On yer bike

A few years ago I mentioned to a friend of mine that I wanted to get a bike. About two weeks later he asked if I wanted a new mountain bike that his dad had bought but never used. (He wouldn't take any money for it: I think I bought a bottle of something for his dad.)

When I moved to the cottage, I brought the (still un-ridden) bike and put it in the cottage's outhouse. I thought it would be good for popping 'round to see the kids and I bought lights and a pump and a lock for it. But never rode it.

Now I'm carless, though, I need the bike for popping in and out of Kirkby Lonsdale, not least because I'm so bad at planning my food shopping. So, yesterday I pumped up the tyres, worked out how to use the superficially conventional looking lock and set off into town.

One thing I hadn't done, however, was adjust the saddle. Thus, having coasted thrillingly down from the cottage into Kearstwick, the slight incline immediately afterwards proved ridiculously challenging and by the time I bumped into a friend of mine, I was pushing the bike up a fairly tame hill.

Thus, when I reached the house I set about raising the saddle, which is exactly the kind of non-intuitive DIY task that makes me despair at my lack of handiness. It was in the middle of my cursing that I noticed the shadows being cast by the low sun and took this photo.

After that calming moment, I returned to the bike and finished sorting the handlebars (just about right) and the saddle (slightly too high). Later, when I left to cycle 'round to Booths I had this horrible anxiety that at the first bump both the handlebars and saddle would suddenly drop but they didn't, they stayed up. Hurrah!

However, the saddle did dramatically tilt forward before I got to the end of the road and so I ended up looking like I fancied myself as a racer despite my leisurely pace.