generations

After a twenty-minute delay to sort out the mushy rear tyre (swapping to the normal tyre rather than flapping about trying to work out if it was a foreign body or a native stud) I arrived at work moments before JustSitting, who enquired if what I was riding was my new bike. I thought I handled it well, neither wailing pitifully nor growling.

This evening, after a protracted cabling session and a game of pick-which-front-mech-to-try (fortunately able to be completed after a quick rootle through a parts box to find the mech I removed but didn't fling out three years ago to steal its cable-retaining clamp screw thing), what you see here is a bicycle technically capable of being ridden, as long as one took care not to change gear (to avoid snagging the chain on the head of the bolt holding the rack in place) or try to use the front brake (currently stuttering on the wonky wheel) or lean forward too suddenly (which would run the risk of being impaled on the excess steerer). It'd also have to be ridden during the day, as the electrical wiring still has to be replaced. Even if I had managed to get round to doing the wiring I'd have still been unable to test it as Nicky was out all evening. At least the sparebike is rolling slightly less laboriously (and a bit more quietly) with only half as many spiked tyres in use, so another couple of days can be tolerated.