Gmail on my Blackberry

Aparently, it's extreemly easy to add external email accounts to you BlackBerry and many of you will think I'm out of it for posting this. But I am and yes, I am out of it. I started this post sitting on my couch procrastinating before my 4 mile run at 5:30 in the morning...

Previously, I had only used my BlackBerry for what they refer to as "corporate email", which I guess is an accurate term. I've always been using the enterprise service which means our company has a BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) that bridges our Exchange server with BlackBerry's service. I guess there are a lot of BlackBerry users that are in situations without such infrastructure or have a BlackBerry for personal use, so being able to use Yahoo, Google, HotMail or any other free email service is vital.

Anywho, here are the easy steps as performed by me on GMail and my Sprint Blackbery 8703g. Your results may vary. (I used this article when going through it originally)

1) Go to Gmail, login and enable POP on your mailbox (Settings -> Forward and POP).

2) On the Blackberry, go to "Email Settings" on the main menu

3) Set up an account if you haven't already

4) When asked for email address enter your Gmail email address (i.e. somebody@gmail.com)

5) Enter your Gmail password (twice for verification)

Now you'll see a new icon just to the left of your main Messages icon that's a globe with a letter behind it. Your Gmail messages will arrive there, but for some reason, I get them in both my main bin and the Gmail bin. That's a bit annoying, but I'm sure it's just a setting somewhere.

It took about 40 minutes for me to start receiving messages after completing the initial setup. You can send mail as well. The delay between a message in your Gmail box and on your device is in seconds, not minutes, so it's very functional.

Anyways, I know people have been doing this for years, but it was interesting to me. Oh, and I did my 4 miles, but man is it humid outside. No more cotton shirts for my runs.

I survived the 2007 Cicada Brood XIII

Well, almost, as they’re here for a few more days. Where I live, there have only been a few. I've really only seen 3 in my neighborhood and heard a handful of others. Last week, there were some wind blown and awfully lost cicadas in the Loop.

My sister's place was crawling with them. One of her trees I refereed to as the "living tree". We were there in late may when the brood was emerging. There were literally hundreds coming from the grass while we were there. Thousands were already in the trees. It was a sight.

We were there again on Father's Day and snapped this short video. Notice how we have to talk loud because the noise of the bugs is overpowering.

I didn't get to eat any this time around, but maybe next time. I've got 17 years to build up the guts, specifically stomach. So, I'm happy to say I've survived the 2007 cicada's in NE Illinois. I will see you again in 2024.

Vista finally working

After 7 months of full time use, I will say that my laptop is as good as it was with XP. I'm not sure what happened when, but I must have done some updates that made the sleeping/power management work. The machine is now living up to it's potential.

I still won't play games with Vista, though. The loss of frames per second is just too much, especially with a Dell Latitude D620 with the lousy Intel video card.

7 Miles Down

Saturday was a great day. My buddy and I meet early to do our run with the goal of 7 miles. The weather couldn't have been better: mid 60s and overcast with a sprinkle every once in awhile. We paced ourselves well at 9 minute miles and actually hit it. We didn't have the typical run fast early and drain towards the end.

The Nike+ recorded the run as you can see now as my furthest run. I'm finding I'm running out of tunes on my play list, as we're now running for over an hour. Next week, we're doing 8 miles, which should be doable.

I hit Fleet Feet in Lincoln Square today and bought some shoes, socks and energy snacks. The service was great. I can't even remember the last time I went to a shoe store and actually had someone fit me to my shoes (maybe 15 years ago?). I got a great consultation which included observing my running style to find the shoe that works well. It was awkward running to the corner and back 5 times, but it's apparently normal there. Much better than going to Sears in February and picking up a pair that said New Balance because I heard runners prefer them.

The shoes I ended up with were Nike, which was unexpected. I thought they were not so great, but I'll find out soon enough when I try them on the trail. These are the shoes, Air Structure Triax+. They've got the build in Nike+, which means the pedometer chip goes into the soul of the left shoe. I guess Nike got me eventually to buy that...

I found out my feet are wide and you could tell on my old running shoes that my feet were spilling out and pushing out the top of the shoe. The new shoes are wide and roomy, but I don't slip. I haven't had any blisters yet and I'm hoping to keep it that way.

After the run yesterday, we ran over to the Cell to catch the cross town classic. Let me just say, it was a great day, as the Cubs won and I reached my mileage goal. Go Cubs!

Do we look tired?

Mister Pickles Marathon Stretch

Last year, while waiting in line for a portable toilet outside a U.S. Cellular Field, a buddy and I made a "before we turn 30" proposition. We apparently had too much to drink before the game...

