March 2009

'stache

Submitted by minnesota_slim on Tue, 03/31/2009 - 10:47

wrencho

Submitted by minnesota_slim on Tue, 03/31/2009 - 10:24

The word is spreading about the 3wrencho:

HKFixed

Trackosaurus Rex

F*ck Gas

hero

Submitted by minnesota_slim on Sun, 03/29/2009 - 14:43

At the central Taipei subway stop they have gates so you can't fall down on the tracks and get smoked by a train. This may be safer, but what about erstwhile subway heroes? Has no one thought of them? Mr. Ma Ying-Jeou, tear down those walls!

the _3wrencho has landed

Submitted by icepick on Fri, 03/27/2009 - 09:30

We are stoked to announce our first shipment of _3Wrencho tools has arrived. This was a small batch, so all but about 10 of them are headed to distributors that will get them into a shop near you! This tool is just the ticket for the rider with a bolt on wheel! The _3wrencho is our first ground up design and we are really excited about it.

big in finland

Submitted by icepick on Fri, 03/27/2009 - 09:11

I got this email from my old college roommate Alyssa who is studying design in Europe:

The elusive, original Jopo (yo-po) was sighted today! It was Finland's
version of the Ford, only for bikes. In its inception it was
utilitarian, but not very desirable from a kids perspective. Now a
days, these originals are the hottest bike in Finland, when I first
arrived in town I went to the local used bike store to track one down,
but no luck.

As you can imagine the bike shop owner laughed at me, we
had a nice long discussion about the Jopo's. If you see one on the
street, it probably won't be there for long, as they are the number
one (desirable) bike that is stolen in the Helsinki area. With the
high production runs on these original models it makes you
wonder....Where have all the Jopo gone?

Suddenly, I want a Jopo.

rose city fix

Submitted by icepick on Wed, 03/25/2009 - 15:15

A little care package arrived at the pdw HQ from our pals in the Steel City. In it was some 'zine love including the newest issue of Urban Velo, issue #23 of The Outcast, Residue #8, and a pile of stickers from Rushin Revolution. First off, thanks dudes!

Secondly, as I was paging through the aforementioned issue of UV, I spotted a familiar site in one of the photos: a burned out hardware store not two miles from where I'm sitting. I did a little research (the photog's name and blog were listed under the pic) and found out that gallery was work from local photographer Brenton Salo. I ended up spending a while cruising through his pics. Wow, is all I can say. These are locations I see all the time, but he is able to capture such simple things in such stark beauty...also he is working on a forth coming book called Rose City Fix. Do yourself a favor, check out the work!

Here are a couple of my favorites:

 

down mexico way

Submitted by icepick on Wed, 03/25/2009 - 10:09

A couple of friends of PDW are taking a bike tour of Baja. I just saw some of the photos this morning and I gotta say, color me jealous. It is wet, wet, wet here in the Rose City the last few days, and Baja looks positively, and sublimely arid.

The crew is Leah Stargardter, Ahren Rodgers, Cari Myong and a friend of theirs. Last year about this time, Cari, Leah and another woman named Jude took a wonderful trip in Argentina. Those pics kept me warm all year.

beer factory

Submitted by minnesota_slim on Mon, 03/23/2009 - 22:47

My liking for adult beverages is well-known on this side of the Pacific so one of our suppliers took me to the JianGuo Beer Factory to sample some of their libations. The beer garden is hidden pretty well behind the factory so you need to walk down a sketchy-looking alley to locate it but once you get there the 3,800cc mini kegs are plentiful. My Taiwanese friends seemed to like it:

Jetlag had me ready for some z’s but they were not to be had. Our Australian distributors showed up just past bar time and we cajoled the bartender to set us up with another round. Still thirsty, the Aussies shoved me into a cab and I was shanghaied to another tavern with a later closing time. It was at this tavern that I learned of “Marchstache,” a pledge drive for cancer research:

Anywho, as far as I know everyone made it home okay. I bumped into a few of the Aussies the next day and they looked right as rain (sorry for the poor picture, Brett)

case of the mondays?

Submitted by icepick on Mon, 03/23/2009 - 07:19