In which I rode my bike to the store today!

When we moved to M-F I decided I needed a bike.

The grocery store’s a mile away, and there’s no way I’m hauling a gallon of milk an entire mile on foot. Work’s a half mile away, so a bike would cut my already-short commute time in half, plus I could haul stuff — packed lunches, extra jackets — more comfortably.

So there’s a cheap-but-new bike at the College Place Walmart I like, it’s a Scwhinn and it’s cute (I’m totally the demographic, the bike’s clearly designed for middle-aged white chicks; I know it’s tacky as fuck but it appeals to me). I decide I’ll buy it online and go pick it up! And then I’ll have wheels!

This was back before the winter fog set in, when the sun still shone, and there were still leaves on the trees, you dig.

Anyway, so I buy the bike online, easy peasy. Then I check back a couple hours later, and discover it’ll take over a week, nearly ten days, before the bike is ready? What the fuck, it’s literally right there in the fucking store, I’ve seen it, why can’t I have that one?

Oh, well, whatever, a week or so, fine. The reviews say it’ll be assembled, maybe they only have the floor model in stock, I don’t care. I can walk to work for a week.

So it finally comes in, and I ask my better half to go pick it up. He does.

It’s in a box and most definitely not assembled. I pitch a fit, he puts it together because he’s a goddamned SAINT, but parts are missing. The PEDALS are missing, for fuck’s sake.

So I open a ticket with Schwinn, and they send the missing parts. It takes about a week.

The parts arrive, I finish assembly, but because I’m an ass I don’t bother to adjust it, and the first time I try to ride the bike to work the derailleur goes into the spokes.

ARRGGHH!

So I contact Schwinn again to try to buy a replacement derailleur, and even though their documentation explicitly says bad adjustment is not covered by warranty, they send me a replacement for my fucked up derailleur for free. KILLER customer support.

There’s some delay with the package; it takes ten more days to arrive.

I read up on replacing derailleurs and watch a couple YouTube videos and think, “Fuck this, I’m taking it to a shop.” I mean, we have a garage and some tools, but I don’t have a bike stand and I’ve never done it before and it just looks like something I’d rather pay for.

Well, of course there’s no bike shop here, and I have no car of my own, and I work Saturdays, and all the bike shops in nearby towns are closed on Sundays, and and and, so it takes awhile to get the stupid thing to a shop. Like, another week or ten days.

But we did finally get it done, and he picked it up for me yesterday on his day off (because HE’S AMAZING), and today I rode my bike to the store for the first time!

Yay!

It was glorious weather for a maiden voyage: bright overcast and cool. Allegro Cyclery adjusted it perfectly: shifts great, brakes great. The cheap saddle bags I bought seem to have turned out to be a remarkably good deal! And they’re lighter than the Wohl chrome baskets I’ve always preferred, which definitely matters now that I’m fat.

Having not ridden much in years, I have no quads, which sucks, but they’ll come back. Turns out the journey to Safeway is all sliiiiightly uphill, but check it: the journey back is all slightly downhill! Fortuitous! I don’t have to pedal much when hauling groceries! Whoo! Coasting rules!

I didn’t go in, because I don’t have a bike lock and I would absolutely flip my shit if the very first time I take the bike out I get the stupid thing stolen, but I’ve finally Been To The Store On My Bike, and it took a long while to achieve this feat, and I am SO pleased and SO stoked I just can’t even tell you.

I timed the ride from work to home: it’s four minutes. I have a four-minute work commute now. How glorious is that?!

I’ll just order a bike lock online and drive the Jeep over to Safeway later for the weekly shop, like a gas-guzzling asshole American.