Bike Riding Causes Stiff Playing

            A few weeks ago I’d applied for Albert Moritz’s second year Creative Writing course VIC280 at Victoria College and had sent some samples of my poetry as was required. On Friday I got an email from Albert telling me that though I’d be perfectly welcome in that course my poetry is a little too sophisticated for it. He asked if I’d consider taking his VIC480 Creative Writing course in January. I wrote back a confirmation and he responded that he would transfer my application to the other course and that I would definitely be accepted and will receive official notification next month. My enrolment time for my other courses is this Monday at 9:40 and so because of the Creative Writing half course I’ll skip Philosophy this year and just enrol in one other full English course. I’ll have to sit down and decide which one before Monday morning.

I had planned on taking a fake rain day on Friday and skipping my bike ride as I hadn't had a day off from my two and a half hour ride out to Scarborough and back since the Thursday before last. But then I looked at the forecast and saw that there was a better chance of it raining on Saturday afternoon and so since I didn’t need two days off and I would feel guilty while staying home on a real rain day for having slacked off on the sunny day before, I decided to take my velo out after all.

There tend to be fewer bikes on Fridays at rush hour, perhaps because cyclists linger downtown after work, banking, shopping or going for drinks with colleagues before heading home.

I got out to Danforth and Pharmacy four minutes faster than the day before. I rode north past St Clair to Rosita Crescent and took that till it turned to Dorine Crescent and came back around to Pharmacy and I continued north to Camilla Crescent and took that to Fairfax Crescent, which I followed to Warden.

There were hardly any cyclists on the way back on Danforth. A woman trailed me from around Pape until she shot ahead around Sherbourne. Once she was ahead of me I could see that she had long, uncombed hair, a loose fitting dress, sandals and a Toronto Library bag over her shoulder instead of a backpack or purse. She had kind of a frantic and almost desperate way of pedalling. I probably could have caught up with her but I chose to go down Yonge while she continued on Bloor.

That evening I practiced playing my translation of Gerard de Nerval’s "Andalouse" three times. I figured out why my guitar playing is so lousy when I practice after 19:30. It’s because my fingers are stiff from gripping my handlebars after my bike ride.

I heated up the last of the pork ribs for dinner and had them with a potato and gravy. At one point I bit off a piece of what I'd thought was meat but that turned out to be a tooth-sized hunk of gristle. It got lodged in a gap between two teeth on the lower left side of my mouth and I had to stop eating to go and try to floss it out, but it wouldn’t budge. Finally I was able to push it out with my finger. I finished my meal while watching the last two episodes of the third season of Dobie Gillis.

In the first story Dobie hears that a bully named Butch, who had left town to join the army, but promised Dobie he would beat him up when he came back to town, would be arriving at high noon. Suspense builds as we keep seeing the clock ticking towards high noon while Dobie tries to figure out a way to save himself. Finally he decides to meet Butch at the bus and to confront him even though he knew he would lose any fight with him. Butch is impressed with Dobie’s courage and they become friends.

In the season finale Dobie wants to join The Silver Spoon Club but his social standing makes his membership impossible. Although the club members are rich though, they are desperately short on food, and so Dobie’s father secretly bribes them with groceries to allow Dobie to join. Dobie finds out though and mistreats the club as they try to draw him in. Finally Dobie realizes he's been a rat and gives a speech on the night of his initiation to explain why he will not be joining. They ask him to join anyway with no strings attached.