotter. To be better in bed.

I run for my kids.

To play more energetically with them. To show them being active is good for you and fun. To survive long enough to see them move out and build their own lives.

I run for my grandkids.

To meet the grandkids I may one day have, and be able to play with them, too.

I run for you.

This came later. I didn’t start out running for you. No offense. I like you. But you’re not why I started to run (unless you’re listed above). But as I’ve been doing it, and sharing my experience here, and on Twitter, and on dailymile, I’ve found it feels great when people tell me I inspired them to run, or walk, or get off the couch. And that, that sense of community, that evidence that doing what’s best for me can inspire someone to do what’s best for them, that is by far the most unexpected benefit of running. So for that, thank you.

See you out there.

This is a companion piece to one the nice folks at dailymile graciously allowed me to post on the dailymile community blog, where I talk more about running barefoot and in Vibram Fivefingers, and about becoming a runner in general.

Do you smell something?

Lately I’ve been talking a lot about running. Talking, writing, chatting, emailing, tweeting, and conversing about running. If you missed the memo, I’ve been running for the last few months. By my previous standards, which were not running ever, at all, except after my kids to prevent certain death, I’ve been running a lot. For the last month I’ve averaged over 20 miles a week, steadily increasing since the beginning of this year. My longest run to date has been seven miles, and I have an eight mile run planned for tomorrow morning. (EDIT: That eight mile run didn’t happen today. Sorry, Eminem. Stupid daylight saving time. It’ll happen another time.) If you’re reading this on my site, look to the right and you should see a dailymile widget showing my latest run. Click through and you can see my recent running history. If you run or do any kind of regular exercise, I highly recommend dailymile, by the way.

But this post isn’t really about running. Well, not entirely, anyway. It’s about what I listen to while I run, and other times.

In running, as in most things, people tend to fall into camps. Factions. People like to take sides. I’m sure there are more of these groups than I even know about. These aren’t necessarily rival camps, but they are distinct groups, with different points of view on various issues.

One divide is between barefoot/minimalist runners and the traditional running shoe crowd. In fact, this can be even further divided. Diehard barefooters would claim a camp unto themselves, and would likely want nothing to do with the minimalist footwear folk. I straddle the line between barefoot and minimalist running. I may eventually go fully one way or the other, but for now I do both, depending on a variety of factors. Most of my miles to this point (roughly 230 of them) have been in Vibram Fivefingers, with about 30 miles run completely barefoot. I fully believe traditional running shoes don’t do much to prevent injury or improve performance, and aren’t really necessary. But I’m already going deeper into this than I meant to here. The point is, I’m on one side of this debate, and there are a great many more on the other.

Another fairly sharp divide is between runners who listen to music when they run, and those who don’t. I don’t. Lots of people do. While I know I’m in a clear and distinct minority when it comes to barefoot running, I’m not sure about this one. I think this split is closer to even, but I’d wager more folks listen to music when they run than don’t, based on what I’ve seen and heard. Some of my reasons for not listening to music while I run are similar to the reasons I don’t usually wear my iPod when I walk on city streets, don’t listen to music while I work, and why I ALMOST NEVER text while driving. It’s distracting. For someone who’s spent his life making and studying music, the amount of time I spend listening to it is fairly small compared to many. The degree to which I’ve devoted my life to music is in part the REASON I don’t listen to it that often. For me, music is immersive. I can’t ignore music while I focus on something else. If it’s on, I’m listening to it. Really listening. If there were music playing while I was writing now, I’d be all kinds of distracted, and would most likely either stop writing or turn off the music. The same applies when I run. It could be cool to have a soundtrack while running. But it would take me out of the moment, and away from the experience of what’s going on. There’s a safety factor here, especially since I run mostly on the streets of Los Angeles, but it’s not entirely about safety. Part of it is about focus.

Running for me, a bit like music, is a fully engaged activity. In part because I run barefoot (or almost), the sound of my footfalls matters to me. The quieter they are, the more correct my form. If my feet are slapping the pavement, something is wrong. But beyond that, I want to hear the world around me. Wind in the trees, birds, creatures of the world, other people, cars. These things are all part of the experience of running. If I were running on a treadmill (which, by the way, I have yet to do since I started running regularly), I would very likely listen to something. But out in the world, I want to hear myself, and the world.

