Last updated on July 1, 2026
My Bike & Groceries(Click for full size…)
Last friday I received some email from the person who had promised me that a bike rack would be installed at the VG’s near my house, apologizing that it hadn’t yet been installed. Sunday, on the way to
I haven’t needed groceries yet, but with finishing up the yogurt, carrots, bananas, and smoked salmon within the last few days, and combined with some rather nice after-work weather, I figured I’d put the basket on the back of the bike and go pick some things up.
The basket, tires, and lock all worked out great, even though the basket does occasionally touch my bum while riding. As it’s only 1.5 miles to the store, that’s not a big deal. The cheap black bungee cords I picked up for holding things into the basket seem to work pretty good, and if they somehow get lost or break it’ll only be another $2 or so from Lowe’s to replace them.
I’d brought a brown paper bag to the store with me so that I could not take up another new bag, and that seemed to confuse the checkout guy a bit. He first took it and put the potato chips (Better Maid Hot, I hope they are good) and bananas in there alone, then went to get me another bag for other things. After a little prompting (and my saying that I’ll just carry the chips myself) he packed things differently, and it all fit nicely in the bag. That single bag then fit in the basket great, I was able to strap the top down, and ride home.
The lock worked out pretty good as well. It’d be nice if it was just slightly longer, but it worked. I found that the left strap on my helmet can’t be wholly undone, so it’s safe to lock it in the cable. Someone could cut the straps on it, but a helmet without straps is pretty worthless.
Now, time to figure out what to have for dinner. I would go for a longer ride, possibly trying to find a reasonable way to get to Riverbends, but it’s really windy and it’ll take at least half an hour to find and prepare food, I think.
Oh, darn. I just realized that I forgot to purchase bread.
I have a bunch of cloth bags and they have no idea what to do with them. I tell the casier I have my own bags, hand them to her, stop her when she tries to use plastic anyway, stop her when she tries to use plastic again, remind her repeatedly there are more cloth bags to be used. *sigh*
Yeah, that’s just crap. While I dislike using new paper bags, I really, really don’t like a bunch of extra plastic bags. Those things are just, overall, awful.
We keep some plastic grocery bags on hand because they’re the perfect recepticle for scooping the litter box. I only get new ones when I need them though. Otherwise I try to take my cloth bags everywhere.
Ah, yeah… That makes sense, and it’s a decent use for them. Just using them to carry stuff before throwing them out is horribly wasteful. As you know. :)
You’ve probably said in the past, but where’dya get that basket. I like it.
It’s this one, which I just snagged from Amazon with free shipping. It’s designed to slide right into one of the Topeak racks. The bag I have does the same, so it’s pretty convenient.
I need to pull the handle off the basket, though, because it’s just not strong enough to hold a basket full of stuff. Ideally I’d be able to shop with this then just latch it back on to the bike, but without building in some new straps that can’t be done. I’m thinking I’ll try to fashion a handle with nylon webbing and a couple small PVC tubes for handles once I… get up the incentive to.
Yay complaining works!
Nope, no complaining. I just asked politely if they were going to put one in. :)
Heh, well it’s just the nicer version of complaining ;)