Prince - P@$$y Control - A modern coming of age story.

While scouring the bowels of the internet yesterday, I came across a Prince video. I love to hate Prince. I do not like him and have had many debates with people who think he is a genius. Ooooh, he plays 17 different instruments. So what? He makes shitty music with them. Dream Theater plays their instruments really well and can’t write a song to save their lives.

My judgment on his music may be clouded by just how much I hate Prince himself. Changing his name to a symbol and showing up in pictures with “slave” written on his cheek makes me want to strangle his midget neck. Waaaah, I’m a rich rockstar and my record company is being a meanie. Shut up. Worst of all is his Napoleonic sex god act that is so trite and annoying. Apparently, by declaring yourself a sex god and making bland music with lots of sexual references you actually become a sex god. Who knew?

However, my hatred of Prince is tempered by one thing and that thing is Pussy Control. The song itself encapsulates everything I hate about the man, but it is so damn catchy. First off, the song is named “Pussy Control.” You either have to be a genius or just completely full of yourself to give that title to a song. I lean towards the latter. The beat is entirely bland with Prince talk-singing over top. The chorus is an over the top high pitched male voice singing “aaaaahhhh Pussy Control” with an unmemorable keyboard riff and cheesy record scratching.

That said, the lyrics are such an amazingly ridiculous story that it overrides the unimaginative music and catapults the song into unforgettable heights. If you are not familiar with the lyrics/story of Pussy Control, Pussy Control is the actual name of the character. The song begins with Prince, the narrator, welcoming “boys and mother fucking girls.” As the title of this post suggests, the song is a modern coming of age story of a young black woman and “begins in a schoolyard, a little girl skipping rope with her friends.” “One day over this hoodie, she got beat for some clothes and a rep.” Pussy, emotionally scarred from this experience goes to college, earns a master degree and “hire[s] the heifers that jumped her and made everyone of them work for free.” In essence, Pussy has escaped her ghetto/prole roots, become a financial success, and taken revenge on all those who have wronged her in the past by making them her indentured servants.

The second verse focuses on Pussy’s life as a successful business woman. Pussy is now rich and meets a “fool named Trick” who, “wanna stick her, uh, talking more shit than a bit.” Trick promises her fame if she were to”sing a lick on his hit”, a clever double entendre by our narrator. Pussy of course doesn’t fall for this cheap ploy. She rejects Trick and reminds him that “every women in the world ain’t a freak” and that “[Trick] could go platinum four times” and “still couldn’t make what [Pussy] make in a week.”

Obviously, Pussy being a successful modern woman is having trouble finding love. Men are intimidated by her or just trying to take advantage of her. Luckily in verse three, our hero-narrator Prince comes along. Prince meets Pussy at “the club – International Balls.” Pussy at the time was “rolling 4-deep; 3 sisters and a weepy-eyed white girl drivin’ a hog.” Prince, being the sex god that he is, is not intimidated by Pussy Control though. He unrepentantly tells Pussy, “Motherfucker, I know your reputation and I’m astounded that you’re here.”

Sensing Pussy’s isolation and knowing that he is the only man confidant enough to be with her, he goes on to tell Pussy “I fear you’re lonely and want two know, a 12 o’clock straight up nigga that don’t give a shit that you’re Pussy Control.” Notice how Prince both compliments yet backhandedly insults Pussy. He simultaneously increases his value while decreasing hers. He then begins to rebuild her by complimenting Pussy’s physical appearance saying that it is “hard as hell to keep [his] mind off a body that would make every rich man want to sell, sell, sell.” Prince has obviously read his “pick-up artist” books, e.g. The Game.

Prince, much like Aesop, is careful to make sure his audience is enriched from his story. He leaves us with, “the moral of this motherfucker is ladies make ‘em act like they know. You are, was, and always will be Pussy Control.”

With that, I love to hate Prince. A flawed poet, his sexually explicit stories of modern living enrich us all. Yet, despite these beautiful tales of romance, everything about him screams arrogant, compensating midget. Now, listen to the song for yourself and try not to dance:

Smoked Salmon Boozing

Alaska Distillery in Wasilla created smoked salmon vodka. You can bet your sweet bippy I will be downing a chipotle salmon bloody mary at Bear Tooth this weekend when I am in Anchorage.

I'm shilling for SPOT today.