I said this post isn’t about running, and it’s really not. I want to tell you about what I listen to when I DO listen to something besides the noises going on around me. The fact is, most of the time, what I listen to isn’t music. It’s words. Spoken words. More specifically, radio shows and podcasts that are mostly speech.

My favorite podcast (actually a radio show on NPR which, like pretty much everything else I listen to, I can’t bother to structure my life around being available while it’s actually ON the radio so instead download and enjoy the podcast whenever the hell I like) is This American Life with Ira Glass. If you do not listen to This American Life, you are missing some of the best storytelling around. Not just on radio, but anywhere. For me to describe it doesn’t really do it justice, but it is a mix of fiction and journalism, art and real life, that to me is one of the best things going.

In a similar vein, but with a rather more scientific, existential bent, is Radiolab. Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich do something similar to This American Life, in that they pick a theme for each show and tell stories around that theme. But theirs are generally focused on science. What is time? What is music, and how does it relate to language? What does it mean to be self-aware? What’s the difference between humans and animals? Cool stuff, very well done, great show.

More recently, at the suggestion of Will at betheboy.com, I’ve been listening to The Best Show on WFMU with Tom Scharpling. This is basically a traditional talk radio format, with a comedy writer for  a host and a fairly liberal bent. It’s three hours long, and while not every minute of every show is amazing, there are some really wonderful moments. I have to say, I muse on the title now and then. Is it The Best Show of those currently on WFMU, or is it actually The Best Show of any available, and simply happens to be on WFMU? Perhaps we’ll never know.

Another regular download for me is Dan Savage’s Savage Love Cast. I first became aware of Dan Savage through his occasional appearances on This American Life. He’s a gay sex advice columnist based in Seattle. To be clear, he’s gay and gives sex advice. The advice itself isn’t necessarily gay, nor is the sex about which the advice is given. Savage Love is his sex advice column, and the Savage Lovecast is the audio version that column. He’s candid, direct, uncensored, and often bitchy, and I find him hilarious. Your mileage may vary.

So here I’ve said most of what I wanted to say, and in the end I wrote more about running than I did about the topic I claimed this post was about. That’s actually rather typical of my life lately. I start off talking about work, family, music, whatever, and end up going on about running. I hope this means I’ve found something I truly enjoy, which, for a change, is unequivocally good for me. Hopefully me going on about it doesn’t drive everyone around me crazy.

So, runner or not, what are you listening to?

This is sort of a guest post by … well … me. I wrote this a couple weeks ago over at a group blog that’s still in development. Since that’s not available yet for viewing (though it will be awesome once it is!) I figured I’d bring this over here to share with ya’ll. Hope you enjoy it.

In the last year, many things have happened which I didn’t expect. I dived into social media through blogging and Twitter. I got laid off. I started running in Vibram Fivefingers and barefoot, and realized I LOVE running. I found new social outlets online for running in dailymile.com and Barefoot Ted’s Google group. I began inspiring others to try running (and minimalist footwear, and barefooting). And then, last night, perhaps most unexpected of all, I became an expert on sports bras for well-endowed women. I was surprised, too. Let me explain.

Through dailymile, I post every run I do online. This post also goes out automatically on my Twitter and Facebook feeds, and to a widget here on my blog, so pretty much everyone I know online knows about my runs. Since the beginning of this year I’ve run four to five times a week, and my mileage and speed are steadily improving. I’ve also shared information about minimalist footwear, barefooting, Born To Run, the successes and setbacks I’ve had, and generally been open with my online friends about my running adventure.

So, yesterday, someone on Twitter suggested to a friend of theirs to follow me on Twitter for inspiration to get into running. She’d been wanting to do it and considering the Couch To 5K program, but finding it hard to get going. Flattered, I thanked her for the complement and followed them both back. Happy to be a positive force for this thing I love doing. Then the new runner sends me a note with this question:

Considering my Twitter name is badassdadblog, and that I put my bald-pated mugshot right there for all to see, I’m not sure what made her think I might be an authority on this subject. But, when someone asks a question, I have a hard time resisting the urge to go find an answer. So, I had a mission.

