Sunday 20 March 2011

Punctured Bicycle on a hillside desolate... Will nature make a man of me yet???

Ok, well it's been a while since my last blog and it's been a time of expansions. Nicholas & Steele have expanded into the vintage wedding hire sector, successfully too, and my stomach has increased to the size of a super moon! I even have my own gravity, anything that remotely looks like a cream cake, biscuit or a tender steak seems to be pulled towards my mouth at a speed that Galileo or Sir Isaac Newton couldn't even calculate.
I promised on my last blog that I would have at least gone for one cycle ride before the christmas food fest happened but sadly, I failed. The bike never made it past the 'open shed door, look at bike, pity it's condition, close shed door' stage.... until just recently!!!
My lovely wife was gifted a bike from one of our customers who adopted us as her UK son and daughter. Sweet. So after a short spin around the block which saw us attempting to set off the digital road sign around the corner, 20 mph on a dutch style ladies bike is an amazing feat (if not slightly amusing to anyone who watched the 6ft man cycling at full pelt on a very small ladies bike) I came back feeling i should give my old girl a bit of attention and get her out of the shed... at this point i should say i'm talking about my bike and not my wife.
So, with a renewed sense of purpose, I pulled the bike from the shed and promptly banged my head on the roof.

 

Ouch!!!



After a lot of swearing, I wheeled the bike slowly from the shed and couldn't help feel slightly guilty at neglecting my trusty partner for so long. It was actually 2 years since I last swung my leg over the razor thin saddle and wobbled off into the distance. On closer inspection I now realised that there was no chance of a quick blast as it was in much worse a state then i had hoped. The tyres were not only flat but had actually perished in places, and the inner tubes were about as much use as an inflatable dart board. The chain and all the little nuts n bolts had signs of rust.



I returned to the shed to fetch my foot pump and once again banged my head, so hard that it made me feel sick and dizzy. It was after much swearing and jigging around that i could see the funny side of my mishap and carry on with the assessment. Needless to say that the bike is going to need a bit of tlc before I can take it out. I'm really itching to get out and about but for now I shall have to cut back on the food and use the money saved to buy the parts i need.

Oh and one more thing before i go, on clearing away my tools I banged my head again. This time much worse than the others that i had to sit down for a bit.  3 times on the same spot in one hour, that has to be a record. I think I should add a crash helmet to my list of bike parts.

TTFN xx