I just spent a chunk of this afternoon doing Dad-Type Stuff. And, I suppose, doing a little bit to save gas and make the world greener.
We have a couple bicycles in our garage from when I worked at an auto parts plant up on the north side of town. I had wrecked the frame on one of them, hitting a curb too hard and we had to buy a second one. Then shortly after getting the second one, the plant closed and I was laid off. This was in 2008, I think, which you might recall, was a bad time to be working in the auto industry. I wound up working temp positions for a long time, nearly all of which were located out of town and far out of biking distance.
So the bikes got stowed in the garage, and stayed there for a long, long time.
But now I have reason to dig them out again. My younger daughter, Rodan, has a job working at a local movie theater, and I usually pick her up to bring her home after her shift. But this past week the plant manager at my present job, (a permanent one, not a temp position, thank God and thank the union which stood up for me, but that’s a different story), asked if I’d be interested in transferring to a different department. It will mean a raise in pay and less grueling hours, but it will mean working the night shift, which means Rodan will have to find a different way home.
Ah, but we have bikes!
So I spent today digging the bikes out of the garage and seeing if they were still rideable. The one with the bent frame wasn’t, not surprising, but the other one looked hopeful. The tires were flat, having spent the past two presidential administrations in storage, but I knew we had a little air compressor someplace. I just couldn’t find where.
Not a problem. The Friendlee-Mart down the street offers free air, and it’s close enough that I could just push the bike there and ride it home. Except that the Friendlee-Mart is closed this week because of construction. Whee. That meant I’d have to go digging through the cat’s room some more to see if I could find our own compressor after all.
Fortunately there are about a half dozen Friendlee-Marts in our town. I scouted ahead and verified that it had free air too. Then I just had to figure out a way to cram the damn bicycle into my little trunk. It wasn’t pretty, but I found a bungee cord to hold my trunk down and a red rag to tie around the part of the handlebars sticking out.
I got the tires all up to pressure, put a little oil on the wheels and the gears and gave it a test ride down the block. It seems to work fine. And I discovered that it still had its bike lock on it and that I still had the key to it, so that’s one more less thing we’ll have to buy.
Now the question will be if it will work for Rodan. The bike frame was designed for a tall person, and she might have trouble riding it. We’ll have to see.
But I think that’s about as much adulting as I can manage for one afternoon. Back to drawing.
UPDATE:
And, it looks like it was all for naught. This afternoon, Rodan actually had the opportunity to try out the bike, and it turns out it’s too big for her. The frame is designed for someone 6’ or taller, and the bike’s cross-bar comes up higher that is comfortable for her to ride. So, she’s going to have to buy a new bike for herself. And I’m going to have to clear out more space in the garage to put the too-big bike back and still leave room for the new one.
Gr.