my car was broken into

i hardly drive anymore. when i do, its usually just to do the "SF shuffle," which means moving your car around twice a week to avoid getting a ticket in the street sweeping zones.

in the past year and a half i've lived here, i've been pretty lucky because i've never had my car broken into. after my honda civic was stolen in san diego around 2006, i vowed never to own another car with upgrades/mods. i wanted a plain ol' stock family wagon. i got a subaru outback.

i don't keep anything in my car. i'm parking it on the street in downtown san francisco, 24/7. i see cars with broken windows literally every single day. my method: i leave it completely barren, with untinted windows for any beholder to look and find nothing. if you are dumb enough to leave a bicycle, electronics, a purse or bag in plain view, some crackee WILL STEAL IT. i even left a bunch of blankets in the hatchback so that if the seats are folded down, it looks like someone might be sleeping there. they were originally used in the move, but just kinda stayed in there.

when i walked to my car today, something felt weird. i'd parked it on haight, just below octavia. octavia is a pretty bad street for broken into cars- a friend got his stuff stolen there once. anyway, i didn't see any broken windows as i walked up, so i felt ok. i looked inside. stuff was all over the seats. it took me a second to realize that i hadn't left it that messy- someone had gone through my shit!

turns out the thief was kind enough to just pry back the rubber seal on the door jamb and somehow let himself in.

here's the turnout:
1. they didn't get anything, because as stated above, i leave nothing in my bone-stock car.
2. there was no permanent damage to the car. i put the rubber seal back in myself.
3. i learned how to discreetly break into a subaru, should the need ever arise.
4. they didn't even find my spare change?! crack is a helluva drug.
5. they didn't bother to take my cd's?! so sad, nobody buys music anymore.
6. since my shit was already spread out everywhere, i figured it was a good time to clean out my car. so i did.
7. months ago, somehow i had lost the knob that you pull to fold the back seat down. you could manage to still do it by grabbing the threaded screw, but the knob was MIA. the crackhead found it for me, as i found it laying on my back seat. thanks!

tips and tricks for changing a flat

customer: "hi, i got a flat tire. i need to buy a tube."

ken: "ok, what size tire?"

customer: (pointing)"its that exact bike right there."

ken: "alright, here you go."

customer: "are there any tricks to changing a flat? like without taking the wheel off the bike?"

ken: "WHAAA???! sure. here's the trick: take the wheel off the bike."

customer: "yeah, but it seems easier to leave the wheel on there, like if you were in a race or something?"

ken: "thats impossible. think about it. the tube is completely round and the wheel is enclosed in the rear triangle."

customer: "what if you disconnect this part right here (pointing at quick-release)?"

ken: "i suppose that could be done, but you are making it a lot harder than just taking off the wheel, removing the old tube, replacing with a new one, and putting the wheel back on. you would have the entire bike in the way of working on the wheel."

customer: "ah i see."

ken: "i'd recommend looking online for a how-to tutorial with pictures to show you how to do it. that way you will get it right the first time."

customer: "ok, thanks!"

electronic shifting

yesterday our shimano rep came by the shop.

i rode a cervelo with the new DA group that uses ELECTRONIC shifting.

it was weird.

derailleurs are hard wired (not wireless), brakes are normal, cranks are normal. front derailleur auto-trims, and makes a cool sound. shifting is actuated by two buttons that are in the place of the shift levers. weight savings are non-existent since any weight saved in the shifters is gained back in the derailleurs plus battery pack. super expensive too.

shifts pretty crisply, but i'm not sold on it. i guess i'm just old fashioned.

TX homies weekend

3 of my best friends came up from houston and austin for the past 5 days. we've been friends for about 15 years, through it all. skateboarding, high school, punk rock, straight edge, surfing, hardcore, drugs, prison, law school, and beyond. i love how we can live so far away but still get together a couple times a year and its like no time lost. it was like a 5-day sleepover at my house.

i ate soooooo much food. pure, shameless, texas-style gluttony. last night we went for chowder breadbowls at fisherman's wharf, then went immediately over to in-n-out to get burgers and fries for dessert. we had to move fast so that we wouldn't feel full, which would prevent us from further gorging our guts.

other stuff we did: city loops on bikes, muir woods, twin peaks, best biscuits and gravy ever, riding trains, TL bars, mission bars, burritos, dolores park, dim sum, moved clare from TL to panhandle, kings/circle of death, upper haight bars, hill climbing, hill bombing, thrift shopping, farting, PBR, pupusas, full house house, and good ol' male bonding.

