powdercoating

My bike finally got the powder coat it deserved. Maybe next will be decals?

The color is called 'candy gloss black' or something of the sort. it's basically a blackish clear coat that has a blue-green tint to it in different lights. I'm pretty excited about it, especially since my clear coat was finally starting to come off by the end of last race season.

back on track

The past couple weeks have seen me back on my feet, and a lot happier. I'm visiting my new chiropractor 3 times a week. I've also been back on a bike, and even working part-time for the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition. My job doesn't really have anything to do with advocacy there, but it's been good so far.

The Secretary of State politely answered all of my inquires about my LLC filing, and was even able to assure me it was due to be processed by the end of this week. That being finished, everything else should come together pretty quickly, and by that time, working on my feet shouldn't sound so terrible either.

April 11th-13th is the Los Angeles portion of Velocity, and is being hosted by Swarm! Alleycat and gold sprints Friday night, track events are Saturday morning, and Block Party Sunday (Heliotrope Village of course). If you've never made it to Encino Velodrome, this will be a great time to try it out! www.cyclehawk.com

Moving on..

I've got an appointement on Monday with a new chiropractor in Glendale to follow up on my recent visit to Las Vegas and my sister's chiro. I had some problems believing and trusting the woman I saw in Los Angeles, and wasn't getting much in the way of results. After X-rays, and a full history of abuse my body has taken (soccer, horses, cycling, jiu-jitsu, accidents, messengering, etc...). fortunately, nothing is fractured, I've just been receiving less than awesome chiropractic care and reccommendations. I had two adjustment and felt tremendously better. I even took my freshly built mid-90's Landshark out for a ride yesterday. I'm basically in physical therapy mode which means taking it easy, and refraining from doing anything that makes me hurt at all. I hope to be back in full effect in the coming weeks, and catching up with everything I've missed out on in the last months.

no backyotomy in portland

I busted my back working in the last days of November moving heavy, and awkward things around. It wasn't even doing something awesome or really stupid, just really wrong I suppose. Potential problems could have been quitting messengering and my back losing a large amount of it's strength in the month and a half prior to said incident. It's been questioned whether or not getting hit by a car last February could have been a problem, but at this point seems unlikely. My head also seemed to have taken the fall.

Needless to say, I've been through chiropractors, acupuncturists, and now have a different chiropractor in Las Vegas I will be visiting next week. My sister has been fixed by this guy on a few occasions, so it's worth a shot since I'll be in town anyhow.

I will not be going to Bermuda/Canada with Sea Shepherd this time around since my back is a big problem, and the last thing I need is freezing cold weather and hard work. I think the last thing Sea Shepherd needs is a broken volunteer.

Against better judgement I still went up to Portland for the North American Handmade Bicycle Show. Portland is awesome, and attracted a lot of my favorite people from around the world.

Highlights:
Naked Cycles

Ground Up



and Rock Lobster's bicycle pulling bicycles!


I really didn't take many photos. I actually only took my camera in one day as I was trying to avoid the extra weight on my back. I even had Jim C. from Orange 20 carrying my bag around for a bit.

the reverend of doom

, originally uploaded by MOTH ATTACK!!.

Rev snuggles under the blankets with me better than any human is capable.

Net Ripper Campaign

I just got accepted onto Sea Shepherd as a crew member on the March campaign to interfere with sealers. This means things might be on hold until April for any new builds if I can scrape together the airfare! Details to come...

business license?

I'm falling apart physically, and haven't been able to even work on cleaning up the A-Lab in over a month. Hopefully this new chiropractor helps solve my problems. I have been learning how to pay taxes, file licenses, and well, I suppose some sort of business skills. I just sent my own track frame out for a powdercoat after the first year of racing and trying to break it myself. It's wonderfully stiff and responsive, and deserved better than a clearcoat. I've ridden it on the street, track, and managed to even crash once at ADT without a problem in the last year.



I'm taking $500 deposits, and starting the waiting list. I'm not going to be insured until March 1 at the earliest, and my back isn't going to be very happy about framebuilding for a couple weeks anyway. Frames should start at $1200, no fork, no lugs.

I'm also trying to figure out how much interest there is in flat crown straight bladed forks like the one on the bike above. No one sells them outside of custom builders, and that is usually one of the things people like most about my frame. If there is enough interest, I can make a batch cheaper than one by one.

I'm not sure how I'm going to work it out yet, but I'd like to donate a percentage of each frame to something awesome, like Sea Shepherd, or the Shac 7. 1% for the Planet seems to be a pretty cool organization, but the non-profits come across as being pretty tame for my tastes. Maybe each frame can come with a couple different options for organizations to donate to?