Comments (19)

By kilax, November 14, 2014 6:39 am

Or instagram or any other social media platform that uses metrics to show you the amount of “interest” in your postings, whether by likes, followers, etc. (And really… was the “like” feature always there? I can’t even recall!)

Well, this article is interesting (pdf here) (highly recommend if you have the time to read it!). The author discovered there is a browser plug-in called “Facebook Demetricator,” which removes all of the “numbers” from Facebook – likes count, who liked it, dates, etc. The plug-in description explains it well:

The Facebook interface is filled with numbers. These numbers, or metrics, measure and present our social value and activity, enumerating friends, likes, comments, and more. Facebook Demetricator is a web browser addon that hides these metrics. No longer is the focus on how many friends you have or on how much they like your status, but on who they are and what they said. Friend counts disappear. ’16 people like this’ becomes ‘people like this’. Through changes like these, Demetricator invites Facebook’s users to try the system without the numbers, to see how their experience is changed by their absence. With this work I aim to disrupt the prescribed sociality these metrics produce, enabling a network society that isn’t dependent on quantification.

Interesting to think that you get your “social value” from places like Facebook, but hey! That is the society we live in now. And that is what made the author of the article try it – they read a paper the plug-in developer, Benjamin Grosser, had written, where the point was that people are using these numbers to assign value to their relationships and life. SCARY! (or not? normal, maybe? sadly?)

So what did the author think after using the plug-in?

• They weren’t sure if it was “liberating or invalidating” to not know how many likes a photo would get. 
• They did like not seeing who liked something, then liking it themselves, based on its merit and not feeling like they had to, because their friends did. I thought this was really interesting. I have liked things after seeing a friend like them, too. 
• They felt immune to “viral posts, to Facebook peer-pressure, and to acutely targeted ads.” They hardly clicked anything, anymore, feeling like they were in a vacuum.

Super interesting, right?!

Alright, now tell me…  would you try this Demetricator plug-in? Or do you NEEEEEED your numbers?!

Of course, I turned it on, to try! Here is a screenshot of the changes I noticed so far (showing my blog page for privacy reasons, but it’s similar on the personal page):

(Also, if someone likes a comment, it doesn’t show who, or how many, just that it was liked – you have to click on it to see by whom. And I really like that it turns off how many unread posts you have in your groups!!!)

But, I think I will still see these metrics in the pages app on my phone and on the iPad! We’ll see how this experiment goes!

Comments (14)

By kilax, November 13, 2014 6:31 am

Crazy how much the closing statement of an article can make me think so much about “tribe,” labels, and branding.

In Rachel Toor’s December Running Times column (pdf here), she compares the “excessive celebrations” of football to the ways runners display their accomplishments. It inevitably comes around to the way runners sometimes celebrate themselves (and their feats) on social media, or by putting a 13.1 or 26.2 sticker on their car, or by wearing their medal or race shirt around. She ends the article saying she misses the subtlety of an old giant Timex Ironman watch she used to wear, because it identified her to the tribe of runner without being so “in your face” about it (now she uses her phone and a Garmin instead). 

Tribe. What a perfect way to put it. 

There are many tribes to which we can choose to identify ourselves with – the type of exercise you do, what you eat, what you drink, if you have kids or not, if you have pets or not, the types of activities you do (or don’t do), your religion… you get the idea. But! How do we identify ourselves to these tribes, and… do we want to?

Like Toor, I personally prefer subtlety in my tribe identification. Ha ha, funny I say that, since I have the tribe of running permanently inked on my back, but that is not going to be visible that often.  I like the tribe reveal to be more organic, like a few weeks ago, when wearing an old pair of running shoes (to change out of, obvs) to a meeting caused a contractor to ask me what I think of those shoes, and ask me about running.

Subtlety (actually, privacy) is something I’ve started to prefer over the last few years, really, as social media has expanded. It’s blatant that people are making assumptions about me based on what I put out there (and how they interpret it), so I really don’t put much of critical substance in the interwebs. 

And that is the risk with tribe identification, and why I avoid being identified as part of some of the tribes I could. We identify in the first place, because it makes us feel good to belong. It feels good to be part of a group. It feels good to say, “I did that!” or “I don’t do that!” or “I made that!” or “I drink that!” or “I believe that!” or whatever. And have people relate. 

