When I was in my 20s, I bought a Volkswagen Thing. It was orange, with a removable hardtop, a three-inch body lift and larger than normal tires. It was a fun car, especially in the summer, and I was always working on it.

One day, my boss told me he was living vicariously through me (and that car). At the time, I really didn’t understand it, but now that I have more responsibilities and can’t spend all my time or money on a special-needs car, I understand where he was coming from.

This isn’t a post about old cars, but rather about podcasts, and one podcast in particular. It’s interesting how our media consumption habits change. Podcasts have been around since the very first iPod (and many people will argue that they were around as radio shows before that), but I never really got it. I think it’s because I never really found a podcast that spoke to me.

Guinness foreign extra

One thing I like most about traveling is getting to try things that you can't get at home. When I travel, I really enjoy sampling the local beer (even though one guy I talked to said he doesn't drink the local beer because it's made with local water!).

We just got back from a trip that included a cruise to the Dutch/French island of St. Maarten. After touring the French side of the island and spending a few hours at the beach, we stopped in a little convenience store at the cruise port. In the back, the shop was selling cold beer for $2 a bottle. They had all the typical beers, but I also spotted something that I've been wanting to try for years - Guinness Foreign Extra!

Anyone who knows me well, knows that I hate shopping. This means that I don’t buy anything new until there’s a real need to do so.

Keens: My old and new Keens
That’s the case with my beloved Keen Newport H2 sandals. I bought my first pair three years ago before a trip that included some hiking and cave-tubing in Belize. Since then, I’ve worn these shoes nearly everyday - summer and winter. They’ve been to Belize. They’ve trekked around Honduras and the beaches of Mexico. They’ve become stuck in the mud while clamming in Georgia. They’ve walked the canals of Venice, and ridden bikes through Tuscany. They’ve been whitewater rafting, kayaking on the Colorado River and a ton of lakes. They’ve been hiking and trekking all over Colorado. And they’ve been on more dog walks than I can count.

The story of Balloon boy Falcon Keene was played live all over the country thanks to the real-time web. Ten years ago, would this story have gotten as big as it did today? I don’t think so. Sure it would have been played (to a limited mid-day audience) on live television and the radio, but the web and it’s real-time sharing capabilities, really propelled this story into the limelight. Then the social Web took over with #balloonboy hashtags, and now it’s become the latest meme, with people joking about taking off in a balloon to get doughnuts, or hiding in the attic.