To tell DH to fetch it himself?

[GooseyLoosey]

Bit of background - DH likes bikes. Not like a normal person might but in the way that a train spotter likes trains. This has caused some tension over the years but I try to rise above it. DH has over 20 bikes in various states of partial dismemberment. He yearns to buy more "vintage bikes" (aka rubbish) all of the time and spends hours looking at pictures on e-bay. It is quite sad really.

Yesterday he runs into the kitchen telling me he had found a bike with the perfect 1950s cranks on that he had been looking for for months. His for a mere hundred and something pounds, but not to worry because there were bits on it he did not want that he could sell for twice that. He has never sold one single bike bit despite saying something similar each time he buys one. I tell him he knows my feelings about bikes and what our finances are like but he is an adult and I am not going to stop him spending the money he earns. Two minutes later he comes into the kitchen, the proud owner of yet another bike. I grimmace.

He comes to give me a hug and is very lovey. I think this is because he has bought the bloody thing and is trying to win me over. But no, there is more to it. Turns out the bike is collection only from London. We live over a hundred miles from London. However, I work there. He wants me to collect it from a suburb it will take about 40 minutes to get to after work and then somehow I have to get it back to the mainline train station and then in my car at the other end. I told him to get his own fecking bike.

His reply to me was that I was being totally unreasonable and he bet that if he was on something like mumsnet and asked everyone would agree, so I told him I would ask. If you lot tell me IABU, I will go and get the damn thing. If not, he is on his own. So, am I?

[GooseyLoosey]

Tortoise, it would be fair to say that there is some resentment on my part. I no longer venture into the loft as I find the whole experience quite traumatic. He has reigned himself in quite considerably (at my request) but occasionally he just cannot help himself. I would not have believed it possible for anyone to actually salivate over ancient rusty bolts had I not seen it with my own eyes.

[MadBusLady]

He wants me to collect it from a suburb it will take about 40 minutes to get to after work and then somehow I have to get it back to the mainline train station and then in my car at the other end.

My gob is smacked by that.

He cannot seriously think he is being reasonable?

[vintagecakeisstillnice]

Not a hope in Hell.

he is being an arse

[MadBusLady]

And by the way, over-excitable impulse buyers like him are the scourge of eBay. They just don't think things through, renege on their purchases and make sellers wary of all of us. If I buy something that isn't being posted, I have a plan for how to get it to mine. In which any participants are already informed and willing before I bid.

[YouTheCat]

I think you should collect the bike....


Then you take it to an undisclosed location and tell him that if the other rusty old bits of crap are not removed/sold, you will send back the bike in parts (one a week).

[GooseyLoosey]

In DH's defence, he won't renege on the purchase - he would never do that. If I don't come through (which I won't) he will arrange a courrier or drive to London one night to fetch it.

[GooseyLoosey]

YouTheCat - hold it as hostage? I am absolutely loving that idea, am cutting letters out of old newspapers now.

[FriskyHenderson]

Tell him you'll do it. After he's put the rest of his collection on ebay.

[MadBusLady]

Fair enough, so he's not willing to put anyone else to a lot of trouble. Only you.

[RescueCack]

Love the bike hostage idea.

[digerd]

My DH would have done it for me . Infact my DB did. But I don't drive. But then I was not an obsessive collector of bikes , just dogs

[pinkyredrose]

He's got bikes in the loft?! How the fuck is he getting them up there? What exactly is his grand plan regarding all these bikes?

Does he just gaze wistfully at them? If he was restoring them and selling for a profit that would be something but just collecting them and having them lying around? That would do my head in.

I think you should work out how much he's spent on these heaps of metal and spend the same on yourself on a spending spree.

And no don't collect the new heap of rust bike!

[Nagoo]

Nope, no way would I go and fetch it. I would not be encouraging him to bring more crap into my house. [mean]

And what if it is dangerous? What if you are mugged for it by a rabid bike collector?

[ExitPursuedByABear]

Noo waaaaay.

[EglantinePrice]

YANBU.

At the very least he should have asked you before he bought it.

Also doesn't he want to see it first? What he if you brought home a rusty bit of shit? Would he start saying you should have checked it first and that's not the right description etc

He needs to take responsibility for his 'hobby'

[OddSockMonster]

The bike hostage plan is a very good idea indeed!

[sparechange]

YANBU and you should not go and get his bike
You should introduce a one in, one out policy for all future bikes and bike bits
You should have a parallel 'Goose's fun fund' running which indemnifies you from spending the same amount that he spends on bike on shoes/spas/restaurants/whatever floats your boat
You should also tell him to get a grip, and then make him watch one of those hoarder documentaries in a 'ghost of christmas future' sort of way...

[GooseyLoosey]

"How the fuck is he getting them up there?" - with me standing at the bottom of the ladder manouvering them up there. I admit that this is not easy but anything that removes them from my sight is welcome.

I think he does gaze wistfully at them. I don't understand how one can do that but he does. He also spends ages rubbing them with sandpaper and then leaves them in the kitchen to admire until I threaten violence (to either him or the bike) unless removed.

I wish he would obsess over something smaller and easier to store - stamps perhaps.

[GibberTheMonkey]

At least trainspotters don't ask you to bring a train home on a train after a long day at work

[MrsOakenshield]

he does understand that London covers something like 300 square miles? No? Thought not.
YANBU.

[pinkyredrose]

Ok next birthday or Xmas present: a big shed - for all the bikes and him too!

[LilyAmaryllis]

I think heaving a rusty piece of junk all over London and home for hours will give you CONSIDERABLY more ill-will towards this purchase than knowing the price of the courier would.

YANBU

[LimburgseVlaai]

Has anyone mentioned yet that you are not allowed to take a bike on a rush hour train? Folding bikes only.

[waltermittymissus]

Well, I would say: it's a sad hobby but not a dangerous one and you should get the bike.

BUT....only if it was convenient and easier for you to do it. Instead it's a train ride to a stranger's house, a cycle, another train ride (if you're allowed on the train with it) with a bloody bike, trying to get the thing in your car and then driving it home.

That's insanely U of him and he shouldn't be asking it of you.

[MadBusLady]

With my dad it was cars, also through some lean financial years, and in an otherwise mostly happy house the friction was a bit horrible to be honest. All spare money was my dad's hobby money, my mum had no money to spend on herself, I have dreary memories of being driven miles and then sitting for hours in hot, empty garage car parks so that my dad could go and wibble on to other petrolheads. I don't know how my mother stood it.