It's not about Ted Lasso

 Dear Jason, Brendan and Joe,

I forgive you.

With the debate and (sometimes harsh) discourse about how Season 3 of "Ted Lasso" ended, I think much of the message behind Ted's outlook has been lost. From Season 1's forgiveness of Rebecca, through Season 2's struggles with his own past, Ted and the show in general has always lifted us up with the aim of humans being able to be better to each other and to ourselves.

I know many of those fans disappointed at the ending in the season finale have dwelled on Ted and Rebecca not being romantically linked. For a show with the premise of "What if Nora Ephron wrote a sports film?" and many allusions to the soulmates and baggage that fit together that Ted and Rebecca show, it would be a reasonable expectation to see that outcome. "Ted Lasso" has often defied our expectations though, so I'm not here to be part of the Tedbecca clan. A different memory of Nora Ephron's legacy may be less in the romantic comedy of "Sleepless in Seattle" and it's ilk, and more in how words can separate or draw people together. "Psychic" and "Bully" can bring two people out of their inner worlds, just as "Thank you" can just be enough to let each other go. Beyond a romantic ending, I did just have higher hopes of happiness for our leads, but hey, sometimes it is the hope that kills you, right?

I forgive you, Jason, for leaving us at the end of Season 3 with Ted back in Kansas, with Henry (for sure), but away from the family he built - from his (at least platonic) soulmate Rebecca, his best friend Willis, and the 'sons' who look up to him.  I know on a personal level your own life has some mirrors to Ted's in working abroad with your children thousands of miles away. Ted's story hit somewhat harder for me, in that in my own life, much of my children's lives growing up was spent in another country, whilst I did what work I could that would enable me to see them as often as I could. So I forgive you, Jason, for having Ted finally in Kansas with his son, even though everyone else important to him is thousands of miles away. I hope you can forgive those of us who wanted Ted and Rebecca to have to all, in return.

The problem with splitting your life between two places is that, just as with a Kintsugi bowl, the presence of the golden fissures are always visible, no matter the beauty that is present. I know the strain of carrying a critical success whilst spending time away from those you love must have been hard, but then it's also not easy having your other life move on, whilst you focus and spend time with your children.

I believe that the many unanswered questions, from Ted's own romantic happiness, to Richmond's future, are 'good' unknowns with which to tie up this part of the story. Whether you're paving the way for a Season 4 or not, I believe in you. I just hope you remember to be kind to yourselves, and if this writing serves in someway to remind others that it was never about Ted, then I believe I will have served some use.

Moving to Mastodon

 Just to say that I’ve moved off Twitter and on to Mastodon. You can find me there as tall@mastodon.social

An Arc

The current debacle about Google introducing itss Google slanted Search Plus Your World (SPYW, presumably pronounced "Spew") is just one more step Google takes along it's arc.

What's 'the arc', you ask?

It comes from a discussion I had with Charles Fitzgerald a while back, observing that certain successful tech companies follow an arc. It's a little richer than a timeline of newness & excitement through to jaded boredom. It goes something like this.

• Found company based on a great idea and great execution.
• As important, be lucky enough to be in the right place, at the right time, with the right backing & connections, to take off quickly.
• Exploit an economic trend (some dramatically reducing price curve) and get products to a receptive audience.
• Grow (as a company - # people) rapidly - introducing interesting management expansion problems (how do we scale? who do we hire? how do we retain our 'culture'
• Make a ton of money and become successful
• Keep on doing 'the right thing' for customers.
• Make a few enemies
• Make more money and get a lot of customers.
• Become dominant in a market - expand into other markets, and make more enemies. Still mostly doing the right thing for customers.
• Be threatened by a new trend that may be disruptive
• Re-engineering your entire business to focus on the disruption, and in doing so not recognize that you just screwed your customers.
• Leverage an existing dominant product position to gain traction against the disruption.
• Government involvement and scrutiny
• Competitors cry foul
• Lawyers

In the above scenario you can insert Microsoft (Windows/Office + "Internet Tidal Wave" + Internet Explorer) or Google (Search + "Everything is Social" + SPYW).

Interestingly Google's arc is half the time period of Microsofts. I'm assuming Facebook's will be half the time period of Google's.

Perhaps we should just rename this "Fitzgerald's law" and see if it sticks?

Well wishes to my dad, and free shoes for you

This is going to be about knees. I'll also give you a chance for some free shoes. But mainly about knees.

My dad is in hospital today, having knee replacement surgery. The surgery is happening in the UK, so like as not he's out by now, and I hope it's all gone well. He's only seventy-cough, and there are likely a few reasons why he needs knee replacements now. At University he was an excellent middle distance runner - used to train with Roger Bannister in his heyday, and could run the mile with the best of them. In those days, running shoe technology wasn't too advanced, and I recall him complaining on a number of occasions about how the streets of Sheffield were not kind to his achilles.

My dad returned to running in his retirement, and was doing some impressively quick times in his late sixties. He really enjoyed it - also enjoyed the new shoe technology that had come along in the 80's, which gave him much more cushioning. Unfortunately about a year ago, his kneee gave way while walking along a path. Various trips to the doctors and MRI's later, and the long and the short of it is that he's knees are shot and he needs replacement surgery. Given my dad's athletic history, this is hard for him, and I hope he can get back being active in some way or other after a speedy recovery. Knees are important.

I'll get to the free shoes in a moment. I need to talk about my knees next.