on my way to drop them off at the oakland airport, a seagull flew straight into the roof rack on my subaru. that was sad.

the stolen bike market

stolen bikes are everywhere. bike shops that sell used bikes must necessarily take the utmost precautions to avoid liability when purchasing used bikes off of people who walk into their shop. some collect driver's license numbers, other ID, etc. however, if you reach a certain dollar amount, you legally need a pawn license to do so.

my old shop, which sold only used bikes, had purchased bikes on 3 different occasions which turned out to be stolen. the police got involved, as did the owners in some cases, and it was not pretty. of course, none of these were bought directly from the thieves- stolen bikes typically get bought and sold a few times before ending up at a swap meet or flea market, where salvage-types buy things and resell them for a profit. this was the case for all of the aforementioned instances, and in all cases, the bikes were returned to their owner, free of charge. but the shop took a hit on the purchase price.

my current shop is a non profit. we gladly accept donations, but cannot buy bikes off people. its just a shop policy. people try to sell used bikes to us all the time- many seem legit, but some are clearly stolen.

this conversation happened today.

guy: "hey, do you guys buy used bikes?"

me : "no. many shops in the city choose not to get involved, since there are a LOT of stolen bikes floating around san francisco."

guy: "yeah, but my bike isn't stolen. . . "

me: "huh. do you think that people who try to sell stolen bikes typically mention, 'by the way, THIS BIKE IS STOLEN?'"

idiot.

heavenly, lake tahoe- feb09

we rented a cabin for a few days of snowboarding. with john roark, steve, shaun, other steve, angie, and this dude named greg. the code we got for the lockbox that keeps the key to the cabin was wrong, so after trying unsuccessfully to break in, we ended up getting a cheap sketchy hotel the first night. had this not happened, we wouldn't have learned about chevy's $3 happy hour specials, which we indulged in 2 nights in a row. the trip was super fun, as always.

chain installation

i've been installing bike chains for a long time. its not hard to do, especially if you've got the right tools for the job.

about 5 months ago, a guy came in with a broken chain on a brand new cannondale road bike he bought from a big bay area chain (name omitted) bike store. since the bike was only a week old, i advised him to bring it back to the store he got it from, since they could at least comp him labor for installing a new chain, and probably even give him a discount on the parts, since it should still be covered under a warranty. chains shouldn't just break for no reason, especially when they are brand new.

however, he decided to just have me replace his chain, since he wanted the work done ASAP and didn't want to deal with the hassle of bringing the bike all the way to the other store, booking an appointment, and having to wait for days.

so i installed a new chain on his new cannondale, and adjusted the rear derailleur.

anyways, i didn't realize it was the same guy, but this cannondale guy ended up becoming a pretty regular customer of our shop. we built him up a track bike with a handbuilt wheelset that he's spent a lot of money upgrading lately. not unusual, people get really into that stuff.

today he came in to pick up his track bike with $550+ worth of upgrades we did to the drivetrain. as i rang him up, he mentioned the time where i replaced his chain (it was long time ago, but i did remember him). he told me that when he went back to the other shop, they looked at the chain i installed and told him that we did it wrong.

"WRONG?! what shop told you that?" i begged to differ.

he said (not maliciously) that the guys at the other shop told him that the chain pin should have been installed the other direction.

when a chain is new, it comes with one open ended outer plate, and one closed ended inner plate. sometimes the outer plate has a pin sticking out of it, which is what you use to fasten them together. the correct and easiest way to thread a new chain onto a bike, is to thread the closed ended inner plate over the cassette and through the rear derailleur. that way, the open end (with or without pin sticking out) can easily be slipped through the front derailleur and over the chainrings. then you attach the two ends together at the bottom. (if you have ever done this, you know what i'm talking about)

this is the way i've always done it. i'm pretty sure this is the way everyone does it. i didn't even question it, since its harder to do it the other way.

i told the guy that, like many other techniques related to bikes and other things, there are always differing opinions about how things should be done. some people who subscribe to a certain method assume that all the other methods are wrong.

if the guys at the other shop, in an effort to dilute their own botched chain install/derailleur adjustment, were trying to take a stab at the mechanical diligence of my shop (which is just plain bad business technique, in my opinion), i was offended. i asked him, "did the chain that i installed break, or the chain that you got from them?" and, "in the last 5 months or so, have you had any problems with the chain that i installed?"

i think he understood my point.

after he left, i even checked the shimano directions just to make sure i'd been doing it right all this time. yes i was.