Born To Run?

In fact, she’s not the first woman I’ve heard raise this issue in one form or another. “I can’t run, it’s too uncomfortable.” “Some people just aren’t built for running.” “My boobs are just too big.” Though I know I have no firsthand knowledge or experience here, I can’t help but say (or at least think to myself) bullshit. This sounds like just another in the litany of excuses people give to avoid giving running a real go. But I firmly believe each person must find their own way. To running, to enlightenment, to happiness. One sure way for someone to not enjoy running is to have someone else tell them they have to. Do you remember gym class? Not my idea of a good time.

So usually when someone raises an objection, I let them hold onto it. I might argue another point of view, but I’m not here to argue or talk you into doing something. But this was different. She didn’t say “I can’t, because…”. She ASKED me what she could do. So, I set out to find an answer.

One of the things I love about social media is it is a wellspring of knowledge, information, and (perhaps above all else) opinions. In addition to dailymile, Twitter and Facebook, I also recommend Aardvark for getting answers to some pretty obscure or detailed questions from people who really know the answer. I put out a question across various platforms asking women who run for their solution to this problem. Is there such a thing as a perfect sports bra?

I got many answers. A few were from women embracing the shape of their bodies as a reason not to run. Some were from women genuinely seeking the answer to this same question. And some were from those who had solved this problem, and how they did it. These I cheerfully passed along, both to the original asker and to anyone else who cared to know.

What I learned is that there is no one answer, as everyone is different. This was no surprise. There were a few themes, though. Chief among them was that for very well-endowed women, or women who truly want to pretty much stop any and all unwanted motion, the Enell bra is about the best there is. This thing is pretty amazing. There’s even a video on their site showing how it works. It’s almost like a little vest that hooks up the front. It looks a bit medieval, but apparently this thing really does the job. And in another stroke of awesome, they sell a “male support vest” for the moobs! No kidding. Other recommendations included Moving Comfort, Title Nine, and Champion (which is available at Target, and probably the least expensive of the bunch).

Interestingly, while Title Nine has a lot of different models, apparently from different manufacturers, the one they call the “Last Resort,” for when nothing else will do the job, is actually the Enell bra. So in a way, that recommendation was validated yet again.

So, here endeth my journey into the world of supportive women’s undergarments (as far as I know). I hope you’ve found it interesting, and for some of you, I hope it proves useful. Maybe it can remove at least one of the barriers between you and this wonderful activity called running. Take it from me, it can take you places you truly never expected to go.

(Special thanks to Miss Grace at boobemancipation.com for donating the photo.)

My grandma would yell “Don’t run!” whenever she spotted me moving at any pace faster than a stroll. I swear she said it every time I saw her. I thought she was being ridiculous. Clearly she didn’t want me to have any fun. Maybe I should blame her for my sedentary tendencies? But that’s another post.

When I watch my children playing — running, climbing, jumping, hurling heavy objects at each other — I can understand where she was coming from. It’s scary watching people you love do things that could harm them. But I try to remember the kid I was as I watch my own. Running is fun (which it’s taken me close to 30 years to rediscover). Risks are a part of learning about the world. So the question I keep coming back to is, when to intervene?

I suppose this is one of the essential questions of parenthood. It’s easy enough in the beginning, knowing when to get hands-on. With newborns, the answer to when to intervene is, pretty much always. They’re helpless. It’s all on you. One of the first tests of parenting is getting a baby to sleep. I’m watching good friends go through this again with their 4-month old. How long do you let her cry before you go in and do something? Every instinct says, “Go to the baby, pick up the baby, soothe the baby.” But at some point, the baby has to go to sleep on her own. This cycle plays out over and over for the rest of our children’s lives, with constantly evolving challenges, and steadily increasing consequences for failure.

