Before we left for Australia we had big plans for getting bikes. I had one in East Hampton which paid for itself after a couple of weeks with random trips out to Montauk or Riverhead. Not sure why I wanted a bike so much at the start but I think that's the only thing I said to Stacy during the whole three days/two nights we were staying in a shack out her back yard. "Shoore you'll get bikes, there's lots of bikes, people are throwin' em away" the old bat shouted back to me in her horrible raspy American drawl. The next morning she had dumped a load of rusty broken old piece of shit bikes outside our door. That day we talked to her about possibly moving on cause she was weirding us out knocking on our door all the time to give us gone off pepsi and talk shite. Plus my bedroom had 4 doors in it so I had to sleep with one eye open. Stacy wasn't impressed and the following morning she had moved the bikes over to the other shack that was full of D4 heads. We left a note on the door "Stacy, the money's on the table, thanks for the pepsi" and got out of there. A few weeks late someone in work told me about a guy who makes bikes out his back garden. While I waited sitting out in the sun he put one together for me from scratch for 60 dollars and it was a beaut.
But we had bigger plans in Oz: there was talk of doing triathlons and cycling from Sydney to Melbourne for the craic. Despite being completely strapped for cash I treated myself to a Christmas present in the sales. $700 for a savage little racer was hands down the best decision I ever made. Spending another $550 on random accessories, some of which I have yet to use, was not.
I still haven't worn that yellow t-shirt outside the house yet. I tried it on size medium and it was a bit of a squeeze but I had to get it cause of the colour. Then I was standing in the shop holding it and a guy with the exact same shirt in his hand picks up mine and starts looking for the tag. I was like "need any help there?" and he says "I'm looking for this t-shirt for my 16 year old daughter, I think medium would fit her better. This is large" We swapped but even the large is a bit suffocating. I found those glasses on the the street one time I was doing construction, they were a savage pair of oakleys which I lost shortly after. $175 for a set of tri-bars was another silly purchase at the time, they're in a cupboard somewhere.
The triathlons never happened and neither did Sydney to Melbourne, but I did still sleep with the bike beside my bed knowing I'd get some use out of it eventually. Sydney is just too hilly. We lived on a hill and every time I went for a cycle I had to roll down-hill for a few seconds to change the gears before turning back around and attempting the hill. 5 minutes later when you got to the top absolutely shattered there would be a massive down-hill and you're hitting 50k in a couple of seconds. Then theres another up-hill followed by a sheer drop followed by a mountain followed by promising not to cycle again til I got back to Ireland.
