Well, this promises to be an action-packed report! A couple of days ago, Nani of the TDSB’s bike repair course announced to members of his Yahoo! bike group that he was going to do a pre-dawn ride out to the Leslie Spit (or whatever they call it now) in order to watch the sun rise. Ok, my wrist has healed enough that I can type with it at times and I figured that I’d give this ride a shot.

Woke up a bit later than usual for a 5:30 am departure for the 6 am meet up. Had to refill the tires with air, dust off the bike and so on since I had not touched it since the accident. Upon stepping outside of the building, after dragging the bike down the stairs since it turned out that I could not LIFT the bike up over my shoulder, my Jetlites‘ Starfire basically went pffftttt. The battery had finally given up the ghost after sitting around for almost two months but I didn’t think it would last much longer anyways. It was down to about an hr’s worth of run-time before the accident and a replacement has been long overdue. I’m just lucky that it had lasted this long. I guess there will be a future post about what its replacement will be.

Luckily, SL had earlier lent me one of those silly “turtle” LED lights that are basically an LED bulb and watch battery encased in two bits of translucent plastic made to look like a turtle on a flexi-string. This allowed me to satisfy the requirements of the law in having a front light but did nothing to allow me to see anything. *ugh*

Riding down to the entrance of the Spit was fine if a bit worrisome since it was pretty dark in spots. Wrist was fine with just a few twinges and the realization that I still do not have a full range of movement. Nani was waiting with a much larger group of people than I had expected; in total, there were seven of us. I had expected maybe two or three. By 6 am the sun had already started to light up the eastern sky through a low cloud bank and we had a slight breeze. Temp was almost perfect for riding .

It’s pretty amazing that one could almost feel like they’re riding on a country lane yet there’s a downtown core just two kms to your rear. Trees everywhere, rough asphalt road, heaps of logs, water on every side, etc. It’s great! I really need to ride down on the Spit when there is a full moon out. Of course, the biggest hazard of riding in the “dark” on this ride is that I kept”popping” snails. I was NOT happy about that. There’s something “off-putting” that I’m killing something just because of an activity I am enjoying. I definitely need lights! And that moonlit ride? I’ll do it when the weather is too cold for snails to be on the road.

After waiting for the sun to be up and about, I did not look at the sunrise since it’s something that I see almost every time I ride, which would be hundreds of times in the past few years we all headed to the Beach area of Toronto for breakfast. Stopped at this Queen St. East diner called Mars Beach Diner and I ordered their “Galaxy” special. It was pretty good…hash browns, 1 egg, 2 sausages, 2 bacon, toast, and something called a griddle cake which turned disappointingly enough to be a large pancake. It’s a decent-sized breakfast but on occasion I’ve been known to eat fried calf livers and a couple of plates of rice for breakfast or, more commonly, four large eggs and a few plates of rice. So, the Galaxy special sort of hit the spot. Big breakfasts usually keep me going for most of the day.

One of the guys later paid for everyone’s breakfasts which was an incredibly generous gesture! Wow! I’ve done so for family and relatives but never for acquaintances…hrmmm…must earn more money. hehehe

It was a short ride back home and to multiple errands. Something also came up which was very worrisome and this was gross hematuria. I did not put much thought to the first occurrence but by nightfall it was very worrisome. Thank goodness for the Internet! It looks like my case of gross hematuria is the result of stupidity and complacency. I had not drunk any water before the ride, drank very little water during the ride and this was a roughish ride of 30 kms after almost two months of no exercise. Basically, I was asking for trouble. Everything’s cleared up now but I am going to take it easy until tomorrow. I can’t do any sort of pre-dawn or evening rides anyways without a proper lighting system.

So…it looks like we’re back on the road!

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For those of you who are curious, I am still off the bike. My wrist has healed enough that I can type with the right hand to some extent. Right now, I am not too sure if the current ache/pain is the result of the injury or of not using my wrist enough.

There is still no way that I can put any significant pressure on the wrist which means that cycling is going to have to be dropped for the next little while. I was having high hopes for this coming weekend but really not too sure.

On another note, I may be looking into getting a stationary trainer so I can put in some mileage during the winter months. It’s always a shock to the system when you first go out and cycle after several months of sitting around. It would also help to allow me to get up and going faster after the snows melt.

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For those of use who do a LOT of typing a keyboard is a tool that may be as important as the software or the monitor that we use. When I first heard about the Tactile Pro I was really excited because I hated the mushy feel of the Apple keyboard that came with my PowerMac. I wanted something with a bit of response and that felt comfortable. I read a LOT of reviews from various review sites and customers on the Amazon.com site that were almost universal in their praise for the new keyboard. Almost universal in that I knew that there was a slight problem with some of the lettering being rubbed off.

