Okay, feel free to join in and post your adventures here.

Heading home Friday afternoon I stopped at a rummage and picked up a Schwinn (something or other), probably mid-late 1980's. I thought the frame was bent like the bike ran into something, and the forks looked a little pushed back as well, plus the paint near the headtube on the top and down tubes was flaking off like the metal had been flexed. So I got the bike home, only paid $3 for it, and stripped it down for parts and spares. I would have fixed it up as a rider/loaner if the frame and forks hadn't of been tweaked.

Local small town had their weekend citywide rummage on Saturday and we had an overnight guest so my wife and I and our guest headed out to rummage city, the gas station had a list and map of the town with 54 locations. I marked the ones with bikes, canoes, fishing gear, and tools and we headed off. I wound up with a small 12" tired Princess bike to fix up when grandkids are around. Handlebars were bent on one side and it needed a rear tire. The handlebars are one of those integrated stem and bar welded steel assemblies so I bent the handlebar back somewhat into shape and rattlecan painted it, slipped a new tire on the rear, and somehow misplaced one of the pink grips. I don't know how I lost a pink grip. I also installed a set of training wheels onto the bike and had to chop and modify one side to get it to work with the plastic chainguard. Oh, paid $3 for the bike. Got a deal on the new tire and training wheels. Hopefully the missing pink grip will reappear (I don't think the dogs ate it).

Sunday headed cross county and saw a guy throwing a whole bunch of bicycles onto a flatbed trailer. Turns out he'd had a rummage sale. Mostly all Murrys and Huffys, mostly all needing major work. Did find an old girls Schwinn 10 speed on the bottom of the pile so I lifted one corner of the pile while the guy lifted near the center and we got the whole pile up enough to slip the purple Schwinn out from the bottom of the heap. I didn't have enough cash on me (wanted $5 for it) so he set it up against the side of the house for me to pick up later, I said I'd put a $5 bill under the chrome hubcap laying in his flowerbed when I came back for the bike. When I got back I had to break the rusty chain in a couple of places to get the rear wheel off of the bike. Front and rear were bolt-ons. Stopped on the way home for my wife to visit with her 11yearold grandson, so I stripped the bike down behind the car in the street with my multi-tool (AlienII) and a small Crescent wrench. All I really wanted off the bike was the handlebars and Shimano thumb shifters to use on a MTB=>Commuter conversion I've been playing with.

So, all told, $11 out of pocket plus a little extra for parts, got two good sets of handlebars and a usable stem for an ongoing project, a couple of gallon-size ziplock baggies of parts and components for spares or ebay fodder, and some fun playing with the bikes. Good therapy and stress relief. Not really a "Classic & Vintage" story, but is where a lot of good finds come from. Oh, and one guy did have a nice looking Cannondale roadbike, 12speed, unknown model, probably around a 60cm framesize, but at an $80 asking price it was a bit higher than my wallet allowed.