Mechanical mayhem

Last week the postman apparently tried to deliver a parcel but I was not in. I would take the time to debate this fact and generally moan about the quality of the post around these parts, but I shall save that for another day.

Since the PO do not re-deliver, a trip was required down to the sorting office to pick up said package. It's not far off, and it was a reasonable day so I hopped on the ole 2 wheel cycle and toddled off down the road. I was just approaching the depot when the pedals stopped turning, but not because I stopped pedalling. Oh no, it was as if something got jammed in it, and it stopped rather abruptly.

Fortunately the wheels kept turning, giving me a chance of not falling off. Never has it taken so much concentration to un-clip the clippy (clipless grr) pedals but I didn't fall off in the end. On examination it seemed the gear had come totally out of alignment. I twiddled enough to fix it and allow me to get home with the package, but couldn't figure out what was wrong.

Today I decided to try and sort the problem, and started playing with the gears in the kitchen (no garden y'see. Plus it's raining anyhow). Things looked to be getting better when *snap* the gear cable snapped. Grr.

A quick trip to the ye olde bike shoppe and I arrived back £2.00 less well off, and holding a new gear cable. Now, I am one of those people who can look at a practical situation and see exactly what needs done. I can formulate the best way to get it done and usually I'm pretty close to being right. The problems arises when I stop the planning stage and enter the doing stage. That's when 99% of the time things go wrong. I can royally screw up anything DIY or engineering related. And usually I do it with style.

But, and I know you're going to be disappointed, it was incredibly easy and I had it done and working in 10 mins. That's not to say when I ride it that it won't blow up spectacularly, but at the moment, lying upside down in my kitchen, it's working like a charm. Exciting stuff, eh?

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