Now I have to figure out how to get that image out of the library and into this post.
Incidentally, image © Winston Rowntree, 2012 http://www.viruscomics.com.
Now how the preparations are going for the Bike MS, I still haven’t been getting much in the way of long rides but I have been working on my climbing skills by riding in my 20 MPH gears all the time. This increases my low cadence power immensely, in fact it upped my average speed by over a full MPH to just under 13 for the church round trip. Apparently my endurance cadence is in the high 90 to low 100 RPM range but I make the most power under or around 70. Whodathunkit?
The other Bike MS preparations are in slow more at the moment as we have until April to get things really rocking and the $$ collected. Our web mistress is trying to get the code to install the button to send donations to a separate account in our PayPal account so that we can keep donations to Bike MS separate from donations to our church (hint: Do both). Our artists are still learning how to draw on jersey material, and we have some incredibly talented artists so I am expecting to have the best looking custom jersey at the event. I don’t know how long it will last after the event, but I will look good during the event.
In grandbaby news, the due date has been refined to September 6, 2012. The balance bike project is getting refined as the rake and head angle are being set to give a zero trail so the kid has quick handling to teach how to balance on 2 wheels. The tricycle is still in concept stage as I try to decide what kind of trike would be best for indoctrinating my grandchild into the recumbent lifestyle. A tadpole trike would be better at growing with the grandchild, but a delta would have significantly more “cool” factor as it would look more like other kids’ trikes. Not to mention that a rear-steer delta could “spin out” or “drift” by using the pendulum effect to break traction on the rear wheels. Now for adults that would be a problem, but for kids that would be a positive thing. It may have been more than 4 decades since I was a little kid, but I still remember that I wanted to do the handbrake 180 like the commercial for the original Marx Big Wheel. The trick for that was you needed to have really short legs to do that as the rear wheels had to be lightly loaded for that stunt to work, and by the time the Big Wheel came out my legs were already too long. To be brutally honest I was outside the size range for the Big Wheel by a standard deviation or more, as my butt would just fit on one if the backrest was completely removed. “Butt” for my grandkid I can make the trike to his or her specific size, or make it grow to fit the child so they can do bootlegger turns to their heart’s content. Actually for a rear-steer trike it would be a reverse 180 facing backwards. I could “grow” the trike by turning the seat around and moving the pedals forward from what had been the front wheel that is now the rear wheel, and the steering is now in the front instead of the rear, et voila what had been a front-drive rear-steer delta for a toddler is now a tadpole trike for a 4-6 YO. Good enough until I can make a mini-StratusXP clone that will grow through their tween years.
And now I need to veg out with some comics and a cuppa, before I have to help with evening services tonight.
PSA, opus
Witch on a Bicycle 