Same as Willamette Valley light, just more of it, more often.
Blog
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Santa Rosa – home again!
Hey great time back in Santa Rosa! I dropped off the UHaul way down on Santa Rosa Avenue, after paying $.18 too much per gallon to fill it up, took my bike out of the back, and rode back to town. Had a burrito at El Patio (not as good as I remembered, but fine and filling), faffed around the apartment with a headache, until I remembered the last time I’d had coffee was two scant cups Sunday morning.
Down to Peet’s to make it up with a triple shot Americano and two giant refills.A rider on a Roubaix asked the cops at the next table to watch his bike while he got a cup of coffee. The cops were leaving in a minute, so I said I could watch it. When the guy went in, I asked the cop, “so, you think that bike is my size?” He said, “no, it looks like a 56.” Somehow I like that random Santa Rosa cops know road bikes.
When the guy came out, he recognized the Quickbeam as a Rivendell, and said he’d met Grant a few times. We talked about the Tour, which had started in SR on Sunday, and I got to tell him how on Sunday, Grant had been speaking in Portland while the Tour of California had been kicking off in Santa Rosa, and I’d been in transit between the two places, unable to see either.
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Baggins Little Joe
two cords, two cord locks, the end of each goes through a grommet back into the bag! That’s the genius part.
That middle bottom grommet might just be for looks. It’s a vent hole*.Thanks for sharing these, Leslie – if I ever get another Little Joe, I’ll know to do it this way.
*cracked myself up.
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bike mojo
Elizabeth and Haley came over to poke through my ‘free’ pile of bike and art stuff.
This is Haley’s Hunqapillar, with Frodo ziptied to the bars. That’s Lizzie’s Peugeot in the background.They took more stuff away than I thought they could get on their bikes. Backpacks, baskets and bags saved the day. I also was getting rid of a pair of panniers, so maybe they came into play. Haley’s Hunqapillar sure had the racks for them!
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Little Joe (Opening)
Little Joe (Opening), originally uploaded by Archival Clothing.Oh. That’s how it works.
Thanks to the guy who bought the Little Joe from the guy who bought it from me for the link! Maybe I tried it this way? I don’t remember. Maybe that’s the way it even came?
Two cords, one for each side. Cinch one side up tight, leave the other loose. The smart thing Leslie (not Lesli) did, was run the cord back inside the bag through a lower hole before knotting it. Lots of slack, and no dangling cords. Smart.
Here it is on its new home. Matching Acorn straps, and a bike that really is the business! Thanks for the update on the bag’s new incarnation!
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Mr.Orange himself
Mr.Orange himself, originally uploaded by MannyAcosta.
Check out the light mount sprouting from the vestigial brake mount hole. I swear I had this exact idea a few weeks ago.
Bike Psychic – that’s me.
I also quite like the U-lock / Saddlebag rig. One toe strap down to the seat stay bridge, then another one from the seat post to cinch it up. The U-lock goes through the saddle rails, and locks behind the straps, held in like a… a thing that can’t flop around so much. -
Bike Shoes
My bike shoes are the shoes I’m wearing while I’m on the bike. Unfortunately, I recently promoted my Born shoes ($8 new at Goodwill) to permanent bike shoes by riding them in the mud. I learned my lesson (kinda); now I put them on to go ride in the mud.
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Impromptu wheel truing stand
Pure genius. Building the wheels for a new bike? Do this.
Downside – if you only have a built bike, it’s more trouble to remove the fork and stem than not.
I’m really digging on the “these things I had laying around worked together in perfect concert to do what I needed” vibe. V-brakes, gear cable, and a jag-wire barrel adjuster, and the ‘feelers’ are probably better than the truing stand I’ve been using for the last couple years. Serendipitous. -
New pedal decks going out
I got a couple orders for pedal decks, and made some new ones. “99 – o”
These have a black laminate layer, which I think looks cool.
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New Tire Pressure Widget Design
This is what’s on the way to replace the Google Doc. After that, some kind of mobile app that will let you create and save multiple bikes.
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Working Bike – Sturmey hub in for repair
Working Bike, originally uploaded by bikamper.
My Flickr friend bikamper repairs the Sturmey Archer hubs that come in to his LBS (“local bike shop” (if you don’t live on the internet, this might not be a familiar acronym)). They pay him in parts.
I have a semi-equivalent relationship with my shop, only I do “internet consulting” instead of providing a tangible service. He says, “Sometimes, being that old weird guy in the neighborhood has its rewards.” ahh… one day. “Hey, grandpa – you can make us some “8 bit” graphics, right?”
