Hasta La Ideas

We spotted one of these Chaino bicycles with a flat in a bike stand yesterday afternoon, and we must admit we had not heard of them before. As far as we could see, instead of an ordinary chain, it had a drive-shaft sort of arrangement, much like BMW motorcycles. It also seemed to have some gear shift arrangement. We vaguely remember a bike a bit like this for sale in a Muji shop in London in the eighties, but other than that we have not seen anything like it. Now we want to know more. Do you know anything about these bicycles? Were they nice bikes or disasters? Do you own one, or have you owned one? If you have any information, we’d love to hear from you!brbr

Just as all previous Easters, we have been cooking and eating a lot of eggs. And just as all previous Easters we have discussed the same thing; how to boil the perfect egg. We have tried a lot of ways over the years, but this year’s best (and probably all-time best as well) is a method attributed to all-american housewife Martha Stewart. Here are Martha’s egg boiling tip: Place the eggs in a single layer in a saucepan, and cover with one inch of cold water. Bring the water to a boil, cover, and pull the saucepan from the burner. Let the eggs rest for about 1.5 to 2 minutes for soft-boiled, 2 to 2.5 minutes for medium-boiled, and 12 to 13 minutes for hard-boiled. Then remove the eggs from the water. Soft- and medium-boiled eggs should be served immediately, while hard-boiled eggs should be plunged into a bowl of ice cold water, to prevent the yolk from discoloring. Why the hand boiled eggs should rest in the hot water for so much longer than the medium ones, we have no idea. But as long as it works…brbr

We spent a few days in London recently. We had not been there for some time, so there were quite a few new things to discover. Among them we spotted these little city cars, that kept popping up all over the place. At first we thought they were a version of a EU moped car, but a closer look revealed they are smarter than that. They are electric. The car is called G-Wiz and it is available in two versions. The budget version comes in black only and has a little lower top speed and a little less range. It is GBP 6.998:- inc. VAT (approx. USD 14.000:-). The cheapest Smart Fortwo is GBP 6.770:- or about USD 13.300:-, but then you will have to add the cost of gas. The slightly up-market G-Wiz at USD 16.300:- has a range of 48 miles on a charge, can be coerced up to 45 mph, is available in any number of colors and with options like leather upholstery, AC, alloy rims, carpets, cup holder and a lot of other goodies. At GoinGreen who markets the G-Wiz, they claim to have sold more than 850 of them in London alone. And they have a few pretty good sales points: Apart from the actual cash, they are exempt from road tax and congestion tax, gets free parking and free charging in London and the lowest rate if you should decide to get one as a company car.brbr

The fifties was a decade of cold war between the East and the West. Sweden had a geographically precarious position between Nato and the Warsaw pact. Sweden also had one of the world’s strongest air forces and made serious plans to build nuclear weapons. In spite of all the money that was spent (or invested, if you will) in defense during those years, hardly anything remains. Nothing except the only skin care product almost every Swedish male knows and have used. Försvarets Hudsalva, or Defense Forces Cerat. The cerat was developed during the fifties by the Swedish Military Pharmacy as a remedy for blisters and cold sores, but its uses quickly expanded as grunts discovered its versatility. It was used greasing bicycle chains and door hinges, as shoeshine, as a substitute for butter, for dry elbows, as ski wax and, it is rumored, as frying fat. Today this icon product is also used as lip cerat, paw ointment for dogs and much more. A 25 ml pack is SEK 29:- (approx. USD 4:-) at the Swedish Pharmacy web shop. Manufactured by APL, Apoteket Produktion Laboratorier.brbr

We saw this in an ad in the paper the other day. The new auto shift bicycle from Skeppshult is called Arc Automat (gent’s version) or Nova Automat (ladies) and features an eight-speed automatic gear assembly from Shimano. There is no information on how it works on the Skeppshult web site, which is pretty lame, but it could be the same auto shifter from Shimano we posted on earlier. If so, it is electric and gets its power from a dynamo in the front hub. We are going to have to pedal down to our local bike shop for a test drive, but since the bike is priced at SEK 9,895:- (USD 1,415:-) we are probably not going to buy one. At least not this year…brbr