Question

[jianantonic]

The balls of my feet and my toes tend to fall asleep or just get really, really hot and tingly (in the uncomfortable, not sexy way) when I run on an elliptical machine.  Does this happen to anyone else?  WTF?

I've tried different kinds of socks and shoes, and it still happens every time.  Only on the elliptical. 

Anyway, I have a new PT article today if you feel like checking it out...find out where the best vegetarian food in America is.

I'm trying to work ahead on that blog, so I'm working up something on the Baltimore Aquarium right now, which I'll probably set to publish next week.  Then I'll get on with more DoubleSqueeze material. 

My goal for the first month of DoubleSqueeze was to get at least one comment from someone that neither of us knows, and that happened two days ago.  Awesome:)  Thanks to everyone who's been reading and spreading the word!

Peace.

Comments

[skydiamonde.livejournal.com]

I gave Mac some hints on blogs that will hopefully help you guys. I especially suggest signing up for Google Analytics to watch your page hits grow. It's very satisfying to watch the numbers each day and see the numbers in your audience increase as well as where you are getting hits from (it's esp fun to see all the ones from various countries).

Also, I'm not sure if you're aware, but someone created doublesqueeze (I tried to be that someone but someone else beat me to it), so you can encourage your lj friends to add the feed as a friend to keep reading.

Good luck!

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

Thanks:) We're all signed up with Analytics, and we've already wasted lots of time looking at the information there.

My only concern about the feed is that if people are reading it directly on LJ, they're not actually visiting the site -- so do those "hits" count? We have ads on the site, too, so we're kinda hoping that people will go directly to the site to read...

But hopefully people will show up to comment, anyway. We <3 comments:)

[skydiamonde.livejournal.com]

Well, depends on what you're looking for. I find feed subscribers to be more important than people who happen to stop by once in a while. They will probably end up visiting your actual site to leave comments as often as if they were just visiting your site by sporadically checking it. They are your loyal fans who look forward to when a new post shows up as opposed to deciding to go check out your site since they hadn't visited in a while, and end up maybe skimming the content because there are too many new updates that they missed. Those "hits" from livejournal will count as feed hits (Feedburner does a good job with stats for feeds), but probably not for the site itself. I definitely get a bunch of page hits from username.livejournal.com as a referring site, even from people who I know haven't commented on my public blog.

As for ads, unfortunately I tried them too and I earned $0.37 over 4 months and they don't pay you until you get $25 or something like that. People have to click on the ads for you to get money, and most people are now mostly desensitized to google adsense ads. You want them reading your content anyway, not the ads. It'd be nice to make money off the site, but it's hard through google adsense unless you have a lot more foot-traffic and probaby a pagerank of 5 or something. I would suggest maybe taking off the google adsense ads for now (you can try it again after your site gets bigger). If you want to run ads, I would find direct affiliate programs. Amazon is a good one. On your Amazon account, make a Listmania list with all the good bridge books the two of you recommend (and maybe bridge supplies if you can find them on Amazon). Then sign up for Amazon Associates (link is at the bottom of the amazon page). You don't need a new Amazon account if you have one already. If you both have Amazon accounts already, you can attach both of them to the same associates account. Then there's a widget option to add a link to your Listmania page onto your blog. Now, whenever someone takes your suggestion and buys one of the bridge books you recommend, you will earn 4-10% on the sale. I find that this is a better option since 1) even a $10 book at 4% will result in more money than I got in 4 months of Google Adsense, so overall it should generate more money 2) it's directly targeting to your audience since it'll be bridge-related stuff and 3) it's stuff you honestly do recommend, instead of what google thinks your site should recommend. There may be other affiliate programs out there, but unfortunately I cannot suggest any more specifically for bridge.

[skydiamonde.livejournal.com]

Oh, and you can also do a review on a book in a separate individual post in addition to the ad on the side of your page, and create Amazon Associate links directly in your post. That way, if after your review, if someone decides to buy the book, they can directly click on that link and you can earn off that. Plus the best part is that they don't have to visit your site to earn money from this method. And it'll be good material for you to review a book a month or week or however often you feel like it.

Oh and if you end up deciding to stick to AdSense, feedburner will add AdSense ads to your feeds too, so they'll show up on LJ if that's really a concerrn for you.

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

Good stuff, thanks

[kixeldorado.livejournal.com]

Sometimes when I run, I get numb toes.

That's one of the symptoms of compartment syndrome (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compartment_syndrome). A girl I work with had that last year, and had surgery for it.

However, unless you've got some of the other symptoms, I probably wouldn't worry about that.

Maybe it's a pinched nerve or something stemming from the broken ass?

[capriciousbee.livejournal.com]

That actually happens to me on the elliptical ALL the time. It's really annoying. I figure it might be a modification of circulation, especially since it only occurs after you've been on a while.

My theory is that you've got lots of blood flow going to your legs because they are the working muscles, but your feet are actually NOT working (unlike with running), and so blood flow there is less important. Also, your outgoing blood pressure from the heart increases when you're working, but venous pressure (the way your blood returns to the heart) doesn't have an independant pressure increase, so your venous return in places like your feet might be reduced, and then your feet might fall asleep.

I've asked around, and it happens to lots of people, so it's probably not harmful. I reduce the problem by going up on my toes for a few cycles of the elliptical every once in a while, to keep your feet moving as well as your legs.

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

I took your advice about the toes and it totally worked! Thanks:)

[goob712.livejournal.com]

That happens to me also, every time on a machine. I blamed my crappy $20 payless "sneakers" but I think it also has to do with the weird angle the elliptical machine makes you take. It's not a repetitive motion that your feet are used to.

[skydiamonde.livejournal.com]

Oh! Is the comment from the person you don't know "Memphis MOJO"? He's a regular reader of my blog as well. =) He has a bridge and poker blog himself, so I returned the favor and commented back in his after all his comments in mine.

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

It was indeed -- I assume you sent him our way, so thanks for that:)

[skydiamonde.livejournal.com]

Heh, honestly, I don't think it was me. And I have no clue who he is either. He found me from "Dealing with Develin" I'm sure. Actually, this is also something good to do... go to other ppl's bridge blogs and comment in them about their entry, but make sure to leave your website somewhere in the post. If it's a blogger post you're commenting on, reply using the name/website option maybe and put a link there. I find this more effective than using the normal blogger login which points to your profile where they may or may not click on your actual blog from there. Make it an insightful comment about their specific post as opposed to anything promoting your own. Do this, and other readers of their blog will be curious about who you are and click on your name and be directed to your site. Some active blogs that are good are: Dan Korbel's, Jonathan Ferguson's, Stacy Jacob's, Jeff Miller's. (I was too lazy to link all of them, but let me know if you and Mac don't know one of these and would like the address to it)

Eeps though! I just peeked again and apparently Memphis MOJO specifically asks me a question in his last blog post.