I'm putting on the yellow shirt (and fighting windmills?)

This blog was supposed to be about Washington. I've been methodical about it at times, have written profusely at times, have ignored it at times, changed it's theme and never stuck with it at times, got angry at it at times. Last time I changed it, it was going to be a sort of photoblog. It still is, if I ever get around to posting more. My laptop died, so it hasn't been easy.

I do have a slowass PC, so at least there's something, but it's rather annoying to wait for everything, and I don't have a desk big enough to use it comfortably. The monitor is huge. But it's great for watching baseball games online, which I do four or five times a week.

Anyway, the point of this post wasn't any of the above. I wanted to write about a new hobby of mine, one that I'm thoroughly enjoying and that may give me the freedom I want from office life for awhile. Cycling. See, because I have been so miserable having to sit inside an office all day while life goes on under the sun, I've been trying to come up with ways to take a break from it and to enjoy life for a bit. So I got this notion in my head that I was going to sell my car and bike around Europe for a few months in the fall. It's been seven years since I've stepped foot on European soil, and I miss it dearly. I know so much has changed in those seven years, and I am very curious to see what has. I also thought I could write a travel book on my adventures there, one that would show not only the changes that have taken place in the decade since I first visited Europe until now, but also how I have changed since my college eyes were opened to the world back then to the jaded, bitter person I've become.

So with that crazy idea came the bike thing. My bike was in horrible shape, so I took it apart to fix it up. And I enjoyed taking it apart and learning about all of the parts - just learning the proper names for things was a start. The bike was covered in rust, so I was going to have to take it apart down to the frame, strip it, repaint it, replace the seat and seat post that were stolen, replace the brake and gear cables...pretty much everything but (thankfully) the front and rear deraillers and the pedals needed to be replaced. I went to Craig's List to find parts. Instead, I bought another bike for $25. It had a lot of rust and wasn't high quality, but at least I could ride it to start getting into shape for my European trip. I continued to look for parts on Craig's List for the other bike. I found a quality Trek bike for $75, so I bought it, thinking I would sell the other bike on CL. First, though, I took it apart, sanded all of the rust off of it, repainted the parts that needed to be repainted, put it back together, and sold it for $100.

I really enjoyed it, so I put an ad on CL asking for people's old bikes they did not want. I got a lot of responses, so I'm picking up four bikes to fix up tomorrow at no cost. And voila, a new hobby with a potential to turn into a job was born.

And why did I post that here? Because this is a themeless blog these days, and I will be doing a lot of biking (and a lot of photography during the biking. Of course, I'll stop the bike to take the photos!) And I'll comment on the things I'm taking photos of and who knows what will come of it?

I don't know if I'm going to do the Europe thing, but I'm really hoping this bike stuff works out so I can work on my own for a bit. Life's too short to sit in an office.