I decided that if I was going to be traversing around Alaska, I might as well take advantage of new safety technology so I bought a SPOT Personal Tracker. The prices are now down to a reasonable $100 (plus $140 yearly fee). SPOTs are GPS/emergency beacons for the lazy and technology inept. It is one weatherproof unit that performs three functions: tracking, emergency signaling and non-emergency messaging. Using GPS satellites, SPOT will take your location or track you, taking your position every 20 minutes. It also sends out an emergency signal to a central call center who contacts emergency rescue professionals. Finally, it will send out and “okay” signal with a preset message to your contacts, giving your position on Googlemaps. This is useful if you are just running late, but not in an emergency situation.

I tested it out this weekend. I drove to Counsel (the village at the end of the road going east) to meet people for a boat ride up the river and tracked my progress. Unfortunately, I drive too slowly, didn’t give myself enough time, and ended up missing the boat. I had never driven too far down the roads so this was a first. The Ford Ranger, while 4-wheel drive and a pretty reliable, doesn’t handle washboard roads very well. It is too light and the ass end kicks out . I used to keep sand bags in the back, but they were left back in Vermont.

After realizing I missed the boat, I walked around a little bit and then drove 76 miles home, stopping to check out all the old mining equipment along the way. There are a couple nice dredges and old mining camps on the road. Also, at the bridge in Solomon there is a great abandoned railroad train. Literally a whole train, engines and cars included. The train is smaller than your average train though - a rusty pigmy ghost train. It was brought up to the Seward Peninsula during the peak of the gold rush only to have its tracks washed away by a storm. So like everything else up here too big to be dumped in the ocean, it was abandoned.

The SPOT did just what it said it would do. I tested it when I started and it sent a signal with my position to my cell phone and to my father (who incorrectly guessed that my location on Front St. as being at the Board of Trade). It also tracked my trip. Here is my journey to Counsel:

One problem with all this cheap and easily available technology is that it tends to make people too brave. Instead of being cautious, idiots take stupid risks figuring that they can just hit their transponder button and wait for the helicopter. Hell, Discovery made a highly unwatched show with just that premise – come to Alaska to survive for 8 days but hit the button when you can’t hack it. This taxes the emergency responders, puts them at risk, and costs the State lots of money.

For example, my favorite news story since arriving in Alaska was this little gem from last summer. Two guys from Bethesda, Maryland used their transponder because the Alaskan summer was too bright and they were exposed to too much daylight. You read the correctly. No bear attack. No broken limbs. They got floatplaned out because they were at risk of sunburn. It is not surprising though. I lived in Bethesda for four months. There are more BMWs and Mercedes per capita than any other location on Earth. The Sunday morning jogging groups are the ass-hats who wear an aerodynamic five bottle hydration belt for a 4 mile jog/walk. These people freak out if the Bagel Store runs out of lox and chive cream cheese. In other words, complete pansies.

However, now with GPS and emergency beacons, these city dwelling panzies can go be John Wayne and Jack London. As much as I think that Chris McCandless and Tim Treadwell were retards whose death is not really mourning-worthy, at least they died being total idiots and didn’t pussy-foot it. They ran off into the woods without a safety button, and died from it. Hopefully I rely on my Arctic survival training and Boy Scout like preparedness and keep my adventures safe. If I never hit the 9/11 button and waste $140 for the next 20 years, I think I will be able to call my Alaskan adventures a success.

Weekend Movie Round-up

It was a movie-filled weekend. I have been slacking on my movie watching lately. I had actually been on a spree of doing things outside, but the Midnight Sun Festival was in town, which meant live music at the bars, which meant lazy hangover days filled with movies – interrupted by short pussyfoot jogs to sweat out the booze.

Showing on the small screen was Alfred Hitchcock’s 1956 version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, All The King’s Men (1949), and The Girlfriend Experiment (2009). Lots of spoilers ahead, so read at your own risk.

I really like Alfred Hitchcock. I grew up watching Alfred Hitchcock Presents on Nick at Night. The Birds, Psycho, and Rear Window are untouchable classics in suspense and horror. However, The Man Who Knew Too Much fell flat. This is a shame because the plot holds a lot of potential. The son of a Doctor, played by the usually awesome Jimmy Stewart, and his former stage star wife, played by Doris Day, is kidnapped after Stewart, on vacation in Morocco, learns about the plan to assassinate a high level politician in jolly old England. The kidnappers say the son, played by some annoying little kid, will be returned in exchange for Stewart not revealing the assassination plot. Stewart and Day are faced with the choices to remain quiet and trust the kidnappers, try to get help, or go after the bad guys themselves. Of course they go it alone and of course they get the kid back and everybody is happy. I’m surprised this hasn’t been remade with Will Smith, his annoying son, and a bomb in NYC. Actually, it probably has and I just missed the previews.

