The Seat Part Connected to the Seat Post Connected to the... Brand New Bike

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Way back in November last year I talked about the irretrievable breakdown of the relationship between my bicycle seat and my bottom, and the travails of finding a suitable sitting point for my ongoing bicycle adventures.  I may have been silent on this issue but I haven't been slacking: indeed, I spent the months since November wading through all the possible ways of achieving bum-seat compatibility.  Along the way one thing led to another and eventually I took delivery of a brand new bicycle seat which came attached to a whole brand spanking new bicycle.

Kind of like the ankle bone connected to the leg bone etc...

New seat, new bike, fancy little bell.
 

I collected my brand new bicycle in between cleaning and packing up the cat-brushing house sit and zooming off to the Tired Old Dog in time to let him out to.. ahem.. visit the back yard grass.  There was just time, I thought, to squeeze a quick ride on my brand new bike in between unpacking my stuff and dog-nannying.  And then it rained, and proper rain too: heavy and consistent and cold.  I couldn't possibly take a squeaky clean bicycle out in the rain for its maiden voyage, so I had to wait and eventually the sun set and I gave up and planned my maiden voyage for tomorrow.

As luck would have it the whole of tomorrow was taken up with errands which, while important and even enjoyable in their own right, forced me to leave my new bicycle locked in the garage at Aldinga while I drove up hill and down dale and all I really wanted to do was ride my bicycle and I even took delivery of a brand new bicycle lock with which to lock up the brand new bicycle that I hadn't yet got to ride. I got home just in time to squeeze in a quick maiden voyage but first of all I had to pump up my new tyres, because the bicycle shop and I had different ideas about what constituted an acceptable tyre pressure for riding up and down the esplanade on my maiden voyage. With the dog for company I got out my little hand pump and went to pump up my tyres, except that my pump was set to pump tyres up via a Schrader valve and my new bicycle had presta valves and the pump fitting for one couldn't be used with the other and although I knew my pump could be converted I hadn't had to do so in a very long time. I fiddled with the valves and had a half-hearted attempt at converting my pump by which time I was getting frustrated and the dog's malevolent body odour was becoming overwhelming in the confined garage space.

Far too small to cause all that fuss.
 

"I'll go down to the esplanade" thought I, "and pump up my tyres with the free pump at the public bicycle service station."  And off I went, walking because my fiddling with the valve had let some air out of my tyre such that I didn't want to ride it until it had been inflated. I enjoyed being out in the fresh air. I saw a Pelican floating on the silver sea, fishing in the shallows of low tide. A bird of prey hovered in the updraft at the edge of the cliffs, and the rain stayed safely contained in clouds down over the Fleurieu Peninsula. 

Pelican at sea.
 

The bicycle repair station had a pump and the pump had a fitting for a presta valve, and by the time I'd figured out that the pump head didn't work I'd released all the air from my tyre and it was totally flat.

Bummer.

I walked home again, this time wheeling my bike along on its back wheel because I didn't want to ruin the flat front tyre, and grumbling under my breath about useless public bicycle repair stations. I got some funny looks. Oh well.

Bee on flower.  Nothing to do with my sorry story.
 

Back at the house I locked the smelly dog out of the garage and did what I should have done in the first place, which was to Google how to convert my hand pump. The whole process took 2 minutes and was easy peasy lemon squeezy (once I knew how, of course). Then I pumped up my bicycle tyre and stopped to chat to my beautiful daughter and by the time we finished talking the sun had set and the dog wanted his dinner and the time for bicycle riding was over.

 

Dying of starvation.

Tomorrow, come hell or high water, I'm going for a ride on my brand new bike.


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