Needed a New Bike for Little Cash

I've been a cyclist - of sorts - almost my whole life. I never decided as an adult to take up cycling. Instead, I just never quit riding from when I was a kid. It has always just been something fun to do. The fact that it helps keep me in shape is just an added bonus. So, while I say I'm a cyclist, I am not your ordinary cyclist. This is especially true when it comes to what gear I use and what bikes I ride. For the last 15 years or so, I have ridden a steel Schwinn 15 speed road bike that was built in the early 80s. I have loved that old thing, even though I knew there were better bikes out there. I paid almost nothing for it, and it has served me quite well. Alas, its time has finally come. While putting it on the bike rack on top of my car, I noticed some dirt on the underside of the frame. When I brought it down to clean it, I realized this wasn't dirt. This was rust. This was rust that went straight through the frame. Its days were numbered. So, the search began for a new bike. The first thing I learned was that the cycling industry has grown quite a bit. There are frames made of steel, aluminum, "cromoly" or carbon fiber. Then, low and behold, there are different grades of steel, different grades of aluminum, and even different utilization of carbon fiber! So, I started researching, reading, and visiting bike shops. My local bike shop (LBS) sells a certain brand of bike with the cheapest road bikes costing just shy of a grand. That's a LOT of money for a bicycle if you ask me. Honestly, it's absurd. So, I started researching that brand to find out what was so special about it. As it turned out, not much! The frames were built by an enormous bicycle frame company called Kinesis. The components - brakes, derailleurs, shifters etc - were built by Shimano. In fact, not a single part of the bike was built by this vaunted bike brand that thinks their bikes are worth a grand. All they do, it would seem, is pay for custom graphics to be printed on the bikes. Is that worth a grand? In my researching those Kinesis frames, I stumbled across many other brands that use those frames. Most of them charged close to a grand for their bikes. However, I found a handful of brands, only available via an online retailer, that used those same frames. They also used those same Shimano components. The difference? $750. Enter "Bikes Direct Dot Com" Bikes Direct's website isn't my favorite website I've ever visited. It's a little cluttered with tons of products and tons of links. But, it is well organized. It didn't take me long to find a Bikes Direct bike that had the exact same specs as one of those $1000 bikes. The big difference was that the bike from Bikes Direct only cost $350 tax and shipping included. Bikes Direct received my order on Wednesday. I had my bike the following Monday. If you look at the website, they warn you that you'd better have a little mechanical knowledge before you attempt to assemble one of their bikes. I, however, was surprised at how little I needed to know in order to put the bike together. When I opened the bike, though, I was a little intimidated. It looked like I'd made a huge mistake. Here's a few shots of the box & the bike before I assembled it. The box looked great! No damage at all!

When I opened the box, I didn't see anything that looked like a bike to me!

A mild taste of terror set in when I pulled the contents out of that box. This looked like it might be a bit more than I'd bargained for!!!

Fortunately, after I removed the packaging and laid out the parts, it looked much simpler.

Slide in the seat post, bolt on the pedals, put the quick release in the wheel, inflate the tires, make some minor adjustments, and it was ready to roll!

I am incredibly pleased with this bike. It is exactly what I wanted, and dealing with Bikes Direct was as easy and simple as you could ever want. I put 50 miles on it the first week, but near constant rain has kept me off of it over the last few days. Hopefully, I'll be able to do some more pedaling in the coming week to make up for it. I have shared my experience with Bikes Direct with some friends, and one of them ordered a bike from them as well. In fact, he's asked me to assemble his for him, which is what I'll be doing, tonight. I will probably spend more time cutting the packaging off of the bike than I will assembling it! This is my wholehearted endorsement of Bikes Direct. Ignore what the LBS is selling, unless they have sub-$400 bikes there. For $350, I got a bike that weighs about 22 lbs, has Shimano Sora/2300STI shiftgear, a Kinesis frame with a Cromoly fork, and looks fantastic. I opted for a "lower end" bike, but rest assured, they have everything from full carbon Di2 monsters to big ugly single speed granny bikes. You will find what you're looking for, but you won't find stupidly high prices. Who shouldn't shop at Bikes Direct? If you're the type of person who is more impressed with brand names than substance, don't go there. All you'll find is some lesser known brands with great components for an insane bargain. So... here's the link: Bikes Direct Next post... my friend's new bike from Bikes Direct!



_______________________________
If  you're going to ride on a regular basis, you know you're going to be needing to refill those tires on a regular basis.  Most compressors for car tires simply can't handle the 90 to 120 psi demanded of bike tires.  You'll be wanting something that can fill your tires up quickly and to the proper pressure.  I purchased one similar to this one.

Just a quick note to share... I decided to make a Facebook page for education minded stuff I find and have another outlet for sharing my videos. Feel free to keep track of me there, too! https://www.facebook.com/RoopullsGigglingBrains

New Educational Video Up On Youtube!