There were a few good scenes in the film, most notably the assassination attempt in a giant concert hall where the actors don’t speak for a good ten minutes and the orchestra/chorus that is performing provide a gradual and suspenseful build up. An unneeded taxidermist mix-up was cute and clever, but again, unnecessary especially in a two hour movie. All this was overshadowed by lackluster performances and lots of “no way somebody would do that” moments. Stewart and Day have no chemistry. I don’t know if this is a modern era thing, but with two starring leads I expect good dialogue and emotion between them. Alone, each put in a passable performance, but as husband and wife it was totally unbelievable. They couldn’t even make marital squabbles sound believable.

As for the no way somebody would do that, there is no way that a couple would let their child wander around Morocco with two English folk that they met the day before and after the mother accused of spying on them. There is no way that you don’t take that child to the police station with you. There is no way that an assassin uses a pistol to shoot somebody half a concert hall away. There is no way that you sit through a full church service that the kidnappers are putting on.

Finally, maybe this is no enough women’s studies classes talking, but does anybody remember the good old days when it was appropriate to not tell your wife immediately about your child’s kidnapping and then use your position as a doctor to force sedatives on her before you reveal it? You know how hysterical and emotional the female brain is. They just can’t deal with stress, best to drug them.

All The King’s Men was the much better of my two classic choices. In case you don’t know, All The King’s Men is based on the book of the same name which is based on the life of real life Louisiana politician Huey Long. The plot is simple – guy fighting the corrupt system becomes corrupt by that very system, power corrupts, etc. Old news to cynics like me, but seemingly unknown to our current voting public.

The setting is Any-Southern-State, USA and Long is a character named Willie Stark, a mild mannered, uncharismatic, humble roots country boy rallying against corruption in government. The movie does a good job of not making Stark a member of any discernable political party and keeps his politics to basic populist ideals. A big city reporter picks up on his story and begins following him around. His speeches are dry attempts to tell people the facts and figures and lead him nowhere. He tries again and again to run for office with no success until he finally gets drunk (his wife didn’t approve of drinking) and gives a fiery speech to a crowd of “hicks.” The “hicks” become Stark’s base and he wins.

After he is elected governor, Stark begins building and modernizing his state as promised. There are projects upon projects bearing his name. He also begins purging all those who don’t agree with him and using more and more dirty tactics to deal with issues because Stark’s way is the right way. Nobody is going to disagree or interfere with him. In the process, the reporter gets wrapped up in Stark’s administration and becomes a reluctant hatchetman, even digging up dirt on a long time friend and Judge whom he highly respects.

The moral of the story makes up any slips in acting. I am split on whether I like the 40’s and 50’s over the top noir style of acting. Sometimes it works well, other times it is just painful. Broderick Crawford struggles as hick Willie Stark, but comes to life as the corrupt politician balancing self-righteousness with charm and charisma. John Ireland as reporter Jack Burden does a competent job with a typical 40’s overacted noir style. Joanne Dru was excellent as Stark’s outspoken assistant and offered a quite a few good one-liners.

I try to avoid politics on this little blog, but as an ever-increasing jaded and disillusioned Obama voter, I couldn’t help but see comparisons to the current administration. I think the White House should think about having a screening. Also, for all the Tea Partiers out there, you may want to invite presidential prospect Sarah Baby over for popcorn and a viewing. For the rest of you out there, if you don’t want to read the book, All The King’s Men is definitely worth watching. Sure you will come out more cynical and distrusting, but isn’t that what the Founding Father’s wanted us to be?

On a completely unrelated note, what struck me about both The Man Who Knew Too Much and All the King’s Men was the vast amount of cigarettes and booze. I in no way support making smoking or alcohol in movies criteria for ratings, but come on, when was it socially acceptable to carry around a giant flask of whiskey in your suit? Should the paralyzed from football playing son really be sucking down unfiltered smokes? Did people in 1950 not realize they were bad for you? Nobody noticed that the running back who didn’t smoke ran faster?

People prior to 1980 had to have constantly stunk of liquor and smoke. Smoking indoors everywhere? Have you smelled a smoking hotel room? We have the modern technology of air ventilation systems and Oust! and it still smells. A few hours out at the bars here, which all still allow smoking, and my hair and clothing reek. You can smell the drunks and partiers that inhabit Front St. from ten feet away. Seriously, is there anything worse than bourbon breath?

