Flatbread

I know you all are tired of hearing my biking stories, but I have a feeling you will enjoy this one more than all the others.

On Thursday, I decided to bike to work. It was a beautiful 70 degree morning, and my backpack was light because I have become an expert at figuring how to pack all my work clothes into a shake 'n bake bag. True story.

The secret is: light weight blouses and rolled pencil skirts.

My ride was not as easy as usual, though. The flat surfaces felt almost as tough as the hills. "Maybe I'm just getting back into it," I thought since I hadn't biked in a while.

At lunch, I decided to check my tires, thinking that could be it. The back one was fine and firm, but the front one was a little more squishy than I would've liked. "I'll need to pump this up when I get home" I thought.

I left work at the end of the day. The tire still felt like it did at lunch, and I hoped I could make it all the way home. About a quarter mile later, it was making a weird noise, and I stopped to check the front tire. It was losing air fast.

Somehow, I made it about 2 miles before I admitted to the reality that I had a flat. Like an amateur, I had no spare tube or pump with me, even though my bike is configured to carry all these supplies.

I made the phone call to an unsuspecting Michael, who had already started cooking his dinner in the oven, and he grabbed the rarely-used bike rack to come meet me by Wal-Mart.

For the record, I would have walked the remaining 5-6 miles, but I had guitar practice because I'm in a band now, so I kind of had somewhere to be that night.

While I was waiting, I posted the following picture on Instagram, trying to stay positive amid a crappy situation in the back of the Home Depot parking lot.

"What a beautiful day to get stranded with a flat tire!"

Unfortunately, the situation only got crappier.

When Mike pulled up, I heard a loud pop from one of his tires from where he ran over a white garbage bag. He got out of the car. "What the.....OH MY--- *gag*"

Dude ran over a bag with a diaper in it.
The diaper bust open.
There was human poop all over his front left tire.

The smell. Oh, the smell.
This wasn't just diaper smell.
This is diaper-poop-sitting-on-warm-asphalt-for-who-knows-how-long smell.

This is a true story.

We got the bike rack out and assembled it on the trunk. Every so often, a breeze would blow and we'd get the nauseous wave of stink in our noses again.

Finally, we had the bike tied down. Mike held his breath and carefully tip-toed to the drivers seat. He back up the car, so as not to get two tires covered in poop.

Conversation on the ride home:
Mike: You and your biking.
Me: I know, man. I'm sorry, but I really appreciate you coming to get me. Let me know if there's anything I can do for you.
Mike: Well, there is poop on my tires...

When we got home, he parked in the garage like usual, but he almost threw up when he got out of the car. We took the bike off and then he backed the car out into the driveway.

I got out the hose and went to work, holding my breath.

It was worse than we thought, though. As he was driving, the poop was being flicked and smeared all around the metal part of the car that surrounds the tire. Plus, it had dried, so I had to scrub it off and pray that the smell would go with it.

Meanwhile, Mike had gone inside to finish fixing his dinner. Apparently when he left to come get me, he turned the oven off, but had left everything inside of it. His potato chips were black and his biscuits had all congealed into hard little rolls.

We were so traumatized that we couldn't even eat. The smell was infused into our senses. Everything smelled like crap. Food turned to ash in our mouths. We were ruined for the night.

I took him by the shoulders, looked him square in the eye and said, "I never. Ever. Want to have children."
His face broke into a half smile. "This confirmed it for you?"

I have now cleaned cat crap off of lawn mower blades and human feces off of car tires.
I would be perfectly happy never having to clean up someone else's doodoo again.

 This is the stuff of nightmares, man.

The lesson here is to bring a spare tube and tire pump on every bike ride because you never know where a dirty diaper could be lurking.

When you've got trouble, I've got trouble, too,
TWS

When You've Got Trouble; Liz Longley