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stormdogIn other news, my grandmother came up to see my dad's production of Almost, Maine yesterday. My family went out and had lunch with her, except my dad who was at the high school getting ready.
It was great to see her again, and I feel really bad that I haven't gone out and visited her in Richmond. She's decided that she is no longer a safe driver, so is increasingly unable to get out and do things. She does, however, live in a large house with my aunt and uncle and their children, so that makes a big difference. I love that relative of mine have managed to live in an extended family grouping for so long. It's really unusual, and it makes me happy.
Anyway, we all chatted for a bit over lunch before I went back home and to work while they saw the show. I'm going to go visit her in person, too, after my presentation is done and I feel like time is my own again.
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While that was going on, my bike was at the shop here in town getting fenders installed. It's back home, and I'm really digging having an increasingly practical bike for bad weather commuting. I'd really like to try living as car-free as is reasonable for me here in Kenosha. To that end, as well as the fenders, I just got a nice frame pump in case I get a flat, and I also bought a trailer. It was from a Craigslist seller, who had a $100 trailer for hauling two small children around for $40. So I picked it up with the intent of using it for large shopping trips, dropping stuff off at Goodwill, that kind of thing. I haven't installed the connector for it yet, but it looks pretty easy.
I'm enjoying constructing an identity facet as a serious bike commuter. I've found myself wondering how much of that comes from actual money savings and how much of it is me shaping myself into a person more inline with my idealized self. Clearly I'd save a ton of money if I didn't have a car at all. But I do, and I have to keep paying for insurance and such things. And with the bike, I've spent a non-trivial amount of money on all these (to be fair, very practical) doo-dads. Calculating money saved over driving, it doesn't look terribly good if I put gas money up against things like fenders, a pump, a spare inner tube, a trailer, and winter snow tires and a rain cape in the future. On the other hand, if I look at those costs for the bicycle as part of the cost of the vehicle, and then include the cost of the car and the parts and services that it needed to be drivable, then the bicycle is still the clear winner, by a vast margin. Plus, I suspect that biking 80 miles a week to school and back keeps me way healthier than I would otherwise be, so that's a real benefit that should be taken into account.
But I do hope that my opportunistic purchase of a trailer turns out to be at least as much about utility as it is about me feeling cool and urban because I have a bike trailer.
---
I applied mink oil to my boots today, in the interest of protecting them from the salt and dirt of winter, and keeping them waterproof. Like everything else I've read reviews on, half the people say mink oil is great and you should use it on all your boots, and the other half say that it's terrible stuff that will make your shoes smell bad, feel weird, and collect dust. Whatever; I put it on. We'll see how it goes. I want to learn to choose quality, durable goods that will last, and I want to take care of them the right way to make them last longer. I guess I just have to dive in, do my best at it, and learn.
I feel like I have other things to say, but they've fallen out of my head. Hopefully I'll be here more often in the future to record them!
It was great to see her again, and I feel really bad that I haven't gone out and visited her in Richmond. She's decided that she is no longer a safe driver, so is increasingly unable to get out and do things. She does, however, live in a large house with my aunt and uncle and their children, so that makes a big difference. I love that relative of mine have managed to live in an extended family grouping for so long. It's really unusual, and it makes me happy.
Anyway, we all chatted for a bit over lunch before I went back home and to work while they saw the show. I'm going to go visit her in person, too, after my presentation is done and I feel like time is my own again.
---
While that was going on, my bike was at the shop here in town getting fenders installed. It's back home, and I'm really digging having an increasingly practical bike for bad weather commuting. I'd really like to try living as car-free as is reasonable for me here in Kenosha. To that end, as well as the fenders, I just got a nice frame pump in case I get a flat, and I also bought a trailer. It was from a Craigslist seller, who had a $100 trailer for hauling two small children around for $40. So I picked it up with the intent of using it for large shopping trips, dropping stuff off at Goodwill, that kind of thing. I haven't installed the connector for it yet, but it looks pretty easy.
I'm enjoying constructing an identity facet as a serious bike commuter. I've found myself wondering how much of that comes from actual money savings and how much of it is me shaping myself into a person more inline with my idealized self. Clearly I'd save a ton of money if I didn't have a car at all. But I do, and I have to keep paying for insurance and such things. And with the bike, I've spent a non-trivial amount of money on all these (to be fair, very practical) doo-dads. Calculating money saved over driving, it doesn't look terribly good if I put gas money up against things like fenders, a pump, a spare inner tube, a trailer, and winter snow tires and a rain cape in the future. On the other hand, if I look at those costs for the bicycle as part of the cost of the vehicle, and then include the cost of the car and the parts and services that it needed to be drivable, then the bicycle is still the clear winner, by a vast margin. Plus, I suspect that biking 80 miles a week to school and back keeps me way healthier than I would otherwise be, so that's a real benefit that should be taken into account.
But I do hope that my opportunistic purchase of a trailer turns out to be at least as much about utility as it is about me feeling cool and urban because I have a bike trailer.
---
I applied mink oil to my boots today, in the interest of protecting them from the salt and dirt of winter, and keeping them waterproof. Like everything else I've read reviews on, half the people say mink oil is great and you should use it on all your boots, and the other half say that it's terrible stuff that will make your shoes smell bad, feel weird, and collect dust. Whatever; I put it on. We'll see how it goes. I want to learn to choose quality, durable goods that will last, and I want to take care of them the right way to make them last longer. I guess I just have to dive in, do my best at it, and learn.
I feel like I have other things to say, but they've fallen out of my head. Hopefully I'll be here more often in the future to record them!
