Twenty-five years ago, I was deep in my cycling phase. I’d discovered the joys of biking two years earlier, and since then had been riding about 2000 miles per year.
When you ride that much, you learn that bikes break. Things go wrong. And while sure, it’s possible to take your bike into a shop every time something goes wrong, it’s much more practical (and rewarding) to learn to fix things yourself.
This year, for the first time in forever, Kim and I have pulled our bikes out to ride around town. They’re in bad shape. The me of 1999 would have relished in repairing the bikes himself. The J.D. of 2024 feels overwhelmed by the very thought, so yesterday we took them to a local Mom and Pop bike shop for maintenance.
This is all a long lead-in to our first story today. 😉
A love letter to bicycle maintenance and repair. [Tegowerk] — “I realize this may sound overblown, but the changes this hobby has wrought in me go beyond just teaching me a fun and useful skill. Learning to fix bicycles has changed my outlook on manual labor, on the nature of work, and ultimately on life itself.”
The edge of discipline. [Happily Disengaged] — “Discipline has been my super power in this financial independence period of my life. It’s what I used to cut down on spending and up my savings. It’s what I used to keep throwing money each week into two bear markets. And finally, it’s what I used to do four plus years alcohol free. Could it be my discipline is waning? What’s next? More spending? Less investing? Less hard work?”
The great flattening. [Stratchery] — “Change is guaranteed, but the type of change is not; never is that more true than today. See, friction makes everything harder, both the good we can do, but also the unimaginably terrible. In our zeal to reduce friction and our eagerness to celebrate the good, we ought not lose sight of the potential bad.” [I very much enjoyed this thoughtful piece.]
Let’s close today with an arbitrary non-financial video. It’s “Tank!”, the incredible theme song to Cowboy Bebop. No reason to share this other than it’s still awesome after all of these years.
“I think it’s time we blow this scene. Get everybody and their stuff together. Okay. Three, two, one…let’s jam!”