I’d like to learn how to repair IG hubs. I still need to open up my Sachs Automatic and rotate the spring so it actually shifts, after I replaced the broken drive thingie…
!! agh !!
Sorry – my mind just boggled at the amazing unused, half-repaired crap I have in my garage:
- Kelsey 3×5 letterpress and drawers of type (I’ll just cast new rollers out of gummi bears),
- vintage LaPavoni Europiccolo espresso machine (sure, the seals are the hardest repair, but I’ve done all the others),
- Sachs two-speed auto hub (the spring just needs to be shifted – the drive-thingie has already been replaced),
- silkscreen press (totally functional, I just need to make something with it),
- dump-rescue 3-speed that needs tires and bearings…
They all flashed in my mind at the same time. I definitely do NOT need to learn to repair internal gear hubs at this time…
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not a great idea
This is a follow up to the previous post that has map data. Local people – if you like climbing, and you like sketchy singletrack, you should come on out. Poke some sticks in your shins. Fall down.Using the Rivendell “grab bag” as a bar bag worked okay for uphills, but with an ipad, a dog leash with a heavy choke chain and a 22oz Ninkasi “Spring Reign,” it turned out to be a liability on the descents.The weight pulling on the bars was the crucial edge between getting your weight back and managing the descent, and just bailing.
It’s something you could master, but the bandit trails around here are really steep, and even though the sun was shining, the ground was still slippery enough that a 4 legged 60 pound dog was leaving slidy pawprints on mild gradients. The human fared about the same. The bag’s high-tech mounting technique (wrapping a bunch of strap around the bar) came loose a couple times, and had to be fixed as the bag ZWWIPPed against the knobby tire.I pushed the bike and drank my beer up a really pretty trail, listened to music (bluetooth blah blah playing Theme Time Radio Hour on random, so Bob Dylan’d introduce Bob Marley, and Shellac would come on instead), and had a good time with the bike and the dog.Still, this isn’t a recommended bag rig, and I had to brush the mud off the bag after. Still isn’t clean. Kind of undercuts the metrosexual man-purse look I was going for.The bike on the other hand had me wondering why I was jonesing after a Jones bar. The Midge is great, especially off on the ends.
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sun-burny ride with the dog
The route the dog and I took last weekend and this. This one was shorter, but I did more pushing. The sun was out, but the mud didn’t know. It thought it had been raining for the past week. Extremely sketchy singletrack downhills, and slippy bike-shoving uphills. Pretty, though!
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Jedi Rust
Grant Petersen is coming to Powell’s for a Book Related Appearance on May 12, at 2pm. There will be a ride afterwards.
Grant’s book is controversial, he says, but I will bet <a small amount of money or art I can do quickly> that it boils down to “bicycling is not an extreme activity. ” That thesis could get some people into uncomfortable territory, though.
One of the things I enjoy about Grant’s writing is the wordplay – not puns or double entendres (he tries to make his writing as single-entendre as possible), but just playing with words for the fun of it, and the mental excercise. Writing with no “e” (I mis-said: “without 5th unit”), for example, which is why I’m looking forward to getting the bookmark.
Bafflingly, Powell’s doesn’t allow linking directly to events. They just pop up in a lightbox over the calendar. Book Link: Just Ride
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iPad Bar Bag Design
Title, originally uploaded by BikeTinker.
This is the bag I want to make for my iPad. I used it for tracking a ride, which was pretty fun, and I listened to music on the downhill (closed logging roads).
I think it would be great to have a bag that mounted the iPad on the top, just like a cue sheet. You could use it AS a cue sheet, cue up music, consult your map, have a video chat with someone… some of that is actually stupid (sweaty facetime calls), but it’s what I’ve been thinking about.
The top would be a ‘cap’ style to keep out water, and it would be angled up about 25 degrees for ease of view and for scary low-angly panda photos from the front camera.
The thing I really want to make is a periscope-style adapter for iPhone lenses, so I can take photos and videos straight from the bag. Basically so the back-mounted camera shoots out the front.Anyway, that’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it. This was also drawn on the iPad, which I’m really enjoying.
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BikeGuard?
I got an unsolicited email promoting “BikeGuard,” a free online registry for bicycles. My eyes are narrowed in suspicion as I write this (literally), but I think I’m going to try it out. I’m suspicious because it’s free, and also because someone got paid to send out emails about it. I’m sure the email is a template that includes hooks for <blog name here> (I hope it does, ’cause don’t waste your life) but it had to take someone some time to even find me, right?
Anyway, I think I’m going to try it (eyes are narrowed again), firstly because it’s free, and secondly because they send you free sticker-tags for each bike, and damn I love stickers. Sometimes I even BUY stickers.