And it gives you power. By claiming a tribe, you are taking control over your identification/personal branding. But you are also giving power to other people, to make assumptions about you, based on what they already think about that tribe. Confusing, right? So do you claim or tribe, or not?

Not that we should give a crap about other people’s assumptions. But, it may still make you think twice about which tribes you identify with! That is why I avoid the tribe of vegan. I don’t go out of my way to tell people I am vegan. Vegans have a pretty negative connotation, and I can totally see why. A lot of them that I’ve met have been judgmental a-holes.  Which is a shame, because “vegan” can be a really useful label to use, when trying to explain your dietary preferences. Too bad it’s so damn loaded of a word. 

Now that you’ve read this far (if you made it through the blabbering), you can probably think of some tribe identification you have seen in other people. I see it A LOT. And unfortunately, some of it is people forcing themselves to do things to identify with that tribe, despite not liking it, or preferring it. I see this a lot in the health and fitness arena, and honestly, it concerns me. People who really want to do a certain exercise, because they want to be seen as someone who does that… despite hating the exercise. Or people who follow a certain diet, and struggle with it, but want to be seen as “healthy.” I am sure you’ve seen it to. 

I encourage everyone to follow what Torr said in her column – “We each get to figure out how much cheering we require and get it where we can.” Do what you need. Identify with the tribes you need to, how you want to. Post away on Facebook if you need to! Don’t, if you don’t like it. Share what you want. Keep things private. Whatever. Just don’t get too lost from the tribe of you! That’s the most important tribe with which to identify. 

Comments (20)

By kilax, November 12, 2014 5:00 am

In 2009, feeling ecstatic about running after my first half marathon, I immediately signed up for a full marathon, and continued to run all of my runs at my half marathon race pace – 9:00 minute miles. This was before I understood that running plans ideally have a variety of paces in them* (long slow distance, speedwork, tempo, and my fave – easy) and that I really, really should not be “racing” my long runs. 

During one of those long training runs, I visited a beautiful local forest preserve – Grant Woods. The forest preserve is split in to north and south sections. The north section is forested and hilly,

and the southern section is mostly flat prairie. 

Hee hee, it didn’t look quite like these photos then, because it was summer, but you get the idea. 

I ran there once in 2009 and then avoided running there for an entire year, despite it being so close to my house. 

Why?

I was convinced, CONVINCED, that the hills there hurt my calf, and eventually caused a chain reaction that caused a stress fracture in my shin, and derailed me from running my first marathon in 2009. I thought the place had bad running juju.

Yeah, 2009 Kim was not so smart. 2009 Kim was a running n00b, and did not have running friends (or read running magazines) to tell her to not race her long runs, ha ha!

After I got three more stress fractures in 2010 (not from running fast, but) from lack of strength training and wearing the wrong shoes, I finally admitted it wasn’t the fault of the Grant Woods Hills. And went back. 

But every time I go there, now, I think about how I felt like the preserve had bad running juju for me, for so long. And how I let that keep me from maximizing a beautiful place to train that is so close to home!

Do you have any places you’ve deemed to have “bad running juju” (for you)? If so, why?

The other place for me is not so close to home, but it’s a place where I’ve had a bad run nearly every time I’ve gone there – Busse Woods. And I am thinking about doing a half there this month. It’s time to let that place have some redemption (although I am not sure how it could become any less boring… maybe a lot of runners crowding the path will make it interesting!).

*Ha! Not that I by any means do them – I just know it’s advised. I do most of my runs at an easy pace. 

Comments (23)

By kilax, November 11, 2014 11:58 am

To be thinking about holiday gifts?

Usually I am all ready for Christmas by November 1. I know. I am one of those people. 

Oh! And I don’t mean ready in the sense that I have my house decorated and meals planned and gifts purchased. Ha ha ha. No. 

I mean ready, in the sense that I am excited for it! Feeling gung ho about it!

Well, it’s November 11th, and I am still waiting for those feelings to kick in. The holiday still seems far away, even though it isn’t. 

I’m not feeling grinchy or anything. I was super excited to get my first Starbucks red cup drink last week. 

