may day! may day!

ok, so you're reading it a week later, but last wednesday i left my happy little home to go live in my car for my may roadtrip.

or at least i started to.

because i got as far as shelburne road and all my check engine lights came on. and since i wasn't out of burlington yet, i turned around and went to see my mechanic to ask if maybe they could squeeze me in and do a little diagnostic?

you know, before i hit the road for a few weeks?

and they did.

only mechanic guy (whom we'll just call bob because it's not his name and even though if you look a little you can find out his name, i think he'd just as well not have his name on this story so...)

anyway, bob comes to get me and he says he wants to show me something and it is the kind of conversation you start with your mechanic when you bring it in for a tire change and inspection sticker as i did last fall and bot discovered i needed a new headlight assembly.

and a new head gasket.

and he starts of telling me that they found the problem and fixed it cheaply and then he says "now we get to the bad part, the part that's ruining my afternoon and is about to ruin yours"

and i am desperately trying to think what thing he might have found wrong with my car that he is describing that way because "ruining my afternoon and about to ruin yours" is not how he described three days worth of repairs that ran me about two thousand dollars and my mind is spinning, unable to figure WHAT COULD BE THAT BAD????

and then we are nearly around the corner when he gets to the part of the story where the technician (whom we'll call mike) started to pull my car out of the bat not realizing that the door wasn't all the way up and my bikes are still on the roof and just then i come around the corner and i can see it:

my rear window exploded and my mountain bike lying twisted and hanging from what's left of the rack.

and i just started to cry.

oh, god, not my bike, please not my bike.

because if you follow my story at all you know how much i love my bikes. and this bike is my best bike, my racing bike, the best bike i have ever ridden and i just collapse to me knees in the parking lot, crying.

i gain composure after a minute or so; it must have seemed an eternity to bob, who is kneeling beside me telling me he will make this right and as soon as possible and he will repair my car and i think he still doesn't get that i am far less concerned about the car than the bike.

and i get up on the ladder to take the bike down and we get it down and THE BIKE IS UNDAMAGED!

i am going to have to ride it rough to see if it still performs but i think it is fine. there isn't a scratch on it, and the brake rotors aren't even out of alignment.

tally of damage: destroyed bike rack, easily replaced. exploded rear window and dented tailgate.

bob determines that he can just replace my tailgate and he has found one that matches my paint code and everything and quite frankly i'd been noticing that my hinges and handles had not been working so well these days because they're getting old and i live on a dirt road, so i'm probably coming out ahead on that count.

i have to unpack a lot of my gear and repack it in order to remove all the glass because when a window explodes, it explodes.

and i am missing a day of my trip, but it could have been SO much worse.

and bob is totally taking care of everything because he is a classy guy and he runs a classy business.

the thing about the accident? everyone who transports bikes frequently has done that exact bonehead thing at least once. i myself have done it twice, so there's no point getting all mad at mike for a thing that we all do sooner or later.

it is a terrible feeling when you do it to your own car and gear. i imagine it is a very terrible feeling when you do it to somebody else's car and gear.

so. in a couple of hours they will call me to tell me that the body shop has delivered my new tailgate and a couple of hours after that i'll be on my way.

as crashco always says, you're either having a good time or you're having a good story to tell.