daverea.com

If you read daverea.com with any regularity (and who has the time these days?) you’ve probably heard me talk a time or two about mountain biking. Since the end of July, I’ve spent more time in a bike saddle navigating rocky trails, climbing dirt paths and traversing fallen trees than I spent through all five years at RIT combined. You can add in the two years after that, too.

I never thought a cyclocomputer would really be all that useful on a mountain bike, but over the past couple of weeks I’ve started to wonder just how far I’ve ridden, or what sorts of speeds I’m holding on cardio runs along level ground. Thanks to Jason, I haven’t had to wonder long – his computer happily helped us out.

So today, I decided to stop by Dad’s house to pay his old ten-speed road bike – which I rode extensively in high school, and equipped accordingly – a visit. Oddly enough, the cyclocomputer was gone. I’m not sure what I/someone did with it, but after over seven years, I think I can safely kiss it goodbye.

Who knows if it would have worked, anyway…

Which leaves me looking for a new cyclocomputer. The last time I bought one, e-commerce was still in it’s infancy, and I didn’t even have a credit card. Heck, I was probably about 16. Now, there are web sites to browse, and I can even peruse the owner’s manuals before making my selection.

But in this instance, nothing’s really doing it for me. For some reason, I can’t get excited about the computers I’m seeing on the web pages of Bike Nashbar or Performance Bicycle.

What was needed just happened to come in the mail today. A good old-fashioned glossy-page catalog from Performance. This is how I remembered buying my last cyclocomputer – back when $25 seemed like a lot more money than it does today! The brief, snappy descriptions are the same now as they were then.

Thanks to Performance’s catalog, I’ll probably go with the CatEye Enduro 8. Or maybe I’ll opt for the PlanetBike Protege 8.0 instead. Ultimately, this is a commodity purchase – a relatively inexpensive (at least as bicycling accessories go) gizmo that’s not necessary. So I’m not sure why I’m putting so much energy into finding the right one.

But it’s always fun to window shop…