I’m ready for the radio station to start playing holiday tunes. I’m greatly looking forward to watching holiday movies with my mom when she visits in a week. And somewhat looking forward to outlet mall shopping with her, ha ha. 

And that’s probably the big thing that is making me feel like I am not in my normal holiday mood – the gift ideas. I usually only have a few presents purchased by this time in November and some ideas for the rest, but this year, I have very few (I have an idea for one friend, and a few for Steven). And I am not feeling too excited about present research. 

Because of that, and because I think it’s a fun idea, I asked a few friends if they wanted to do “experiences” this year instead of gifts. A spa day. A hotel and a race the next day. Spending time together. Making memories. Ha ha, queue cheesy music here—>!

Luckily, the friends I talked to about it really liked the idea, and didn’t seem to think it was somewhat (only somewhat) what it feels like to me – a cop out. But the thing is, the friends I asked are the friends I would have no problem finding gifts for, and kind of gift to all year long.  They’re the people I feel really excited about having a day planned out in the calendar to spend with. 

And researching races and other things to do with friends is a lot more appealing to me, right now, than researching gifts. Ha ha, that is probably because another reason I don’t have Christmas-brain yet is because I have marathon-brain! I am so focused on that December 14th marathon, that 11 days after, I’m going to be like “Christmas, what?!??!?!” Ha ha. 

Do you get in to the holiday mood? About what time of year?

Comments (28)

By kilax, November 10, 2014 12:42 pm

Where you work, do you spend most of your time sitting or standing? Do you have the option to switch from one to the other?

Don’t worry, this isn’t going to become a lecture on how sitting all day is killing us and negating any exercise we do, ever (we’ve already discussed that!).

My day job is actually in office design, and it excites me that one of the current popular trends is adjustable work-height desks. So, throughout the day, you can move the height of your work surface so you can sit or stand (sometimes this is a function of the desk itself, and sometimes, it’s something you put on your desk, and sit your laptop on). 

I really hope this trend sticks around, because I like the idea of being able to adjust how I am working. In fact, I do it now, at the office and at home. Neither place is fancy enough to have a moveable desk height (manual or automatic), but I have bar height surfaces at both locations that I do use when I feel like standing – typically in the afternoon at home, and last week, at work when I realized how sore I was from my self-inflicted DOMS. Ha ha. 

Chair for Data to use to keep me company

Now, just don’t ask me how I feel about the trend of treadmill desks… I still need to try one before I can form an opinion. Yeah, that’s it!

Comments (13)

By kilax, November 9, 2014 11:45 am

Highlight(s) of the Week: Teaching the new strength class, a surprisingly fast 5K, and lots of company on my runs!

Monday | November 3, 2014: 5 m run (w/Kelly) + 8 m run + teaching strength class x2
Loc: Grayslake, Temp: 41°/41°, Time: 47:54, Pace: 9:34 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: great
Loc: Millennium Trail to Nippersink FP, Temp: 58°/57°, Time: 1:16:54, Pace: 9:37 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: hungry
Strength: Two dumbbell, Difficulty: medium, Felt: hyper
Strength: Two dumbbell, Difficulty: easy, Felt: great, excited that my new class was so fun!
Tuesday | November 4, 2014: 7 m run (w/Kelly)
Loc: Grayslake, Temp: 53°/54°, Time: 1:10:13, Pace: 10:02 avg, Difficulty: medium, Felt: challenged by the wind. And by my stomach, ha ha.
Wednesday | November 5, 2014: rest
Thursday | November 6, 2014: 5 m run (w/Kelly)
Loc: Grayslake, Temp: 46°/46°, Time: 49:12, Pace: 9:50 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: good, happy to work out the DOMS
Friday | November 7, 2014: teaching strength class + Full Moon 5K
Strength: Body Bars, Difficulty: easy (mostly observing), Felt: good
Loc: Zion, Temp: 41°/40°, Time: 23:41 (23:29 official), Pace: 7:38 (7:34 official), Difficulty: mostly easy, Felt: great/strong
Saturday | November 8, 2014: 7.2 m run (w/Bobbi, part of Efit Run/Walk Social)
Loc: Independence Grove, Temp: 43°/44°, Time: 1:12:45, Pace: 10:06 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: great
Sunday | November 9, 2014: 18 m run (middle 8 w/Bobbi)
Loc: Savanna to McDonald Woods and back, Temp: 36°/42°, Time: 3:08:02, Pace: 10:27 avg, Difficulty: easy, Felt: mostly good (just super frustrated with the wind at the end, and struggling with a headache)

