Mechanic Mondays Are No More

First off, allow me to apologize for my extended absence. I've missed several weeks of writing, and I swear, I have a good excuse.

I have been "promoted" to a full-time mechanic, complete with a schedule change to insure we have wrench coverage every day of the week. So whereas before, I had some downtime to ponder new posts, and lunch breaks to write on, I now have a near constant rotation of repair work to handle, and eat my lunch mostly one bite at a time between flat fixes and other assorted fun.

Therefore, I am officially updating the name to "Mechanic Whenever-I-Have-The-Chance-To".

As some of you, who follow my Twitter, may know; yesterday I had an unsuspecting customer bring me a 1965 Schwinn Paramount track frame/fork/Campy headset/Cinelli bars/Campy cranks from his mother's garage. It essentially looked like this, but blue without chrome lugs:

Serial number Y95, which makes it the 85th frame produced in the Chicago factory after July 20, 1965. (I guessed 1967-1972 when I saw it). Nervex lugs, Campy dropouts.

He had no idea what he had, and explained to us that he scoffed at his mother's suggestion that it might be worth $300. Simply a fairytale created by a senile old lady... Naturally, it occurred to me momentarily that I could probably offer him $100 and have this beauty all to myself.

Unfortunately, my excitement over seeing a bike this rare got the best of me, and my mouth was working independently from my brain spewing random facts about Paramount, Waterford, including guessing the age within 2 years and telling him its value would be closer to $500 (or up to $1,000 if he had the rest of it in said garage).

It's just as well, I never would have slept again if I ripped off a widow selling her beloved's favorite bike. Damn my morals and values.

And on an unrelated note; what is it about people who buy electric bikes? They are the only sub-genre I've ever experienced that seem to always be pushing their bikes on everyone else, suggesting that everyone try it out and buy one because it's so great and better than a regular bike. As if people who ride bikes don't really like it, and would prefer to not actually pedal, but rather cruise around on a notbikenotmotorcycle...