So close...

I spent most of my free time this weekend putting together my new snow bike. I was happy to have finally acquired all of the parts. It was fun in the beginning, bargain shopping and finding parts in the garage and acquiring free parts from friends, but after awhile trying to pick out parts just got annoying.



I'm not really into bike gear. I like WHOLE BIKES, that I can ride. A pile of bike gear laying around my living room floor in bags, doesn't really excite me. So it wasn't until today that I fully realized that soon I would own a Pugsley. A whole one that I can ride in the snow, instead of fishtailing and sinking and struggling or having to hand shift the Snow Ho.

I was dreading putting the bike together. This is my first bike build, and if you read this blog regularly you know that I am a little clumsy. Me and bike tools (or tools in general) don't really get along.



But I wanted to ride my bike. So, Friday night I had the guys at Speedway install a new bottom bracket and crankset, and put on the headset cap thingys. Yesterday Brian wrestled with the headset caps (I still am not sure what he was doing) while I disassembled my summer mountain bike for parts, and assembled wheels with tires and tubes. Big ass tires and tubes... oh yeaaaahh.



We cut the fork and assembled the headset together. I set up my seat height so that it matched the height of the seat on my old mountain bike, which is now just a pile of old cables and frame, so sad.



I put the wheels on and we installed the brakes and brake cables. That was where we left it yesterday.



Today I woke up thinking I would spend an hour adjusting the brakes and installing the shifter cables, then adjusting the derailleurs and I would be out the door by noon riding my new bike.

Brian guessed that it would take me two hours. I laughed at him. Hahahaha!

Then my bike laughed at me. It took five hours and it was 5pm when I was still messing around with my rear derailleur trying to figure out why it wouldn't shift all the way to the largest cog. I realized my chain was too short. I took it from my mountain bike and never thought about the fact that you have to change the length of the chain to fit. I have never done this before, remember.

I thought about running to the bike shop before they closed, but realized I had neglected Niko all weekend, and he needed to get out and run. So my poor little Pugsley sits down in the garage without a chain waiting to be ridden.

The idea that I will have a fat bike to ride by tomorrow makes it feel like Christmas Eve. Last night also felt like Christmas Eve, but then today Christmas came and we unwrapped our presents and we realized that the one thing we were hoping for came, but it needed to be assembled and needed batteries and all the stores were closed because it was Christmas. Makes sense doesn't it.