Notes:

• Holy cow, I had DOMS so bad late Tuesday and Wednesday, from teaching those two Monday night strength classes. Lesson learned (derrrr) – don’t go all out when teaching back to back classes, Kim!
• But! The new class went really well! The students are a lot of fun and they picked it up quickly! I’m looking forward to working with them again this Monday. 
• Next week is my first (of two) peak weeks of training and I am really excited! I am doing a virtual half marathon on Tuesday and a 22 miler on Saturday! Fun fun fun!
• The forecast is calling for some lows in the 10s and 20s next week! That is totally fine with me – if the wind mostly goes away. Ha ha! Would you rather run in “cold” temps or in warmer temps with high winds?

Link to Training Week 263

Comments (20)

By kilax, November 8, 2014 10:17 am

Well, this race ended up being a total surprise!

Ha ha, not a surprise that I was doing it (quite a few from my multisport club had been planning on doing this Friday night race for awhile) or how the race was organized, but my personal effort!

In my mind I was going to do speedwork once a week in October to prep for this race. In reality, I did it once – I’ve made long, slow miles my focus.

So come race day, I looked up my time from last year on this course (a different race but several in the Zee Bee Run Squad series use the same course) and saw I ran a 25:27. “If I have a really good day, maybe I could beat that,” I thought. But I really had my doubts about maintaining 8:00 minute miles.

The race started just after 6:00 pm and I took off, feeling great. I glanced down at my watch and saw a mid 7:00 pace. “Crap! I went out too fast! I can’t maintain this!”

But I did for two miles (7:24, 7:35), and felt awesome, like I was hardly working. It wasn’t until I started to get the typical stomach cramp right before mile 2, that I slowed down, running that mile in just under 8:00. My legs and lungs felt good but my stomach said no – I need to try a tip my friend told me after the race – breathe deeper to get more air to my diaphragm.

I sped up to a 6:38 pace for the last tenth because I heard someone coming up behind me – ha ha, they totally had more energy and passed me! Luckily, my time, 23:29 was still good enough for 2nd in the 30-34 age group! Woo hoo! I wasn’t sure I’d ever place in that age group!

We had six Efit runners and everyone did really well – we had five age group placements!

And Kelly, my running partner, got a PR, and Dawn got her first ever age group award! Awesome!!!

I really enjoyed doing this with the Efit crew. Ha ha, especially cause there is a hella long (hour+) raffle before awards and it was fun to hang with friends during that!

The last race in this series is in four weeks! I wonder if I’ll have another surprise then. Ha ha, just kidding – I won’t get greedy!

A few other notes:

• I ran with my headphones and the beats helped! Although some songs worked better than others. Weird. 
• They ran out of adult sized t-shirts in this year’s race shirt and offered a shirt from last year. A nice offer, but I don’t need more shirts, so I got a kid sized shirt for Kelly to take for her kids. I liked the design and phrase on it!

• Ha ha, I also sent Kelly home with my raffle prize – I won the same thing as last year. 

• (TMI) I had the taste of blood in my mouth for most of the race. Weird? I think I may have spit up a bit too, after. That could just be my nose being all dried out. I am fighting the beginning of a cold this week and spend most of the night sneezing, after the race. 
• I wore my Asics GEl-Lyte33s and think the lighter shoes gave me a mental (and maybe physical?) boost!
• I studied the course map a bit so I could run the tangents – that helped!
• The results for this race are all over the place – last year, the winner of my age group ran it in 29:25. This year, it was 22:09, me at 23:29, and third at 31:18. You never know who will show up! I feel lucky I placed!
• The results and free (!!!) photos were up late last night, after the race! I love that! 
• It’s funny (to me, that) this is the second “Full Moon” 5K I have done this year!
• Time to get smaller shorts. You can see in my finish line pic that they are creepin’ way up my leg. Classy. Ha ha. And that smile? That is because last year my finish line pic looked like this. 

