Calgary and CP Rail

How to tell it's lunch hour or rush hour in Calgary!! Seriously, CP Rail does whatever it wants, whenever it wants, with impunity. 

The Blind Lawn Bowling Nationals 2015

This week saw Calgary hosting the 2015 Blind Lawn Bowling Nationals and Blue Circle, and the Inglewood Lawn Bowling Club, were pleased to be a part of it by sending volunteers to help out. 

We acted as Markers for several of the games and not only did we enjoy ourselves and meet some very nice people, we learned a few things too. 

Of course, we knew that sight impaired people have many admirable skills and attributes but we were very impressed with just how well these competitors played and how well they demonstrated some of the finer points of the game, plus some excellent sportsmanship. 

It certainly made me a lot more conscious of my own game and what can be done to be a better bowler, and perhaps this might be used as my own league fast approaches the end of the season and the Championships on September 13th. 

Sarah, from Blue Circle, acted as a Marker for one of the Singles Matches

Most of the provinces were represented at the Nationals

Some accurate line and weight with the red bowls, impressive for someone who is sight impaired.

The Director gives advice to the bowler as they make the shot

This 94 year old gentleman was sitting out for the first time in his playing career

Ontario came to play

I was Marker for the Alberta v.s. B.C game

Sarh and her 'official scorecard'.

ASRAB

Sarah is one of the hard working and committed young members of the BlueCircle Insurance office, but she's more than just an amazing organizer of our 'paperwork' and all of that goes along with making sure policies get endorsed and payments get made on time. Sarah also happens to be a volunteer, helping out with the Alberta Sport and Recreation Association for the Blind ( ASRAB). For 'Sight Night', you will find Sarah manning a station along a designated route and giving directions to runners. as participants head out into the dark of night to run an 8 km course or walk a 3 km route. The idea is to raise awareness of some of the daily issues facing people with visual impairments may have, hence the night time start which puts sighted runners/walkers in the dark and levels the playing field, so to speak.
As well, Sarah is helping with a special event this month and volunteered for the Blind Lawn Bowling National Championships, being held here in Calgary during the week of August 26 - 30th. Sarah, along with a few other BlueCircle volunteers, will act as Markers for the sight impaired bowlers and their coaches. It's world class bowling, so look for a future post later in the week featuring some of the game play.
And, great job Sarah! Without volunteers, so many things would not be possible!

  "We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give"

Sarah asked for volunteers to help while playing at her own league night with the Inglewood Lawn Bowling Club.

Big Daddy and Rat Fink

As mentioned in my post "Big Daddy", which featured that beautiful custom BMW R80, the inspiration for that bike was Ed "Big Daddy" Roth. Starting back in the late 50's, Roth proved to be a real entrepreneurial guy who did everything from cartooning and illustrating to customizing cars and hot rods and pin striping. He started the 'monsters in hot-rods' cartoon craze with the 'Weirdo" t-shirts he created along with fellow artists and hot rod pioneers like Stanley Miller and Dean Jeffries. One of the quintessential Big Daddy cartoon characters was the Mickey Mouse anti-hero "Rat Fink", still popular enough today to warrant the 'Rat Fink Party and Kustom Kulture Extravaganza' held yearly in California.
Roth created many custom hot rods, like the surf buggy 'Surfite', seen in 'Beach Blanket Bingo' (with Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello) or 'Beatnik Bandit' which resides in the National Automobile Museum in Nevada. He also did his fair share of custom motorcycles and trikes and was, for a time, involved with a few outlaw motorcycle clubs who frequented his garage. Roth couldn't get any mainstream motorcycle magazines to publish his ads, let alone his features on custom choppers, so he printed his own black and white publication and distributed it himself. It only lasted about 3 years but was the first of it's kind and certainly paved the way for other such magazines down the road.
After a few 'incidents' with bike gangs and the police, Roth changed things up and eventually, with his 4th wife, joined a church and became involved in social work .

Rat Fink was the anti-hero, in contrast to Mickey Mouse

Big Daddy was a bit of a ham! He was likely the first to use the Iron Cross in association with 'biker' culture.

Ed  independently published  and distributed 'Chopper' magazine

Big Daddy loved nicknames and catch phrases

Rat Fink rides

One of Ed's custom trikes

 Big Daddy airbrushes one of his 'Weirdo' t-shirts

Ed took a lot of photos of bikers and made up posters to sell

'Monsters In Cars" cartoon

Big Daddy!

