About me: I have had a makeover and am in a new home.
I have lots of programs and projects and events planned.
Stop by the new space, message me here, leave a voicemail, or email ddbcwinona@hotmail.com
Who I'd like to meet: potential members of the Bicycle Co-op.
potential attendees of bike maintenance lessons.
volunteers in all facets.
people with bikes to donate.
someone with a pickup truck
WHY ARE YOU SO FAR AWAY FROM ME DDBC?! I don't know if I can start the satellite DDBC de Montreal all by myself. You might have to have a fundraiser to send Ryan out here and help me...
hey lovelies! I am sooo excited about yr new space and can't wait to come back to Winona and see you all.... until then Bemidji would love to meet you!
i thought i'd plant some seeds for future DDBC-related events: boat-punk Pete's band Dirtyard are interested in either an Island or Clubhouse show July 1st. http://www. myspace. com/dirtyard666
Poppa Neutrino is back in town with a "big idea" that he wanted to do at the Arts Center, but perhaps the Clubhouse now. http://www. poppaneutrino. com
The Pasties (Bikes Are Sexy) and any solo or side-projects from Judd, Joe, Kendl would work if/when they pass through. http://www. myspace. com/thepasties
On May 30th - June 1st, 2008, folks from all over the Midwest will be heading to Minneapolis, Minnesota to flesh out solid proposals in regards to how we’ll work together against the RNC/DNC come September and August.
This three day event will include essential party-crashing workshops, networking, and intensive strategizing. If you have a specific workshop you’d like to see or facilitate, get a hold of us at the email address at the bottom of this release.
TO GET INTO THE STRATEGIZING SESSION YOU MUST BE VOUCHED FOR. If your planning on making it to the strategizing session, please send an RSVP (to the e-mail at the bottom of this release) specifying your willingness to be apart of it. At this point we’ll send you a form to complete and send back to us.
THE REST OF THE WEEKEND IS OPEN TO EVERYONE. Because of this, we ask that folks to keep security culture in mind to create the safest space possible for all parties involved.
PLANNING EARLY. We are asking people to send their proposals and ideas for the strategizing session ahead of time so we can go into this organized. You can send your input to the email address at the bottom of this release.
CHILDCARE. We will be providing childcare for most (if not the entire) convergence. Please give the organizers a hand and RSVP ahead of time to the e-mail at the bottom of this release. We need to stock up on toys and supplies!
Please RSVP to the following email address well ahead of time so we know what we can expect for food, housing, numbers, ect.
A few of us at WSU are in the process of starting a bike co-op/leasing program on campus. We're having an "event" of sorts, and were wondering if any of you would like to get involved in any way. (Even if it's just planning to ride your "specialty" bikes through campus one day between 2:00 and 5:00.) We'll also be doing bike tune-ups during that time every day that week...so if that's of interest to you, feel free to help with that.
Here's the official press release:
Bike Week at Winona State University Monday, April 7 – Friday, April 11
Pump Up Your Bike- Get your bicycle tires pumped up, brakes adjusted, chains oiled, etc. Every afternoon, 2:00 – 5:00, at the Gazebo. Free.
Raffle tickets will be distributed on bikes found in campus - prizes will be given out all week. Turn in "tickets" to the gazebo.
"Wheels & Reels: Bike Week Film Night" Featuring World Naked Bike Ride by Johnny Zapatos of High Altitude Films
7:00 pm Tuesday, April 8, SLC 120. Free.
Bike Ride around Lake Winona 5:30 pm Wednesday, April 9. Meet at the Gazebo. Bring your bike. Free.
Basic Bike Maintenance Workshop with Tim Kolter of Kolter Bicycle and Fitness. 4:00 pm Thursday, April 10, at the Gazebo. Free.
Prizes each day--Raffle prizes from local businesses, with a grand prize on Friday
On March 1st-2nd anti-authoritarians will gather @ the Belfry/Jack Pine community centers in Minneapolis, MN for the first U(nconventional) A(ction) - MN consulta in the books.
If your planning on attending the 2008 RNC/DNC demonstrations and you live in/border Minnesota it’d be extremely beneficial to get involved with this event.
Come prepared to discuss the updated RNC/DNC strategies, partake in essential party crashing workshops, and network with MN natives and all others involved.
