We had a week of rainy days, and during that week I noticed the front wheel of my bike started to make a funny noise. And a bit of a vibration. Hmmm, not cool. Im not willing to let my main mode of transport get out of order so I took it pretty promptly to the bike doctor. I suggested there might be a problem with the axel-thing-whatever-its-called, or maybe the hubs, whatever they are, maybe the rain had created a situation where some mud got flicked in there or something? Bike doctor dude looked at it for a few mins and then he says he thinks hes figured it out. We go out to the car park and sure enough the noise has stopped. The cause was not rain or mud: the reflector light had moved and was now vibrating against a spoke, making a bit of a noise…. He didn’t even charge me. How embarrassment.

I got these stupendously fab new shoes. Red ones, for work. Sooo cool, and very well padded and supported inside. The soles are quite thick. I noticed when I was driving the car in them (cos in the week… er, weeks since I bought them I havent really taken them off) that the car was all kinda chuggy and uneven and I figured that it must be due to my new shoes. You know, cos its a manual and there is a lot of foot action going on, and I was obviously just not quite feeling the pedals thru the soles or something. Whatever. And then the car died. Totally died. It was the alternator, not the new shoes.

Im just so not very good with all this mechanical stuff… and hooking the problems up to obvious changes in the environment seems not to work very well in the problem-solving department.

• Kristen (not in the kitchen making dinner) said on 08/05/12 at 10:41 AM.....

  I think we all do that from time to time. Often we don’t learn the proper cause and go along thinking that X makes Y happen.  You were lucky (?) to discover the real reasons for your problems. Except an alternator is one of the expensive bits of the car, isn’t it?

• Ashman said on 08/05/14 at 09:26 PM.....

  Hey ya, Sorry haven’t see the red sports shoes you were trying to find when you were here last.
  Hope the car did not cost too much to fix, must just about be on its last legs or in need of a new clutch at least.
  Love ya
  A