A Grimm Day

13 June - it was a pretty grimm morning when I left the house and I realised that I’d left my rear fender behind not 200m from the house - couldn’t really be bothered going back for it especially as I was buzzed by the dispatcher for an early morning SHT from the Bernd Tanton, home of the lovely Zaba. It was the start of a reasonably consistent day, even had a few hot runs where I really had to work to get them on time. On top of this, the grey skies never even opened up so it had all the markings of a really good day. Replaced my front tyre in the morning but a slow leak on the front tube meant it needed to be changed in the afternoon and there was a very frustrating 15m when I couldn’t get the front wheel back on the mountings - the washers and bolts we'd bought second hand from the community bike shop just didn’t want to lock back in - eventually got it sorted but not without much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Had an interesting chat with Mary, Mary who was concerned about the moral fortitude of Rad, who works for her every once in a while - he always seems like a relatively straight up guy but apparently some of the other couriers don’t share my experience. Trip and moneywise, probably the best day since I’ve been back (dont know how jason went but wasn’t going to ask) and after a slurpee at the gallery I rode home with a bit of a spring in my legs and a song in my heart - however, while heading back over the viaduct towards home had a little bit of an accident - normally I hug the wall of the bridge until I get to the exit when I have to merge into the middle lane to get off the Prior St exit - shoulderchecked and found cars far too close to my left so shifted a bit further right but got jammed up against the wall. Unfortuantely, with the fixed gear my legs have to keep on pedalling and I scraped along the side of the wall for a few metres before losing balance and was thrown off my bike and over the wall onto the footpath. The fall itself was pretty soft although did get a few scratches on my hands but the scraping against the wall took a few layers of skin off my right leg (however, the lack of hair meant the damage was limited - nobody will ever be able to make fun of me for waxing my legs again) and Celeste's handlebars were completely twisted out of shape. Managed to get back on the bike and ride up to dream Cycle where Darren replaced the handlebars (with new Celeste green bartape - applied with much more skill than my original job) and did a few more little adjustments - total damange, $80. This little expense pretty much destroyed my earnings for the day, but what are you goingto do?
Went home, bought some hydrogen peroxide and cleaned up as best I could and made as little noise as possible when the antiseptic bubbled up on my raw flesh - watched the brothers grimm which would have to be Terry Gilliam's worst film ever (have not had much luck with movies of late - hope superman doesn’t disappoint).