At happy hour last week, we were talking a bit about bikes— a couple of the regulars are Serious Cyclists, and I do a lot of biking for exercise— and I mentioned that one of the shifters on my bike was doing something slightly weird, which had me thinking it was time to schedule a tune-up with the local repair guy. This got me teased a bit— “You do know you can do that yourself, right, Mr. Physicist?”— but I stand by it for a couple of reasons. One is that if I’m noticing one bit of dodgy behavior, that probably means there are three other things that could stand to be tweaked that I’m not noticing yet, but someone who does this for a living will. Another is that it’s an exchange of money for time— I could almost certainly fix the gear so it stops doing the (intermittent) thing that annoys me, but it would likely take me half a day, where somebody who knows what they’re doing would get it done in fifteen minutes. The money I would pay to have it done right and quickly (and also identify and fix whatever else needs doing) is less than the value I place on the afternoon I would otherwise lose to that.
But both of those are really rooted in a bit of psychology around the drawing of boundaries. That is, the guys who were making fun of me for not wanting to do my own bike repairs, like a lot of more serious cyclists, regard tinkering with the gear as a part of the hobby. I’m not in that same headspace— I spend a lot of time riding my bike, and will re-arrange bits of my day to make time for it, but I still regard it as a means to an end. I’m biking for exercise, not cycling for its own sake, and as a result, I don’t have all that much interest in the paraphernalia that goes with cycling. I had a very basic mountain bike that I rode for years, and my “new” bike (now around five years old) is likewise a relatively basic model. I don’t have a ton of accessories on it— the most significant are some pannier bags so I can use it to ride to and from work when the weather permits, and a phone mount so I can log rides on Strava— and I’m not really looking to add to that.
I don’t even have a car rack for my bike, so I stick with routes that start and end at Chateau Steelypips. I’ve sometimes been tempted by the thought of going elsewhere to ride different routes, but it seems like a bit more hassle than I want to deal with for what is, ultimately, an exercise program, not a lifestyle. This might change when I find myself forced to retire from playing pick-up basketball, but for now, I’m just not that into it.
This isn’t limited to bikes, though; on thinking a bit about this, I’m just not that into tinkering with gear in any context. I spend a moderately significant amount of time dabbling in photography, but have pretty much maxed out the number of lenses I’m willing to buy (the next set up are like $1500 apiece, which seems pretty steep if I’m not selling the pictures), and am not super interested in upgrading from the entry-level DSLR camera that I use. I’ve got a basic understanding of GIMP for photo processing, but don’t see much need to learn the really high-level techniques, let alone something like Lightroom.
I spend a lot of time typing on computers of various kinds, but am not particularly interested in how they work or optimizing the systems I use. In fact, I deeply resent it whenever some upgrade makes a significant change in my existing workflow that forces me to spend time tinkering with the system to make it work better for me. There was a brief period when I was using a third-party Twitter client to manage multiple accounts, but they suddenly stopped supporting it, and since then I’ve just used the bog standard app or web interface; I’d rather face the mild frustration of its limits than have a more optimal experience that gets yanked away again.
Collecting lenses and optimizing software are things that other people consider essential parts of those hobbies, but they’re not for me. Or maybe it’s that, much like with biking, I still think of them as more of a means to an end. I have the fancy camera because I want the pictures I take with it, but I don’t want to spend more time futzing around with lenses and filters than needed to get the shots I want. I use the computer because I want the ability to write books and bang out self-indulgently introspective blog posts, but I don’t feel any deep need to optimize the efficiency of those processes.
This is one of the aspects of The Pip’s baseball career that I find sort of amusing: it’s a very gear-oriented sport. He’s got two different gloves— one for playing first base, one for any other position— and multiple bats. When he went to buy new cleats for the season, he also picked up a pair of high-end batting gloves (a category of Thing I was not previously aware existed), and is going to hilarious lengths to take care of them (rubbing leather conditioner into them, airing them out after games and practices, even taking them off before drinking from his water bottle between rounds at batting practice, lest they get dripped on). He and his teammates have lengthy debates over whose fancy bat is the best on the team, and I’m sure that when he tries out for the school team in the spring and needs a heavier bat for that, we’ll be in a whole new category of stuff.
This is funny to me (when I’m not at the check-out with my credit card out, anyway), because my sport of choice growing up was basketball, which is maybe the least gear-intensive of the major American sports: all you need are sneakers and a ball. And when I was playing organized basketball, there wasn’t even that much choice with regard to the sneakers— we’d get a team discount for a particular style and color of shoes, and while we weren’t absolutely required to get those, it was strongly encouraged. These days I’m just playing faculty/staff pick-up ball, and still go for pretty basic sneakers; the collection of knee and ankle braces I have to keep my joints reasonably intact probably cost at least as much as my shoes.
I guess there’s a bit of chicken-and-egg to this— does my lack of interest in sports gear reflect my hoop background, or does my preference for a minimal-gear sport reflect my personality? I suspect it’s more the latter: a general preference for satisficing over optimizing. I need things that are Good Enough to accomplish what I want, but not more than that. That leads me to draw different boundaries around what things I consider essential parts of my hobbies than many other people do, and as a result leaves me in a weird place with regard to a lot of conversations about the various things that I do.
I’m really on a run of self-indulgent noodling here, but the start of this term is kicking my ass, so it’s what I have brain for. Anyway, here’s a button:
and if you feel compelled to share strong opinions about bikes, bats, or lenses, the comments will be open:
I'm with you on the bike. I sometimes try to fix stuff I am not familiar with but it usually ends up taking way more time than it is worth.
It's been a bit age-dependent for me. When I was younger, I was all-in for DIY projects around the house, doing my own tiling, light-duty carpentering, painting, plumbing... but now firmly in middle-age, I'm sort of *actively* not interested in those things. Maybe you could chalk it up to somewhat more disposable income now as opposed to when I was a grad student, but I really don't think that's it. I've started to resent things that take up *time*. Even if I'm not using the temporal savings to do other work or "useful" things, my valuation of time is way higher now to use for little side interests, relaxation, reading... whatever. Last year we were going to paint our bedroom/bathroom, but realized it was realistically a 3-weekend project between going for supplies, prep, painting, cleanup. Nope. Happy to pay for a professional to do it in a 1.5 days while we could do other things, even if it put a wrinkle in the budget.