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Mon, 12 Sep 2005
[08:02] My Bike, my NEW Bike
Date: 9/12/05 at 4:02PM
I'm sure everyone remembers how I got a bike a few weeks ago (you better - there's a test at the end). Well, the story developed but as work is going through one of those "Your life is mine, MINE, MIIIIIINE MUHAHAHAHAHAHA" phases at the moment I haven't had a chance to write about it. As I sit here at work at 1900 I find I now have some "spare" time, so here goes:
Well, in what ended up being a stunning surprise to absolutely no-one, I broke it (especially my father who, being used to such things, just laughed at me). I don't know what it is with me and, well everything pretty much! Generally things just fall apart in my hands. I refuse to believe that I am the only one to get one of those bikes and ride it so hard that it just disintegrated under the pressure. I'm not morbidly obese and I was being careful (I'm not even going to qualify that with a "for me" - I was actually riding normally). I've gone through a large number of bikes in my past so I know that I can be a little rough (I managed to actually detach the frame from the forks on one - it just snapped whilst I was riding home. Took me a while to work out what happened, I heard the SNAP but the brake and gear cables held the whole thing together so I couldn't actually see a problem - when I got on and pedalled the pedals were scraping on the ground but it wasn't until I got home that I worked out WHY, but I digress)...ummmm, yeah, so, on with the story:
I actually broke it the week I got it - I described the disintegration of the whole gear assembly but I was willing to live with that, when the rear wheel bearing started to give out (this is within four days of purchase folks) I decided I better take it back to the shop and let them do a post-mortem. I took it back on Saturday - exactly one week after it left the store on its maiden voyage. They were, non-plussed, shall we say. The blokes exact words were "You've had this how long?". He took it out the back and after about five minutes I sorta peeked around the corner - three people were standing around it all with their hands on their hips, heads a'shaking. He came back and told me that they could swap it for me or refund my money which I thought was pretty cool. I decided that I didn't want another piece of poop bike (anyone spot the cunning plan here?) and asked if I could perhaps upgrade to something not constructed entirely of tinfoil and my erstwhile assistant said "Yup" so I requested a parade of the next crappiest bikes. I got the option of a mountain bike or a commuter bike, both with front suspension, I'm not real keen on suspension but I had no choice so I test rode them both. I decided on the commuter because by god that was one DAMN comfy seat - the seat on the original bike and the one on the mountain bike were both ass-reamers, to put it bluntly. So, BEHOLD MY NEW BIKE:
This little beauty is a Decathlon Riverside 3, constructed especially for riding alongside rivers - luckily I have to go over the Thames every morning so it's OK.
Now, as I write this it is a day over two weeks since I got the new bike and so far (touch wood, touch wood, touch wood) it has behaved perfectly. It is insanely more comfy than the old one, the bell actually works (the old one was constructed of tinfoil and just crumpled when you tonked it with the little hammer) and you can even change gears!!
In another two weeks it will have paid itself off and I will be in credit to the tune of £70, huzzah!
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