So I promised a regular report on the diet/fitness thing (more for my own benefit so I can stay on it), and here it is. After two weeks or so on the “low-carb” Phase 1 part of the diet, I lost about 4 pounds. Now, granted, that it could be mostly water weight, and maybe it was the time of day that I weighed myself, so who knows. I also haven’t been doing the yoga that I said I would do due to scheduling conflicts. Yeah, excuses, I know. This week though — I’m beating this weak body into shape!

Speaking of that, I had an amazing shopping adventure this past weekend. I have this pair of Nike+ shoes that I bought with the Nike+iPod kit. It looks pretty stylish, and it fits my feet just fine. The problem with it though, is that running with the shoes really hurt my feet. I wasn’t sure what the deal was. It just didn’t feel right. Someone then suggested that I go to a professional running shoe store where an expert can look at my feet and get me the right kind of running shoe. So I make the long trek to On The Run, which is purportedly the best running shoe store in the Bay Area. And after getting my feet evaluated and scoring a sweet pair of shoes, I almost want to say it’s the best running shoe store in the whole world.

This was the procedure: They measure your bare feet. Then they ask you to roll up your pant leg, and walk around as they look at your gait, posture, and so forth. After that, they get a sense of what your “problems” are — whether you over-pronate when you walk, or you tend to lean a little toward the left, etc (These guys are trained to notice these things). Though I didn’t have many problems, the one thing that the store assistant did notice was that my left foot tended to roll a bit more on the ball of the foot. Not too sure what this meant, but I get the feeling that it means my left and right feet walk slightly differently. Then the guy disappeared into the back, and emerged with a pair of Brooks’ Addiction 7 shoes for women. He then placed them on my feet, and encouraged me to go walk around the store, run in place, even jog around the block and come back. And I have to say, these shoes are amazing — they are designed for control, cushioning, and stability — basically meant to “correct” your stride as much as a pair of shoes can. I was impressed, I have to say. He even taught me a special “butterfly” lacing technique meant to secure the shoe further. I was sold. Great shoes, and top-notch customer service. What’s not to like?

Of course, the next solution was to get one of these cheap Shoe Pouches for the Nike+iPod sensor so that I can use these new shoes to track my running progress. I’m guessing I will suck royally, but hey, I gotta start somewhere.

That’s key. Getting started. We’ll see where I go from here.