Chai and Mark's Toys

[andygates]

Just spent a strangely happy evening sifting through a dead friend's gear.  His missus, also a friend, had a whole floor of Bromptons, Moultons, a Dahon Speed and a Birdy and crate after crate of stuff which needed sorting into "keep" "ebay" "freecycle" and so on.  It was weird picking through someone else's bike parts stash - amusing that the stash had certain universal commons (plastic toeclips, different-sized stems, wheel reflectors still in their plastic, obsolete lights) - maybe it's like bread or cake: some ingredients are always the same, some are different.  He did have some great kit.  A spare Thudbuster?  And you can get a sense of the mood of a person from their gear and tools: the habit of upgrading, and a dislike of carbon, for one. 

He said "he who dies with the most toys wins" and among the bikes we found model rockets and cameras and guitars and gods know what.  At the funeral his Birdy was propped up against the coffin.  Bikes make the best toys.

Comments

[ravenbait.livejournal.com]

How is Celeste?

Give her my love, will you?

[andygates.livejournal.com]

She's good, actually. Moving on in a good way, having fun on ebay (!). I'll give her a squeeze from you.

[ravenbait.livejournal.com]

Is she selling any of the Bromptons? I quite fancy a singlespeed...

[andygates.livejournal.com]

She's selling some bikes, possibly to fund a Bike Friday. There's a Dahon Speed which isn't too shabby, which I brought back from "never knowingly under-engineered" (thudbuster! sus stem!) to factory spec (carbon and common sense) last night. None of the bikes are singlespeeds at present.