MoveOn starts the Health Insurance battle

Moveon doesn't want the insurance companies to shape this battle with a couple on rocking chairs this time. So the battle for minds and wills begins. I do appreciate the naked truth in this case. Insurance companies are NOT to be trusted, you would be a fool to think otherwise. I hope that Congress and the Senate take note of this.

CNBC vs Stewart, continues

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Basic Cable Personality Clash Skirmish '09

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Cramer, the Today Show, and Morning Joe continue the excitement so Jon Stewart calls on his peeps. Just too funny.

The CNBC and Stewart fight continue

This feud has been a popcorn fest and will continue to be one. Cramer and the CNBC crowd are too stupid not to keep picking at their scabs from the wounds that Jon Stewart inflicts. That just eggs Stewart on.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

In Cramer We Trust

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things With Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Economic Crisis

Here is the link the Jim Cramer clips where he disses Jon Stewart. I didn't bother to dissect the comments. This feud will be fun and provide entertainment for all.

Cold Commute and Raptobike stuff

It was cold today on the way in to work. The temperature gauge read 23 degrees F during my ride in. I had to switch to my winter commuting setup, I added the solstice fleece layer and a base layer. Overall it worked well and my little commute was comfortable though there was some ice on the bridge I cross.

The work day has been going well and the weather turned sunny. It is now 46 degrees F and very nice. My commute home will be a very different ride then the one to work. I also received some very welcome news, my Raptobike will ship out on Friday, March 13th. Incidentally that happens to be my Mother's birthday, she would have been 67 this year. I think that is very appropriate, the bike feels like a gift from my Mother for my 40th birthday this way as it is shipping on her birthday.

Enough of these maudlin thoughts, it is a good day and I am happy. Even though Haddayr has been revealed to be much tougher than I, she likes riding in 0 degree F weather and I was cringing from the thought of 23 degree weather.

Raptobike Update and Wheel Cover thoughts

I recently received a few emails from other people who ordered Raptobike frame kits. So I figured I would update my blog with the progress of my Raptobike order. Everything is ready and should ship soon but there was a delay with the Carbon seats. The last batch that was manufactured came out too heavy and so we are waiting for the next batch. I am expecting news soon and the Raptobike team has been very nice about keeping me in the loop. It is just hard for myself and some others as we are all eager to get our new toy. The Raptobike just inspires so much excitement and lust that it is hard to contain it.

To occupy that part of my brain I have been working on designs for my wheelcovers. I am going with 4mm Coroplast split down the middle for my covers. I emailed a few local sign makers to see if I can get Coroplast sheets from them. Hopefully I will hear from them soon. I have also been thinking about the details of how to attach the covers to the wheels. My current plan is to use fishing line to attach the covers to the spokes. In this way the second cover per wheel is doable with a curved needle similar to the one on the left. This way I can hook around each spoke as long as I know where they are. I will leave a section unlaced near the valve of my tube. That section will be held with tape only so I can peel it back to fill up the tire and deal with flats.

Late update: This article from recumbents.com should be required reading for anyone working on wheel disks.

Jon Stewart keeps up the pressure on CNBC

I mentioned Letterman's attack on McCain after McCain failed to show in my previous post on the Jon Stewart vs CNBC battle. Well Jon heard me and so appeared on Letterman and continued the onslaught.

His takedown is short and brutal, behold.

"The thing that upsets me the most, honesty, there are three 24-hour financial networks," Stewart complained. "All their slogans are like, 'We know what's going on on Wall Street.' But then you turn it on during the crisis, and they're like, 'We don't know what's going on!' It'd be like turning on The Weather Channel in a hurricane, and they're just doing this: 'Why am I wet? What's happening to me? And it's so windy! What's going on, I'm scared!' How do you not know?

Power Meter vs Heart Rate Monitor

Bike Hugger has reported on an interesting study on training with a HRM or a Power Meter. The short version of that article is that the HRM came out favorably in the study beating those who trained with a Power Meter. Now there are limits to this study and Power Meters have some really nifty features but at least this keeps those of us who use heart rate monitors from feeling like we are in the stone age.

Tailbox art

I was speaking to my wife Kristin and she told me that I was silly to limit the colors on the Raptobike to just white and black. Not being an idiot, I listened, and thought I could use orange coroplast for the tailbox. Of course then I needed to think about what kind of art I would put on the tailbox. Given my limited artistic skills I thought a sunburst in yellow would look good and I could use reflective tape for the sun rays, or even reflective tape for the entire sun motif.

I still need to decide what to put on the wheel covers but I can work that out later. The simple paint drawing above is not to scale and really is just a concept drawing.

Raptobike Pr0n

The Raptobike build is coming along. I heard from Arnold at Raptobike and the carbon seat is almost ready and then it will ship this week if all goes well. I am going to get a Ventisit seat pad for the Raptobike, I found a good source here and am working on this now.

I am very excited about the progress. I am planning on picking up some coroplast to make wheel covers and a tailbox in the meantime. I am still on the fence on the color of coroplast to use. At this point I am leaning toward black, so as to make my color scheme black and white. I can use 3M reflective tape to make it reflect silver at night. But black will be hot in the summer and my water will get warm faster. White also fits the color scheme but it will get dirty faster. Barney Harle made a nice white tailbox for his Raptobike here:

I like his total weight of 1.1kg and the shape is pretty nice as well. Adding a white wheel cover for the rear wheel wouldn't add much weight and it would still look pretty good. Maybe I will go with white. The dirt and grime should be easy enough to clean off if I am good about doing it. I would really like to have my tailbox made by the OHPV Human Powered Challenge in Portland, OR. That would put me in the super-stock category.

I think I could still use the black reflective tape to put nice designs on the tailbox, which would reflect nicely as well. I am still on the fence, but I think white with a black design on the tail-fairing will be nicely artistic and show up well.

Ventisit

Hostelshoppe now carries the ventisit seat pad (pictured left). I am pretty happy since their price is about $20 less than my other sources. I want to get one for my Raptobike build, but don't currently know the size of the seat. They offer three options, the Bacchetta euromesh size (which I can measure), the 86cm size and the 89cm size. I emailed Raptobike to find out the size of seat they make. Hopefully I will get a response in time to get everything here for my 40th birthday in April.