Originally Posted by
dr_lha
It may be a shallow interpretation, but I've seen it repeated many times on here and elsewhere. People seem to long for a bike that will be their "last bike". I'm baffled as to why.
I am wholly satisfied with my Workswell/Ultegra.
I have four road bikes and a mountain bike. I cannot see buying another bike, ever. I might occasionally dream about it ... but I( have bikes to do everything I ever want to do on bikes. having more would be wasteful.
Originally Posted by
dr_lha
.... getting new bikes is one of the great joys of cycling, why deprive yourself?
I take extreme exception to this.
From my point of view, buying and upgrading bikes has nothing to do with cycling. It is a wholly different part of life, a wholly different set of pleasures (and believe me, it is one I have explored in great depth and detail.)
Thing is, if I do not Ride a bike, I do not enjoy cycling. it doesn't matter what new part I put on my old bike or what new bike I bought ... if I am not our riding, I am not a cyclist and I am not enjoying cycling.
Riding a bicycle is "cycling." Shopping, dreaming, upgrading, buying bikes and parts are pleasures associated with but separate from cycling.
If buying new bikes and new parts were an Essential part of cycling, no one with only one bike could be a "cyclist," and could never enjoy "cycling." That is patently absurd.
I like photography ... a relatively expensive hobby. If I constantly shopped for bikes and bike parts (which I could easily do) I would never have cash to upgrade my shooting rigs. If I spent all my time and cash on photography, I would never have cash for bikes.
However ... if I spent all my time and cash buying stuff, I would never have time to go ride or to go out to shoot. And if I spent all my time and cash on acquiring gear, I could never take vacations to go to great new places to ride and shoot.
I am done doing bike shopping except for tires and tubes. I have all I need (unless something breaks.) I have Enough.
I have a few upgrades I'd like to make to my photography kit, but none are necessary. As with cycling ... my Gear isn't holding me back. I might want to buy one more lens and one more body and one extender ... but I don't really need to and might not.
Shooting more would do more to improve my shooting than any new gear. Riding more would improve my riding more than any new gear. I have Enough.
If I person can never be happy with "enough" ... so be it. nothing wrong with always buying more and better if that is what that person decides.
But for a person to criticize someone who Can have "enough" ... is just small-minded.
I have Enough. Now I can stop looking for more and focus using what I have more and better.
Yee-ha. Life is good.