I still went ahead in Dec. ‘05 and spent about a hundred bucks on a new Tactile Pro which was a real bargain at the time since it was selling for about 50% more in the US. Initially, it lived up to its hype and it was great to be able to blaze through what I needed to do but earlier this year I sat down and realized that a litany of problems had shown up. They include:

• Caps Lock key lighting up intermittently when pressed on or off.
• Up Arrow key may or may not be responsive when pressed.
• Letter “e” key failed to work (nonresponsive) a few times.
• At least six of the keys have had their “printed” characters rubbed off.

There are probably others but, frankly, this sort of thing is unacceptable even coming from a cheapo ‘board. I’ve heard that Matias will replace the ‘board but with a v.2, which from the one review I’ve found on Amazon is not really a step up. More tellingly, the new version only has a 1-yr warranty versus the 5-yr warranty with this version. Hrmmm…

I’ve decided (and it’s one reason for this review) that I am going to purchase a new keyboard but only one that has had some “legs” in the marketplace. I think that, in this case, rushing a bit on the purchase based on people’s first initial impressions has lead to one of the worst purchases I’ve ever made. To that end, I am leaning towards a Microsoft Ergo 4000 which has been out for over three years and still getting great reviews.

I’m also considering an older IBM Model M keyboard which is a real solid piece of work and ones in good shape still fetch a nice price along with Apple’s Extended II keyboard. Hrmmm…

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This latest installment by Penny makes me wonder if she is ending the series? It seems to tie up two major story points involving Inspector Gamache’s career with the Surete which would eliminate what, in the past, has taken up a good quarter of her two earlier books. It does allow for the introduction of one or two new characters and maybe explore new areas.

This time around the storyline/mystery is darker and more sinister than in the past with a step into the occult. The humour and witty repartee is still there along with the devious twists and turns that one expects with Penny. What was unexpected was she’s almost wiped out any of those foreigner-in-a-strange-land gaffes that she made in past books. There is still the Tim Horton’s error but, otherwise, the book is “clean” or maybe I just missed them? The book seems to be more of a mystery than trying to be a mystery in the “exotic” setting of Quebec.

There is one other thing that I haven’t brought up and that is the supposed Quebecois’ attitudes towards Anglos…not sure how true some of her characters’ thoughts ring…?

Anyways, certainly the best work by Penny so far.

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Medicus is the first novel by new mystery writer Ruth Downie and it’s very very good! We follow Gaius Petreius Ruso as a doctor who’s freshly recruited to serve with the 20th Legion in Northern Britain and encounters a Jane Doe upon his arrival. Despite repeated attempts not to get involved in trying to solve this mystery he keeps getting dragged in again and again. Ruso is a lot more concerned about writing his Great Medical Guide, finding wealthy patrons, climbing the social order, battling bureaucracy, and flipping a recovering slave to make a quick profit.

It’s a fun read that’s less mystery and more the story of a hapless, penurient, grouchy guy just trying to find his way in the new order of a military machine. Thumbs up!

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Bummer…just found out that July 25th was the grand opening of the first flagship Apple Store in Canada in Montreal. My record is not looking very good so far…been to Yorkdale, Sherway, and Eaton Centre. Missed out on a total of four others but the flagship opening was a real blow.

Of course, going with a gimpy wrist would have made it that much more difficult but I like a challenge.

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I’ve always loved space operas, well, two space operas specifically which are the original Star Wars saga and David Weber’s Honor Harrington series. You gotta love a storyline that includes true grit (I love that movie too.) and determination in the face of seemingly impossible odds put up by an evil foe, a plucky hero joined by a small band of quirky friends who are united by friendship, trust, a spirit of adventure and, in the case of Han Solo, avarice. All of this sandwiched in with pseudo-futuristic technology and big space battles.

Always on the hunt for something along those lines, I came across this series by Graham Sharp Paul at my local library and it tweaked my interest because it seemed to have the right ingredients as listed above. Well, not quite. Paul’s hero, as a young graduate is almost just there along for the ride, as a witness to great events rather than the catalyst for those great events. Much like that young American flyer who was shot down in the early hours of the Battle of Midway and, subsequently, survived to float amidst the Japanese fleet to watch the whole thing, Paul’s hero, Helfort is stuck in the bowels of his ship tweaking sensor drones while things happen all around him.

This is wholly unlike Honor Harrington or Luke Skywalker, granted it is much more realistic of modern navies but it means that we’re probably in for a very long war before Helfort does much. In other respects, this is an excellent start for a new space opera series, the book is well-crafted and detailed. It’s hard to put a word to it but it feels polished. Other authors need a book or two to hit their stride but Paul’s book feels like it’s spent years in a garage being worked over and smoothed into shape. I’ll be sure to try the next book and see what happens next.

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