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As you can see here, Tal and I went on a grocery run, to Dollar Tree and Mal Wart. This is probably the maximum amount I can carry with his 30+ pounds on the back. I had to put him on first, then load the groceries around him. I have a special bungie cord I carry along now to keep the front wheel straight while I load the front rack. 
This is the load. Those are 3 litre bottles, a little heavier than I am used-to. The bird seed will be mixed with scratch feed for the chickies.
It feels a little strange, pulling out onto Crawfordville Highway with a bicycle loaded to bear with groceries and my son, with huge pickup trucks and SUV’s all around us. We aren’t the only ones here that use alternative transportation means, but there certainly aren’t many. One elderly lady has an electric-powered three-wheel bicycle, and rides all over the county with it. That thing can book! I don’t think I could keep-up with her if I were to try. She appears to cruise along at about 20mph. I can attain 21mph, but with a good tailwind in third gear. I have seen one family walk to the store with their wagon and park it at the bike rack. Otherwise, it’s just the odd person on foot.
I know that attitudes are changing in this country about our fuel usage and folks are wising up to alternative transportation, but being in a small town in Northern Florida, it’s hard to tell by looking around. I know that auto and truck traffic on Crawfordville Highway hasn’t lessened any that I can see. People will tell us that it’s so good that we ride our bikes everywhere, but they don’t want to try it themselves. Since when did people get so lazy?
This is a trip we have been meaning to do for a long time, just didn’t have the money. Admission to the Gulf Specimen Marine Laboratory is $20.00 for all three of us. This aquarium is 12 miles from our house, in Panacea, Florida.
We took a break under the trees at the Kangaroo Pantry in Medart where Crawfordville Highway meets US 98. Tal ate a whole Moon Pie by himself! I kept a fairly-easy pace up, staying around 11 mph most of the way. No rear-end problems from either of us now that we switched to the Cloud 9 saddles. There was a fairly substantial hill between Medart and Panacea. I decided to stand up and stomp my way to the top, which made Cyclingchicken almost run off the road laughing because Tal was having to ride the rear rack like a mechanical bull. He loved it.
We took up our own full parking space, because this place is almost never busy. I remembered to slather plenty of sunblock on us this time. Notice I have switched to wearing long shirtsleeves. Tal and I wear sunhats during the spring and summer to protect our heads and shoulders. We are thinking of getting straw hats this year.
Sign going into the aquarium
Tiny crab crawling on my hand.
The smallest horseshoe crab I have ever seen.
Fish that nip at your fingers.
There were many neat things to see, but I think the touch tanks were the most fun and educational for us. 
Tal riding the dolphin at the entrance. 
Eventually, though, we had to leave, as we had worked-up quite the appetite. We went to The Coastal Restaurant on US 98 in Panacea. Sorry I didn’t get a pic of the place, we were concentrated on food. This is a small establishment, run by local people. They have all-you-can-eat specials, and my favorite is the chicken fingers. They really load you up, and these are the best chicken tenders I have put in my mouth. I was even able to order fried green tomatoes as a side, and they were good! Ashley, our waitress, took good care of us. We left her a good tip. Folks, try to always leave a good tip, because waitstaff don’t even make minimum wage. There is a law of sowing and reaping… All three of us ate for less than $35.00 with tip. That is pretty good for an eatery right on the coast. We relished this trip, because we don’t get to do this very often.
25 miles round trip. The Beauty developed a very bad grinding noise in the full chain guard a couple miles from home, but we were able to make it on in, and I will open it up to look tomorrow.
Tal and I went to Tallahassee and did a bit of shopping for both bikes today. The objective was two bicycle computers and a new seat for The Beast, but I also purchased some green bandannas as skirt guards on Beauty. Just goes with the whole frog theme.
This frog was given to Wifey by our landlady, so I installed it on the front mudflap. The eyes move around when the frog is turned or shook.
Here is the computer for Wifey’s bike. It’s a Schwinn, purchased for less than $10 at Mal Wart. I assumed they were all the same, but when I got them home, there was a silver and a red one, so the red one went on my bike. I did a roll-out test and measured the circumference of a 28″ wheel with 28 x 1 1/2″ (40-635) tyres, and it came-out to be 2208 millimetres, just-in-case you were ever wondering if you could use a bike computer with your English roadster. Calibrating is as easy as entering that number for your wheel circumference. 
Here’s a pic of that awfully comfortable Cloud-9 seat and the new red cyclocomputer on The Beast. It will match my red milk crate panniers.
The reason for the computers is that Cyclingchicken is very serious about improving her health, and wants to track her progress. One of the tools for doing so is by keeping up with how many miles she is riding per week. Our sources, Yahoo Maps, Mapquest, and our landlady’s car tripmeter, have each come up with a different number, far off from the other two, so we decided to just get some computers. We got two so we wouldn’t be arguing over distances like we usually do. I tend to use alternative routes to avoid heavy traffic, while Honey tends to plow on down the shortest possible route, traffic-be-damned, which, to me, defeats the purpose of putting on more mileage. So, I sometimes I have to convince Wifey that my alternative routes aren’t as far out-of-the-way as they feel to her. :)
Last week, we ordered a full chainguard for Wifey’s bike from Yellow Jersey. They sell roadsters based on the original Raleigh roadster design and manufactured in India, but the chainguards Yellow Jersey sells are made in China. I don’t care, so long as it is metal, fits, and does it’s job. That job is to prolong chain life by keeping it clean, and prolong pants legs life by keeping them out of the chainwheel and chain. A plastic full chainguard is certainly better than a hockey stick type, but will eventually grow brittle and crack, plus, I haven’t seen any as cheap as this one: $50.00.
