In the Classroom

Today was Day 1 of the UBI Bike Maintenance class; it was a very busy day.

An hour of instruction is typically followed by an hour doing something to your bike. Three instructors circulate to answer questions and test my outcomes. The instructors are excellent and the work bench arrangement is so good that I’ll be miserable the minute I get back to my garage.

Bromptons tend to congregate.

You can work on your own bike or one of their bikes — I did a little of each today.

The session started with tires and tubes, rims and wheels. It was a good refresher for fixing flats.

I’ll never be satisfied until my work bench is similarly equipped. Each drawer was meticulously arranged, too. This kind of organization makes for greater efficiency.

Bike corrals, like this one, are everywhere around Portland. The town is rotten with bike racks.

At home I spend plenty of time on my bike, but the Portland commuters blow right by me. These people are fit. And maybe there’s no correlation to bicycling, but this city looks quite prosperous to me. There’s a mini economic boom happening here, according to my brother-in-law. It shows. That the weather is gorgeous only adds to the effect.

I’m tired as I write this post; the class was maybe a little over stimulating, but being on the bike all day — riding to class, to coffee, to lunch, over the Broadway Bridge, then running errands this evening — it was a full day. Four more to go.