It is prom day, so the story begins with a bicycle ride to to buy important prom accessories - gold flecked nail polish, hair ties, fancy hair pins, gold eye shadow and diamond stud earrings. And a stop at the supermarket to get bagels.
I had to add a little air to the back tire before leaving.
After a nice ride, I came home and received a call from the . They said my laptop was ready and we agreed I’d pick it up at 2:30pm.
Since it is Saturday, I have all day to spend not doing the things I should be doing. So, it seemed like a great idea to ride my bike to go get the laptop. I found a towel and a backpack, put on my helmet and safety vest and went out to the garage to get my bike.
The back tire was totally flat.
I spend a lot of time fixing flat bike tires. This is how to fix a flat tire on a bike.
The most tiresome part of fixing flats is pumping up the tire with my small, frame mounted pump. It takes forever. Really. And finding where the leak is so you can patch the tube. I can never find it, I always have to use a bucket of water.
In addition to the very flat tire on my bike, my daughter’s bike (mine when she isn’t here) also needed air in the tires, and the wheelbarrow had a slow leak. Clearly there was a lot of pumping that needed to be done. So, I decided to buy a new air pump on the way to get the laptop.
When I got home, I pumped up my daughter’s tires. It was so much easier to use the new pump than the old one. Then I decided to fix the flat on my bike. I took the wheel off, found the tiny strand of metal that had punctured the tire and the and patched it.
I put the tube in the tire and the tire on the wheel and the wheel on the bike.
And I pumped it up.
As I finished pumping I heard the air escaping, so I figured I had missed the leak or there was a second one and I took everything apart. The seam had split on the tube. It was a cheap tube from a major discount retailer. So, I put another cheap tube from the major discount retailer on the bike and pumped it up. Unfortunately, I didn’t check to ensure the tube was in the tire properly and when I heard a big bang, I knew I’d done something wrong. I had one more cheap tube and I put it on the wheel and that was that.
Since I had a new pump, I though it would be a good idea to add a little air to the front tire as well. I did. When the pressure hit 60 psi, the tube blew. That was the end of the cheap tubes, it was time to buy more.
But I didn’t buy cheap tubes this time. I went to Goodale’s Bike Shop and bought three nice new tubes.
I also stopped at and bought a .
When I got home I put a new tube on the bike.
Then it was time to fix the wheelbarrow. I found the piece of metal that caused the slow leak and removed it. After reading the instructions on the tire plug kit, I put in a plug. It didn’t look too good, but it was holding so I pumped up the tire. But I needed to cut off the excess. Using bolt cutters was a bad idea, as they pulled the plug out just enough that the tire could spit the remainder out and sigh itself flat. I’m not sure how I did it, but the second plug ended up entirely inside the tire. That must be why they give you three plugs in the kit I bought. The third plug worked nicely and I used a razor blade to cut off the excess.
My daughter is at her prom. She looks beautiful. My friend was kind enough to call me over to the house where the girls were getting ready for the prom so I could see her and take pictures.
The bike is hanging off the back of the car, ready to go to Maine tomorrow.
There’s more to the story, but I’m tired (bad pun). Good night.