Rantings of a Lunatic

Got both of the tires and tubes replaced so far. I also removed the kickstand and attempted to change the brake-pads. Unfortunately the brake-pads I got are too large, and will keep the brakes activated permanently. I know there are a few things I need to do to get it road-worthy yet, but, I did take it for a test ride today. I still need to replace the brake-pads. I also need to change the tension cables for the derailleurs and brakes. Unfortunately it appears I need to replace the return spring for the front brakes, they activate when I squeeze the handle, but they don’t return to the released position. Also, the front wheel to handle-bar alignment is way out of whack, but, I think all of my large wrenches are at my storage facility. I will check tomorrow. The front derailleur doesn’t seem to be adjusted correctly, so when I switch to the smaller front gear the chain doesn’t correctly seat on the gear. But, I will learn how to fix that. Luckily Austin is a very bike friendly city, so there are lots of small independent bike shops around. Now its just a matter of finding the appropriate parts to fix a 40 year old bike. Almost all of the parts are labeled Shimano, so hopefully it will be easy to get the parts. Oh, and I should probably re-wrap the handlebars.
I am trying to limit my upgrades to essential repairs though, because I really enjoy that its an old bike, and I want to try to keep it as original as I can. Just a decent cleaning, and some necessary repairs. Reflectors, maybe lights because they are apparently a city requirement after dark.

Due to the unnecessary theft of my bike, I have embarked on a new project. I was at my parent’s house over the weekend, and picked up my dad’s old bike. I am in the repair/restore phase of getting it back roadworthy. It’s not a great bike, but, its an awesome bike. My personal favorite part of the bike is that it still has the registration sticker from when my dad was ridding it to work, which expired in March or April of 1976. Its a K-Mart All Pro, and it seems to shift smoothly. I still need to remove the kickstand, which over the last decade in storage has become bent and is impeeding the rotation of the pedals.
Today I got new tubes and tires, new brake pads, a pump, and a U-Lock for it. I will be keeping it inside as much as I can, and the lock is for when I get to the point that I can ride to work. Anyway, here are a few photos:

Tonight I got the front wheel cleaned up and the tube and tire replaced on it.

First: Fuck You.
Second: I hope you don’t live near me, because if I see you riding my bike you will be lucky to see me use the same amount of effort to get it back as you used to steal it. I know you made a trip back to get it after you saw it, because you had to bring the bolt cutters to cut the lock.
Shame on me for using a cheap lock, thanks for pointing that out. Next time I will put a better lock on my bike.
I hope that you stole it so that you could pawn it. Further, I hope you used the $20 that it was worth to buy bread and Peanut Butter to feed your family that is now homeless because the recession and global outsourcing have robbed you of your career. Unfortunately, I am pretty sure that is not the case. I am pretty sure you are just a lazy dick who isn’t capable of doing an honest job for honest pay. So you stole my bike for a quick buck.
In the case that you haven’t figured it out yet, let me warn you that my back tire was flat; which is the reason I haven’t been riding it. I hope you didn’t try to ride it and mess up the rim or the tube. That would just make it worth even less to the pawnshop.
Also, the rear shifter is cheap and doesn’t align properly between the fifth and sixth gears, so don’t force it, just jump from fifth to seventh. It will work fine, though someone of your class would probably just ride it in whatever gear its in, and try to pedal harder to go uphill. Oh, and if you see someone running fast at you, faster than it seems they should be able to run, that would be a good time to learn to shift gears, because I want my bike back asshole.

Why is this the first time I have seen/thought about making the drop-down go up over the wasted header space?

As the Director of Technology at my job, I have several responsibilities. One of which is to oversee the rollout of Windows 7. This is an awesome responsibility because I am a POSIX compliant computer user at home. I use that term pretty loosely, but it fits for the most part. I love Linux, and I have used it for many years. I am currently pretty devoted to my hackintosh because it has the desktop application support that just doesn’t exist for Linux. This is all changing though. As part of the Windows 7 rollout, I have to know, use and breathe Win7 before I overwrite all of my user’s hard disks. So, for the undetermined future, I have decided to switch to Win7 at home. I have installed an evaluation version, because I am not sure I will continue to use it after I do the roll out at the office, but if I want to, I will be able to purchase the license then. As I have just started using it, I haven’t installed any software yet. Well, I installed the Lightroom Trial, thats good for 30 days, and is as good of an opportunity to give it a test run as any. I also installed Firefox, but that’s it at the moment.
So far, its fine. I used Windows for years, from 3.1 through to XP64, so I know what I am doing. Admittedly, there are some new features I don’t know about, but, that’s the purpose of this experiment. But to be honest, I find myself really just looking at my computer now, and feeling that its a blank slate that I really don’t have a use for. This is probably not related to the Operating System, its probably just me deciding what’s important in my life at this point.
I have gotten back into photography, I am just finalizing all of the moving into my new apartment and basically I am not sure that as I move forward I want to find myself chained to my computer any more.