With this on my mind I watched The Girlfriend Experience, the “edgy” indie film about a call girl in NYC starring porn star Sasha Grey. A flash of inspiration came to me and I suddenly realized that sexual revolution of the 60’s, the following women’s rights movement, up through the loosened morals of hookers and teenage blowjob journals today were not caused by secularism or a loss of morals and God, nor was it progressive views on the role of women or human sexuality or any other social theory. No, all these are directly caused by increased hygiene, air-conditioning, synthetic fabrics, a decrease in the casual use of alcohol and indoor smoking bans. In essence, things that make people smell better.

Bare with me on this. If you are running around in a gray flannel suit in the south in 1950, smoking two packs a day and having three martini lunches, you are going to be a sweaty, nasty mess. Nobody is going to want to do freaky deeky sex things with you. Are you turned on when your significant other comes home from a night of drinking and crawls into bed? No. You make their stinky ass sleep on the couch. Ever have sex after a day of running around outside, jogging, riding bikes or playing softball? Doable, but still kind of gnarly. Flash forward to the 1960’s with looser clothing, in cool northern California and the northern East Coast, or in an air-conditioned apartment, and stoned instead of drunk, and an orgy sounds much more inviting. By the 1980’s we had smoke free restaurants and buildings, easily washable clothing, cocaine and designer cologne. Consequently we had lots of people doing it.

So anyway, The Girlfriend Experience, was some hyped up Steven Soderbergh, low budget, improvised, non-professional actor flick. It sucked. It was supposed to be a look into the life of high priced call girl, played by Sasha Grey, during the onset of the recession, but it left you with nothing. I literally got up 77 minutes later slightly rested from laying on my couch, with everything in my head exactly the way it was before. Check that, I had disappointment because you only get to see Grey’s boobs twice briefly. She gets gangbanged on film for money, show some sex in a movie about a high priced hooker for God’s sake.

There was no character development. None. Grey is a call girl looking to expand her business and believes in astrology or birthday’s or something stupid. Her boyfriend works at a gym. There is a recession. That is all there is and that is all we get. Grey, in an effort to expand her business talks to a reporter and tells him nothing. Nothing! The reporter at one point even says something to the effect that you must have an iron door protecting you. She just agrees. What the fuck? This entire film could have been done in ten minutes if that is all we are getting.

The acting is atrocious. Improvising works well if you are intelligent or have something to say. The actors had neither. The role of Grey’s boyfriend was played by some dolt who let his five o’clock shadow do most of the acting. He reminded me of the tall dark-haired hack from American Pie, Chris Klein I think, but in comparison makes Klein look downright Shakespearian. Grey should stick to making nudie films. Her acting ranges from brooding to pouting, which is a shame because I think it would be great to see more porn stars in major films. In an age when Meghan Fox, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kate Hudson and Miley Cyrus are considered professional actors, if you can convince the world that double penetration is getting you off, you should probably be able to do alright in Hollywood.

Do not rent this movie. Spend your 77 minutes reading the blog Confessions of a College Callgirl. It is free, more entertaining and much more informative about the life of a fancy hooker.

The Vibram Five Finger v. Nike Free Run+ v. 3 year-old New Balance with no insole Running Shoe Challenge Pt. I

I have been running a lot lately and as a service to my three readers, I decided to do a comprehensive review of the Vibram Finger Finger KSO, Nike Free Run+ and my old ass New Balance shoes. In the end this post turned into a diatribe on running, a book review and partial shoe review. Enjoy it.

I used to hate running. To me, track always seemed like you were replacing the much faster horses on a track with some humans and calling it a sport. I like sports with quick thinking strategy, e.g. soccer and hockey. I swam in high school because it was great exercise and I was a fat ass, but always hated meets. A swim meet is a whole bunch of waiting and then a minute or two of excessive energy exertion and just plain boring.

It wasn’t until after getting ACL replacement surgery that I really started running with any bit of seriousness. It helped me drop 70 pounds (245 down to 165 (and those 165 days are long gone)) and found that running was a lot like swimming practice: solitary, in the zone physical exertion. Plus, before the days of waterproof mp3 players and ear buds, unlike swimming you could listen to music while running. Also, unlike the bottom of a pool, the scenery changes when you run. Thus, I became a jogger.

