Re: gliding over pavement

Considering the sun likes to peek out from behind the rain clouds every so often and I don't have to wear a heavy jacket to venture outdoors anymore, it's high time I took up inline skating!!!
Now I know what you're thinking; rest assured the rolling blades will probably never replace the mountain bike as my first love (sports-wise that is). It's just that, well, hm, how do I state this... there are no mountains here! Sure, there are dirt roads I hope to ride soon enough but that won't be happening on a regular enough basis to call it exercise - ergo the wheels on my heels. Besides, once I combine the skates with a sporty outfit, a pair of shades and a tan, there will be one very cool cat painting the trails in this town!
Ok, here's the catch. I can count the number of times my feet have been strapped to rubber wheels on the fingers of both hands, maybe even on just the fingers of one hand if you've got six fingers. When wearing the rollers I kind of look like Frankenstein's monster trying out a new dance and I am attracted to the ground much like a large helium-filled balloon is not.
Also, I don't own a pair of skates - well, at least not yet. Are any of my avid readers an authority on the matter of inlines? Would you like to impart some of your knowledge to me? What should I keep in mind when purchasing the means to release myself from the grip of static friction? Is there a good brand name I should choose? How about durometer? bearings? flat-rocker? hard or soft boot? Is it really not possible, as I've been told, to get those cool clip-on blades in the United States? And finally, that burning question, should I get soul plates?
BTW, FYI, a full five minutes into my exhaustive research on the matter I discovered a couple interesting facts. First, inline skates where invented long before some square decided to arrange the rolleys in a rectangle. Second, did you know that, like Kleenex, Rollerblade is a registered trademark? Sure it is. Why the Rollerblade website even has a fascinating grammar lesson on the proper use of trademarks. Who would have thunk it? Well, it was enough to get me to edit out of this post any incorrect use of a trademark as an improper adjective, a noun or a verb, but nobody owns slang so the blade lingo stays!