Shoot n' Squeal

With bike week and the diamond jubilee celebrations in full swing, it was perhaps ironic that the Univega’s cantilever mounting bolt should eject while I was negotiating a tricky junction. Instinct took hold and having leaned the bike against a road sign, I sprinted back to the intersection, eyes scouring the dimpled asphalt for these small, vital components. Mission accomplished and with functioning stoppers, we continued our backwater meander but then foul of the dreaded squeal. Cleaning the rims and purging glaze from the pads using Green Oils legendary citrus based bike wash and in the latter context, emery paper certainly helped but didn’t silence the banshee howl. Net effect, I resorted to replacing said pads with another set of the cheap but oh so cheerful Jagwire to coincide with some very interesting EVA based bar wrap, superseding the six month old Arundel Gecko grip that was looking tired through no fault of its own, repeatedly disturbed to facilitate cable/component replacement.

Joshua has suddenly rediscovered his solo, choosing to spend several hours’ on subsequent days cruising a combination of metalled road and green lane. He’s also been sharing in my love of derelict/abandoned places (virtually) while Uncle Benny muted a desire to cruise down to the former Soviet block with me to capture some of the disused airfields, military bases and similar wonderments that proliferate that corridor down to Russia. During those years when the iron curtain was drawn fully closed, my Uncle spent a disproportionate amount of time in Warsaw with a friend acquiring second world war military equip’ before returning with a wife!

Aside from a strange and some would argue, irrational love of MZ motorcycles- tough, reliable and extremely cheap (an ETZ251 in good order could be snapped up for £50 back in 1989) I’ll freely admit to a lifelong fascination with what lives behind heavily armoured doors, gates and houses in clearings…particularly if it had been deserted for any period.

Photojournalism depicting the uneasy transition from communism-its bleak alienation, anomie and substance misuse accentuated this desire to nip through the freshly drawn curtain. As we speak, I am gently badgering relatives in Warsaw for contacts, leads and indeed somewhere to stay for a week, few days even to capture such before nature reclaims, or worse still, someone decides to demolish it.  Meanwhile back in the blast cabinet Trevor and the boys are in the throws of transforming the 4130 expedition rack and bargain basement tune-up stand. I hadn’t realised quite how inexpensively it had been constructed until I came to dismantling…

Certain sections looked to bolted but were in fact bolted and welded in situ, the nylon seatstay hook apparently secured via 4mm Allen screws were in fact secured from the inside courtesy of two vertically positioned 10mm bolts… However, with some old school ingenuity and Joshua’s help it was ready for the blaster in a matter of minutes. After some deliberation, I’ve decided on a cheery Coca Cola red powder coat. Coupled with some name decals, it’ll make mine easy to spot at race meets…

Speaking of scrap metal “Any old Iron!” will be a call widely familiar to anyone in the UK. It originates from this profession who drive around collecting old metal goods people no longer want-washing machines, ironing boards, copper storage tanks etc from people’s doorsteps. Perhaps unsurprisingly, these have become increasingly prevalent in the recent economic climate along with a pronounced escalation in bike theft. It would seem along with the usual problem of bicycles being good currency for drugs and similar activities, metal thieves who have traditionally stripped abandoned pubs such as this one of lead, copper pipe, radiators and other valuables have taken to stealing bicycles en mass and selling them on for literally nothing as scrap-adding further insult to injury! 

Bad enough that the rightful owner should be deprived of something they doubtless love and cherish but to think of it being added to a pile of indiscriminate junk has me howling with outrage.  Unfortunately and for a time at least I can see this intensifying since, depending on which school of economics you subscribe to, we are only thirty per cent through the decline and with those sorts of statistics, I can see a generation who will prove not only long term unemployed but unemployable, with tragic consequences for the individuals, their families and the wider society. Trade is slow for freelancers like myself too but rather than fall into that hole of self-pity, I’ll partake of some Fentiman’s ginger beer (Belching improves creativity…) and put some serious hours into the book these coming days.