In all my time of bike riding, never a flat tire. Knock on wood. Sure enough, a couple of days ago, my first. No different than a car, you feel immediately that something is off and since the surface of where the error could be is so tiny, it doesn’t take anytime at all to know it is a tire. Forego the college degree, become a bike repair and sales shop owner. Always work to be had. The hourly wage is 60 euros and parts are not cheap. When you have to leave your bike at the shop, it feels as if your right arm has been left behind. They are so busy it took two days to get it repaired and returned. A new outer tire and inside tube. Away I peddled, scarf flowing behind…. Until a couple of days later, that same sinking, literally, feeling. I was on the return part of the trip from shopping at a far-away grocery store. Same tire. and this time, the air was gone in a nano-second. “Poof”and flat it was; rim-to-the-road flat. Nothing to do but dismount and push it home. Grateful I suppose that i didn’t have to carry the contents of my ‘saddle bags’. I also could not go directly to the repair shop, again, because it was Sunday. Sunday and Monday the shop is closed. Wheeled it home, emptied out the ‘trunk’ and turned the bike upside down to check out the tire. I had no inclination to fix it but did want to see if the cause was obvious. It was. A small, hard piece of steel was inbedded in the newly purchased tire. Two days later when I wheeled it to the shop, in addition to the hourly wage to make the repairs was the cost of a new inner tube; they apparently are not salvageable. I asked if the shop strewed tacks for more business since I had just been there. He said “Yes. every morning!”