With our two boys, three years apart, we get to navigate two different sets of overlapping issues as we work out how to parent them. With the 18-month old, right now it’s mostly about keeping him from falling to his death, electrocuting or drowning himself, or destroying our house. Most recently he’s taken to whacking his brother in the head with anything he can get his hands on (see: bam bam). At his age, it’s still mostly black and white. You step in to prevent the kid doing harm to himself or others. There’s a little grey area around how high to let him climb or how quickly to jump to the bigger boy’s rescue, but not much.

With the 4-year old, it’s already getting more complicated. He’s clearly much more self-sufficient, and, in our case, a much more cautious child than his little brother. He rarely does things that are truly dangerous, and usually operates pretty well within his capabilities. Sometimes he actually needs to be pushed a little outside his comfort zone. (I mean, really, how hard should it be to get a kid to try PIZZA?). Lately, with him, the question of when to intervene comes up more in social situations. Owen has lots of friends his age. With a few of his best friends, particularly the boys, everything is suddenly a competition. Who gets to be first? Whose is better? Who’s smarter? Faster? Stronger? You name it, they’ll turn it into a contest. Sometimes it’s all fun and games, but sometimes it turns into real conflict, complete with tears and even hitting. So, again the question — when do we get involved?

Sometimes they make it clear they WANT you involved, by coming and “telling on” the other for something he did or said. But even this isn’t a clear indication that stepping in is the right move. Sometimes they just need to work it out. I find myself saying, “Why are you telling ME? Why don’t you tell HIM to stop hitting/teasing/rubbing-his-string-cheese-on you?”

It’s part of our job description as parents to protect our children from real danger as much as we can. But that’s not the same as making sure they never have a bad experience. “Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.” (Bonus points to the first one to name that movie in the comments WITHOUT resorting to Google). Wise words, those, and something to remember as we decide how quickly to get involved in our children’s conflicts.

Now, I’ve seen parents who take the hands-off approach too far, in my opinion. I know it’s easy to judge how others parent their kids. It’s hard, and everybody’s got to make their choices. But, standing 10 feet away, completely oblivious as your child steals toys from other kids and proceeds to whale on them with said swiped toy? That, to me, is abdicating one’s parental responsibilities.

So I let my kids run, climb, and sometimes even reach out and touch the hot barbecue after I’ve told them 17 times it’s hot because nothing short of a little pain on the fingers is going to convince them it’s not a good idea to touch it. But I try not to allow them to do serious harm to themselves, or to those around them. This doesn’t always work. Sometimes they fall, sometimes they cry, and every day there’s a new challenge. A new question. I guess this is how it goes with parenting. Goodie for us.

I resisted reading Christopher McDougall’s Born To Run. I’d been wearing minimal footwear and reading about living, walking, and running barefoot or in minimalist shoes for over a year. Then along comes this book (and accompanying media blitz) and suddenly everybody’s like, “Hey, regular shoes are BAD! People run BAREFOOT or in these crazy TOE SHOES! Isn’t that CRAZY?” It reminds me of my first college roommate, Sam, who’d seen No Doubt when they were a scrappy local band and couldn’t like them once they hit it big. (Random aside: When I got the letter from my college telling me my roommate’s name and phone number, I immediately decided he was black. I had this whole image in my head of my black roommate and his family. Not sure where that came from, especially considering he was from Orange County, but the blond surfer dude he turned out to be was a far cry from my imagination’s original version of him). But unlike Sam, who refused to play Tragic Kingdom in our room, I played hard to get with Born To Run for a while, but finally gave in and read it.

Know what? It’s really good. It’s exciting, engaging, well researched, well written. It’s nonfiction and packed with a lot of science and other information, but it’s also a really good story. The descriptions of the ultra races, 50–100+ mile footraces through some amazing and rather inhospitable locales, and the freaks people who run them are gripping stories of human endurance, competition, and community. Discussions with evolutionary biologists, paleontologists, physiologists, and a bunch of other -ologists paint a fascinating picture of how, as humans, we evolved to be runners. While not a book about barefoot running, it does suggest the elaborate footwear we’ve been sold as necessary to run (by the massive marketing machines of the athletic shoe companies who make them) and the bad form they encourage may be part of why so many runners are constantly getting hurt.

