Because the laundry card machine broke for the fourth week….

I had to go to the bank to get $40 worth of quarter

These machines are old. Some of the new quarters get rejected sometimes…

When will they replace these machines? They are in constant repairs.

I usually run two to three miles a day, and I always run with music.

I have experimented with various running headphones, and I have not been fully satisfied with any of them until I tried the Sennheiser PMX80.

The first problems with previous running headphones have been durability. After six month of almost daily usage, it has become a pattern that one of the ear buds becomes dead. There are two reasons for this problem: Either the cord fails due to the weak build or the ear bud fails due to its sensitivity from sweat exposure.

In any case, this really drives me crazy, because it always happens during one of my runs. Running without music makes the exercise a little more painful and dull. So, I have decided to check out the Internet to invest on a new running headphone.

The Research

The problem with a lot of “The Top Ten Running Headphones” list on the Internet is that many of the products are not in production any more. I did not know that head phone products would have a short lifetime in terms of production.

To get the current best running headphones, I headed to Amazon and did some research. The user reviews really helped to get the “feel” of the headphones, and it was even more helpful to know that many of the reviewers were runners themselves!

Now, there were a couple of criteria that I was focusing on: durability, sound quality, and comfort. After digging through multiple stars reviews, I have landed on the PMX80 page. It was the video review by a fellow customer that got my attention, and in a few minutes, I ordered the product.

Initial Impressions

After the package arrived, I was quite happy with the easy packaging. Initially, I was quite surprised by the build quality of this product. Unlike most headphones, it did not feel fragile or hollow.

As I put on the headphones, I was quite surprised by how comfortable it was to wear it. At the same time, the headphone was positioned in my ears such that it wouldn’t fall or move around as I did my jogging.

The sound quality was great as a running headphone, but it was also nice to be able to hear the background noise from the outside world (Especially if you are running outside).

I also was surprised that you can actually wash the ear buds using running tap water. Although this is not completely water proof (Do not submerge this underwater), it is nevertheless ready for any weather conditions (such as running in the rain).

Overall Evaluations

Due to the back-neck design of the headphone, you cannot wear it while lying down. However, the PMX80 is an excellent choice as a running headphone. The long-term durability is still in question, but in the event that the headphones do break within a two year period, you can always rely on Sennheiser’s excellent warranty repair service. However, I doubt that I might need to replace this headphone due to its solid build and durability, and I am overall happy to invest the PMX80 as my running headphones.

Congratulations Microsoft! From what I have been reading on the internet, Windows 7 seems to be a success! Many journalists have mentioned that the new operating system might give a much needed boost for Microsoft after a Vista’s terrible features and performance…

Wait, what? I have been using Vista for almost two years now, and I do not think the operating system sucks. Sure, the operating system might have had some problems in terms of driver compatibility issues, but with improved security architecture and loads of included goodies, I think Vista is a great operating system.

The people who have bad memories of Vista probably did not have the right system. Sure, if you did not have a dedicated graphics card (most laptops during Vista’s launch did not), then your CPU was doing more work to make the user’s interface pretty (and useful). It’s not Vista’s fault for their not-so-good experience. It was their fault for not providing adequate hardware or turning on unnecessary features (I turn off Aero, because I don’t find it to be useful).

Just because your computer didn’t run Vista well doesn’t mean the operating system is a bad operating system. It is mostly due to the ignorance from the user’s end that is causing the headaches in the first place.

For the record, I am going to stick with Vista at least until the service pack one for Windows 7 is released.

The above fascinated looking kids are my students at the orphanage center. We had a couple of minutes to burn before our class time ended, so I decided to take out my Cowon P5 and play the World News Webcast podcast. They never have seen an English news video before, so it was a great experience to them.

Unfortunately, some of my students are still struggling to remember and recognize the ABCs (Capitalized and lower case, which are actually a lot of letters), and all of them probably did not understand a word what Charles Gibson was reporting. Nevertheless, they loved watching the news, because they got to see President Obama in video form (I guess these third graders don’t watch the news at all).

Teaching English has been a rewarding opportunity, but there have been some hiccups. I had to punish two students today for continuous disruption and made one of them almost cry. Still, I love all of my students and hope they can use my English lessons to do well in school when their term starts.

I have mentioned that I am volunteering at a children orphanage by teaching Basic English to nine third graders. Unfortunately, due to the increasing moral hazards among the young students I was forced to punish a boy for disrupting the class.

It was not a pretty scene, but it was necessary. Many of the third graders poke each other, make jokes (which are tangent to the class material), and sometimes yell at other students during class time. I have been very tolerant for their behavior, because first, they are young, and second, they are doing their best to study the material, despite what it seems to the contrary.

Many times, the yelling and the screaming among the students get out of hand, and in the past I have threatened them to kick anybody out for excessive distracting behavior. But because I have never actually kicked anybody out, the children seemed to develop a theory that I might not follow the penalty regardless how disruptive they are.

So, I had to stop class and tell a student to get out. He was under emotional paralysis, but I had to act firm, so I told the class that I would not resume class until he got out. He stayed glued to the seat, perhaps waiting for a possible pass from the teacher, and I just waited without teaching until our class time ran out.

This was a very effective punishment, because many others in class have told the student to get out, so that they can continue learning English (which clears the notion that the punishment was arbitrary and unfair). I talked to the student alone after class and told him not to disrupt class again. I really did not want to punish a student for misbehavior, but the moral hazard levels were approaching beyond my tolerance.

Well, it was a good experience nevertheless.

Here is a video of my class when they are mostly working hard.