The Weekend That Was

So I was standing on Swan Street at 10am Saturday morning - in the fullest, warmest, brightest sunlight of the past six months - surrounded by people in coloured scarves.

Some kind of sporting event I guess...

One the the small clutch of shops stuck like barnacles to the underside of Swan Street's Richmond Station is Abbotsford Cycles; a fine store if you're one of those rational people more interested in maintaining a bike than throwing it away to buy a new one.

Also good if you're one of those people who's broke.

It was to AC that I had travelled to replace a broken spoke on my rear wheel... aaaaand the rear hub axle. Turns out mine was snapped clean in half.

Good thing I didn't break the $50 before leaving the house.

"The problem with an aluminium frame like that" explained John the Mechanic, "is that there's no flex in it - it doesn't absorb any of the impact". He asked if I had hit a pothole, and took my hesitant shrug as uncertainty. Probably for the best - given a few more seconds I might have pressed index finger to digit after digit and recounted them like rides at the fair - without so much as a conscious thought I manage to sample them all before a day is done.

Anyway, the whole thing came to $40 - including a free derailleur hanger straightening. Funny that I never had a problem with it until BSC's spanner monkeys repaired a flat for me.

"Heh heh, your new tube, like, exploded, so like, now we have to upsell you to a new tire, heh heh, plus we kinda don't have it in the 700x32c you're after, so we hope you don't notice that we gave you a 28 instead, and like, we totally bent your hanger and left your bike in its highest gear. That'll be, like, $75!"

John also tells me I'll need a new bottom bracket soon, as I've mangled the current semi non-sealed one. Apparently I'm "cutting grooves in the cups", which, despite the lyric quality of the phrase, is not a euphemism for krunk DJing.

A Shimano UN-54 will set me back $35.

I ran my plan to buy a Cross-Check* past John, which was met with slow and steady nod of the head.

"A steel-framed cyclocross bike is a very good idea if you want both speed and durability".

Why doesn't everyone ride one again?

Simondo out.

P.S. Saw the Mummy 3 on Sunday with some free tix Jen scored from work. Up until that point I thought the two hours I spent inhaling RP-7 fumes while cleaning my drivetrain was the biggest hit my IQ could take before the weekend was out. Geeez. I mean, you've heard of wait 'til DVD? This is more like wait 'til drunken skeet shooting. End credit design was nice tho.

*This isn't throwing a bike away and replacing it so much as it is removing one from an abusive relationship.