Bit of a tense ride home on Wednesday. I pulled my bike out of storage and discovered the front tire was flat. Normally I'm well equipped to deal with such a situation, but I'm all out of patches in my patch kit (long story), and the stem on my spare tube wasn't long enough to fully poke through the deep-ish rims. If I had had my good pump that screws onto the valve, I might have been okay, but the pump in my pack only clamped on with compression, and I wasn't able to get enough stem into the pump to get a good grip. I maybe got 10-15 psi into the tire before the pump wouldn't hold onto the stem anymore. (This is a 700X23 tire, and I usually pump it to about 90.) So, I rode home very gingerly, with hands on the tops and my @$$ hanging off the rear of the saddle to shift my weight as far back as possible and keep the front light. I was in serious risk of a pinch flat with that little pressure in the tire, and rode very carefully to avoid potholes, personhole covers (can't be too PC these days...), curbs, big cracks in the pavement, etc. I did make it home okay.
No ride yesterday, but I did manage to finally get to the bike shop yesterday evening to pick up a couple new tubes and a new patch kit. The Gatorskin on the front of my fixed gear was getting threadbare, so I picked up a new front tire too, a Continental GP5000! A bit pricey at $100 CAD (that's what, about 6 bucks American?), but man, that tire is the shizz. It completely negates the effects of headwinds, amplifies the effect of tailwinds, easily added 5MPH to my average speed, I can climb like a goat, and take hairpin turns at 40MPH.
Okay, the tire does none of that, but it is definitely quieter on pavement than the Gatorskin. That thing was loud AF. Just need to clean my chain and my fixed gear will be deathly silent.