Another Pair Of Eyes

Planning

I sat down this morning to plan out how I’m going to make this under piano thing I’m building. I managed to scrounge a bunch of tools etc from home so now I am fully tooled up* and ready to roll. I’m going to start marking out the wood tonight, so when some nice weather rolls around I can hop outside saw in hand and pounce. Should be good. I’m genuinely quite excited about working with wood again – not done it since school and I enjoyed it a lot back then. Depending on how this goes (it’s a pretty simple design, nothing but straight edges and hidden dowel joints) I may or may not end up making more stuff in future.

We shall see.

Apologies about the image quality above…

Check out the rust on that tri square.

*with the exception of a centrepunch, which I will procure from somewhere.

Exciting Things

Because I am tired, I have made this picture in place of a normal blog post.

Clickety click.

Terrific

Yesterday was a good day. In fact, it was a great day.

• It was sunny all day.
• I had my first mental health assessment and got a perfect score – not a mark mislaid.
• I came home and found I’d been sent the wrong parcel. This wasn’t great, but opening parcels is always nice.
• I got to talk to a patient at the adolescent forensic unit. I will talk more about this later.
• I got home and began the major alterations to my bike. These aren’t yet finished but are going well
• I went to hockey for the first time this year. Not only could I remember how to play, but I also didn’t feel TOO unfit at the same time. I have slightly stiff legs and a sore ankle this morning, but such is the price of Fun.
• I spent the day feeling generally awesome about life. Elevated mood, anyone?
• I knew I had a lie-in until half seven the next morning.

Bits’n'bobs

I’m off to the hospital now to chat to everyone I’ve not seen this week. I heard there was some kind of lecture at the same time, but you know, whatever.

Tinker

Last year my not-actually-all-that-good bike was stolen, and I was displeased. I bought, being short of money, a very cheap bike off the web. Unsurprisingly, it’s turned out to be pretty shit and it seems to suffer from what I can only describe as the bike version of premature aging. Creaks and niggles and a clicking pedal, slightly dodgy gear transmission, all that jazz.

The only thing which is in a good state is the frame. It’s not light, but it is pretty solid and would probably outlast me given the chance. With this in mind,* and with my budget also in mind, I’ve come up with my new pet project – transform this shoddy creaking heap of almost-unbearable-transport into something which is a pleasure to ride and still is relatively theftproof due to it’s crap looks. Challenge? Maybe, we’ll see. Anyway, quick list of problems and a photo, and we’ll see how I get on in the year:

• Tyres are constantly deflating, but there are no punctures. Cheap valves on the inner tubes are responsible
• Big mountain bike tyres make it slower on the road.
• Right pedal clicks every time it goes round, and sometimes locks in position.
• Pedals are well slippy like, especially in anything damper than light mist.
• Cranks are made of plastic, and won’t last long.
• Plastic cranks connected to shitty front cogs. Whole lot will need changing. Probably the most expensive part of this enterprise.
• Handlebars are too short for my hands with the gripshift gears.
• Gripshift gears are a pain.**
• Endless mud thrown up my backside is boring when in smart clothes.
• I can’t carry much on it – I am limited to whatever is in my backpack. It needs a rack, it does.
• It generally takes twice as much effort for me to cycle anywhere as it should.

So I put in my first order to a cycle shop for some parts and spent £40 on a complete set of new slick tyres, new presta valve inner tubes, and new pedals. They should arrive this week at some point, and I’ll get started then and see what happens! Knowing me I’ll end up spending a lot more on this over time than I would have spent on a new bike, especially once you consider the time constraints, but I reckon the satisfaction and the distraction offered by tinkering will be worth it. Plus, it’s another handy skill – I’d quite like to be able to service my own bike in its entirety and save some money at the bike shop in future than be stuck relying on them forever.

So we shall see, yes?

Currently, the bike looks like this:

It’s like an advert, in reverse. I like this.

EDIT: I have since changed one of the inner tubes on my wheel, and have discovered that the wheels aren’t exactly what one would call straight. And the front brake is a little shifty now. Tick tock…

*and the fact that I hate to waste things, so wasting a perfectly adequate frame seems perverse.

**This will probably, I’ll admit, be the last thing to change. The idea of completely replacing the gearing system and then adjusting it for the chainset makes me slightly nervous still.