Just when I'd gotten myself set up to head out (I'd invented some errands I need to run, so as to have an excuse to bike all over Ottawa running them in the gorgeous sunny weather we're having today.) I was thinking maybe I needed to go to Westboro and the MEC to shop for, oh, say, a headlamp.
I thought, as I was about to hit the road, that maybe I should just pump up the tires a little before I go. So I got the front tire. Then as I was unscrewing the cap from the back tire, I heard a hissing burbling noise. The valve had cracked away from the rest of the tube and now Mike's sitting there hissing at me and slowly sinking on his back tire. That's a valve crack, that's not patchable. Crap.
Okay, okay, so I shouldn't have bought the things at Canadian Tire, and maybe I should be way more meticulous about replacing inner tubes so I don't stress the rubber around the valves. Lesson learned. So now, it's off to my neighbourhood bike shop on Alta Vista... on foot, of all ungodly things... for an inner tube.
And I may have to ask the guys at the shop: What is that foul-smelling gunky liquid that builds up inside your inner tubes? It's just gross. It's like... bike snot. Ew ew ew.
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