I wish I had time to ride a god damned bike!

[tk2kewl]

1½ hours of commuting each way to work ...

8+ hours of work ...

and working every weekend renovating an old house.

I've only had about 3 days for recreation all summer, never mind 3 hours a day for bike rides! :grr:

[patrice]

1. Just do it.

I'm one to talk; my bike sits in the garage as I run errands . . . ???

[ContraBass Black]

2. Send it to me.

I could use one.

[mike_c]

3. I'm gonna say something that you might not like....

But really-- is that the life you want to lead? Even asking the question sounds like a segue into a platitude, but I think it's a legitimate one. When you're old, will you look back and say that you're happy with that life? If so, then great. But if not-- and I hear some frustration and dissatisfaction in your post-- how about changing it while you can, because once you've lived your life you're stuck with whatever choices you made.

If *I* were living the life you describe, I'd be doing everything in my power to change it. I once did live similarly, and I did change it. You can too, if you want to. At one time I drove an hour and a half to work each way, worked 8-10 hours as a cog in someone else's wheel, and was always too exhausted to have a life in the small amount of free time that was left. Now I live in a beautiful rural area, ride my bike to work for 45 minutes each way because that's what I WANT to do, and get fresh air, exercise, and stress relief, and love most-- not all-- aspects of my job. I changed professions completely.

The tipping point for me was the realization that I was a wage slave-- that the only thing I had of real value to sell in a market economy was my time, and that the time I sold was absolutely irreplaceable. And it's a buyer's market. My skills were only useful because I sold my time-- that's what my employer was buying. That hasn't changed of course-- I still work for someone else so I'm still selling time-- but now I sell it on much better terms because I like the way I spend it.

[tk2kewl]

4. My wife isn't too keen on the idea of moving out of the NYC area

I have pretty much lived within 15 miles of manhattan for half of my adult life, and the other half I lived on the east end of LI and had a 15 min commute. Needless to say I had quite a bit more time to enjoy recreational activities then.

[patrice]

10. Yeah, you don't want to die before you've actually lived.

[crispini]

5. the renovation will be over sometime.

however, it may very well ruin your marriage before it's done. it's happened before.... :scared:

[tk2kewl]

6. thankfully this a house in which i used to live.

the house we now live in is done and we are trying to get the old one ready for the market.

[crispini]

7. And that's taking you all summer?

Good gad, what did you do?

[tk2kewl]

8. it is about 60 miles away, for one

so since it takes an hour to get there I can only work on it over the weekend.

It has so far had:

• about 60 yards of brush and trees cleared


• new roof


• new ceilings upstairs due to leaky roof


• new windows


• new decking for front porch


• new driveway


• exterior completely painted


• interior completely painted


• leaky plumbing repaired

and it still needs:

• carpet upstairs


• minor bathroom tile re-grouting


• serious cleaning


• basement door


• grading and grass seed

but we are getting close

[crispini]

9. Damn, that's a lot of work!

:thumbsup: Good job!