I confess. Sometimes I am cheap.

And sometimes it backfires.

And today, I am going to share a story about it.

So I’ve just moved out into the suburbs. My partner and I quickly realized the bus schedule is a lie and it doesn’t run nearly as often as we thought and in reality, the city centre is a smidge farther away than I’d like.

Before making the drastic decision to buy a car, I decided to see if a bike would do.

I looked at various prices and ultimately decided that ordering a bike from the evil empire, Amazon, would be the most cost-efficient choice.

Mistake #1: It’s almost so dumb I don’t even want to write it.

I didn’t read the description carefully.

I though the bike would be delivered assembled (like… naively like a brand new car with a bow?? I don’t know. I admit this was just stupid). It came in pieces in a box.

And assembly was a nightmare. I had no less than three nervous breakdowns trying to assemble the thing before my partner, who is much more patient with instructions, sort of just took over.

But the instructions were missing key elements – like how to assemble the breaks. And not in much English. The video that we could play from the QR code in the instructions was even weirder and less clear.

But two days later, we had the thing largely assembled… we had to walk away the first evening due to frustration on both our parts.

There was no planet on which we were going to successfully attach the bike basket, so that was just abandoned and the front wheel fender, which had several dents in it, was also clearly wonky.

And the tires were flat.

I thought… this sort of sucks but I can live with most of this. I ordered a cheap bicycle tire pump and the tires would absolutely not inflate.

Honestly, I was frustrated a piece of it was warped and dented – and that that wasn’t evident until hours into assembling the thing. I was scared I’d put together the brakes wrong and was gonna die. The basket… just icing on the cake.

I Googled local bike shops and looked at reviews and most of them had comments about how rude and lousy the mechanics were if you brought in a bike you didn’t buy in their shop.

I thought… screw this. I am returning this bike and I’m just gonna go pay £20 more in a bike shop for a fully assembled, brakes-definitely-work bike and I am gonna chalk this very frustrating week up as a reminder to not pick the cheapest way to do things.

So my partner helps me disassemble the thing. It’s not sitting in pieces again in our living room.

And I log onto Amazon to setup the return and…

The package must be dropped off at an Evri collection spot.

The nearest one is half a mile away.

This box is massive and heavy. We don’t have a car, as you may recall from the beginning of this post. The box will not fit in standard Uber or taxi.

W.T.F.

The bicycle is now in pieces in the living room, mocking me. I beg my partner to help me drag it to the post office on his day off at the end of the week, because, of course, the post office’s hours align perfectly with his usual working hours.

He tentatively agrees.

On the morning of his day off, we pack up the bicycle. I pat myself on the back because, actually, we’ve fit everything in there so well. We use the last of the packing tape from our move to get the box securely shut. I go upstairs to print off the return label, and come down to tape it on the package when my partner points out that we forgot to put a wheel in the box.

I stare at the wheel. I begin to hyperventilate. I throw myself onto the couch and have the a small hissy fit. I calm down.

We take a walk around the corner to the local store and I spent £8 on duct tape and bubble wrap. We return home and wrap the heck out of the tire and duct tape it to the box.

We begin our journey. The wheel seems… not so secure. So we drag the box around the corner to the local store and I buy £5 more of duct tape – the last in the store.

At this point my partner also says we are not dragging this box any further. The box is far too heavy.

The box is very heavy but I am fuelled by spite. …he is not.

We start Googling and looking for a man with a van or information about exactly how large an Uber XL is. 20 minutes later, he manages to hunt down a taxi company with minivans that will pick us up and take us the remaining .33 miles to the post office.

Approximately 2 hours after beginning this journey and £33 later, we drag the bicycle box into the post office. The woman behind the desk asks us if we know how much it weighs because there are weight limits on Evri pickups.

I start to laugh, because I do not know how much it weighs. Fortunately, the weight was on the printed return label and it was an acceptable weight.

My partner and I walk out of the post office laughing hysterically with relief, as we were certain the bike would be too heavy, and he was probably wondering if he had made the right decision moving in with me at that point. …if not at many points earlier in the day.

And I bought a new bicycle, from the local shop, for £19 more than the one on Amazon. The owner of the shop was lovely. The bicycle was ready for pickup the next day. The wheels are inflated. The brakes work. It has a basket. And it comes with a free check-in at the store after I’ve been riding it for two months to make sure everything is all good with it.

The level of headache I caused over £19 was… insane.

Let my misery be a cautionary tale for you, my friends.