The prop: we both run the 2007 Chicago Marathon (Oct . If I don't run, I pay his wife $500. If he doesn't run, he pays my wife $500. And, if we both bag it, the wives still get their payday. There are no stakes on finishing or time. Also, an injury would null the bet.

So, you can see the motivation to run it is there. You could argue that I just have to pass the start line and you'd be right. Before we started training, I kept stating that all I have to do is make it to mile 6 where there's a good bar that was my old stomping ground. However tempting that would be, it's becoming a personal challenge for both of us. We're going to try to finish it. That's our goal.

I began pre-training, getting up to 30 min running without stopping, in April and now have started formal training. This week's long run was 6 miles, almost a quarter marathon, and wasn't terrible. I fell into the zone at about 3 miles and it became automatic. Next week, we up the distance to 7 and then retreat to 5 (here's the long run schedule we're following). It's going to be interesting.

I track my runs with the Nike+ iPod, which is a great tool if you already have an iPod Nano. It has a pedometer that sits in your shoe and connects wirelessly to your Nano via a small attachment. When you finish your runs, it uploads them at sync to the Nike+ website, where it tracks your individual runs and history. So, it's basically a running journal.

When I hit a total of 50 miles recorded, the site added features that allow me to share my runs to some extent. I've added those features to my blog. The furthest run, which currently is yesterdays 6 miles, and then my last five. They alluded to more features when I hit 100 miles, so perhaps I'll be able to share more or make it more interesting. I'm at 62.5 miles now since I got the thing in early May. I'll probably hit 100 in early July, so we'll see.

Wish me luck towards my goal of completing the marathon and if you want to see my progress, drop by. If I'm slacking and there have been no runs for awhile, kick me. I need to do this!

Blogs go stale

It's been over a quarter of a year and no posts. If post was food on your shelf, you'd throw it it out.

I've got lots to say, but never find the time. but I will return.

Mr. Pickles is stretching...

Outlook 2007 - Favorite Features

I've been using Outlook full time for about 7 years now, and I must say, Microsoft keeps adding on very cool features that make my life easier. Outlook controls my life in terms of scheduling my calendar, keeping tabs on tasks, organizing contacts and, of course, email. I'm also a Blackberry user with the Enterprise Server running, so the integration into my phone is seamless (thank you RIM).

Each time MS has come out with a new Outlook, I've found a few features that make it worth the upgrade. For 2003, for example, it was the new grouping fetures that allowed you to collapse whole groups of mail, the tileing of calendars and the right hand reading pane.

Here are my favorites in 2007 which I feel make it worth the money to upgrade:

Search - Search has always been clunky in Outlook. You enter a term and wait while your disk thrashes. Now the search uses pre-indexed catalogs it creates automagically when your machine is idle. I had formerly been using Google Desktop Search to search email, but have found that the new built in search is lighter on my machine and yields relevant results quickly.

Applying Catagories - I always liked the idea of catagorizing contacts, calendar items and tasks into groups like Personal and Business. The only problem was it was pretty tedious requiring you to open the list or remember verbatium how you named the lists. Now Outlook keeps a drop down list when you're in an item that is populated with the most used categories. It also has a right-click -> categories ability when you're viewing a list. I'm finally using categories for all items except email.

Cached Exchange Enhancements - I'm not sure how many people use cached Exchange mode, but for my enterprise, it's a necessity. Cached Exchange mode is a passive way of using Outlook, where it polls your Exchange server at regular intervals and doesn't hang if there is a disruption communicating with the Exchange environment. It also allows you to work on email offline. In 2003, the polling was locked at 60 seconds and delays on receiving emails was noticeable, as the Blackberry would always beat Outlook on new items. In 2007, it appears this has been circumvented and it feels more connected. I don't even notice an interval anymore, which is a nice change.

RSS Integration - It always seemed natural that RSS would just be embedded into Outlook as most RSS Readers feel like it. I understand that in 2003, when the last Office product hit, RSS hadn't been widely excepted, so there was no way to get RSS into Outlook without a 3rd party. I used News Gator for a while, but i abandoned it when it asked to be purchased. I like their implementation. It's not in the foreground and doesn't notify you. Rather it's just there when you want to look at it. The IE7 integration is good as well and produces a seamless subscription process.

That's all the big ones I can think of now. There are other enhancements that don't wow me too much. The interface is light blue and easy on the eyes I guess, but I'm a fan of the rigid classic Windows theme. Also, there's a to-do bar that would be good if it didn't consume a large amount of screen real estate.