I had a couple of requests for a video teaching colors. I'd toyed around with recording examples of colors in the video, but didn't think it worked out very well.  There was the issue of the colors not showing up well in the video for starters, and there were just too many distractions for it to be a good educational tool. 
So, this new video is perhaps overly simple, but when testing it with my own kids, it seems to work. So, as with my other videos, it should be good for kids, ESL students or even stroke victims re-learning things.
Here's the link.
http://youtu.be/xLV8etYAeh0
Be sure to share it with others!
Coming up in the nest few days will be a video of the alpabet presented randomly. It's almost like flash cards presented in video format!
God Bless You!

How to keep your computer BUG FREE!

I have modest nerd credentials. I don't claim to be an expert or anything like that. But, for many, I'm their go-to guy when they have computer issues. While I'm not a professional nerd, I have a pretty good track record when it comes to keeping my machine clear of viruses. I've been online since 1993 and have yet to have a machine get over-run. Add to that the fact that I'm so cheap that I've never paid for a single anti-virus program, and I think I just might have the right formula.

So, here are some things to do to help your machine work better...

Anti-Virus
You MUST have an anti-virus program. There is absolutely no reason to pay for it, though, so don't sweat it. If you're not absolutely sure you have anti-virus, then you probably don't. I have been using AVG's free program for years, and I love it.

To get it, go to this site:
CNet's Secure Windows Software Site
There's a search bar at the top. Type in "AVG Free."
Download that bugger. In order for it to work, you have to actually use it, though. After it downloads, follow the instructions on installing it. Open the program and study it. Learn to use it. Make sure you have it set up to update itself and scan your computer on at least a weekly basis. The advanced settings to do this are under the Tools tab.

:::EDIT:::
AVG's free edition is offered for free because they hope you'll like it so much you buy their other goods.  When using this program, you will see advertisements asking you to upgrade to a "better" version.  DO NOT DO IT!  Don't even accept the trial.  There's nothing wrong with it, but if you end up failing to pay for the full version after the trial expires, the program will no longer work!  I recently discovered that a friend who had followed my advice inadvertently did this and went about two months with NO anti-virus program running on their computer!

Windows Update
Almost as important as an anti-virus program is making sure your computer's operating system is up to date. Microsoft issues updates to Windows on an ongoing basis so that holes in the program that hackers have found can be patched. Not updating Windows is like leaving your door unlocked in the ghetto. The process is slightly different on different versions of Windows. The easiest way is to simply go to Microsoft's website and follow the directions. Here's the web address:
Microsoft's Windows Update Page

Email
You probably already know that email is one of the biggest risks to getting viruses and other nasty stuff on your computer. There's an easy way to stop that. Use a web-based email service. These are free and inherently safer for your PC than the email program (like Outlook) that you may be using. The reason is simple. With Outlook, when you check your email, it and its attachments are downloaded onto your PC. If there's something nasty in it, it's already on your PC just waiting for you to open it. With web-based email, the email and any attachments stay on the internet and you view it just like you would a website. In order to get a virus from a web-based email service, you have to intentionally download the file to your computer. Even then, you'll be asked if you're sure, and the files are generally scanned by the email service provider in advance to hunt for viruses.

They're super easy to use and, unlike normal email, are available to you from any device with an internet connection, not just your home PC. To get them, go to any of these links and sign up for a free account.
gmail.com
yahoo.com
hotmail.com


Web Browsers
Most people, whether they know it or not, use a program called Internet Explorer to get on the Internet. Internet Explorer is a fine program with one glaring problem. It is the world's most used Internet browser. As a result, every hacker interested in causing you grief knows the most likely way to get his or her virus onto your computer is to try to find weaknesses with Internet Explorer. A good way to simply avoid this problem is to just not use it. There are some very good alternatives out there that you may actually like better. Follow one or more of these links and download the browsers offered there. I actually use five different browsers for different reasons (we won't get into the reasons, here.)
www.google.com/chrome
www.opera.com/browser
www.mozilla.org

Finally, here are a few simple tips or rules to follow when browsing the Internet to keep your machine clean.

Never
Download any type of toolbar for your browser. They're junk and usually infested with nasty stuff. They may even work as advertised. While they're doing that, they're also collecting data about you and transmitting it to the bad guys.
NEVER
Download any coupon printing programs. Yes, there are legitimate reasons for these to exist, but just like the toolbars, they're generally junk... baiting you with the promise of great coupons while looting your bank account of every penny you have.
NEVER
Download anything if you're not 100% sure where it came from. Even if you get an email from a friend with an attachment, don't download it unless your friend told you the attachment was coming beforehand or in a SEPARATE email. Once someone's email account gets hacked, the first thing the hacker does is send out emails to all that person's friends with attachments full of viruses or bogus links.

