Chad Kurzawski

Marathon training (again)

Sunday marks another round of serious marathon training; last time, I decided to ease off training after I was regularly running 10 to 12 miles. I had finally hit the runner’s high that so many articles and podcasts urged me to wait for, but I just didn’t have the mental wherewithal to run for hours at a time.

This year, I’m planning on using:

• the Hal Higdon Novice 1 program
• an embarrassing number of audible.com audio books. When I was last running seriously, I listened to quite a bit of fiction. I’ve missed studying memoir, though, and I can’t wait to read Julian Barnes Nothing to Be Frightened Of, a book I shouldn’t have missed.
• another new pair of Mizunos, my fifth
• new running podcasts, since so many of my old favorites have fizzled away.

iPad textbooks

There have been strong rumors of Apple getting into the textbook distribution game and optimizing educational content for the iPad.

The recent Jobs biography makes it clear that Apple will try to revolutionize the textbook industry. Jobs wanted to hire excellent textbook writers and give away content free with the purchase of an iPad.

“Cheaper” is not a tablet feature that interests me

Cheaper tablets— The industry’s enthusiasm for tablets was considerably tempered this year compared to last, when more than a hundred manufacturers thought they could capitalize on the iPad’s success with their own models based on Google’s Android software. Sales were disappointing, in large part because Apple prices the iPad relatively low compared to the cost of making it. Then, late last year, Amazon demonstrated that you can take on Apple by selling a smaller, barebones tablet for $199. Analysts believe Amazon sold millions of Kindle Fires in little more than a month.