One of the runners featured in the book is Barefoot Ted. An ultra runner and running coach who runs barefoot or in Vibram Fivefingers, he’s portrayed as a bit of a spaz who never shuts up. This both gets him into trouble and ultimately endears him to the other runners in the book. After spending a couple hours with him the other day, I can fairly say his depiction in the book seems a bit of an exaggeration, but only a bit. He’s very energetic, and he does talk a lot. I found him interesting and charming, but I could see how he could wear you out, especially if you were a reclusive hermit type living among the native Tarahumara in the Copper Canyon in Mexico.

I met Ted for one of his coaching clinics — Introduction to Barefoot Running. Along with about 16 other people, I stood, walked, ran, and jumped around the streets of Santa Monica near Palisades Park on a Friday morning. I’ve been running barefoot before, and gotten a few looks. When you’re standing in a crowd of almost 20 people, all naked from the ankles down, people notice. Most just sort of looked over and listen as they passed to whatever Ted was sharing at the moment about technique, history of running, etc, but a few couldn’t help commenting. Most were good natured enough, but one guy was downright hostile. He called us “freaks” and rather aggressively admonished us about how we were gonna get splinters if we attempted to take the flight of wooden stairs he’d just finished hauling himself up. We shrugged it off and went on our way, but it stuck with me, and his reaction calls up a few things about barefooting and minimal footwear and marketing and humans.

As Ted likes to say, we like to buy our solutions. Hurts when you run? Figure out the perfect shoe to solve your problem — the more padding, the better. Learn to run differently? Work on your form and technique? Bah. Too hard. Takes too long. And … there’s no money to be made by shoe companies selling technique, or barefoot running.

Ted calls the Fivefingers a Trojan Horse for barefooting. Finally, a product we can BUY to make a move toward a more natural approach to running. I get weird looks and many questions when I wear mine. A Facebook friend hopes barefoot running doesn’t catch on because he doesn’t like looking at people’s naked feet. I see shoes like these (which cost HOW MUCH?) and marvel at the power of marketing and fashion, which has convinced us shoes that resemble malformed hooves (as Twitter friend @suebob described these) are considered attractive, but shoes that look like feet, or even just the feet themselves, are thought to be repulsive or bizarre.

For me barefooting is a way to strip away some of the unnecessary layers that stand between us and our world. Are there some sharp/rough/hot/cold/yucky things out there I don’t really want to run on? Sure. But there’s a sense of being connected, through my body, to the Earth that only comes when I’m ACTUALLY TOUCHING IT (the Earth, not my body. Sicko.). Barefoot Ted isn’t dogmatic about barefoot running, and neither am I. Sometimes a little protection is desired, even necessary. So I’m out to discover out how LITTLE extra gear I need to run healthy, happy, and injury free, rather than figuring out how much I can pile on and still lift my feet.

This is kind of an update on a post from mid-October about getting in shape and barefoot/minimalist running. I’m still at it!

Before Owen was born, I was in the best shape of my life. You know those guys who are like, “I was in awesome shape in high school but as I got older things started going downhill.” I wasn’t one of those guys. I wasn’t fat in high school, but I was, uh, soft. I didn’t play sports. I did choir and drama and it pretty much showed. But in my early thirties, I got serious about getting in shape. I picked up a copy of Body For Life, started working out 5-6 days a week, eating 6 small balanced meals a day with an emphasis on protein, avoided sweets, gave up soda, and pretty soon I was looking and feeling badass.

Then … we had a baby.

You’ve heard this story (or lived through it) before. Sleep became a luxury, food was something shoveled in whenever possible, often whatever the kids didn’t finish, and if there was an option for comfort food, you took it. Cookies? Sure. Ice cream? OK. More wine? Yes, please! In addition to the food, I stopped going to the gym. Pretty soon I was back up to the weight I was at before I started working out.

So for the last 4+ years I’ve wanted to lose my baby weight. Lisa has since been pregnant again and given birth to our second child, but I’ve been struggling to drop the 15 pounds I added after the first one.

