
Sampling While Walking
I really did not feel like walking today. Wait, let me rephrase that. I really didn’t feel like walking on a treadmill again today. Although today would only be the fourth day this year that I’ve resorted to walking on a treadmill, it would be the first time that I did it two days in a row.
Despite the clear blue skies and bright sun, the AccuWeather Real Feel® temperature of -5° F only gave me two options. Either I head out on a very, very short walk in my neighborhood, or I go to our park district health club and get my butt on a treadmill. Since I had the time and could really use the exercise, I decided the treadmill was really the only option. Like yesterday, I took my Kindle.
I’d like to take a moment here to share my personal list of e-reader virtues:
- A library in my hand. All of the books that I’ve purchased or received as gifts in the past two years are on hand, and I can easily take them with me. If I’m on the road and finish a book, I have easy access to another.
- Ease of propping up on a treadmill. No books falling over, no closing pages, it just stays put on the correct page until I tell it to turn to the next one. (I actually just added this virtue after yesterday’s walk.)
- Free book samples. This is the first virtue I discovered when I got my Kindle two years ago. I love sending free samples to my Kindle. Although I’ve stood and paged through books in a bookstore, I’ve never read the entire first chapter or two. (I always felt like some sales associate would tell me to buy it or yell at me for bending the paperback cover.)
I could easily waste a lot of time looking at books on Amazon, so I try to limit how often I do it. Today, I talked myself into going to the health club by making it a Kindle sample day and allowed myself to peruse Amazon for new book releases and send some samples to my Kindle.
One of the samples that I added was On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes by Alexandra Horowitz. The book description states that it’s about observing and perceiving the world around us. Since it also seems to be about walking, I thought it sounded perfect for today.
It was. After I took the picture above, I started reading the lengthy sample and only looked at the timer on the treadmill twice (once was after my time was up). I will be adding On Looking to my reading list. Oh, I’d also like to add the following to my list of e-reader virtues:
- It covers the timer on the treadmill, so I don’t check the timer constantly.
Good day, good walk.