“Rolling” Into Tallahassee

Should I apologize to myself or forgive myself for my incompetence this day? This I am thinking as I have an imaginary conversation with Scot, my Warmshowers host for tonight. I am imagining him picking me up as I’m walking into downtown Tallahassee pushing my bike with a flat tire.*

So I’m walking into town pushing my bike imagining this conversation we’re going to have because he’s going to call me to find out where I am because I’m taking so long, and I’m going to tell him that I couldn’t Uber to the bike shop because no Ubers had space for my bike and bags, nevermind the fact that I haven’t bothered to signal an Uber because how should I know if my bike will fit or not and are there consequences for this if the bike does not fit (like do I get charged something for wasting this person’s time), therefor I wasn’t able to make it to the bike shop before it closed so I just continued walking to his place and then he will find me somewhere along the way and pick me up. Or I’ll just arrive really late and be like “hi, I’m here,” and laugh and the whole thing will just be stupid because IT IS.

Tallahassee is very hilly, and I’m trying to ride my bike on the downhills in the grass. I’m tired of it though because I’m on my bike for a solid ten seconds (maybe) then I’m hopping not entirely gracefully (not that there is anything graceful about half riding a bike with a flat tire in the grass plot between the curb and the sidewalk) off because the grass is interrupted by a concrete driveway, then I proceed to hop back on, then off again…. It’s very tiresome after a few times, and honestly hard to determine if it’s even that much more efficient (it is slightly, but not so much so that it’s worth the effort, especially after fifty miles of cycling on a loaded bike).

*why do I have a flat tire? Simple. I’m running tubeless and, thinking this would be sufficient, (it was for over 600 miles back home) failed to bring a spare just-in-case tube with me. Well, the sealant didn’t work this time, I don’t think. I am now uncertain about this because after I did procure a tube I found to my astonishment that my very expensive, and relatively new, pump would not pump up the tube. So who knows. If the pump had worked properly I may have been able to pump the tire back up.