The real workout was carrying books

Thursday I turned off the sound and watched the beginning of the Real Roads IMC course. It seems more interesting now that I've done that ride. During my ride I was on and off the bike a bunch of times, mainly trying to find the creak. An elusive creak that was driving me crazy. Even the loud music at spin class won't drown it out. Eventually I tracked it down to how the trainer clamps onto the spindle. I played with it a bit and dropped the squeak by about 90%. Rode 1.5 hrs, though it wasn't in one go, and my butt was killing me at the end. Knee exercises.

Thursday the big workout was keeping up with the conversation after Cl &JL dropped in. We had a wonderful chat, but since I'm the strong silent type I have trouble keeping up my end of the conversation. I think I did ok, but the wine helped. There was more on Fri am, but the coffee helped, and then they were off for a shopping rampage. So lovely to see them again!

Friday I should have gone for a run, but my left leg was feeling weak and feeble. Did the knee exercises. The left calf is still feeling grumpy and did not feel like going for a run. Rollered it good.

Saturday was a quiet day till we hit Chapters to do some book shopping. Linda has been looking for one in particular for a while. I've been in a mood to try SERIOUS LITERATURE again, and in Canada there is nothing more serious that the Giller prize. Unfortunately, only 800 copies of this years winner have been printed. They're like gold right now. Only a few hundred people have read the book, and tens of thousands want to. The publisher is going crazy trying to get another print run going at short notice. So I picked up last year's Giller winner.

While I was at it, there were several books that caught my eye. One of them is an autobiography of Mark Twain, only this time it includes material that was expurgated from earlier work. Can't wait to read all 736 pages of it, although almost a third of that is explanatory notes and appendixes and other stuff. But then, since Twain was writing it HIS way, I anticipate this to be marked different than any other biography I've read.

They didn't have Griftopia. Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con That Is Breaking America, by Matt Taibbi. The phrase about Goldman Sachs - "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money." was enough to make me want to buy the book.

I also picked up Why the West Rules - For now, by Ian Morris. This is along the lines of Jared Diamond's Guns Germs, and Steel, and I love this sort of stuff. It shows how things are interconnected, and how explanations are never quite as simple as bastard lying politicians and army generals make them out to be. We also got a few more books since there was a sale going on. I ended up carrying an arm stretching load of books in a checkout line for a long time.

Even though IMC was on TSN this morning, I don't get cable TV. So I hope one of my buddies DVR'd it, and is willing to invite me over, hint hint. I'll bring the wine.