I received a call the other day from a fellow bike commuter (let's call him "Andrew") asking me if I had any tools.
"What for?", I asked.
It turns out that Andrew had ridden his bike off to a meeting at nearby office but when he'd come back to his vehicle, he found that somebody had locked their bike to his—not a very bright or friendly thing to do. So Andrew was looking for a way to disentangle his machine.
I didn't have any lock removal tools to hand and if he couldn't locate any I was concerned that Andrew would have to leave his bike locked to a post, perhaps overnight.
"Will it be safe to leave it in the street overnight?"
"No, I've brought it back with me."
"Well, why do you need the tools then?"
"Because the other bike is still locked to it!"
It turns out that the other person hadn't accidentally threaded their cable through Andrew's bike and around the post, they had simply locked their bike to Andrew's! So he just unlocked his bike and walked off with both of them, leaving a note on the pole saying "Lost your bike? Call this number&hellip" Hopefully that didn't sound too much like a ransom demand.
This story reminds me of what happened to my friend. However, this guy did lock his bike properly, that is, to a stationary object. When my friend wanted to ride home he couldn't because he was still locked via the other guy's lock. So then what? Tit for tat of course so my friend then locked the other guy's bike with it to the post. This resulted in a multi-day stand off with neither guy unlocking the other and without them actually meeting. Then a note was left to end the stand off and without ever meeting they did get each others lock off. Reason prevaled in the end.
That's a tad harsh. But we can safely say that the person concerned does not value her bicycle in the same way that Surly Dave values his…
And they allow people like this to vote and to reproduce.
You know something? It never occurred to me to ask that.
So I guess I'd better be the one to do this. Was she Blonde?
She was sorry, just said she was running late and couldn't even remember locking her bike, let alone what she locked it to!
Mad? Absolutely nuts, I'd say! :-)
What a great story. Was she mad? Or apologetic? Did she explain why she'd done something so dumb?
Hmm, I'd love to know how she explained it…
Not the smartest pencil in the pack - you should have sold her some "magic" beans...
Awww, don't ya love a happy ending?
...and you'll be pleased to know she did ring about 6pm that evening - recovered her bike the next day :-)
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Hah! But just think of the extra security those extra locks provided to both bikes during the stand-off.