The Cart v. 1

The mild sun shines on the park across the street, making the colors on the basketball player's garments glow like ornaments, but there is no glare and the air is refreshingly cool. I cannot think of any place I ever lived that is as pleasant as San Francisco in a great many ways.

We had another faculty meeting yesterday, and it was a very happy event with lots of joking and laughter. We are now a smaller department because 4 or 5 part-timers have been laid off, and all of us are getting shoved around a bit into courses we don't exactly want to teach, but we are happy like soldiers who survived a battle. We have a lot of new courses under development, and a lot of classes are going to be offered online, so we may find a way to get by. Even when things are shrinking, there are small victories: we got a new hardware lab, and finally a department office, and there will be a graduation ceremony to award certificates to the students who completed the requirements for them. We are gradually earning some respect at the college.

I got a cart from Sears, and after considerable struggles got it built and registered with DMV. I put Rick's scooter in it and threw my bike on top and we went off to Golden Gate Park in it last Saturday. Here's how it looks, with a Beverley Hillbillies ambiance, and, as you can see, a lot of shiny reflectors on both his scooter and my bike.

The trip did not go too well. We got off to too late a start, so it got dark and cold and on the return journey the cart fell apart to some extent. The worst spot was when the catch holding the cart level came loose and the thing flipped up in the middle of the street on the Great Highway right at the foot of Sloat, by the zoo. I was pleased to observe that the bungee cords I used to tie the scooter on held very well: nothing fell out but I ground off some of the corner of the cart, leaving a trail of sparks in the road, and one of Rick's radios fell apart and lost its battery case in the road.

I had spent several days of work on the thing and was pretty fed up, but the next day I went over to Rick's dad's shop and we fixed up the cart in many ways. We tightened all the bolts better, double-nutted the important ones, and added a safety pin that will prevent the thing from flipping again. Rick says he is ordering a cover to put over his scooter in the cart to keep all his radios inside next time, and I will carpet the thing inside to make it quieter and provide some padding. Right now when I drive it down the street it sounds like someone dumping a load of gravel onto a tin roof, and the scooter is subjected to a thorough shaking like a washing machine. But I think by next week we will be ready to try it again.

10:45:59 AM     comment []    .