Comments (26)

By kilax, November 6, 2014 6:18 am

• I love it when I am trying to learn more about a program at work by reading a brochure about it, and find my name listed under contacts, as an expert on the program. Um…
• It feels like Steven and I haven’t seen as many movies in the theater this year as we have in the past – only ten so far! On Tuesday we saw Interstellar on the IMAX. I enjoyed the story (minus one hokey bit) and liked the acting and the music (when it wasn’t too loud <— old lady alert). And it was a MILLION times better than the last thing I saw in the IMAX – Gravity. Uhhh. Shudder. Ha ha. I hope Interstellar is an Oscar nominee, so we have a head start on seeing the movies on that list. Ha ha. 

• I’m going strong with re-learning Spanish – I am on a 53 day streak on the Duolingo app! I finally hit a snag, though, when it came to re-learning verbs in past tense. The app started me off with all of the irregular verbs and I was having a hard time remembering how to conjugate the normal ones! Luckily, I bought this book that xaarlin recommended, and it’s helping me! A few people have recommended I use a Spanish tutor (for conversation) as well. Hmm… maybe if I keep it up! Right now, it is really rewarding to work on it a little bit each day!
• The hardest part about getting a tattoo (for me) was not soaking it under water – luckily that ended a week and a half ago! I LOVE taking way too hot baths and it was hard to go without one for two weeks (ha ha, I still showered!). (And okay, okay, not scratching it was hard, too – it got pretty itchy!)

• After running with music made me feel so energized last week, I decided to make a playlist for the 5K I am doing this Friday night! I mostly chose electronic songs – those seem to get me going the most!

• All the pictures in this post blow, so here is a fun one! Can you believe I didn’t buy that sweater?! Did I ever tell you guys about the person who contacted me last year after I posted this, asking me to sell that sweater to them? They told me they contacted every Target and they are all sold out, so I should sell them mine, cause they really need it. Um, what?! No one needs a cat sweater. Not even me!
  

Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 67

Comments (31)

By kilax, November 5, 2014 5:03 am

From last December to May of this year, one of my Monday night Efit students (and friends!), Dawn, also brought her oldest son (a high school junior) to class – to take the class, as well!

From last May – Dawn and her older son two in from the right

Dawn’s older son left the class in the summer and has now “graduated” (hee hee) to one-on-one sessions. But this Monday, her younger son started taking the class with us!

From Monday – Dawn and her younger son three in from the right

I have to say, I think it’s pretty darn cool for high school students to be taking strength classes with a parent. I mean, it’s one thing to know that your parent works out, and to simply be encouraged to do it because they do as well, but to see them in action? And workout side-by-side? Neat-o! I think that is so fantastic!

Oh, and let’s note, to like your parent enough to work out with them (and in public! ha ha) says some awesome things about your relationship, too!

In high school, would you have worked out with your mom or dad?

I actually did in high school – my dad played volleyball with friends one night a week, and I went with him several times. I really enjoyed that one-on-one time… and learning lots of colorful language!

Comments (22)

By kilax, November 4, 2014 6:14 am

If you follow my blog’s Facebook page, you know I like to share photos of sunsets and sunrises (and… the sky in general, ha ha). On many occasions, the glimpse of a beautiful skyscape has caused me to pause a run, or pull over my car and stop, or get out of bed and go outside, to enjoy it and snap a photo for memory. 

Is anybody else crazy about documenting the beautiful sky? (if you are, share your pics on my blog Facebook wall or email them to me!)

Luckily, my friend Kelly is just as obsessed as I am, and we are constantly sharing our sky photos with one another. Or alerting the other person if they need to find their way outdoors or to a window right meow so they don’t miss something great. 

October was a such a beautiful month, and I did share a large amount of the photos I took, but when I was doing my monthly photo frame activity, I realized seeing them all together made me feel happy, so I decided to put them all in one spot so I can look back at them whenever I want. Maybe I will make this a monthly post (doubtful, ha ha). 

You can click on a photo in the gallery to see the whole thing (then use your back back button to come back since that was the extent to which it would let me code the gallery). With the exception of the Milwaukee and Chicago photos, all of these are taken near my home! It’s so beautiful where we live!