Sunday is the San Francisco Marathon and I'm getting ready to do a Half Marathon (13.1 miles). This will be the the third time I've done the race and always enjoy the view and the people.
Here is a picture taken today when I picked up my bib at the Expo.
The Course - The Start Line is conveniently located in downtown San Francisco along the waterfront, on the Embarcadero at Mission Street. The staging area will be held steps away from the Start and Finish, in Justin Herman Plaza, across from the Ferry Building at Market and Steuart Streets.
The 1st Half follows the first half of the Marathon course. The 1st Half Marathon starts along the famed Embarcadero - at the newly renovated Ferry Building and Food Mart, going west along Little Italy, through Fisherman's Wharf and passing the fishing boat marina. Running just feet from the Bay in Aquatic Park and up Fort Mason hill, spectacular views of the Bay and of the Golden Gate Bridge greet you at the top.
You continue west along the Marina, where the course takes you past private yachts. Then Crissy Field in the Presidio shows off the some of the most beautiful San Francisco coastline with sweeping views of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Pacific Ocean.
You will then run up to the Bridge entrance, enter the road bed and cross the amazing Golden Gate Bridge. The high, reddish beams will tower over your head as thousands overtake the Bridge for the marathon. At the Bridges end, you will exit the roadbed and loop around Vista Point only to return back across the Bridge. Heading southwest, you will continue on through the Presidio, past Baker Beach and through the magnificent Seacliff neighborhood. Turning south you will exit the Presidio running through the Richmond Neighborhood District entering Golden Gate Park. Turning east you will finish along John F. Kennedy Drive at the Rose Garden.
The starting line for the race is a block to the right of the Ferry building (towards the SF Bay Bridge). If running across the Golden Gate Bridge is anything like last year, it should be foggy and wet.
The race starts at 5:30 AM so I need to get some sleep!
Which form do you use?
I found this at Dictionary.com
Usage Note: The transition from World Wide Web site to Web site to website seems to have progressed as rapidly as the technology itself. The development of website as a single uncapitalized word mirrors the development of other technological expressions which have tended to evolve into unhyphenated forms as they become more familiar. Thus email has recently been gaining ground over the forms E-mail and e-mail, especially in texts that are more technologically oriented. Similarly, there has been an increasing preference for closed forms like homepage, online, and printout.
Its funny how you can write things multiple ways and still be correct. When I looked up "weblog," I found this:
| Main Entry: | weblog |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | a personal Web site that provides updated headlines and news articles of other sites that are of interest to the user, also may include journal entries, commentaries and recommendations compiled by the user; also written web log, Weblog; also called blog |
| Usage: | computing |
Did you notice that they used "web site" instead of "website?" I guess the best thing to do is be consistent in your writing and know that someone will always disagree with your spelling.
I've wrestled with this topic for a while and decided to look more into it when I saw the piece Dave Winner wrote about the New York times using "web log" when he felt it should be weblog or blog.
Update: When I used the Vox spell checker on this post it flagged "online" as being misspelled (should be on-line or "on line"). It had no problem with any other words except e-mail and E-mail.
I was driving home tonight and wondered what I could blog about when I came to a complete stop on the freeway (hwy 680).
I have XM radio in the car and love the channels and ability to listen to the music and channels I want to hear. I purchased it for the commercial-free music (more on that later in this broadcast) and the ability to get up-to-the-minute traffic and weather, 24 hours a day. Tonight I was ready to throw the radio out the window!!!
XM has traffic channels for most major cities in the United States. I've used it from time to time but couldn't figure out why I didn't listen to it more since I typically drive 3 hours a day to/from work. Tonight I can finally list the reasons why I will not use their traffic channel and will not recommend it to my friends.
I left work at 7:30 PM and decided to check the XM traffic channel for the [San Francisco] Bay Area. The report starts out listing the traffic condition (green, yellow, red) and any major traffic problems. It then describes all the major roads in the area and if there are any problems. This report lasts 3 and 4 minutes with a 30 to 60 second commerical for other XM channels. The report repeats (and updates?) 24 hours a day.