Once I started running I discovered that it was a great way to mellow out and clear my head. In law school I jogged almost every day. Blasting punk rock, I would take off down back roads working out the leg kinks and panting like a dog until I hit my Stride. Ahh, the Stride. Some people may call this the Zone. It is that perfect time in life when your legs feel clear and are in perfect unison with your breath. It is very Zen-like. You are acutely aware of every nerve, your feet and legs adjusting as the terrain change, yet at the same time you are aware of nothing. Your mind calm and turned off from all intruding thoughts and you coast along. It is a great feeling.

My body, however, is in no way built for competitive running. Short legs supporting a bulky upper body does not a Prefontaine make (not to mention my inability to grow a mustache). Therefore, my running has never reached any competitive level – 5Ks, a few 10ks and one half marathon. Also, there has always been a lingering pain from when the doctors sliced into my knee, cut out the middle of the patellar ligament, crafted it into and ACL and bone screwed it into place. Running built up my knee enough that the pain was slight, but it would flair up every now and then, just enough to be annoying. I have always been searching for a way to stop that knee pain. A cheap patellar stabilizer strap helped, but was annoying and never 100%

I made the mistake/had the fortune of reading Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen by Christopher McDougall during the annual family Christmas at the beach in February this year. The book begins with a humble premise: the author, a writer for Men’s Health, started running and got knee pain so he went to the doctor. The doctor’s answer for him was that his knee hurt because running was bad. Being a journalist McDougall asked the obvious, why was running bad? To which the doctor replied, running is bad because it makes your knee hurt. With that medical analysis in hand McDougall went out in search of answers.

The book becomes part Sherlock Holmes search, part philosophical musings and part rally against shoe companies. McDougall soon discovered the Tarahumara, a tribe of natives in Copper Canyon, Mexico, who run hundreds of miles at a time, often after rowdy nights of boozing, while getting energy from chia seeds and other native whole foods. And they do it all in handmade sandals, literally old tires cut up and strung onto their feet. These people with no gel arch support stabilization, shock absorption systems or pronation concerns have no knee or ankle injuries. They also don’t appear to die of cancer or modern disease. They don’t war with other people and are generally a tight knit, secretive, serene and peaceful community.

In exploring this mysterious tribe, McDougal starts consulting ultra-marathoners, an odd group of people who run 100+ mile races, and their figurative leader, Scott Jurek. Jurek has been getting a lot of ink lately, even gracing the pages of the New York times. McDougal haunts down a mysterious outsider who has been welcomed into the Tarahumara, Caballo Blanco, and plans a race of the best ultra-runners versus the best of the Tarahumaram on their home turf. I’ll let you read the results.

What McDougall discovers in his journey is a fundamental biological fact: humans were born to run. It is in our blood and genes. We have arches, nature’s support structure, to support our foot and body. Humans can sweat and don’t have to breathe every step like most mammals. Our feet our filled with nerves to sense the ground we walk on. We, as a race, did just fine for 10,000 years running with no support before the 70’s running shoe craze.

Now we are cramming our feet into overly supportive shoes. This false support means we aren’t using what we are supposed, so we are deteriorating and atrophying our muscles. We strike with our heels instead of the balls of our feet, jarring our muscles, ligaments and tendons. In sum, shoes are killing our ability to run.

Born To Run specifically mentions Vibram Five Fingers (VFF). VFFs are basically foot gloves/toe shoes. They have individual toes, some rubber on the sole and a breathable synthetic upper. VFFs are meant to give you a little protection while allowing your foot to run in its natural, unsupported way. The back-to-nature hippie in me couldn’t resist this glowing recommendation so while I was in Florida, I bought a pair of Five Finger KSOs. I don’t know what KSO stands for. Killer Shoe Organism?? [edit: checked website, “Keep Stuff Out” – makes sense] KSOs have a little more fabric than the normal VFFs, which I figured would be good for cold Alaska.

VFFs come with a warning to go slowly at first because your feet and legs are used to artificial support. Well, like everybody who gets a pair, I ignored that and immediately went out for a run. Feeling like a barefoot child again, I ran four miles, on the beach, partially in water. I came back with a nice blister and sore calves for the next few days. I wasn’t deterred. From February until the present my KSOs have been my all purpose shoe. I run in them, I lift weights in them and even play indoor volleyball in them. It took a month or two on the treadmill to get my calves and Achilles stretched back out to its natural state, but eventually the pain went away.

