Well, this'll be the last post, since my Pigeon has been stolen. I'll try to sum up my final thoughts on the experience.

The Good:
I rode it for a total of 830 miles. It never broke down again on me. It was a very dependable ride once the pedals were sorted out.
People would stop to ask about it all the time. It really turned heads and got folks interested.
The ride was always smooth and it handled Abilene's poor streets with aplomb. I've seen cheap walmart bikes that didn't last a month when put up against our cracked, potholed roads.
I'm in much better shape now after riding a heavy single speed everywhere. When I get on my wife's bike I can just fly down the road. The Pigeon never really felt heavy, though. The gearing and long crank arms made it hard to notice that I was essentially pedaling a bag of concrete around.
Although the brakes didn't have a lot of stopping power, they always worked. Even when out of adjustment they stopped the bike well enough.

The Bad:
We've had an unusually wet summer this year. The Pigeon's painted surfaces never showed any sign of rust, but surface rust was beginning to appear on the chrome components, particularly on the rear rack and various bolts/nuts. The rims were beginning to get a bit of rust around the spoke holes, which is exactly the worst place to get it, and I suspect there would have been more inside the rims had I taken the tires off.
I never did get the brakes to stay adjusted. The cheap hardware used just couldn't stand up to the kind of torque necessary to prevent slippage. This probably could have been rectified by using Raleigh components, but I never got around to it.
As the miles went on the bike became more and more rattly. The rear rack was a big source of this due to its design. The brake hardware was another offender.
The seat didn't break in particularly well, stretching so far in one spot that I was sitting on one of the rails. This was exacerbated by its tendency to lose the nuts that hold the springs on.

Would I buy another one? I don't know. Most of its issues could have been easily rectified. With better hardware, pedals, a seat, and rear rack from the beginning most of the things that bugged me wouldn't have been a problem, and the price was low enough that even taking those things into account it's a bargain. The one sticking point is the rims, though. I doubt they would have lasted longer than a few years at most and better quality replacements are not readily available in a westwood rim. Converting to a clincher type rim and modern brakes would solve this issue but cause the bike to lose much of its character.

It was a great experience, and I don't regret buying it. If I had to go back in time I'd definitely buy it again, and if it hadn't been stolen I'd still be riding it. I don't think I'll buy it twice, though. If by some miracle it turns up and I get it back, I'll continue the quest to improve it. It's fundamentally a great bike, even if some of the components let it down.

For now, though, it looks like the story ends here.