Our family has been doing a lot of inline skating since my youngest and I got skates for Christmas. My older daughter and my spouse have had their skates for a few years. I recently replaced the long-overdue brake pad on the formers skates; the pad was worn down to the screw that holds it in place.

Next up: the bearings. I was itching to see what they actually look like and to feel it in my hand, pictures only say so much. I knew my daughters did not avoid standing water when skating, so the skates were ready for some bearing love. Taking the wheels apart looks so easy on You Tube, so I got right to it. I popped off the wheels, hooked out the bearings and was ready to cleanse away the grit.

Hold on, not so damn fast. Before you can get to the grit, you’ve got to take off the covers. To take off the covers, you need to pop out the c-clips. That also looked easy on You Tube.

I’m here to tell you, it’s NOT. Sure, some popped right out, but almost half refused to come out. You may know that each wheel has a set of two bearings, so 2 bearings X 8 wheels = frustration and sore fingers. It took me nearly two hours to get out all those damn things. These are not high-quality bearings to begin with, I will probably replace them soon enough.

Next up: putting the c-clips back in, I can’t wait for that!