I have a bit of a different journey than my dad. I was 'less than athletic' at school. Overweight and would make up any excuse not to exercise. I finally started regular exercise when I was 17 and ran (mainly to decompress) regularly during University. My first marathon was when I was 21 - took me 5 hours and 35 minutes, and wasn't kind to my knees (by mile 16) or my hips (by mile 22) and had me hobbling for weeks afterwards. Given that I'm 6'7" and (was) overweight, I can only imagine the kind of pressure put on my joints at every step.

I keep on discovering that there's things we seem to do naturally that we actually need to learn. Like breathing. Or, in this case, running. In the last few years I've become a big fan of 'minimalist' running - it's been a struggle to re-learn how I run, so that I'm not jolting shock all the way through my joints, but instead, treading more softly, with greater cadence. Whether it's barefoot running, or (my preference for longer distances) in Newton running shoes, lighter and running properly is the way to go. A friend of mine referred me to Newtons, and their lightweight design, but more importantly their ability to cause you to run correctly, without striking down on your heels.

I promise I'll get to the free shoes shortly.

So with a new (and I'll admit, goofy) style of running, I now run marathons 106 minutes faster than when I was 21 - with no pain while running, and (apart from needing a little calf massage) only 1-2 days recovery, with no joint pain. I won't run distances over 8 miles in anything other than my Newtons, and am so thankful (for my knees) that my running is now so low impact.

The evidence is building for the harm big, spongy, badly supporting running shoes can do to you. I've spoken to a few people (when they ask about my garish colored shoes) about how great the Newtons are, and I keep on wincing when I hear the argument "Yes, I've heard great things about them, but I run a lot and go through a number of pairs of my Nike's, and the Newtons are really ($175) expensive."

Don't even get me started on how if you're 'going through' your running shoes, maybe that means lots of impact. Grrr.

So, in the hope that I can help at least one person to not have to go through what my father's going through today, I'd like to give you a pair of Newton running shoes. No more excuses.

Here's how it'll work. Using the power of the interwebs, I'll randomly pick someone (US or UK resident - mailing from anywhere different gets complicated) out of the next 100 twitter followers I get (I being 'tallmike'), contact you, and we'll go from there. Regular distance runners using non-minimalist shoes only please - we don't want these to languish in the garage now, do we? Oh - and this isn't some lame way to get followers - beyond tweets about my running & occasionally about my Google products, I'm fairly busy and don't say much, and feel free to unfollow as you wish. For any lawyers out there, this is not sponsored by Newton in anyway, and I'm doing this solely to give you a new pair of running shoes, as provided by Newton, in your size/style. I make no claims as to whether they will help you as they've helped me - so much of this is up to you. If you go out, fall over or otherwise injure yourself, that'd be what we call "your problem". You'll need to figure out your style (neutral or stable), and would likely be best if you took video of you running to figure it out right. If you live in Seattle/San Francisco or the UK, I reserve to the right to deliver in person. If you live in Seattle, these guys have been really nice to me, and have the technology to do the video thing.

Phew. That's enough for now. Here's to wishing my dad a speedy recovery, and hoping you start 2010 with a plan to run differently. Me? I'm off to work out what else we're doing wrong and I should re-learn - oh, and run a little more.

Ahead of the curve

(disclaimer : while I work for Google, none of this post should in any way be seen as representing Google, it's people or projects. Bah - like I have that kind of influence :-) ).

The folks over at google.org have an excellent tool called Google Flu Trends. The approach is essentially to use the frequency and volume of the things that people search for to indicate activity, to spot a trend. The idea is that data from doctors and the CDC are trailing indicators, whereas aggregate search data shows on the leading edge - people search for "flu symptoms" when they're first getting sick.

It turns out that there's a Google service, called trends, where you can try this out for yourself, in other domains. So for example, if you check for 'recession' you'll see that, while there was a couple of blips mid-to-late 2007, Jan 2008 was the real starting point. Similarly with 'foreclosure' or 'credit crunch'. The trick is to think of a search term that people might use, that's unique enough to be a helpful indicator. So "realtor" isn't that good for house sales, but "home inspection' is pretty interesting. Doesn't seem like the property market is recovering any time soon. Another interesting 'worry' indicator might be "FDIC insured" - be nice to see that settle down to a low steady state.

Becoming a bank

Following Amex's surprise news today, I've decided to become a bank too. I think it's probably simplest in the long run, and I'm looking forward to the kind of financial protection the FED can offer me.

Portland Marathon 2008

After a week of feeling under the weather, I elected to ignore the Dr. and head to Portland anyway. Beautiful city, but definitely felt like an early night after the long drive and comatose inducing (but most excellent!) pasta from Ristorante Roma, which was fortunately jut a few blocks from the hotel. Woke early and joined the crush for the start, and at 7am we were off.
Highlights for me:

• Inspiring to see the wheelchair racers.
• Managed just over a 2hr half-marathon time, despite the weather which started raining.
• Saw Dave on the back-stretch around the mile 8/10 mark - hope you had a good run Dave!
• The bad weather meant that the awe inspiring view of St. Johns Bridge, and the long haul uphill to see it was pretty masked - probably a good thing!
• My pace slowed down a lot in the second half, but I managed to keep going the entire way, despite the best attempts of runners who real need turn signals and brake lights, and the muppets who decided that handing out beer was a good idea. Any other time guys...
• Great to run to music!

Not super happy with the 4:25 finish time, but given how under the weather I was feeling in the run up, it's all good.

Special thanks to Mr. Mercury, Mr. Van Halen, Mr. Jagger and many others who provided inspiration along the way.