At the end of Fall semester, I sat down with my Abnormal Psych professor to chat about mapping out my future in the field of neuropsychology (I know, I know, that’s a long way from my stubborn and persistent claim that I was going to be a homemaker, period). She suggested, among other things, that I get an internship in a clinical setting under my belt while I’m still an undergrad, which sounds like a great idea.
Thus armed with great ideas, I traipsed off to the internship office, where I learned that, among the various other requirements of our internships program, I must acquire … a briefcase.
A briefcase?! What do you take me for, some kind of responsible, hard-working … oh, wait. Right.
Anyway, I rather like the notion of owning an actual briefcase-like object, and as such have been poking around the internet looking for one suitable to my purposes: in short, it has to hold my notebook PC, which is fairly small, and either be of suitable dimensions to toss in my panniers or be capable of serving as a sort of pannier itself. Or, you know, both.
After determining that most of the briefcases I really like are rather pricey (I am partial to the old-fashioned top-flap style, I suppose because they look sort of bikey, somehow, and probably also because the top-flap style tends to be more weather-impervious than zippers and the like do) and that the ones that can be mounted on bike racks are really pricey, I came to an epiphany: I could probably make one myself, and I seemed to remember encountering a set of appropriate instructions on the Innertubes.
Though said instructions were geared towards converting a messenger bag, I have determined that they are probably equally appropriate to converting a more briefcase-y looking creature, which is exactly what I intend to do.
Step one will be poking around at thrift stores to see if I can locate a decent-looking brief case. If I can’t, there are inexpensive options on eBay. I don’t want to invest a ton of money in a briefcase right now, because we’re ticking along on a tight budget at the moment. I plan to get this rolling fairly soon and to document my process here.
In other news, now that I’ve had the Tenacious Tricross for several weeks (it is, in fact, just about time for a bath and a tuneup), I plan to put together a review on the machine shortly. It will be a good one: I like the Tricross so much that if I weren’t absolutely in love with my road bike, I would feel like I could cut back to just one bike (maybe two, if I wanted a proper mountain bike with front suspension badly enough to prioritize it). This is, to say the least, a ringing endorsement.
PS: If you’re considering a messenger-bag or briefcase conversion, I highly recommend the one above. The result is a neat, cleanly-finished product that uses secure bull-snaps instead of simple hooks that might come loose.
