Presenting at Pirrama

Pirrama is a new park at the northern end of Harris st. in Sydney. Yesterday Oct.21st 2012  with was  the  end of the shorter ride of the Annual Spring cycle ride organized by Bicycle NSW.

We plunked down $120 to rent  a tent for the day, thinking that those who came on their bikes, thousands of riders,  might  like some bike art of the superior kind. An Xmas present perhaps.

Indeed, we called the stall modestly,  Better Bike art

Better than what ,  we hoped someone would ask but no one did.  More  art for Xmas can be discovered on our web site,  http://situp-bike-art.com.

I like these tents . They are sort of hasty houses and you feel like an instant property owner, standing on your domain..

Once I knew what sort of tent Bicycle NSW  was providing, intense thought went into how to display the works. You might find our discovery useful one day and so here’s how we did it.

It was not a tent into which people could walk like we had in Newcastle,  (see previous post) and so the art would have to be on the outside.

Also, as I’d found in Newcastle,  where  three of the heavy display screens blew over nearly braining us, wind is a threat.

So,  moving air  had to be able to get though without spinning the art away like frisbies. Can you see how we did it?

From wooden rods,  I suspended thin black webbing.

At first I thought that velcro dots on the webbing and also on the backs of pics would do the trick, but they worked loose,  and so we clipped the art onto the webbing  directly with these distinctive  black clips .Aligator clips, are they?

This system worked extreme well. I offer it freely.

As well, our strange  Socialble, the side by side tandem,   again worked well as a draw-card though getting it to the venue  on the back of our tiny car,  wasn’t easy.

People always  find it curious and amusing and cant  resist stopping to look (I”m glad I didn’t sell it)  at which point we’d cry…..

“There’s bike art here as well!”

 

One of the highlights for me, apart from making a few bucks,  was seeing a superb new Electric bike.

What made this bike special was firstly it had the excellent Bionx system,  made in Canada, which I’d read about.  While Bionx ‘s expensive, it has a great reputation.

But more than that,  the Bike it’d been mounted on called, Change, is a full size folding bike.

As you know most folding bikes have small wheels and have never interested me since I don’t like the ride. But a full 26 inch wheel and folding,  that, folks,  is  very appealing.

The frame swivels at the point of that black band just under the seat.

I wish I’d taken the name of it’s  proud owner. But I do know the name of the shop where be bought the components and  had it made up,  and intend to look into it further.  It’s from Sydney Electric Bikes

This bike would solve the problem of taking bikes on trains,  esp. Interstate.

I love going to Melbourne by overnight train.But its a real drag when they insist bike be taken apart and shoved into a bike crate.

You feel so stupid  disassembling everything at the station, even taking off pedals and handlebars because the crate they provided was for a smaller bike.

Doing all that   on the platform prior to departure, I felt  so stupid,  that I’ve vowed not to do it again

Apart from that great discovery, sales were pretty good , and I actually managed to take photos of two customers. Here’s the first.

The second customer was memorable for the way he strapped his purchase on his back.  Katya is here admiring it

Speaking of my dear one,  she went off to buy a smoothie and found she had to pedal for it .

She found it not so smooth as the guy kept saying, “more, pedal  more!”

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Anyway, thanks to Bicycle NSW. It was a fun day.

This post has taken so long to do because I’ve been dragged away onto several other projects which I’ll mention here in case you interests are wider than cycling.

I had  to do a film in defense of our right to walk dogs on our beach at Avoca. 

Down on Dogs will give you and idea of the bucholic surroundings in which we are lucky to live. ( I’m making the links to these movies hot because the embedding is not working for some reason .)

So if you want to take a peek, click and you’ll be on Youtube. Though the movie  might suddenly appear below as it should

http://youtu.be/c1ZvbERqpVA.

Then there’s the “thing” I’ve invented.

I call it,  Spin me Stories, and rather than try and describe it to you, take a look at least at the first 30 secs,  and you understand immediately.

What you see here is my prototype, my one working example. Hopefully from one,  I can come to some arrangement to make many. I’ll probably try and crowd fund the next stage of Spin Me Stories through Kickstarter.

http://youtu.be/j2jt2Yjy9cQ.

Lastly , in case you are in need of  changing your lifestyle,  and have enough loot to indulge in some really good  care, here’s the place, The Golden Door, to go.  Katya dragged me there, kicking and screaming , tow months ago

I was reluctant because it’s not cheap, but the visit has proved life changing,  and during the week we spent there,  I came to love Tai Chi, and now do that every day, along with lots of great stretching.

I made the  Golden Door movie because the place was so goof.

http://youtu.be/OAwS6Bti198.

So you see,  it’s  been a busy few  weeks.