Geen fiets voor Whitney

So… remember that time someone stole my bike?

Can you tell where this is going?

…Last Monday I’m walking home from work, minding my own business, thinking about how excited I was to go to the gym. I get to the fence in front of our apartment and something is off…

THE BIKE THIEF STRUCK AGAIN!

They cleared the whole damn fence.

When I left for work that morning there were 10-15 bikes on the fence. About half of those bikes leave every day as people go to work (including Shane’s) but a good 5-6 bikes are always on the fence. Not a single one was still there. What’s even more impressive still is that it all happened during the middle of the day. Broad daylight. We are by the hospital and the fence is across from the flower shop so there is a constant string of people. Either no one noticed, or no one bothered to question what they were doing. Poor Theo, ripped from his home and resold to another shady bike shop. Sigh…

What do you do when your bike gets stolen? You buy a new bike and I paint that sh*t pink. BOOM!

Meet Helen.

Helen and I met on my lunch break on Tuesday. I tried out a few normal style women’s bikes, but I just really love the ‘omafiets’ style (aka: grandma bike. Literally, that’s the translation.) So Helen and I go back to work and all is well with the world again. Until 5pm when it’s time to go home.

Flat tire. Are we serious?!

Turns out the back inner tube had “more than 5 holes”. It’s really a wonder that I was able to bike from the shop to work without any problems. Back to the bike shop we go. New inner tube and life is good again.

Until today…

Shane and I were biking home from the grocery store just chit chatting it up when my back tire starts to feel funny as I’m riding…

I start to say “Pookieeeeee…..my tire feels” and BOOOOM!

Shane swerves. Poor guy thought he had just been shot. The back tire blew.

Needless to say, we spent today getting my bike fixed, again! Plus side. The bike shop guy totally knows me know. I walked up and I said ‘Hey! Do you remember me?’ and he replied with ‘Yeah, the American girl!’. Another plus side, he has fixed everything for free. Outside of it being inconvenient I really can’t complain.

Talk about bad bike luck though. When it rains it pours right?

I just keep telling myself it’s cheaper to fix a bike than a car.

Other than that life is normal here! Shane is coming up on week three of his Dutch class and is definitely getting more comfortable with it. He even ordered at the market this morning!

Oh, and we figured out that Meatball’s Dutch name is “Gehaktbol” (pronounced hey-haakt-bowl).

Gehaktbol says hi.

Tot Ziens!

Whitney