The photo above was taken yesterday on the promenade in Blackpool during our run. I’m using the time to train for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation CIBC Run for the Cure.

Each year I participate in the CIBC Run for the Cure to raise money for breast cancer research and prevention. It’s important to me for personal reasons. My paternal Grandmother died of cancer in 2001. She was the most amazing woman and it was heartbreaking to watch.

My maternal Grandmother was diagnosed with breast cancer a couple of years ago, and underwent treatment that would not have been possible without fundraisers like this raising money for breast cancer research. It sounds cheesy, but it’s true: with your help we can make a difference.

This year’s run takes place on Sunday, October 2nd, 2011. I’d like to raise $500 – a modest amount, but right now I’m far short of my goal. If you can, please donate. Every little bit helps.

Thanks for your support!

June marked the first edition of Shelf Life, and July the second, so with August I bring you the third collection of brief notes on what I read this month.

You’ll notice this month’s list has gone up in a much more timely fashion. This time I took my own advice and wrote these notes as I went along. Much easier to remember and comment on the content of what I’m reading as I go, rather than long after the fact.

Some good stuff stands out this month, among them The Lacuna, and, surprisingly, The Chairs Are Where the People Go.

Onward:

80. One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

A book club pick.  We’re trying, in fits and starts, to make our way through a list of “30 books everyone should read before 30″. There are various incarnations of the list, but most include overlapping titles, so we pick randomly from the list, as we’re all still below that dooméd age. So far the results have not been overly gratifying.

A family saga told from the founding of a town in an undisclosed South American country in an undisclosed province, to its ultimate destruction – both of family and town. At the end of the book a baby is killed and carried away by an army of aunts.

It has gypsies, flying carpets, revolutionaries, war, lots of sex and an obscure mysticism. It should be a deeply interesting book, but it’s not. Instead it was universally “mehed” by the group. We’re switching back to CanCon for September’s pick. Continue reading »