What really surprised and impressed me was that my knee pain also went away. ACL surgery can really wreck a person and I still had a few spots that would flare up on run, most notably the top inside portion of my knee where the bone screw is. VFFs stopped the pain. Once I made the concentrated effort to run correctly – straight up, knees bent, landing on the balls of my feet – my muscles and ligaments started doing their job and taking the shock out of running.

Then, the weather in Nome broke and outdoor running beckoned (I HATE treadmills. Staring at myself in a mirror and not actually moving makes me feel like a hamster). Let me say that Nome is not a running town. The row of bars on Front Street that still permit smoking is the first clue that running on the tundra is not a common activity. Cross country skiers are the about the only foot traffic the tundra sees, with four wheelers and snowmachines being the norm. Thus, there are no good trails to run on. From my apartment I have basically two choices to run on – north on the main paved highway that goes to the high school or east along the ocean on a dirt and gravel road. Neither are particularly enjoyable with the eastern route having less cars. The dryness of Nome also means that most times you will have dust blown into your face on a regular basis.

Regardless, dust and traffic still beats a treadmill so I began running outside. The first couple of times was great. I was out in the semi fresh air, pounding pavement/dirt shoulder and just feeling great. Then, the massive amounts of gravel started to take its toll. While you can avoid a lot of large patches, one inch hunks of rock are routine on every road and you eventually step on them. Here is where VFF’s lack of padding becomes a liability. The first couple of times, your foot just takes it in stride, but repeated strikes wear it down. Then you finally hit one and pain shoots up. That is what I did and managed to severely and deeply bruise the ball of my left foot.

Nursing my foot bruise, I took about 10 days off from outdoor running and then tried again. Again, 20 minutes into the run and I hit a rock and the pain shot up. I finished the run in an unnatural hobble/twisting my foot inward in order to strike on the outside of the ball. Looks like I was back to shoes.

Back on went my worn out, three year old New Balances and I headed east. It was strange, yet kind of nice running in shoes again. The padding of insoles and a thicker sole took the brunt of the gravel with no problems. I was feeling good, having flown by two of the small band of Nome joggers. Then 2.5 miles down the road the front of my arch cramped. Not just any cramp you can run through, this was an acute shooting pain. At this point in life I know the difference between muscle fatigue and injury pain. This was the latter. I stopped, took off my shoes and tried to massage it out. No luck. I put the shoes back on and start limping the 2.5 miles homes. When the pain started to subside I tried to lightly jog and the pain flared up again. Screwed again.

I of course blamed the cramp on my feet being used to unsupported running and cursed running shoes. But not being one to take a single event as proof, I took a few days off and tried again. This time within a mile I could feel my arch cramping. I stopped, took off my shoes and massaged my foot. Staring at my shoes an idea struck. I removed my insoles, slipped the shoes back on and took off. No pain for the remaining four miles. My feet had actually become insole adverse.

Realizing that I could run in sneaker and continuing in my pseudo scientific barefoot running endeavor, I decided to try the much touted Nike Free running shoe. I am strongly opposed to Nike on moral grounds and not just for all the sweatshop scandals, but for also for their blatant copyright infringement of hardcore legend Minor Threat’s iconic album cover when launching their skateboarding line. (http://boingboing.net/2005/06/29/minor-threat-vs-nike.html) However, their snappy ad men and the naked running camp video won me over. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m474JNTLKnQ) What can I say, I’m a weak minded child of the 1980’s consumer television marketing. Moving pictures make me buy things.

When my Zappos box came I eagerly tore it open and found my glowing lime green Frees. Nike Free shoes are supposed to mimic barefoot running by providing little insole and unique corrugated sole that is extremely flexible. Picking them up and bending them, they are extremely flexible. They are also incredibly light which is nice. I have a pair of bulky Salomon trail runners which are good for hiking, but not so great for running. The one thing I immediately noticed about the Nike Free Run+ is that they fit a half size too small. My big toe was hitting the top of the shoe pretty hard. Still, I decided to give them a shot and took them to the gym for some treadmill time. One minute on the treadmill confirmed my shoes were the wrong size so the VFFs went back on and the Free Run+s went back to Zappos.

The one minute I did run in them, even with them being too small, felt good. The sole really does flex a lot and I am predicting that the lack of weight will really be helpful towards the end of a run when my legs are tired. Any day now my correctly sized shoes should arrive. When they do I will give them an extensive evaluation. Until then, happy trails.