Day #1 of TechCrunch Disrupt is over. It was hectic, quick-paced and infused with coffee. Berlin seems so nostalgic in late October; we spend more time talking about life than work.

Arrived in Berlin for the TechCrunch Disrupt Europe 2013. No one knows what is happening. The next two days are going to be crazy.

Rode my bike to work today after a long, painful month of commuting. Thus comes the blog post about freedom which I’ve been putting off for at least two weeks. Here’s the witnesses report:

I’m living under a terror. Terror of time. Every morning for the last month has basically been running. It’s because of a crappy commute: 134 departs only twice per hour – at :22 and :52. And so I run to the bus stop almost every morning and barely catch that damn bus. Forget morning coffee. It’s departure time – no room for your “sit down” nonsense! Then the transfer – one where I have to run to the other bus stop or I’ll miss the 612 which departs twice per hour. Returning home is even worse – the transfer is so tight it’s basically a hit-or-miss aided (only a bit) by an Android app which shows me the location of the return 134, which is often late. If it isn’t, I have to take alternate route which is 20 minutes longer, because 134 – YES YOU GUESSED IT – departs once every half an hour.

If you think this is just a commute – think again. This is my time, my valuable and precious time, being wasted. The original title of this post was Enjoy life, with the point being that it’s hard to do so while running.

This is precisely why I enjoy riding a bike so much. It’s all about freedom – the freedom to drink my morning coffee, to choose the route and the stops and the speed and the mood and everything about how and what I am. It’s about being able to change my mind without excruciating waits, about being able to spontaneously stop to shop for fruit and vegetables at some little local grocery, to make an impossibly tight U-turn and get back to some interesting spot I just passed. It’s about the road – not the points A and B that delimit it.

If life is just a ride, then being stuck in a giant metal cage rolling around the city at a bizarre schedule and an abysmally slow pace is not a ride. It’s a torture.

I welcome my bike back. I don’t feel intimidated by the impeding winter anymore: as long as I remember just how much there is to lose, I’ll just find some warm clothes, wrap myself up tight and keep rolling.

“You’ll be told in a hundred ways, some subtle and some not, to keep climbing… and never be satisfied with where you are, who you are, and what you are doing. To invent your own life’s meaning is not easy, but it’s still allowed… and I think you’ll be happier for the trouble.”

Bill Watterson / Zen Pencils

Coming back home from PyCon PL 2013. The conference was a bit disappointing; half of the lectures followed a familiar pattern of “read the documentation, poorly”. Yesterday I got so bored I skipped the lectures and attended a workshop called PyRiddle – which turned out to be a programming contest. Which I aced. And so I’m writing this on a brand new Nexus 7 tablet, sponsored by the company behind the Base CRM. Thank you, guys!

Conferences ain’t that bad, after all.

People sometimes come to me with a painting they made, a program they wrote, an idea they conceived. They ask me about my opinion, fully expecting to be praised for their oh-so-hard-work.

They don’t get much praise from me, for I ask:

– You painted a picture. Good! Come back when you have finished another two.

They never come back.

I just scanned a fresh batch of Autumn photos… and found something so shocking I don’t quite know what to think about it: almost every single frame from one certain roll bears some eerie resemblance to some other photo I took long time ago. Suddenly, memories of one weekend became memories of several years. I find them almost too strong to look at – and mesmerizing at the same time.