17. LETS TALK ZLOTY’S

I guess sooner or later this thing is going to cost me some money. So far my expenditure has been limited to the magazines that I’ve been consuming with gusto and the $80 deposit I put on the frame I have chosen as the one around which I hope to build an impressively functioning trail eating machine....current mechanical knowledge deficits notwithstanding.

But as I say, unless I plan to use the bare frame as some kind of spectacularly un-aerodynamic dirt toboggan, I’m going to have to invest in stuff like wheels and handlebars and seats and brakes and Jesus, when you write it all down (which I have - here) it’s really quite a lot of shit.

On a side note. You know your mid-life crisis is ticking all the boxes when you start to use words like ‘invest’ about things which in no way represent anything you will EVER make any financial return on EVER.

One of the upsides to the path I have chosen to go along (buy a frame and build a bike) is that I manage to spread the pain over a longer period. Like the plucky British POW’s digging a tunnel and distributing the dirt by the pocketful under the noses of their Nazi guards (and if you don’t know what I’m talking about here then shame on you, you undereducated philistine) I can hopefully fool even myself into thinking that ‘Wow that only cost $50....and $75....and $35 (but I’ve already forgotten about the first $50 – see how the delusional mind works).

I have been sensible enough to work out that I’m not going to end up spending ridiculously more than if I just went out and purchased a bike off the rack....I’m not stupid....and the extra level of customisation I get to indulge in, as well as the joy of finishing up with something reasonably unique that I built myself, in my mind at least, more than compensates for any extra financial cost (again – the delusional mind at work).

Alternatively I could keep riding what I have, pick a third world country and buy a whole lot of wells or seeds or fishing rods to teach people to fish....so they have food for a lifetime...assuming they have rivers with fish in them as opposed to chemicals from the local multi-national conglomerate’s fertiliser factory which is pretty much a dead certainty so I’d just be wasting that money right?

Again....the delusional thing.....

NEXT: Why I will never take up surfing....