Even though this post is about a custom bike I really love, I titled it Big Daddy, after the inspiration for the custom work done on this drop dead gorgeous customized BMW R80. The builder, Nigel Broughton, was inspired by one of the originators of the custom build culture, Ed "Big Daddy' Roth, who played a major role in the 50's and 60's with the California Kustom Kulture. Watch for my next post, where I'll do a feature on 'Big Daddy', 'Rat Fink' and all those crazy cartoons I remember from my youth.
As for this beautiful bike, I first saw it via a BMW Motorrad tweet and loved it instantly. It's not that there aren't plenty of customs on bikes other than the usual 'American Iron' that are so popular, but this one leans a bit toward that old school style usually associated with that genre. Suffice to say, I'd love to roll around on this bike and must give huge kudos to Nigel for this awesome creation!

I love the big fat white walls and matching paint on the rims

Very cool custom paint

Clean and simple

A 'Big Daddy' touch

It looks great from any angle

Again, clean and simple lines

A nice profile

How To Get Paid To Ride A Motorcycle: Part One

I know a few motorcycle cops and we've shared a laugh over it being one way a person could enjoy the freedom of riding while also collecting a pay cheque. In the U.S., motorcycles have been used by the police since 1908 and the first official patrol unit was purportedly in 1911. I did a previous post on that era of riding so here's a few photos from a couple of decades later, when low cost and efficiency coupled with mobility and speed made the motorcycle very popular with many police forces. And, apparently it was a great way of attracting recruits to the force because, as I said in the title of the post, who wouldn't like to get paid to ride?

This looks mid 30's

The 60's maybe

Texas oil patch?

Indian Motorcycles were also marketed to the police

The white socks might also give you a clue about the era! haha!

The kick-start era for sure.

Old school police bikes in a recent parade

Another Indian in the force

This might have been one of the first uses of high viz colours.

Yet Another Step Toward Electric!

I've had several previous posts on the development and advancement of electric motorcycles, including a recent discussion on the Harley Davidson LiveWire. I test rode that peppy little beast about a month ago and was impressed enough with the look, feel and ride. Many of the other test pilots talked about the potential to see this bike in production and what it might cost, plus other details.
One thing that was mentioned at that time was the purchase of  Brammo Electric Motorcycle by Polaris, who are also the manufacturer of Indian and Victory motorcycles. In fact, Victory is the official name attached to what is now the Polaris electric bike, the 'Empulse', as well as the prototype race bikes mostly recently seen at The Isle OF Man TT races. The latter were averaging over 161 kmph laps, so nothing to scoff at there.
As for the Empulse, this is a production bike that has a top speed of 161 kmph and, depending on your riding style and aggression on the throttle, has a range of anywhere from 90- 160 km.. Interestingly, this bike has a clutch with 6 speed transmission, unlike the gearless LiveWire, however the shifting clutching is not required when stopping or starting and isn't actually necessary at all. One could simply cruise in 3rd gear so perhaps the idea of a transmission is to enhance control and/or the riding experience. With a 54 h.p engine that delivers 61 ft lbs of torque, this bike has similar enough specs to compare well with the LiveWire as well, which seems to be the intention.
With a $20,00.00 U.S. price tag and the ability to plug the 10.4 kw/hour battery into the average 240 volt charger that is available at most car charging stations, this bike likely will be as serious of competition as the Victory bikes are to the Harley brand.

The prototype used at the Isle Of Man TT races

Another of the Victory electric bikes tears around theTT course.

The Victory 'Empulse' is on the market.

With a 4 hour charging time, this is mostly a city bike.

Kind of has a 'Naked' look .

Deeley No More?

Harley-Davidson is moving to a direct distribution model for Canada in 2017, and perhaps even sooner.
Right now, Harley-Davidson motorcycles are distributed in Canada by Deeley Harley-Davidson Canada, and has been the exclusive Harley-Davidson distributor since 1973. If a dealer wants a bike, they have to get it through Deeley. However, that deal ends in July, 2017, and the plan is to not renew after that.
According to a press release back in April, when the dead line arrives Harley-Davidson will supply independent Canadian dealers through direct distribution, cutting out Deeley as the middleman. The company already uses this arrangement in other countries, including Italy, Brazil, Australia,  and some other European countries.
But now there's talk about the the move coming even sooner than 2017. According to people in teh industry, Deeley and Harley-Davidson are actually talking about making the move as early as third quarter of 2015, which would be about now.
One would hope that this business move will show a benefit to the customer, with reduced prices on motorcycles and parts, plus quicker delivery from the factory for both as well. With American made Indian and Victory motorcycles delivering quality bikes, plus the other competition frrom the Japanese and U.K. manufacturers, Harley Davidson obviously needed to make a move for price parity. Let's see how that pans out, but like the old poster below will tell you, the times they are a changin'.

Not sure what I like most...the matching outfits, or the nicely tucked in tie under the H-D sweater!

'59 El Camino

Saw this beautiful old 'Camino outside Calgary Harley Davidson today.