Today's report is brought to you through the kindness of a stranger.
I didn't quite make 20 of my usual 25 miles round trip. I had ridden the faithful Peugeot UO8 today because it has a rack for panniers and lights which might have been useful had the predicted 30% POP come to pass. That bike choice turned out to be pivotal.
I was tooling along this afternoon on the way back to the Attleboro train station when I heard a gunshot. Well, it wasn't really a gunshot, just my rear tire. I hopped off the bike, pulled off the wheel (working through the panniers), checked it over but found no puncture. Then I head a voice from across the road (Rt 123), "You okay over there?" I looked, saw the caller, and answered "I don't know yet." To which he answered "I'll be here if you need anything." Then I found the problem - the valve stem had, ah, exploded. Simple punctures don't usually sound like that anyway.
The reason the bike choice mattered is that it has Schrader valves, not Presta. When I had put the bike in the car last night I couldn't find a spare tube. I had grabbed tires irons and a patch kit and figured that would cover any normal flat. I have one around here somewhere because both it and the Gran Sport have Schrader valves. But it got moved when I transferred its handlebar bag over to the Bianchi. Memo to self: You have too many bikes.
So I walked across the street and the guy happily consented to throw the bike in the back of his pickup and drive me the rest of the way to the station. As he put it, the weeds in the lawn would keep and the steaks weren't going onto the grill until 6:30. We had a delightful conversation for the next 10 minutes or so. I told him how I'd written to the Attleboro newspaper last year about how courteous the drivers had been all year, and then thanked him for his consideration.
It was a good day. As he put it when we shook hands at the station "God bless America!" People are what make a society. We have some good ones.
