Munger Consulting Services

Better to start at the start. The start – this morning – actually seemed pretty nondescript. Get up. Pack up. Head out. Well, not quite. I made the mistake of checking the tires. My front tire was maybe a tad low. So I thought it would be a good idea to top it off. Whipped out the pump, unscrewed the little screw, and attached the pump. I could hear a little air leaking out, but that’s pretty normal. Would just have to pump a bit more. Except that when I went to pump there was no pressure, no resistance, just moving a limp pisten up and down – while more air fizzed out. Hmm. Took me about 5 seconds to realize that the pump was not working. By that time quite a bit of air had leaked out of the tire. Not good.

See, the problem is that the pump is the only device we have to pressurize a tire. And given that we were in some remote location in the Chequamegon National Forest – and that it was about 40 miles to Minocqua – the next town of any size – we were more than a little concerned.

I took the pump apart and examined the pisten. I guess it had dried up since the last use – enough so that it didn’t form a seal, and that is why it didn’t provide any of the pressure you need in order to push air into the tire. Now, even saying this I wonder what I was thinking with my next action. But then, hindsight is generally 20-20.

What I should have done: dunk the pisten in water or oil or something and see if I could get it to re-expand and form a seal.

What I did instead: Well, I’m in a glade somewhere in the forest. What is in glades in forests? Old abandoned couches, of course. How convenient. “This old stuffing for the couch should work great to help make the pisten fit more snugly against the cylinder.” Except that when I tried to push the pisten into the cylinder with the stuffing it got stuck. And when I tried to muscle it, the whole thing broke – and now the pump was not repairable – just some old scraps of metal. Might as well leave it with the couch . . .

Oh boy.

Only thing to do at this point? Bike very very carefully and hope for the best . . .

So we headed out. It’s a good thing this happened in Wisconsin. Because Wisconsin has great roads – even remote roads in the middle of national forests are well-paved. No exception here. We biked about five or six miles pretty gingerly. As we head along I’m scanning the road for a house that might have a pump or a compressor or something. Problem is that there are like seven people who live in Price County – and none of them are home . . .

But, with the good road and a little luck we are moving along. And after a while we see a guy in a pickup just sitting by the side of the road. I ask him if he has a pump or a compressor. Clearly, I made his day. “I sure do!” I think he has been waiting like twenty years for someone to ask him just that question.

And this is where I finally did something right. I actually had packed the little presta valve – shraeder adapter, and, better yet, I found it.

Within a few minutes we are back in business – with a tire so full of air I could probably hit a big log and not have a problem . . .

But before I get to that I want to say a little more about the old guy who helped us. Old pickup. Rusty. Compressor was taped together. Turns out he is out bear hunting with his buddies. And he has a dog in a box in the back of the pickup – just waiting to be let loose on Smokey or Winnie the Pooh or Paddington – who’s probably in Darkest Peru, but you never know.

Pretty sure we biked by this guy’s house yesterday – and he had one of those Gods * Guns * Trump signs in his yard. But you know what? He was a super nice guy. Maybe us City people need to venture out and do dumb things like break our pumps in the middle of nowhere more often. A little bit of interaction is not that bad. We might actually find a few things we like about each other . . .

He took a picture with us, showed us his dog, which looked a lot like our dog Bowie, and then his dog kissed Diana. Love all around . . .

And then we were off. Some really nice pretty biking followed.

Really nice until I decided to test out the theory about being able to run over a log . . .

We’re leaving the national forest now, and I’m looking at one of those signs saying “Leaving Chequamegon National Forest”- and then, kaboom. I’m running over a 4”x4” post that someone has left positioned exactly in the middle of the shoulder (where I should have seen it – but then I should have put the pisten in water too . . . one of those days . . .)

I’ll just say this: I wouldn’t recommend running over a 4×4 post while biking along at 15 or so miles per hour with no suspension and road tires. Surprisingly, though. I was fine. I guess I really had put enough air in the tire.

But the thing is, I was not the issue. Biking directly behind me was Diana. And when I hit the 4×4 and bucked up with my bike Diana ended up taking the brunt of it. Lots of stuff happened in the next one to two seconds. Diana somehow avoided the post – though she never saw it – but did careen into the back of my bike – and then lost control, screamed, and finally hit the pavement.

Ow!

Of course, those of you who know Diana know that she is incredibly tough. She scraped up her knee, her elbow and her hip – and later complained of whiplash-like symptoms – but she was back to biking within a few minutes and ended up pulling me by the end of the day. (I thought about taking a picture of Diana after she had fallen, but decided that would not be a good idea. Sorry about that . . .)

Kind of a full day and it wasn’t even 11 a.m. yet . . .

But I do have one more thing to report. We made it to our beautiful campsite overlooking Buffalo Lake, but after we arrived we realized that we had no cash. Meaning no firewood. Because you can only pay cash for firewood. Meaning I had to scrounge for firewood in the woods – and from the leftover scraps in other campsites.

So I’m wandering around looking for wood scraps . . . When I come across a beautiful array of chicken-of-the-woods. And let me just tell you, fresh chicken-of-the-woods is a pretty great complement to a steak cooked over an open fire . . .

So that was day two. I’m tired just thinking about it . . .

Oh, and we did get a new pump in Minocqua.

We’re ready for anything now . . .