Plenty of Roadies out there (road bike enthusiasts) are anti a lot of things - bells, kickstands, racks, etc. When I bought a Crossrip 2 cyclocross bike from Trek I decided I'd accept no kickstand. It annoys the hell out of me and I'm looking for other options like a Click-Stand to prop the bike up when I'm parking it. The one safety item I really needed but hated the look of was a bell. ...
Bicycling is my meditation. I use it as part of my toolset to calm my brain and to train my mind to take in a lot of input and focus on important things. I recently realized that there's a moment that doesn't happen very often when biking. It sometimes takes an entire summer for me to have it occur. I call it the Bicycler's Quiet. Bicycler's Quiet is the sudden loss of wind noise in your ears when you're cycling with the wind. It doesn't happen very often because you need to be cycling at roughly the same speed and direction of the wind. Biking on days with very little to no wind doesn't do it because your movement creates wind across your ears. ...