Montreal

So I'm about to move, which is great, because I'd like to explore different parts of the city. In preparation for this move, I realized I have no towel, so I went to go find one in Montreal.

(It's weird when you have no idea where to buy a towel, since there's no Target, no Bed Bath and Beyond or something to just default to. It's amazing the grip big box chain stores have on my psyche. )

I digress.

In any case, I looked up a place, Linen Chest, which appears to be Bed Bath and Beyond.ca, and took off in search of cheap towel. I found the place in this huge underground mall system called the underground city herebouts. This "city" is all awe-inspiring capitalist underbelly. But I like it.

It's basically a series of connected underground malls, which I explored with delight, sampling from the plethora, nay, cornucopia, of shitty mall cafes and juice joints, generally feeling great because it's -18 below. Seriously, -18. That is unbelievably, unimaginably cold to me. Yes, I'm a pussy, fuck off.

Never did buying a towel seem so enjoyable simply because I walked about a kilometer entirely indoors to get to the store and back.

One thing though, which may actually be, you know, interesting.

So I went to the bookstore, Indigo, in one of the malls. One thing about Canadian bookstores, and I'm generalizing based on my experience with two, is that they have terrible curatorship. There were no staff picks, no books arranged in any order other than sales, date, or alphabetical in the store. This means that other than a table full of Oprah's picks, books I have already read and/or shitty trade paperbacks, there's no way for me to pick a book other than literally looking at every book in the store in alphabetical order. Yes, I know, I could find a book before I go, but that's asking a lot for a guy who had no plans other than "Get Towel" today.

So I ask a worker in the store if there are any, "you know, like lists of recommendations or something?" She points me to a kiosk with a browser for their lists (ah technology, I love and hate you). Again, only books listed in order of sales or date or by Times best seller list (which is a list of books to avoid, in my opinion.)  In any case, she recommends Ken Follett's "Pillars of the Earth."  Which rings a bell for me, because this book I read in high school and I remember it incredibly well.

The reason why is that it was assigned reading to me in 8th grade, one of those summer reading books. It's a reasonably well written espionage thriller, intended obviously to endow me with the pleasure of reading.

However, that alone would not suffice to have me actually remember reading it. The real reason is that it has some graphic sexual scenes. To put it mildly, I believe this book is the first place that I became aware of something called the g-spot. Which of course is slightly odd, because I was assigned reading it when I was 13. By Dr. Otto. So clearly, neither she nor anybody else had actually read it before assigning it, or whoever did was some pedophilic weirdo who got off on perverting adolescent kids.

Shame, Dr. Otto, shame. (That's not her, but you get the idea)

Of course, I was about to tell this story to the saleswoman right before someone asked her where to find the graphic novel section. Thank God, or else she would have thought I was going to get all rapey or something. Actually, Pillars of the Earth is quite good. Just, you know, skip the bodice-ripping/cunnilingus parts. or don't, whatever.