Yesterday

It didn't happen. School was pretty intense. We worked on building wheels from scratch for nine 1/2 hours. It is a constant process of adding parts (spokes, nipples), truing radially, laterally and dishing, then adding layers of tension to the spokes, then re-truing & checking and adding more tension, ad nauseum until your fingers scream and your eyes can't focus. At least my (older) fingers and eyes do. I got mine done and started tearing them apart, which has to be done slowly, but without the truing/dishing operations; so that the rim doesn't collapse due to uneven forces. One guy in the class is so upset about not doing it as fast as he thinks he should, that I'm afeared he'd go postal and slaughjter us all with a pedal wrench. Think of that. You'd all know one of the victims of America's first school-wrenching.

Anyway, this course is much more in-depth than the last, and I'm a little concerned about the "advanced" course which has a five hour final exam which consists of building a "perfect" set of wheels. We have the option of buying the wheels we build, and coincidentally, I am learning how .mediocre my existing road wheels are. I will probably opt to build road tires from upgraded components and since they are going to be blood-stained, I'll have to buy them. I am slowly running out of room in car and trailer. I got my tool order sorted through last night and could hardly stuff them into my toolbox, let alone carry it down to the car. Then it clung to the iron bannister due to the force of TWO cow magnets.

No new photos in the last couple of days, but I'll go through and try to find something interesting. Then it's back to the barracks in the drizzle, and cook something filling. I have a great recipe for Pita, peanut butter, yogurt and spinach with a little curry powder if anyone is interested. It tastes like...well quite similar to...more-or-less, oh, try it and you'll never go back to vienna sausage and oatmeal.