I mentioned in a previous post I’ve been working with a personal trainer. While that workout is very effective, it requires one to be pretty disciplined about what one eats. Truthfully, so did my 6-day-a-week workout routine. I was eating really well then, so I can’t pretend exercise alone EVER did the trick to take and keep weight off. I have to exercise AND eat right if I want to lose weight. Fuck genetics. (Sorry, Mom and Dad).

So after I stopped going to the trainer, I started doing other things. I seem to be at a place in my life where almost every activity involves some sort of gadget. So I picked up a few.

First, I got Wii Fit Plus. This wasn’t really planned. My friend and fellow blogger Kim invited me to a yoga party. I wasn’t sure what to expect. Or what to wear. But Kim said I would be the “token man.” I said I’d be there. Turns out the party was sponsored by Nintendo to let people (mostly bloggers) try their new Wii Fit Plus. [Full disclosure — I got a copy of the game and a Wii Fit board as gift for attending the party. I already had a Wii.] The Wii Fit Plus is Wii Fit, Plus some new stuff. I didn’t do all the new stuff, but I did a little yoga and checked out the new games. They’re fun and, like most Wii games, challenging but not super hard, a little goofy, and family friendly. The new “My Wii Fit” feature lets you save personalized workouts. They’ve added the ability to weigh your babies and pets. Cute, but if they think I’m picking up my 90 lb Black Lab to get him on the Wii Fit board with me, they’re insane. My favorite of the new games is Wipeout, or whatever they call it. It’s basically like that show where people make idiots of themselves going through an obstacle course. You get to do that without actually getting wet or injured or humiliated beyond the spectators in your TV room. Good times.

But if you want to do serious exercise, the Wii only goes so far. It doesn’t really qualify as what I consider a vigorous workout, especially compared to what I did in my trainer’s gym for the last year, which felt as close to weekly childbirth as I ever want to get.

So next I got a free iPhone app called “Lose It!” It lets you log everything you eat and any exercise you do. You tell it what you weigh, what you want to weigh, and how fast you want to lose it. It tells you how many calories you can eat daily. Everything you log is tracked against that goal. I’ve found logging what I eat to be the single best way to eat better. When I have to write it down, I think before I stick something in my mouth. Food. I’m talking about food. But come to think of it, if I have to write it down, it might work for other stuff, too. I’ve been using Lose It for about a week, and I give it a thumbs up.

After that, I got this:

When I broke up with my trainer (I hope it’s a temporary separation), he kindly gave me a home version of his workout to try and help me stay in some sort of shape. It requires almost no equipment. The problem is it doesn’t really have a good exercise for the large muscles of your back. The Iron Gym Xtreme takes care of that. It’s a fancy chin-up bar you stick in a doorway. No hardware required to attach it, and it’ll hold like 300 lbs. Thankfully I’m a few stones shy of THAT number.

Finally, I’m doing the thing I said I’d NEVER do: running. On purpose. And kinda far. For me, anyway. I’ve mostly run in my Vibram Fivefingers, and once totally barefoot. It’s fun. Despite being one of the lowest tech activities one could do, running has still resulted in acquisition of several gadgets. I got another iPhone app to track my runs – a fancy pedometer called iTreadmill. I also started logging my runs on Dailymile.com. It’s a social media site for runners and athletes. It’s cool. If you use it, friend me. I’m even considering signing up for a race or two. I’m not ready to start training for a marathon yet, but for the first time in my life the idea of doing that at some point doesn’t strike me as completely insane.

And for the last gadget, because I am a dad, after all, I got this baby:

The BOB Ironman Sport Utility Jogging Stroller. I got mine on Craig’s List, so gratefully I paid slightly less than the crazy money they want for one of these things new. Still, for a cheap hobby, running is starting to get expensive. It’s a cool chariot for the little dude, though. Nicholas has been out with me a couple times and he loves waving at the other runners (especially the ones with dogs), chatting, and kicking his feet.

The quest for a fitter me continues. I’ve also started singing more again, but this post is already way past too long, so that’ll have to wait for another day.