Tonight the reporter (pre-taped) stated the traffic condition was "yellow" and "One problem to look out for was a delay on highway 101." I continued on my way home and came to a dead stop at the onramp to highway 84 in Livermore. There was a Caltrans truck blocking the entrance and a sign stating the road was closed. It was now 8 PM and as I was inching along in traffic and I tuned back to the XM traffic channel and heard the same traffic report and but no mention of the closeur. I tuned to KCBS (740) and a few minutes later their traffic report mentioned that "that highway 84 was STILL closed because of the fatal accident and was not expected to reopen until 10 PM!"
I kept listening to XM and heard a couple more interesting things. In the middle of the report it mentioned that highway 116 had ALL LANES BLOCKED and the California Highway Patrol had issued a Sig Alert (meaning a blockage lasting 30 minutes or more). Why wasn't this listed at the beginning of the report instead of the delay on highway 101 (traffic going 47 miles/hour)?
I continued to listen until I arrived home at 9 PM and never heard them mention the accident. About 8:15 PM my XM display did show the following message: "#Jam_Alert" Hwy84@PigeonPass" but the reporter kept saying "traffic clear on highway 92 and 84."
One more thing. At the end of the traffic report they give the Bay Area Weather Report. We are having a heat wave in the Bay Area with temperatures over 100 degrees in most of the area and breaking records every day. The XM weather report stated the current temperature was 67 and tomorrow's high around 78. This was the San Francisco temperature but they failed to mentioned the heat in the Bay Area (it was 92 degrees at 9 PM in front of my house). Tomorrow's highs in the general Bay Area will be 95 to 105.
I counted on the XM traffic channel in the past and always found problems where they said everything was clear. and it wasn't. I also don't like the fact that the reports repeat over and over without a time stamp letting you know when it was last updated. (I also get upset with Google News when it states it was updated 16 minutes ago -- 16 minutes from when? I've had my browser freeze and nothing gets updated.) I feel they created a traffic channel as an excuse to promote their own XM programming instead of providing up-to-the-minute information to their listeners.
I said I would talk about their "commercial-free music channels." The music channels are free from commercials as long as you don't count "XM promotions" commercials. Most channels have DJs and promotions for others XM channels and specials. I enjoy the DJs because it does bring back how radio was when I was growing up (in the 60's) but I didn't expect the XM commericals on the "commerical-free channels."
XM needs to do a better job reporting traffic and weather and less time promoting their own shows. I hope XM gets their act together soon or Howard will be enjoying more listeners.
Anybody else use the XM Traffic channels? I would love to hear if you find it accurate and useful.
BTW, I sent an email to XM Radio and a link to this post so it will be interesting to hear their response.
QotD: What was the highlight of the past weekend?
I ran the Santa Cruz Wharf-to-Wharf race (6 miles) on Sunday (along with 15,000 of my closest friends). Tempertures were over 100 degrees in the San Francisco Bay Area but were in the mid-70's on the coast. It was a beautiful run along the Northern California coast and there were bands playing and neighbors with garden hoses to cool off the runners.
What's your favorite drink or cocktail? What's in it?
Question submitted by charm.vox.com
The bigger question is why is this the same QotD from yesterday? This is my first weekend on Vox so maybe QotD takes the weekend off? Inquiring minds want to know!
My simple answer to the QotD is white wine (simple, yet pure), and good company (stirred, not shaken).
I went in for my 6 month cleaning yesterday and my dentist walks in and tells me he's thinking of doing a podcast. I was floored. (Actually, his first comment was "I don't understand RSS.") Six months earlier I mentioned that I had started a podcast as an experiment and something I could use to explain/demo podcasting to family and friends. I'm not sure he has listened to any of my podcasts (he asked me again for the URL) but it must of stuck in his mind. He wants to talk about using lasers in dentistry. I told him to give me a call and I could help get him going.
Oh, BTW, my teeth were fine.
Welcome to my first Vox Blog!
I first heard about Vox from the Inside the Net podcast with Amber Macarthur and Leo Laporte where they interviewed Mina Trott. I was hooked after hearing her talk about Vox and the great community here.
I picked this page design because I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and enjoy running in San Francisco. In two weeks I'm running "half" of the San Francisco Marathon and get to run across the Golden Gate Bridge -- how cool is that? (Last year it was pretty foggy and I'm hoping for clear skies this year.) I'll give you an update after the race.
Thanks again to Paul for the invite.
