My wife surprised me with a gift, a used Trek 7200 to use as my "station bike". For those of you who do not have a significant other, the following may seem a little bizzar, but to others it will appear totally normal - the gift cost me $80. It went something like this..... "I know you were looking and I found you this, surprise...... Oh, they need $80."
My new (old) bike was one that was left at the local bike shop for more than a year without the previous owner paying, or picking it up. So, if you bike shop says they will sell your bike after some many days, this one will. The $80.00 covered the cost of the work the shop had performed.
After taking the bike for a spin I found out why no one had picked it up from the shop. The bike had been wrecked and the front suspension fork was bent and the handle bar is a little bent. I replaced the bent fork with the one from my old Montique so now I have a Trek hybrid with a 700c rearwheel and a monster mudder 26 inch front wheel. I raised the stem an extra inch to compensate for the smaller front wheel/tire. There are also a good number of scratches on plastic parts to show the bike slide on the ground a little when it was wrecked.
I bought 7 feet of 3/8 inch chain from Home Depot. It took a while for the checkout people to understand the chain was $9.00, not $110.00 - they tried to charge me by the inch, not the foot as it was actually priced - I don't have good expereinces at Home Depot - this was a bad one. I also got a good stout lock.
Today, I rolled down the hill to the train station and locked my new (old) bike to the rack in between some other "beaters". Let us see how long this one lasts.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Monday, July 14, 2008
Its gone Jim!
The emptiness was overpowering. The great void left me by some fool who stripped my identity with a simple snip turned quickly to rage and images of my doing wrong to that fool filled my mind, but this is foolish of me to think I might actually bring that kind of harm to anyone.
Why me? But in an instant I knew my Worksman was gone and it is now in the hands of some fool who probably does not know the historic value of the machine, the last American built bicycle. And I hope that fool peddles quickly because I have notified the Police and with all the advertising hanging off it, it will be hard to miss this bike as it goes by, it even has my cell phone plastered all over it in big letters - just let the fool park my bike somewhere and have someone unkowingly pick up their phone and call me! Ugh..... what a day.
After all these months of parking my bicycle at the train station, my bike has become such a part of my daily routine that I don't know if/how I will be able to cope in the next few days. I guess I will just have to get up an extra 15 minutes earlier and walk to the station rather than gently guide down the hill on my trusty old steed.
I also hope Mr. Fool realizes that the new gear shift cable sitting on my workbench will no longer be a benefit for my bike, and Mr. Fool will soon see that he/she is stuck in second gear. I am glad I didn't get to that chore this weekend (replacing the cable). I also hope soon that Mr. Fool realizes I haven't put air in the tires in a few weeks and that the tires were a little mushy this morning. Also, when Mr. Fool encounters his first hill he will realize that the Worksman is a big heavy bike that is sometimes not too easy to get up a big hill.
Thankfully, I had easy access to the bicycles serial number, and I was able to print a picture of the bike and the advertising signage to give it all to the Police Officer who made out the report documenting the theft of my bike.
I hope it turns up safe.
Why me? But in an instant I knew my Worksman was gone and it is now in the hands of some fool who probably does not know the historic value of the machine, the last American built bicycle. And I hope that fool peddles quickly because I have notified the Police and with all the advertising hanging off it, it will be hard to miss this bike as it goes by, it even has my cell phone plastered all over it in big letters - just let the fool park my bike somewhere and have someone unkowingly pick up their phone and call me! Ugh..... what a day.
After all these months of parking my bicycle at the train station, my bike has become such a part of my daily routine that I don't know if/how I will be able to cope in the next few days. I guess I will just have to get up an extra 15 minutes earlier and walk to the station rather than gently guide down the hill on my trusty old steed.
I also hope Mr. Fool realizes that the new gear shift cable sitting on my workbench will no longer be a benefit for my bike, and Mr. Fool will soon see that he/she is stuck in second gear. I am glad I didn't get to that chore this weekend (replacing the cable). I also hope soon that Mr. Fool realizes I haven't put air in the tires in a few weeks and that the tires were a little mushy this morning. Also, when Mr. Fool encounters his first hill he will realize that the Worksman is a big heavy bike that is sometimes not too easy to get up a big hill.
Thankfully, I had easy access to the bicycles serial number, and I was able to print a picture of the bike and the advertising signage to give it all to the Police Officer who made out the report documenting the theft of my bike.
I hope it turns up safe.
Monday, February 04, 2008
Too long since last post.
I need more time in the day to do everything I want to do, plus do all those things that must get done.
I rode the Worksman through the summer of 2007 until I had a little mishap when my cable lock got caught in the rear sprocket and popped the sprocket off the rear hub. Well with fall and winter fast approaching I reverted to riding my ex-Tidal Force/Montaque folding mountain bike. Still 5-, and sometimes 6- days a week the bike enables me to get back and forth from the train station with occasional stopps for bread and milk on the way home.
Basically, I have gone 11 months with very little change to my routine. Except for the Worksman which needs a little attention, I have only performed basic maintenance on my bikes.
During these past months, by riding my bicycle the approximately 396 miles back and forth to the railroad station and taking mass transit to work, I have avoided buying almost 660 gallons of gasoline. From a carbon standpoint, I have avoided spewing 6.27 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere (based on 40 CFR 600.113-78). Not too bad.
The economics of my bike-train-bike commute are really good. My mass transit commute is $240 per month. Whereas the cost of driving, with just the cost of gasoline and tolls being $350 per month, is much much more - I haven't even included the cost of wear and tear at $0.80 per mile, or any of the social* costs at $0.33 per mile ( http://www.commutesolutions.org/calc.htm, and http://www.vtpi.org/tdm/tdm66.htm#_Toc18284958) which would bring my drive to work up to $1,700 per month. WOW!!!!!!
The point here is, ride a bike, don't drive a car.
*The social cost does not include the cost of Foriegn Policy, or the war in Iraq.
I rode the Worksman through the summer of 2007 until I had a little mishap when my cable lock got caught in the rear sprocket and popped the sprocket off the rear hub. Well with fall and winter fast approaching I reverted to riding my ex-Tidal Force/Montaque folding mountain bike. Still 5-, and sometimes 6- days a week the bike enables me to get back and forth from the train station with occasional stopps for bread and milk on the way home.
Basically, I have gone 11 months with very little change to my routine. Except for the Worksman which needs a little attention, I have only performed basic maintenance on my bikes.
During these past months, by riding my bicycle the approximately 396 miles back and forth to the railroad station and taking mass transit to work, I have avoided buying almost 660 gallons of gasoline. From a carbon standpoint, I have avoided spewing 6.27 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere (based on 40 CFR 600.113-78). Not too bad.
The economics of my bike-train-bike commute are really good. My mass transit commute is $240 per month. Whereas the cost of driving, with just the cost of gasoline and tolls being $350 per month, is much much more - I haven't even included the cost of wear and tear at $0.80 per mile, or any of the social* costs at $0.33 per mile ( http://www.commutesolutions.org/calc.htm, and http://www.vtpi.org/tdm/tdm66.htm#_Toc18284958) which would bring my drive to work up to $1,700 per month. WOW!!!!!!
The point here is, ride a bike, don't drive a car.
*The social cost does not include the cost of Foriegn Policy, or the war in Iraq.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
