I saw my son’s anxious post last night on his Facebook page; counting down before his video is completed, processed and posted. As any parent would be curious, I decided to stay up beyond my bedtime to see what this video is all about.  Alas, a 7 minute video of him titled “My first day of training in parkour”.

Par what?

I can hear Rich say “Hold off on passing any judgment Mom; please watch the video first.” So I did.  I grew tired just watching it!  What is this parkour thing that he’s into?  How popular is Parkour or FreeRunning?  I Googled it and got 14M results!  Parkour groups, blogs, gear, training video, sponsorships, events, etc…. you name it, they have it!

I watched several videos of Ryan Doyle on RedBull’s website and WOW!  Doyle, who has a huge international following and is a Red Bull brand advocate, makes everything look so effortless!  He glides, leaps, climbs, hops, conquers various forms of barriers with so much ease.  I wonder how many cans of Red Bull it takes to keep his parkour stamina? This is a great example of a consumer phenomenon that was once underground moving into the mainstream. A brand like Red Bull, which is great at spotting emerging trends among their core market, has formed a close relationship with a parkour expert. As the sport increases in popularity, that relationship will be worth its weight in gold.

While Doyle is a pro, the guys from The Office aren’t (but I got a good chuckle out of this clip).

In the end, it really doesn’t matter if you’re an amateur, pro, actor, or simply a “wanna-be”.  For as long as you put safety first, have the focus and dedication to learn all the proper moves (and maybe 3 cans of Red Bull won’t hurt) anyone can learn and enjoy this activity.  Care to try it out?

For my first post, I decided to write about every woman’s favorite word: SALE (well,  next to the word PAYDAY!)

My sister forwarded me a coupon from New York and Company which gives you $70 off any $150 purchase or $30 off any $75 purchase.  So, given that I trust her and often act on her recommendations, I ended up going to the local store and walked away spending $100 on my “wants” because I wanted that $70 off! I am sucker for discounts!   But who isn’t?  I’d stock up on canned tomatoes, cream of mushroom, chicken broth, etc. whenever they are on sale at Safeway, simply because I know that I use them regularly for cooking.  I hate paying full price for anything. Her forwarding me the coupon with some encouraging words was word of mouth marketing in action, and it worked.

But when is a “sale” really a “sale”?  Are you really saving $$ when you buy things that are on sale or simply buying them when the need arises?