My motorphobia has only worsened, and I detest what high automobile ownership rates have done to development patterns in our cities, so I greatly feared that setting up shop here in the West would mean the end of my wonderful ' no-car ' lifestyle. But the gods have smiled upon me and It looks like I will be living but a short bike ride from the office. This means, of course, that I must acquire a bicycle. To that end I have shopped around a bit, but to be honest I am quite overwhelmed by the variety of models, components, configurations, brands and bike-bells.

Since my short term need is merely a get-around-Austin bike, but my long term goal is to ride in something like the MS150 and to be able to make month-long bike tours of Scandinavian countries, does anyone with bike-riding or bike-purchasing experience have any sort of recommendations as to models and brands, etc?