Here, I have removed the old hockey stick type chainguard, and will remove the bracket from the downtube. I had to unbolt the seatstay to get the rear part of the guard off.
Breaking the chain. A good chain tool is important for this. This is the original chain for Beauty, and in perfect shape with no stretch (I measured it). Beauty had low miles. The Beast required a new chain when I installed it’s full chainguard. 
This chain still needed some serious cleaning, though. Previous owner had used a cheap, vegetable-based oil on all moving parts, leaving behind a gummy residue. 
I put the chain in a shampoo bottle with hot water and a couple drops of dish soap and shook vigorously. Look at that dirty water!
I finished up with a good scrub with an old toothbrush and a good soaking with foaming degreaser.
Nice, clean chain, which I hung up to dry. 
I then turned my attention elsewhere for awhile. Removing crankpins without the special driver/remover is a risky operation. I still bent this pin a little, but it came out fine. I always loosen the nut, but don’t remove it until the pin is loose enough not to need hammering.
Most full chainguards clamp to the chainstay, but Raleigh roadsters come with a braze-on for that purpose. It fits the same bolt that attaches chainstay to seatstay. I somehow lucked-up and had several of them, from where, I don’t know. 
This meant drilling a hole in the chainguard for the attachment bolt. Step drillbits are so convenient, and cut a clean hole. I had to clean shavings out of the chainguard, but it arrived plenty dirty on the inside, anyways. 
With the chain dry, it was time to attach the chainguard to the bike. Putting the chain through beforehand it is important, as the alternative is to attach the chainguard and then turn the bike vertical to get the chain to fall through the chainguard.
This is the aggravating part of this process, mainly because I refused to remove the rear wheel to do it. Part of the chainguard had to be removed in order to go through the chainstay. A curved piece of sheetmetal was produced to go there, using the same bolts that attach the guard to the chainstay. I attached the tab first with the lower bolt and folded it backwards, then put the guard through the chainstay and pushed the tab up using an aviation scribe. There was a threaded bar on the backside that also had to be pushed up and aligned with the upper hole. Complicating all this was the fact that the chainstay was flat here, causing the clamp to not fit right. Luckily, I had some longer metric bolts that fit. 
I then reattached the chain. It is important to drive the pin only far enough to be even, then work the link back and forth to get rid of the bind.
I reattached the crank, being sure to drive the cotter pin in with a few blows of a hammer. I only recently learned this technique, always thinking before that the nut on the cotter pin got it tight enough. No wonder my cranks always came loose before. Here, I was lubing the chain. Just because a chain is covered and clean doesn’t mean it doesn’t need lube. The nice thing about a full chainguard is you can put a good bit on without worries of attracting dirt. 
Every Chinese chainguard fits differently- the one on my bike had a serious gap between elbow and rear sprocket hub, so I made-up the difference with two pieces of electrical tape. The gap isn’t so bad on Beauty, so it only needed one piece. 
I had to remove the pedal to attach the pie plate because it is a modern platform-type. A period block pedal would fit right through the sliding window. A word to the wise- positioning the hole toward the top, above the crank will keep the sheetmetal window from sliding off and disappearing at an inopportune time. ;) 
The finished product. It rubs a tiny bit, but it’s hard to find a full chainguard that doesn’t rub in some way. Now, Honey can wear bellbottums or broomskirts with no problems!
After having spent most of the day inside due to little man being sick (high pollen ) and it raining, I decided to go for a bike run to Wal-Mart after hubby got home. This served two purposes: getting me some down time and testing out my new skirt guard. I have ridden the bike since hubby put them on, but the skirt I wore wasn’t long enough to worry about. Yesterday I had on a dress which has a hem line below the knees and has quickly become my fav dress. So I wanted to make sure I wouldn’t be stuck just wearing it around the house. The great thing about a bicycle is that if something is going to get stuck it does it right away not miles down the road. This makes it easy to adjust things, but with the new skirt guard no adjustment was needed! It worked perfectly. 
I made it to Wal-Mart and back with no problems. Plus hubby’s mudflaps worked great at keeping the water off me when I rode through the puddles. I still have not gotten used to the idea that I have flaps and every time I go through a puddle I am pleasantly surprised when I don’t get wet.
I do have one more test to make: my all time fav broomstick skirts. I love these things and at being only 5′2″ these things make my feet disappear (perfect skirt for those times you want to be unlady like and sit Indian style on the floor). Unfortunately, I will have to wait until I purchase one of those as I had one, but it got too big around the waist even after having the sides taken in (I LOVE MY BIKE). Hmmm….I do have a birthday coming up…..
PS Little man is doing fine today, but it is still raining…
cyclingchicken
dadabean