Its a difficult engineering job, how do you create headphones for running that don’t slip, slide, skip or fall out but that aren’t stapled to your earlobes? Fortunately, the boffins of this world have a number of solutions. Well, two.
That scene in ‘Anchorman’ where Ron Burgundy says that he and Veronica are trying this new fad called ‘Jogging’ is entirely plausible. Ron’s tenuous grasp of the English language aside (especially as someone who has such pride in his collection of leather-bound books), Jogging was indeed a largely unknown phenomenon until the 60’s and 70’s (in fact the word ‘jog’ actually denotes a swift, sudden movement, such as jogging one’s memory or jogging someone who is writing/painting) until it was popularized (and named) by a bloke from New Zealand named Arthur Lydiard.
Imagine if you will, a world without jogging. Its like, if you were in an episode of the 90’s TV series ‘Sliders’ and you found a world where Arthur Lydiard had been hit by a car or whatever, all the sports companies would be bankrupt. Think about that. Jogging has actually had a profound effect on our cultural and commercial landscape. Charity Marathons would be a different prospect altogether (in fact ‘Marathon’ originally meant ‘long-lasting’ and had little, if anything, to do with running) and sports/athletic clothing would be reserved for sporting people (as opposed to people who consider shoplifting athletic clothing a sport).
But, I digress; there is nothing at all useful in anything I just told you, nothing that you brought this article up to read about, anyway. I feel like a bloody Maths teacher (in that I’m wasting my time teaching you things that you’ll never, in the wildest dreams of a million, billion years, find a practical application for). Running, jogging or whatever else you want to call it, is here to stay, and long may this be so. Sure, you occasionally see someone in spandex that you could have done without seeing in spandex, but more often than not, you get to see attractive members of the opposite sex (or the same sex – I’m not judging) stretching and flexing in a skimpy outfit. You can’t go wrong, really.
The thing is, if you have the same problem as me and can’t find anybody to run with (most of my friends are either bloated, beer swilling 50-a-day-smokers OR total fitness obsessive who look like Greek statues and can reach top speeds of up to 400MPH) then you’ll want something to keep you occupied (and drown out the non athletic morons in the expensive athletic gear who yell at you from the open windows of their crappy stolen little cars) and that something is music! It doesn’t matter what you’re listening to, as long as it takes your mind of aching joints and that dry phlegm that builds up in your mouth sometimes. Of course, as with all headphones, its a matter of personal preference, but the main choices seem to be concerned with earphones that fit around your ear itself or headphones that cross your entire head. There are too many models in either category (and not enough to choose from between them to mention here) to talk about, so we’ll just discuss the merits of the two main types of headphones for running. The earpiece models wrap around your ear itself, with a little bud that’s specially designed to lodge in your ear hole. These earpieces work very well indeed if you have the right shape of ears. Personally, I happen to be part Vulcan apparently, as my ‘inhuman’ ears (no matter what your friends say, these phones are definitely NOT one size fits all!) simply can’t keep those flamin’ things on my head! If you’re like me, a headset version, lightweight and small is probably your best bet. As I say, it’s a personal choice, just like your running soundtrack.
