RUN OVER REDZONE

I’m losing my zeal for pro sports and finally cancelled NFL Redzone, figuring there’s got to be a better way to spend seven hours every Sunday. So I started the “RUN OVER REDZONE” club on Strava.

Just go for a run from 1-8pm EST on football Sundays. Run a mile. Run a mile every hour. Run for seven hours, whatever.

After watching more backyard ultra stuff, and walking 10+ miles per day for almost 100 days, I dunno… just sounds like something fun to try and do during the football season.

92 DAYS OF 10+ MILES PER DAY

I’ve hit 92 days of walking at least 10 miles per day, covering 1034.8 miles which is about 11.24 miles per day. I’m down about 18lbs., and finally able to fit back into my medium hoodies which is good news since the evenings are getting cooler.

At 50, I’ll take it.

The photo above is from a Saturday morning adventure, when I woke up at 4am to meet my friend at their camp site. It involved navigating a 1000′ climb up the Appalaican Trail in the dark, and it was fucking fantastic.

I’m running some of these miles here and there, but not many. I’ll do a 3 mile run here and there. The other day I did an 8 mile trail run. But I’m taking that very slow, since I’m having a lot of fun “just” walking, and also I don’t wanna get injured.

All this walking takes about 3.5 hours per day, which sounds like a lot, but not if you consider some people have screen times of 5+ hours a day. I don’t walk all these miles at once. I duck out in between Zoom calls, and while waiting for client approvals in Asana. The other day I was going to a party with a friend in the afternoon, so I buckled up and went out for a 5 mile walk at around 7am. Got home, ate a little, then went back out at 9am for the remaining 5 miles.

I’ve burned through two pairs of shoes already, settling in nicely with some Altras. I started out just using the the Apple Health tracking on my iPhone, but I’ve since started tracking each walk with my Coros running watch. Less ambient walking, really, so walking around the grocery store and such doesn’t count, but that’s okay.

THE PSYCHIC WEIGHT OF BELONGINGS

Phil Gyford writes about renting a “skip” (a dumpster, for us American folks):

I’m increasingly aware of the psychic weight of belongings and disposing of stuff that is not and will not serve any physical or emotional purpose lifts the spirits.

I did something similar earlier this year when I had to discard of a massive TV that I was gifted, and it felt so good. Our lease ends in less than a year and I’m already in clean-out mode.

TURNING OUR BACKS ON BILLIONAIRES

Sony took away digital movies that people paid for.
Streaming services keep raising rates.
Amazon bricked old Kindles.

Sounds like the LA Clippers broke salary cap rules.
Sports teams use tax payer money to build stadiums.
Billionaires and VC just bought the Lakers, I guess.
See also, The American Sports Plutocracy Is Bullshit.

People will start turning their backs on all this.

Back to buying books, borrowing movies from the library, going to local sporting events. I can see movie rental places coming back. Hobby shops.

A collective act of turning our backs on the whole corporatized entertainment industry. Playing board games instead of video games. Hosting dinners for friends and neighbors. More pick up games.

“What do all men with power want,” asks the Oralce. “More power.”

Modern top tier entertainment can’t stop. It must seek growth and profit while draining the very soul and joy from everything we fell in love with in the first place.

Good riddance.

YOUTUBE NEEDS MORE OUTPUT

YouTube will always need more. More viewers, more time spent on the site, more more more.

Some folks want to “monetize their channels,” meaning, get a cut of the ad revenue from views. Before you had to 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours over the last year.

Well, YouTube says you need 8,000 hours.

From TechCrunch:

YouTube announced on Monday that new creators will have to meet higher thresholds to begin earning money from ads and subscriptions.

Creators who want to start earning on the platform will need at least 8,000 qualified watch hours over the past year or 20 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days. Currently, creators need 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours over the past year or 1,000 subscribers and 10 million Shorts views over the past 90 days.

More content, more chances for people to keep watching, and an even bigger investment for people looking to get monetized.

As Seth Godin says, the problem with the race to the bottom is you just might win.

SLEEPING ON THE PORCH

I slept on my porch last night. Lived here for like six years now, but finally did it. A piece of tyvek, an inflatable sleeping pad, my camping quilt, and a for-real pillow. Laid under the stars, but I could only see three of them because of all the light pollution. I absolutely had to wear an eye mask.

Nearby a refrigerator compressor would kick on every 10 minutes or so. It got cold enough to put on a hoodie in the middle of the night (it’s August). I woke up about quarter to six in the morning. It was cloudy, but I could see the sky brighten.

Part of me wanted to do this just to try the “cowboy camping” thing in a safe place. I can’t believe people really do that in the woods, or on mountains. But that was fun, and I’m camping again later this week, so maybe I won’t set up the tent and instead I’ll lay in the middle of the woods and see what happens.

ON NOT POSTING FOR EVERYONE

I used to take a ton of photos during my “Bike Nerd” years (from 2010-2012ish or so). I’d post them to Twitter and Instagram, journaliing my adventures in real time more or less.

Without social media (aside from Substack Notes, eh), I rarely post photos from my adventures. Sure, some end up as the lead image on my blog posts on Social Media Escape Club, or I post them here on occasion. Otherwise, I send them to friends mostly.

The urge to post to “everyone” was replaced by the joy of sending to just a few people. A photo of a grand view, or a reminder of something we talked about recently.

One dear friend and I swap photos of the beatiful scenery from our adventures, with an ill fitting caption like, “so ugly.” “Horrible.”

I feel like if posting to 1000 people on social media will only be seen by 100 people, and really only 4 or 5 of them reallly “engage” with it, why not just those things to those 4 or 5 people, you know?