{"product_id":"room-for-improvement-notes-on-a-dozen-lifelong-sports-9780307700025","title":"Room for Improvement: Notes on a Dozen Lifelong Sports","description":"\u003cp\u003eFrom the author of the novel Spartina  which won the National Book Award and has established itself as a modern classic  comes a collection of essays that describe with tenderhearted candor and humor a lifetimes worth of addiction. No  not an addiction to booze or drugs  but an addiction to a more natural gratification: the joy of sport  exercise  and the sheer elation of being ready and willing to say yes to a challenge. Want to run a marathon? OK. Climb Mount Katahdin? Sure! How about canoeing the entire length of the Delaware River? Why not?  Spanning more than fifty years of ambitious and sometimes peculiar endeavors  these essays take us along on some of Caseys greatest adventures: a twenty-six-day Outward Bound course in Maine during the dead of winter; being pinned by a two-hundred-pound judo instructor whose words  Come on  white boy. Dont give up  encourage at least one more attempt at escape; leading a lost couple on a yacht through the rocky waterways of Narragansett Bay by a simple rowboat; and completingon his seventieth birthdaya 70K marathon of his own devising that included rowing  bicycling  skating  Rollerblading  and finally  trotting the dog out for a mile.  Be it a preoccupation with health  vanity  or just an indomitably playful sense of adventure  John Caseys Room for Improvement is a joyful self-portrait of a writer who loves going to extremes  just to find out what its like once he gets there.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45648022863925,"sku":"ByrdShop_030770002X","price":28.39,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780307700025.jpg?v=1781706886","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/room-for-improvement-notes-on-a-dozen-lifelong-sports-9780307700025","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}