Morningtime

Doc J starts his day feeling energized, having just scarfed down a delicious breakfast bagel from his favorite bagelry in town, Atomic Bagels. Actually he is not certain whether or not the bagels taste good or not, since he severely burnt his tongue drinking his piping hot cup of joe. Every morning is the same, he comes into his kitchen and starts up the ill-kempt coffee machine, a device at the leading technological edge of innovation in the field of bean percolation and tongue scorching. One can't help but notice immediately that the machine has taken a sound beating after only two weeks of operation. He readies the machine to make 12 cups of coffee, even though he fully well knows that he will drink a cup and a half at most. He loads the grinding attachment with an overabundance of grounds, not realizing that its true purpose is to produce grounds from beans. He even has the audacity to place a small, brown paper filter over the fine, gold permanent filter that comes included. Doc J doesn't have the time to take the care needed to make even the simplest of observations. The 1-3 cup option button's LED is blinking with a determined intensity, trying its darndest to let the good doc know that the water will be heated to nothing less than two times the necessary amount.

Doc J doesn't need instructions to ruin even the most intuitive of devices.

Fortunately for the poor device, the doc doesn't bother to blame it for the ultimately tender condition of his tongue and the roof of his mouth. He just stops to wonder if a burnt mouth is the newest, cool thing.

My Bicycle

This is how you turn a green and purple bike into a blue and yellow dream machine.

Thanks are in order for Mr. Sears who lent me his garage, some parts and tools, and his know-how; Beth for giving me ideas on how to paint the frame, and the dudes at Aggieland Cycles that installed my Shimano 105 headset for me.

The cranks, bottom, bracket, and track cog are from IRO Cycles. The gear ratio is 46/14, and the rims are Weinman DP18.

Weekly Roundup

1. Bicycle Decal of the Week!


2. Negative Anniversary Card of the Week!


3. Bicycle Frame of the Week!


4. Three Dimensional Solid of the Week!

This is how you turn a simple post into a nerdy post

Oh, here's where I left that blog. Awesome.

Ever since I linked this thing to Facebook, writing on here has lost its appeal. So that's out.

A list of things that are in:

1. Not Boston

2. Nuclear physics experiments

3. Rattle-can paint jobs on bicycle frames

4. Getting married in August and honeymooning in Belize

5. The picture in the latest SI of a shirtless Bob Uecker standing poolside and doing the play-by-play of Brewers' ping pong matches during their latest roadtrip

6. Beth's lemon bars

7. Jumping rope until your heart blows out of your chest ... you know, for kids

8. A team is not a team if you don't give a damn about each other

9. I swear that I don't read and write posts on Cleveland Browns message boards.

10. Wasting money on baseball cards

Something illuminating about gas prices

I typically get around on my bike, which, if you convert calories to gasoline, gets 3000 mpg. I got that from an article in the latest Bicycling magazine. To fact check that, one gallon of gas has 31,549 food calories, if you burn the gas under ideal conditions. So that means the writer estimates that you burn 10.5 Calories per mile on a bicycle. The wiki page on bicycle performance claims you burn 0.4 Calories/second over 15 seconds to accelerate to 25 mph and then burn 0.3 Calories/second to travel at an average speed of 25 mph. This means that the wiki page thinks you burn about 47 Calories per mile of bicycle riding instead, giving you a fuel efficiency of 675 mpg. Perhaps then the Bicycling magazine writer used a more modest estimate for a rider's average speed, maybe like 15 mph.

No one ever travels 3000 miles on bike in a single day, and you could probably achieve 675 miles over a week. So let's think about this in more real terms. An ABC poll in 2005 said that the average one-way commute distance to work is 16 miles. At almost $4 a gallon for gasoline and assuming a fuel efficiency of around 27 mpg, that would mean that the average commute to work today would cost roughly $2.40, probably more if you have to sit in traffic. Neglecting that this long of a bike ride would leave you a sweaty mess, at the going-all-out speed of 25 mph, you would burn 750 Calories. But at the calm pace that Bicycling magazine suggests, you would only require about 170 Calories. The tricky part now is estimating the cost of food. I don't know why anyone who would bike to work would also eat unhealthy food, but the average cost of high caloric junk food is $1.76/1000 Calories, meaning that depending on your pace, your one-way commute would cost between $.30 - $1.32. But everyone knows that people who are health conscious and ride bikes eat low calorie, nutritious food. At the study claimed astronomical price of $18.16/1000 Calories (which, by my experience actually sounds reasonable) then, your one-way commute jumps to a price that ranges from $3.08 - $13.62.

So, there you have it, I guess. In fuel consumption terms only, riding a bike can be more expensive than driving a car. Furthermore, since the cost of food and gasoline are fairly heavily correlated, no matter how high the price of gas becomes, riding may never be cheaper than driving. But, I would have to guess that riding a bike everyday and eating right makes you a better, healthier person. And there must be some value in that.

I was really surprised to find that in reality, the "3000 mpg" statement is completely misleading. When I first read that in the magazine, I thought to myself, "Wow, what a savings that will translate into!" (when I think to myself, I frequently speak like I'm selling a product) But alas, things are never so cut and dry.

ADDENDUM
My bicycle research colleague Matt, pointed out that on occasion, we'll buy this ridiculous mass-gainer product in a bottle as a post-workout supplement. We've always viewed buying these as an extravagant 1000 Calorie convenience since they cost roughly $4/bottle at the rec center here. In reality though, accepting the claim that the price of quality whole foods is very high, we were actually making an economic choice.

Of course, you should use this product as a dietary supplement, and if you drank a whole bottle before hopping on a bike, you'd have the worst stomach ache ever. But, in the scenario where you wake up in the morning before work, maybe eat something light to get the metabolism going, hop on the bike, ride 16 miles at a moderate pace (at the extreme pace of 25 mph, you would burn $3 on this trip), and then drink this product or one of their non-mass gaining alternatives to replenish your body then you would finally realize fuel savings with the health benefits that riding has to offer.