Have a workshop idea? Want to do a workshop? Have something you’d really like to see come out of this consulta? Need housing? Please check in with us to the following address so we can provide enough spaces to sleep and hook you up with what you need to plug into this consulta and have a great fucking time. (It also helps us prepare enough food for everyone):
burnthroughfear@riseup.net
Figure out how to get to the Belfry with the following address: 3753 Bloomington Ave. S Minneapolis, MN
Figure out how to get to the Jack Pine with the following address: 2815 East Lake Street Minneapolis, MN
Know what your getting yourself into with the following addresses: www.unconventionalaction.org www.myspace.com/unconventionalmn www.myspace.com/belfrycenter www.thejackpine.org
The Pasties ("Bikes Are Sexy" etc) from Olympia will be in Winona on March 28th. that's the last Friday of the month, so... Critical Mass to a Bikes Are Sexy party hosted by DDBC. a rent benefit for y'all, a funraiser, a something. perhaps Holzinger Lodge? bike ride at 5:30 to the evening event. Froseph said he'd do it...would Mike? would Thumbelina and/or Helter Skeletor?
that'd be a good time...almost spring, and bikes rarin' to go.
hey how you guys been?! tell gus i still have his key to the shop, i keep it close to my heart. hope someone is actually using my old drumset. someday youll see me again.
mutant bikes and tallbikes and crap. ride 'em in a 'lil parade for the heritage fair. sat. sept.15th, 10am. show up 9:45. from merchants bank lot to the historical society on johnson st. down n dirty bikes can follow the up & clean bus.
Congratz guy's and girlz. That's a really big deal. I'm looking forward to seeing what it turns into when I get back. Started here at West Town Bikes, you'd like this place. it's a fun place.
A bicycle an example of a dynamically stable object. Although the bicycle is unstable at rest (statically unstable), it is wonderfully stable when moving forward (dynamically stable). To understand this distinction, let's start with the bicycle motionless and then start moving forward.
At rest, the bicycle is unstable because it has no base of support. A base of support is the polygon formed by an object's contact points with the ground. For example, a table has a square or rectangular base of support defined by its four legs as they touch the floor. As long as an object's center of gravity (the effective location of its weight) is above this base of support, the object is statically stable. That stability has to do with the object's increasing potential (stored) energy as it tips-tipping a statically stable object raises its center of gravity and gravitational potential energy, so that it naturally accelerates back toward its upright position. Since a bicycle has only two contact points with the ground, the base of support is a line segment and the bicycle can't have static stability.
But when the bicycle is heading forward, it automatically steers its wheels underneath its center of gravity. Just as you can balance a broom on you hand if you keep moving your hand under the broom's center of gravity, a bicycle can balance if it keeps moving its wheels under its center of gravity. This automatic steering has to do with two effects: gyroscopic precession and bending of the bicycle about its steering axis.
In the gyroscopic precession steering, the spinning wheel behaves as a gyroscope. It has angular momentum, a conserved quantity of motion associated with spinning, and this angular momentum points toward the left (a convention that you can understand by pointing the curved fingers of your right hand around in the direction of the tire's motion; your thumb will then point to the left). When the bicycle begins to lean to one side, for example to the left, the ground begins to twist the front wheel. Since the ground pushes upward on the bottom of that wheel, it tends to twist the wheel counter-clockwise according to the rider. This twist or torque points toward the rear of the bicycle (again, when the fingers of your right hand arc around counterclockwise, your thumb will point toward the rear). When a rearward torque is exerted on an object with a leftward angular momentum, that angular momentum drifts toward the left-rear. In this case, the bicycle wheel steers toward the left. While I know that this argument is difficult to follow, since angular effects like precession challenge even first-year physics graduate students, but the basic result is simple: the forward moving bicycle steers in the direction that it leans and naturally drives under its own center of gravity. You can see this effect by rolling a coin forward on a hard surface: it will automatically balance itself by driving under its center of gravity.
In the bending effect, the leaning bicycle flexes about its steering axis. If you tip a stationary bicycle to the left, you see this effect: the bicycle will steer toward the left. That steering is the result of the bicycle's natural tendency to lower its gravitational potential energy by any means possible. Bending is one such means. Again, the bicycle steers so as to drive under its own center of gravity.
These two automatic steering effects work together to make a forward moving bicycle surprisingly stable. Children's bicycles are designed to be especially stable in motion (for obvious reasons) and one consequence is that children quickly discover that they can ride without hands. Adult bicycles are made less stable because excessive stability makes it hard to steer the bicycle.
"half a pedal and a peg"
getting mosquitos drunk with delite
riding a broke-down, piece of shit bike
grinding chucks to smithereens
through winding traffice i carrene
snapped brake cables strumming a beat
scrapping stop, tires kissing feet
cogs grinning broken-teethed grins
to the down n' dirty, to begin
another project, underway
piece-mealed parts, once thrown away
wielding fumes and flying sparks
fixin' up new bikes from parts
tall bikes, choppers, mild stallions
designing freak bikes with companions
trikes and sidecars, wino-bagos
swaying side to side with another payload
salvaged parts and new donations
constructing bikes to take over a nation
