AND NOW TOTALLY IGNORING MY APPALLING LACK OF BIKE RELATED POSTS....

I broke a spoke the other day.
 
Best case scenario 2 years ago, that would have meant dragging the bike into the nearest shop to get it fixed, almost certainly on the second attempt on account of the mechanic not being in till next week, 'can you bring it back then mate', $60 and at least a week off the bike.

More likely of course, I would have faffed about for several months while the bike rusted on the deck and I entirely forgot how to make the wheels go round and round without causing me severe respiratory distress. Before I knew it I'd be 140 kilos (*cough* again) and digging around in my drawers for those XXXXL t-shirts I used to wear but now use to polish my 9 year old's shoes with.

I identified the broken spoke on Tuesday. Purchased a spoke wrench (what the hell is a spoke wrench my 2012 self says cluelessly) on Wednesday, whipped off the casette, rear disc and broken spoke by lunch on Thursday and had it all back together and rotating with barely a wobble by Thursday afternoon.

See, this what you get when you build yourself a bike instead of buying one off the (bike) rack. Best bit is, I never even touched a spoke when I was putting it all together. I mean I touched them obviously, being part of the wheels and all that, but not in the sense of building an entire wheel out of them or anything along those ludicrous lines. Thing is though - because I had put just about everything else together, I now know where all the fiddly bits are, what they are called, what I need to pull apart to get at them and what the tool looks like that is required to do all that and then put it back together again without it resembling some kind Church sanctioned, heretic torturing, confession machine from Inquisitorial Spain.

2012 Matt wouldn't even have been able to get all the crap off the hub to get anywhere near the actual spoke.

It's all been very good for my morale.

Think I might pull our car apart.