The ride that wasn't

I was so excited to get to the Rockliffe Parkway for our ride yesterday. There were a lot of cyclists there already.

My rear tire needed a top up, so Steve pumped it, but then had problems getting the pump off. Oh crap, I've seen this before, the presta valve is tearing away from the tube and I'm about to have a flat. Steve was annoyed that his pump job 'caused the flat', which it didn't, so of course, we snapped at each other. Blah. I sent him on his ride, which he didn't want to do as he wanted to fix the flat, but he hadn't changed a tube since he was a child, and neither of us had done it on a rear wheel. I knew I had at least 20 minutes to remember what I learned in bike class two years ago. Yes, I know I should be practicing this! It started to come back to me as I was fiddling with it, and 20 minutes later, I had it changed. Wow, glad that didn't happen on a race course! I'm was a little concerned about the tube around the valve though, it doesn't want to sit nicely under the tire and might be pinched. By this time we were into rush hour and the traffic was a lot heavier (which isn't that bad on this road) but I didn't want to test my tire change in traffic. Because I'm a wuss. And don't fall gracefully.

So we came home, Steve only got a portion of his ride done, and I got none. I've caught the plague from KT and my lungs are not happy. I may take the bike out later, or I might just forfeit the long ride this week and practice changing my tire instead.