Story time from the archives

On Saturday I went looking for a very important document — the official surveyor’s report of our back yard from when we bought the house. We have some ideas / dreams about work we’d like to have done on the back yard this spring, and I thought it would be useful to have the official measurements of our little kingdom. This paper was so hard to find, and I ended up taking a whole bunch of stuff out of the closet in the office and sorting through it, with a bonus that I was able to throw a bunch of junk away.

I came across a large envelope labelled “London and Dublin things” (written on the envelope in all caps, in green crayon.) This envelope is a real delight as it contains all of the ID cards that John and I have ever had and some other weird stuff, including this document that relates to the first bike I had in Dublin.

Readers may be very familiar with this story, but it just makes me laugh every time I think about it. I needed a bike, and saw a secondhand one that I liked outside McQuaid Cycles in Rathmines. They kept a bunch of secondhand bikes that were for sale out in front of the store. Unlocked. So I went in to ask about it and they said the bike in question was 45 pounds (this was 1991, pre-Euro). This was in October and there was a sign up about the Christmas Club, and I think I asked what that meant. They said I could pay a small amount every week, and it was a good way to pay off a bike.

I thought this was a great service they offered, and so I put down my first payment of 20 pounds, left the shop, took the bike from the rack in front and cycled home. I rode the bike everywhere. Every week, I’d go in and pay a bit more (see the booklet above) until after a month I paid the bike off. After I paid it off the guys in the shop looked kind of nervous and said that they had to tell me something, the bike was gone. They said it must have been stolen. I was so confused, I said –Stolen? But I just rode it here, I left it in front just a minute ago. Then they were really confused and said –You’ve had the bike all along? And I said –You’ve been letting me pay for a stolen bike? They said –You’re not supposed to take it until you paid it off. I said –But I needed it right away. The conversation didn’t really get anywhere.

Oh, and in the end I found the surveyor’s report. It was way at the back of the closet, buried deep in a box. Our back yard is going to get some serious attention! I’m even hopeful the hammock can finally be installed. But I’ve heard landscape work is expensive, maybe we can find a company that has a Christmas Club plan?