Biking is Emotional

I picked my bike up last Friday. It was emotional.
Mixed with the obvious euphoria of collecting my steed from the clutches of international shipping, there was a new fraustration of having to throw the unopened box into the back of the car (it fit by literally half an inch ... I was shaking) and driving the rest of the way to London - straight to the bike store I used to work at. Where, because I only made it to the store 5min before closing on Friday evening (thanks largely to London traffic), I only had time to unwrap it, hug it, wipe a tear from my eye, hug a few other people and set him rather nervously onto a bike stand in the workshop - promising to return first thing in the morning.
As Jo blogged, we were juggling quite a few things last weekend, but I managed to squeeze some time in to rebuild him before tearing myself away for another appointment.
Sunday afternoon Jo met him for the first time (and said all the right things :) ), while I stole another few moments to check over a mysterious creak in his bottom bracket (BB) that had appeared in CO. What should have been a straight forward, clean-and-regrease, became a heart-rendering race against time when the cups from the BB binded while re-entering the recently-chased BB threads. (In layman's terms, it looked like the screw threads in the frame had been cross-theaded; ruined. equals: pick a colour for your new frame).
At 5 o'clock I was still working - and honestly, not getting anywhere - and the guys had started closing the shop up... leaving Jo and I to drive the 4hours back to Manchester - minus our new friend.
James & Frank - both fantastic bike mechanics - said they'd have a better look at it and get back to me in the next couple of days....
Biking is emotional.