Gateway Effect

Image via Wikipedia

The first time I heard the term gateway effect was during the lead up to the Games for Health conference in Boston in June. Ben Sawyer, who runs the org and the conference, sent an email asking folks to think about health and games and examples of gateway effect.

I had absolutely no idea what the man was on about, so I looked up the term via Google. Ooookkkk….for those who Google it as well, you’ll notice that hundreds of thousands of links will come back for marijuana and how its gateway effect can lead one to becoming a hard core drug user. Ahem.  That was obviously not *exactly* what Ben was getting on about.

Yet his meaning quickly became clear.  At the conference, numerous side conversations led to many references at the podiums about the need to find and document examples of exergaming leading their users being active in other ways. The Robert Wood Johnson folks and Shellie Pfohl, Executive Director of the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition, were particularly eloquent in discussing the phenomenon.

At the time, I didn’t have any examples, because ECA works with gamers, who are using exergames for their own sake. The other type of folks we deal with in ECA’s Gamers for Health initiative are folks who want to work out, and opt for exergames instead of other activities. So we rarely see or hear about folks whose use of exergames have opened them up to other types of exercise.  Yet that’s exactly what my exergaming experience seems to be doing for me.

Until two weeks ago, I solely worked out with exergames five or six days a week, as I’ve chronicled somewhat through this blog. So far it’s allowed me to shed about 22 pounds, and the scale number slowly, yet consistently keeps dropping.

But then a funny thing happened. I read “Born to Run” and recalled how much fun running had been in my youth (a really long time ago). I needed and bought a lovely new pair of all purpose shoes that happened to be of the barefoot running variety. Then, at lunch last Tuesday, which was a day that didn’t require a workout in my EA Sports Active 2 challenge, I literally figured “why not” and went for a run for the first time in seven years. On mountainous dirt roads. And I came trotting back 3.88 miles later. It was amazing.

Since then, I’ve run a few times. My longest run thus far has been 4.11 miles without getting winded nor achy. Each run day, I wake up excited to hit the road and see if I can make it as far and as fast as the time before. Each time, I run farther and faster - each time.

Yet none of this would be possible without the exergaming, which got me into shape and keeps pushing me into better shape. Both physically and psychologically, exergames have opened up a completely new world and perspective on life – that’s their gateway effect on me and it can be yours too. Try it. You’ll like it.

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Vanity

I don’t remember how long it’s been since I bought my favorite pair of sneakers. It was definitely before getting married, as I got them directly after E3 one year in the early 2000s. So they may be nearly ten years old. Wow.

They’re cool. They’re black Eccos with white stripes, look like soccer shoes and generally look like cool sporty gym shoes, yet not workout sneakers, which was the look I was going for when I got them. And they’ve served me well. This is why it’s been such a long time before I’ve even thought about replacing them.

But of late, they’ve begun to look super scrungy. Wearing them went from feeling exciting to just plain blah, and I’d begun watching other mommy feet for new ideas in sporty yet not workout sneakers. Ecco has some cool shoes to choose from, especially their Vibration II Toggle in red, but I was looking for something pink this time. After many late nights of internet window shopping, I settled on a great pair of Merrell Barefoot Pace Gloves in Ash (pink). In many ways, they’re quite similar to my Black Ecco swish shoes, but in pink.

But before buying anything now-a-days, I read the reviews. This shoe purchase was no exception. So I looked on Amazon.com, Zappos.com and elsewhere to see what folks had to say. While the overwhelming review was outstanding, I also noticed something else interesting – about a third of the reviews mentioned a book, “Born to Run.”

I’m a voracious reader. As I happened to be in between books, I went online, added Born to Run to my library queue and promptly forgot about it. The next day, a librarian called to say it was in and awaiting pick up. Ok, well, that was fortuitous.

I began reading the book, but it was slow going. I’m not a runner, so it wasn’t pulling me in. A friend who’d read the book (three times), and is a runner told me to stick with it, that it would grab me soon. Ok.

In the interim, the shoes arrived. They’re super cool. They look great. They feel great – just like…wait for it…gloves for the feet. Socks fit in them, but they’re also comfortable barefoot. They’re breathable. They don’t make big footed people look like we have Bozo the clown feet (always a concern). Basically, these shoes are hot (in the cool sense of the word).

In the reviews and on the company website, new wearers are advised to wear them around the house for a while to build up foot strength; the presumption is generally that Americans wear shoes constantly. I generally don’t. Most of my day is spent in (fancy) flip flops or walking around only in socks, or completely barefoot. I like the way it feels, so if I can get away with it, I kick off heels and padded shoes.

