Are we hypnotized into N+1?
Friday was a great ride day and I even attacked one of the dreaded hills I have always dreaded I have always disliked. But just before the top of the hill I was forced to sit down and try to grab a lower gear. For reasons I can’t explain my small front ring and the two biggest read gears on my cassette just didn’t seem to like each other and kept skipping. It was time for servicing anyway so on the way home I dropped the bike off at the LBS and called my wife for a ride home. I had family and friend commitments so I will not have a chance to pick up my bike till Sunday afternoon. While sitting around the house I thought how nice it would be to have a second road bike for the days when my first choice is out of service. Yes I can and do ride my MTB and my Revive when the Road bike isn’t available but that isn’t what I was thinking. While daydreaming I started thinking about picking up an older frame and trying my hand at building a back up bike. I even considered building a steel bike. That may be because one of our club members has been talking about it lately and that made me think of it. I don’t really know where this came from because building a bike isn’t my style. Is there something infectious in handlebar tape that hypnotizes us after we get to some magic number of miles under our belt?