If you must download...
Download from this site:
download.com

That's the simple stuff. There's much more you can look into if you're looking for even more security. For example, look into Web of Trust to warn you of sketchy websites. Use Google.com or Bing.com instead of your browser's address bar when entering a website's address. The bad guys love to take advantage of typos that Bing and Google will catch.

You can also get a Spyware/Malware program like MalwareBytes. I didn't include a link, because these programs can actually be quite dangerous to use by a non-techy minded person. Some of my techy friends might disagree with me and insist it be included on any machine, but it's quite easy to completely disable your system with one in the right situation. If you do get Malwarebytes or something like it, learn how to use it and be very careful when making changes.

That's it, for now. I welcome any comments or suggestions and will adjust this post as necessary.

Hope this helps!

I know some people think I'm bizarre in that I make nerdy little videos for my kids. In the past, I've explained how that came about (just look at the early posts of this blog.) It does back up long held assumptions on my part that I have begun to discover actually have a good bit of scholarly support.
At the behest of a friend, I read an old and short little book called "Amusing Ourselves to Death." It really nailed home for me what TV can do to a brain. I suggest everyone read that book. It's not directed towards raising children, but the message is applicable to them as well as you parents. I'll add a link to the book if I can track it down.

Last week, there was an article in the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics that, again, hammered home how bad stupid TV can be for you and your kids. Mind you, I add the word "stupid" in there for a reason. Obviously, I don't believe that just because an idea is presented on a screen that it is somehow bad.

Here's a link to the super brief summary of the study with the full text available in a link to the top right of the page.

The Immediate Impact of Different Types of Television on Young Children's Executive Function

Dolch First Grade Words Up

Dolch First Grade Words video is up on Youtube, now.

Here's the video... :-)



Even though it's just a few inches down the page, here's the post with a little more info on Dolch Sight Words and why they're so important to reading English.

The other three aren't even made, yet, but I hope to have them up on YouTube in the next couple of days. If you watch these & have any suggestions, feel free to let me know. You can find me on Youtube at http://www.facebook.com/Roopull.

Lazy Dad = Great Dad!

After my first son was born, for a variety of reasons, I took a job at night. One of the benefits of this was that we could keep our son out of daycare and at home with his parents. When he was under a year old, this seemed like a good idea. I slept when he slept (which was a good part of the day.) However, as he got older and needed fewer naps, the struggle for me to find time to rest was just that... a struggle!

It wasn't long before I started making little home movies for him to watch. They were simple affairs, really. 45 seconds of his mommy singing a song to him, 30 seconds of me singing the alphabet song, a few clips of his grandmother talking to him... these were all low effort productions, but he loved them. When I realized just how entranced he was with watching us on TV, I started making longer and longer videos. I'd put him in the very kid friendly living room, turn on one of his videos, and I'd cat-nap for 30 minutes. It worked out great!

Well, when trying to decide what to put into those videos, I naturally added a few educational bits here and there. There was a clip of us holding up various items and announcing their color, us counting, and other simple little things. We had no idea how well this would work out, but knew it couldn't really hurt anything.

Well, to my surprise, by the time he was 18 months old, he was singing the ABCs and KNEW them by sight! My mother in law still brags on him by telling people of how he'd read off the numbers and letters on her car's license plate. That's what got me so interested in using videos to teach. The interesting thing was that I could be standing right next to the TV doing the EXACT same thing I was doing on the video, but he'd rather watch me ON THE TELEVISION than he would in person! Baffling!

He's five, now, and nothing has changed. No matter how boring I think a video is that I've made, he'll watch it through multiple times. If it's a "good" video, they can't be watched enough!

So, my attempts to find a way to take a nap turned into one of the things my mother in law brags about!

I've attempted to talk friends and family into making their own home videos, but I suppose you have to be interested in that sort of thing in the first place for that to sound appealing. This is a big part of why I've made the educational videos that I have... so I can share them with others. I've simply re-made the ones I made for my son without my wife and I in them. Our not being in them doesn't seem to take much away in their appeal, so hopefully, they'll be appealing for your kids, too.



But... But... they're BORING!

Yes, they are. I noticed that the more things I added to a video to make them interesting, the less effective they were at actually teaching. Don't get me wrong, I still make videos that have lots of entertainment value, but the more basic and simple they are, the better. So, while I do have videos with music, graphics and people, I'm focusing on videos with as few distractions as possible. For example, studies have shown that the simple presence of a face is highly distracting to a viewer. So, if I were in one of the Sight Words videos, instead of focusing 100% on the printed word, their attention would be drawn to my face for part of the video. That's counterproductive... not to mention the fact that my face isn't much to look at in the first place!

So, forgive me... my videos are boring to you! But, I'd be willing to wager that if your learner is part of the target audience, and you turn the TV and radio off, they'll be more than interested in what's going on on the screen... particularly if you participate.