What's That Cost?

Since I'm out on my bike all the time these days, I tend to run into other transportation cyclists a lot. Some of these folks are riding because they prefer it to driving, some because they can't afford to drive, and some because, for whatever reason, they no longer have a driver's license. Oddly enough, they all seem to want to talk about the same thing: the cost of our respective bikes.
I had one fellow corner me at a bike rack outside of a Target and subject me to a lengthy lecture about how much he paid for his bike, what the actual retail price was, what the price of the bike was the model year before and after, and what the cost of the other bikes he was considering buying at the time. Then he, of course, asked me how much my bike cost. "Um... I'm not really sure," I mumbled, "I got it on closeout, but swapped a lot of parts and stuff around." This didn't really satisfy him, so I eventually just said, "five-hundred dollars," which elicited a knowing nod and a "not bad" from him.
I didn't quite get it, but it seems to be a common thing. I mentioned it to my boss at the bike shop, and he said last time he and his wife were grabbing coffee after a Sunday ride, the same thing happened (the woman who approached them bragging that she had a "ten thousand dollar bike," which was only off in his estimation by about $9,000).
I'm really not sure how much my bike, as I'm riding it, cost. I know how much the MSRP was, and how much I paid for it when I bought it, but I swapped out a lot of parts, added some things, used some old parts I had lying around, got some stuff from a friend... you get the idea. I could probably tally it all up, but I don't actually care.
I guess it's another case of folks wanting to use their transportation as status symbols. After all, if you're driving an Escalade, everyone knows you spent a certain amount on it, but if you're riding around on a mountain bike, there's the very real danger that people might not realize that it cost you lots of money!
Yeah, it's kind of stupid. I figure even the most expensive add-ons to my bike, like the high-powered headlight for night commutes cost less than a tankful of gas for my old truck, and everything I've done to it serves a purpose.
A more interesting thing to me, in terms of cost/use/etc is to look at what I've worn out since I started using a bike as my main transport almost four months ago. I estimate I've got between 1,500 and 2,000 miles on the bike now (a cyclocomputer doesn't count as a necessity, so my "broke commuter" logic says I can't afford one), and have worn out, lost or broken the following:

A pair of pedals
Two sets of grips
Three inner tubes
Two sets of brake pads
One chain
One kickstand
Two water bottles
One bell
Two taillights
One headlight
One spoke

This is more interesting to me than what the bike cost, or what it weighs (another meaningless question that comes up a lot, the answer is "depends on what's in the saddlebag"), because it's both a tally of the real operating cost of the bike, and a mark of how much use (and care, I fix stuff when it's worn out or broken more diligently than I ever have on a car) my current vehicle gets.

What's it mean? I don't know. It means I'm riding my bike, I guess that's all.

Diminished (Cargo) Capacity

Bicycle commuting, like just about everything else, involves compromise and trade-offs. For example, my Jamis Commuter came with a set of North Road style handlebars, which provided a nice upright riding position and left me with plenty of room to attach a wire basket to the front of my bike. The basket was incredibly handy, and let me carry everything from groceries to small musical instruments fairly easily.

Unfortunately, the handlebars, which were fine for short rides (say, under 5 miles), were causing me problems with hand numbness, in no small part because they didn't offer much room to move my hands to different positions, and kept me locked into a not-quite-comfortable 45-degree angle.

In the interest of saving my nerve endings over longer rides (most of my commuting ends up being between 8 and 20 miles at a stretch) I swapped them out for moustache-stylehandlebars, which bring my hands back parallel to each other, and give me room to move them to different positions as I ride.

The downside is that the new handlebars and the basket don't seem to fit together all that well. The moustache bars sit quite a bit lower and sweep forward, partially covering the top of the basket, and making me bang my knuckles on the basket edge if I have my hands in the forward position.

So for the moment, I've had to remove the oh-so-useful cargo basket in exchange for being able to feel my fingers after a ride (important if you're playing music). But I'd like to get some of my carrying capacity back (I do have a large bag mounted on the rear of the bike, and I can use a messenger bag, but that gets warm really quickly in this weather).

One option is to get a front rack which attaches lower on the fork. This would be ideal as I'd have the option of affixing either a basket or using the flat of the rack and a bungee cord, however, most of the decent racks seem pricey (I'm broke). The other is to try to fabricate some sort of alternate attachment system for the basket I have, that will carry it lower on the front of the bike. This might be doable if I can come up with something simple and sturdy that won't rattle all over the place.

I'm open to suggestions.