GeekApproach

I’ve got a whole host of things going on lately and really not enough time to think about or write about them all.  I’ve got some cool new projects I’m working on, and work may take a big potential upswing this week (fingers crossed!).

In the meantime, this week there are a few things goin on in tech land.  Tuesday is the launch of id Software’s latest game, Rage, which I have happily pre-ordered like every other id game that I own.  Rage promises to illustrate id Tech 5 the latest incarnation to their engine and probably the only competitor (IMHO) that the Unreal engine has.  I have nerd adoration for id’s Technical Director, John Carmack and the impressive amount of things he has created or envisioned over the last 20 years.  If you do anything with computer graphics you owe this man a lot.

Anyway, Rage looks awesome.  3 discs? 25 gigs of data?  This thing has to rock….

On Tuesday, Apple’s holding some press event.  I expect them to announce a lower-end iPhone 4S model and a top-end iPhone 5 and a release date for iOS5.  While I am in the beta, I’ll report on what others are surmising, namely FaceBook integration at a system level.  Personally I’m more happy about iCloud persistent storage for apps and what that means for devices: Game saves in the cloud anyone?  How about automated push downloading of the Daily without me having to manually fire up the app?  It’s very exciting.

Plus, I’m looking forward to getting rid of the “razor blade” phone that my dropped, cracked, but-barely-there-still-works iPhone 3GS currently us.  I’m due for an upgrade and I’m hoping to hear something good on Tuesday.  Stay tuned.

So, it’s been a while since I’ve updated. I’ve had a mess of things going on in my life personally, as well as trying to get trained up for the marathon.  It hasn’t been easy but I finally feel like things have settled out.

The past 3 weeks have been great training-wise.  I’ve worked out my blister situation, and aside from the fact that I still get them they don’t hurt any longer.  The past few weeks have all been about hill training and figuring out how to add in hills into the workout without falling apart.  I’ve felt that I’ve done pretty good with it.  Last week though, I pulled my back muscle a bit much at the gym– like hobbling around and not doing any running for the week issues.  I visited the chiropractor (my first visit ever), but generally I’ve just tried to ice it a lot, stretch, and be as gentle as I can.

I feel antsy about not running at all though.  Like perhaps I’m screwing myself over by not doing anything? Or that my event day performance is going to be completely trashed by not running for this week.   I do feel better though– my calves have had a chance to heal up, and I currently don’t have any blisters.  My knees don’t hurt, and my quads are working normally– that is to say, they don’t ache and burn when I walk.  I need to get back into it this week.

I also tried to quit the team.  There’s a financial component that I wasn’t feeling comfortable with hitting externally or taking on my own plate.  Luckily, my team stepped forward and isn’t letting me quit.  We’re trying some group fundraising ideas, and I’m hopeful they’ll work before race day.  Hoping to get some more data up here soon, but no promises.  As always, you can donate by clicking the link abovee