First 3 weeks in San Francisco

This post is long overdue, but I was simply lacking the time in the last couple of weeks. Since I'm just sitting in a shuttle bus with only 10 more minutes to go, I'm gonna keep it short and sweet. Without further ado, here's a short list of things I've been up to in the last couple of weeks:

• Sold most of my stuff in Zurich, packed the rest.
• Crossed a rather large ocean and quite a bit of land. Made it to San Francisco on January 10.
• Started working on January 11.
• Filled out a gazillion forms both on and off work.
• Started exploring the city. Walked around a lot.
• Went running along the San Francisco Bay and through Golden Gate Park. See pictures below.
• Went skiing at Lake Tahoe (Squaw Valley) with my team. Learned how to snowboard. Then met some of my old time grad school friends for a night of gambling in Reno's casinos.
• Went apartment hunting around Nob Hill & Pacific Heights. Found a place.
• Got soaking wet pretty much every day. The weather has been absolutely miserable. According to SF old timers it's the worst in more than 5 years.

On my agenda for the next couple of weeks:

• Buy furniture, move into place.
• Run San Francisco Half Marathon.
• Enjoy the better weather that's hopefully around the corner.

That's it for now, hopefully the next entry will have a bit more prose and less bullet-point lists.

And here are some of the aforementioned pics, taken during some sightseeing tours and runs.

trainingstagebuch.org

I came across this awesome website today. It's an online training diary to keep track of your training, be it running, cycling, swimming, or any other sports. I know, online training diaries are a dime a dozen, but this one really stands out in a couple of ways:

• Imports data from your heart rate monitor: Polar, Garmin, Suunto, and a few others are all supported. Also supports bulk upload of HRM files, which can be useful if you've used other desktop or web apps for your training tracking before.
• Very customizable views and statistics: Weekly, Monthly, Annual, Total.
• Supports goal tracking & training plans: Set up a training regime, then track your actual workouts against the plan.
• Nice integration of geo data: Upload tracks from your GPS device or draw them on a map, then connect them to your workouts. Or search for running & cycling tracks in a certain location.
• A lot of export functionality: RSS & iCal feeds for training plans, actual training, daily weight stats, etc. Blog and website integration via JavaScript. Full fledged API for external apps.

The only downside: The site seems to be in German only.

Here's a little test of the export functionality. If all goes well, this should show a little badge with the amount of training I've done in the current month:

Yet another attempt at blogging

I've been trying to keep a blog a few times over the last couple of years. Yes, that's right. I'm pretty sure most of you never even noticed, most likely because I never actually got past the setup stage and failed to post a single coherent (or even interesting) post. Well, this time shall be different, I'll try to keep this thing alive for a couple of months at least... ;)

I'll probably end up writing mostly about stuff that's close to my heart: Running & fitness, traveling, technology, electronic music & parties, the occasional acid flashback... That said, I cannot promise I won't digress from this narrow alley to throw in some random thoughts on just about anything from time to time.

So, without further ado, welcome to my new shiny blog! Wonder how many of you are still reading...?