This one's for you, Patty

Our living room view of Oscar making friends with a classic van one day this past winter.

Peter's vehicle of choice these days. Speaking of classic!

Disclaimer: this blog post is not about bicycles, or food, or the wonderful flowers constantly blooming all over the city of Victoria.


Funny how habits come and go. Like this blog. We used to update it regularly, then over time, the blog posts got posted less often and then ... not for over a year!! Were we lured away by Facebook? Or was it life in general? It certainly wasn't an intentional snub of the blogging world. I know there are many avid bloggers out there who, even if they don't blog every day, they blog on a somewhat regular basis. Or at least when something interesting happens. Maybe that's going to be our excuse, that nothing, or too many, interesting things happened and pulled us away often enough that the urge to blog was snuffed out. One wonders, doesn't one?

Speaking of interesting things that happen, we had one this week. Thursday morning I got up and as usual wander into the living room where my computer sleeps to log in and let it warm up while I perform some necessary morning rituals. This particular morning I could hear what sounded like someone tapping metal on metal and noted this was not one of the noises I am accustomed to hearing at 6:00 or 6:30 in the AM. To satisfy my curiosity I took a peak out the front window. Surprisingly, I saw my neighbours at their truck across the street in the process of changing their passenger side front tire. Knowing this was about the time they usually leave for work, I imagined how it would affect the rest of their day. Then, it dawned on me that given about a year ago, a person of questionable mental/emotional stability was seen vandalizing our very own Oscar, our well loved 1993 Subaru Loyale.  So, I moved my gaze over to Oscar and it occurred to me he wasn't sitting as tall and proud as usual (see photo above). However, since I was not yet in any way ready to leave the apartment and some necessary morning rituals to attend to, I did not go down and investigate. Besides, I figured if they were changing a tire, they could still be there when I was ready to go down and investigate. So I went about my routine.

Sure enough, the neighbour's truck was gone by the time I was dressed. I pledged to remember to check on Oscar when I left on my bicycle for work, and gave it no more thought.

When I did leave for work at 7:30 this is what I saw:

 

It's kinda hard to see here, but there is a distinct lean towards the curb. My heart sank. 

Upon closer inspection, this is what I saw:

Two, not one, but two (2) slashed tires. Dead flat, both of them.

Slashed tires! Really??? I parked the bike and ran upstairs to report the situation to Peter. We talked about our options and realized we didn't have to do anything that moment. Neither of us need the car for work or to get around town. Heck, I can even ride to my squash games! I already do the grocery shopping on the bike and last week, I am very proud of this one, picked up 11 shirts from the dry cleaners and rode home with them draped neatly across the handlebars and over my basket!! Only once did I have to snuffle the attempt of the top shirt to fill with air and fly away. (wish I had a picture of that)

So, here it is Friday evening and we still haven't done anything about fixing the tires - mostly because we've been busy and haven't needed to do anything. Now it's the May long weekend and we wouldn't be able to get much done in a timely fashion in any case. We have reported the vandalism to the VicPD but it's not like they can catch the perpetrator and make them pay. We just have to pay. Our neighbours lost a brand new tire.

We didn't do anything wrong. We're even parked legally. Still we have to pay. It's not even that it is a bad neighbourhood. In fact, it's a wonderful neighbourhood! Our backyard is the famous Beacon Hill Park and our front yard is 6 acres of St. Anne's Academy (lots of trees, small orchard, office building, national historic chapel, tended gardens and a parking lot). It's just the luck of the draw, really. Random acts of vandalism. No rhyme or reason. The end.

Poor Oscar :(