No Habla Espanol...err...what?

Here is a good reason to pay attention in the foreign language class that you either take in high school or college. I took no Spanish in high school. But in order to graduate from UNI I needed 2 semesters of it....sigh. That was over 4 years ago. Well, needless to say, I needed those skills yesterday at the shop.

Anyway, an older gentlemen come into the shop. I let him scope out the shop for a few minutes. He then comes up to the counter, and asks for a few parts. The bad thing was that he spoke NO english and it was all in Spanish. I had the look of...."What?" on my face. Since we both quickly realized that this would be a challenge, the converstation quickly turned into a game of Charades. He would act out the part he needed in hand justures, and then i would give him that black stare. It was worth less.

Then I had a swell idea. I had him write down in Spanish what he was saying. I would then take his written words and type them into the online translator Babel Fish. After I typed it in I could see what he was saying. To reply back to him, I would type in English the answer on the same program and translate to Spanish. Then copy it to paper and give it too him.

This went on and on for almost 45 minutes. Finally, we got it all figured out as to what he needed. And he walked out the door with parts in hand. Good thing the shop was not super busy, except for Bidwell slobbering all over Buchanandale's sweet ride at the shop.

So there you have it. Another day at Europa Cycle and Ski.

What's on tap for Saturday...

First, lots 'o spinning at the YMCA. We got about 2 inches of snow yesterday, so I am by-passing the sloppy conditions for a controled environment so I can focus on the task at hand.

Next up will be mucho design work for Smith's, Nooner's college team, and DQ and Rassy's.

Lastly, good to see G-Ted got some good gravel in!

Off to suffer!