Ride a Bike to Tomorrow's Clothing Drive

When I was at the recycling center the other day – I'm sure you enjoy any post that starts with that phrase – I found this.

I rarely bring kids bikes home, but I couldn't help myself: I don't see 20” wheels with five speeds too often. Both tires were flat and the handlebars were loose and twisted about in an unusual manner. It was also covered with stickers, many of which conveyed unnecessary and perplexing information.

Here's what I did: I recentered the handlebars, gave the brakes a quick adjustment, and then carefully peeled off all of the stickers on the frame. The tires even held air, so getting the bike back up to street-ready speed was easy to do and didn't take very much time.

In other words, it was a major dissapointment, and this Saved from the Scrapheap post would have otherwise gone on the cutting-room floor of DIYBIKING.COM's corporate headquarters – if I had one.

Now it's okay if you're throwing away a bike that has been in an accident or has been truly ruined – those are the ones that are the most fun for me to retrieve and work on/strip for parts– but please, if the former owner of the Yellow Bike is reading this or if you have an unused bike in your possession you want to get rid of: don't trash gently broken bikes. If you want to get rid of an old bike that isn't totally gone and could be fixed, please donate it to the Work & Learn program at Domus. Even though the students there are deeply involved with building a one-of-a-kind hybrid bike, they are always looking for decent bikes, so please contact Mitch or Mario at Domus if you have a bike (preferably adult-sized) you'd like to donate to the program.

I'm not sure the Yellow Bike's fate is with Domus as they are mostly looking for bikes with 26" wheels, but I wondered if it could go on a worthy adventure before I decide what to do with it. Before long, I had my answer. 

It has been a while since I used my bike mover/converted child's trailer. I think the last time was when I was retrieving shopping carts and bringing them back to the proper Stamford supermarkets. But I wanted to let you know that Person-to-Person is having a big clothing drive (which has the inspiring moniker, Stamford Take Off Your Clothes) and day of good food and family fun at the UCONN Stamford campus tomorrow between 11 and 3. Since fall will soon spill into winter and you're probably about to change out your seasonal stuff anyway, please take the time to pick out some clothes and bring them to Stamford Take Off Your Clothes. You can bring your donations with a bike, you can bring them in your car, you can leave your hat on. Thanks for reading.

(Follow me on Twitter at @michaelknorris)