Figured I'd come back with a bang.
Anyways, one of Bike Friday's best customers and a close personal friend,
Al Gilens, took it upon himself to represent us at
Round Up, the annual folder festival our Philly dealer,
Trophy Bikes, puts on. (aside: needless to say, he snagged quite a few
referrals for his time, hint hint, nudge nudge)
It impressed one reporter enough that he pretty much described folders as the future of transportation. In
this article, (which is where the title of this entry comes from, by the way!) one learns the previous careers of the major folding bike designers. Interestingly, though Hanz is mentioned, his previous career path is not mentioned.
It was
entomology. Hey, I was going to do molecular biology. Who knows, maybe I still might.
Meanwhile I'm enjoying simply doing sales again and riding the totally quiescent bike path to work every day. We've got a new house a mere five miles away.
Keeping with my human-powered inclinations, I got a
reel lawnmower and a hand edger for the landscaping. (aside: the roller type edgers are great for edges adjacent to cement but they eat up your mulch otherwise, so get the ones you push and rock with your foot for that stuff)
Two old Cleveland bike messenger buddies just moved to the area (that now makes 4 of us here!) which has been a lot of fun. Chris and I have been talking about doing a little fixed gear tour.. to the
hot springs, of course!
My wife have been riding our tandem a lot lately, though perhaps not enough for the 70 miles we plan to do at the
Northwest Tandem Rally. We'll probably go slow, but we'll have fun. Speaking of fun and tandems, my daughter's almost ready to get in the middle of our triple and that will be a blast.
In other news,
Heinz Stucke had his
bike stolen and later recovered it. He's off to Greenland now. As you all know, Greenland and Iceland accidentially got their names mixed up many years ago. Hopefully, Heinz has his warm clothes packed up.
Ruthy Kanagy, author and our official ambassador to Japan, is about a month away from leading a
tour in Japan. Meanwhile, she got her
name in print complaining about symbols while at the
Strawberry Century.
Lynette, our "Customer Evangelist" who earned a whole 3/4 page in
our new catalog (I at least got two pictures and the nomination as the "resident '
fixie' expert," so I guess I can't complain) is
telecommuting across the country. I can never keep track of her!
Speaking of fabulous women,
Susan Notorangelo, the record-making pioneer of
ultracycling for women and husband of fellow ultracyclist and
Race Across America
innovator, Lon Haldeman, finally ordered herself a Bike Friday.
Through their involvement in RAAM, not to mention the
PAC Tours they
do, I'm sure there will be some interesting stories to be told.
Dennis Healy had an article in the voluminous
Little People of America newsletter and we have been getting swamped with inquiries inspired by it. The way things are going, I expect Dennis will have a 2nd bike paid for by referrals alone in no time!
We're still selling the
SatRDay MkII and seem to have worked out all the annoying idiosyncracies, such as the stem that didn't want to tighten down enough. Now we just need to finish the packing video and manual so people know how to use the darn thing!
Ryan Foote, our longest running employee and official "Tandem Master," is back to fabricating after a short stint answering phones in service. For all of you that had the joy of interacting with one of Bike Friday's most interesting characters, I'm sorry to say he is now officially back under the hood.
Support a local ex-Bike Friday employee and buy a fully custom carbon road bike from
Crumpton.
The last bit of BF news is that production is working some hard, intense hours here to keep up with the sales volume and our schedule is creeping farther and farther out. If you're thinking about a Friday, now's the time!
That's about all I got for now, but keep sending your questions and comments and suggestions and I'll try to stay in better touch.
And keep the rubber side down!