During this year of exergaming, this has actually been a “thing” in that some folks have asked to work out together or for me to post videos of me working out. While there are other issues like looking ridiculous working out, my complete reticence has also been about not wanting folks to see me working out in socks without shoes. I never use shoes when exergaming. Now I’m so used to working out without shoes, that when I do try to exergame with shoes on, I feel extremely uncomfortable.

In any case, last night I hit the “trigger point” for myself in the book. About one hundred pages in, the book became compelling, and the only thing that got me to put it down was the knowledge that the slumbering toddler in the other room would wake up with tremendous amounts of energy in the early morning no matter how late one stayed up reading to oneself. Smart move mommy.

At lunch today, I thought about exergaming, but knew that today was one of my three weekly “off” days in EA Sports Active 2. Generally these "off" days have been filled with other exergame workouts. But today, upon looking at the weather channel online, seeing it was already 84 degrees, gazing outside at the trees swaying in the heat, I started to remember how I used to love to run when I was a kid. I was fast. It was never a distance thing for me, but the wind in my face was always as refreshing as jumping into a pool.

I figured, “what the heck, it’s lunch time, why not;” then walked downstairs and laced my feet barefoot into the Foot Gloves. I’d figured I’d slow down to a walk upon getting winded or stop for a bit upon arriving at a known landmark that seemed way too far off for me to reach. I mean, it HAD been 2004 since I’d last jogged at all.

Walking down the front steps, I broke into a leisurely run down the driveway to the mountainous dirt road….and didn’t stop until getting back home 3.88 miles later. Yes, you read that correctly.

It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t deadly either. The exergaming had conditioned me to be able to go farther than I’d thought possible. The shoes allowed me to recapture my childhood glee at tumbling along.

How many of you have moved outside this summer? What are your favorite outside workouts?

Feel free to post here or email me at jenn (at) jbmercurio (dot) com.

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Disappearing Ink

Image via Wikipedia As with many things in life, I get ticked off when stain removal doesn’t work absolutely and every time. I mean, really quite grumpy…for, like, the rest of the day.

As a left hander who uses fountain pens and a lawyer, I write a lot and ink generally gets on me and my clothing – sometimes as much, or more, than on the paper. Through the decades I’ve spent many a day pissed off because the “surefire ink fix” that this or that celebrity or guidebook suggests simply does not work. You have the secret fix your Aunt Melba used once in the 70s and it worked then hunh? Well, screw you and Melba, because using her fix spread the blotch and it totally ruined my favorite t-shirt.

In my 20s I became adept at strategic placement of handbags, cool jacket lapels and pins to cover up the teeny weeny ink stain that simply wouldn’t come out – not even after dropping $50 in repeated dry cleaner bills. To a certain extent my inkedness dispelled any thoughts of buying clothing that was more than disposable, because regardless of whether a blouse was $20 or $2,000, it was destined to get ink on it in my life.

Well, dear reader, if you’ve made it this far…I’ve found ink removal nirvana. Yes, really.

This trick works every time. I repeat, every time. It works completely and it does not harm the fabric. It also does not need to be done immediately. It will work on a dried ink stain as well as one that's just happened.

So what is this magic ink removal fix you ask? Nail polish remover. And it doesn’t need to be fancy schpancy nail polish remover. The cheapo schmeapo stuff works just as well for a fraction of the cost. (But hey, if you want to drop an additional $20 on big name stuff, go ahead. Be a spendthrift. I’d rather save the cash.)

So take the ink stained item (here it was a t-shirt), put a folded up paper towel under the layer where the stain resides. Here, the ink stain was on the front of the t-shirt. I separated the back of the t-shirt from the front, slipped my hand in between (ie-inside the shirt) and held the folded paper towel directly under the stain…so the back of the t-shirt was behind my hand-holding-the-paper-towel.

Then put the paper-towel-and-ink-stain directly over an open bottle of nail polish remover, press the paper-towel-t-shirt onto the open top and flip it over quickly. So the nail polish remover doesn’t “run freely,” but the polish douses that circle of ink. The paper towel will be wet underneath. That part of the ink stain will be gone. Now repeat for the rest of the stain. Blot the front of the item (here a t-shirt) with a dry paper towel so that any excess polish remover is sucked up and doesn’t run all over the place.

After you’ve made the entire stain disappear, close the bottle of nail polish remover and rinse the area with tap water. I generally just run it under the faucet until it doesn’t smell badly when I hold it up to my nose.

Then dry out the item and wash it in the laundry like you’d do regularly.

Have fun trying this one out – let me know how it goes for you!

Any questions on stain removal? Send me an email at jenn (at) jbmercurio (dot) com.

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