Tomorrow Is Already Yesterday

Location:  Studio     ||     7:35 am – 7:45 pm

I did a piece like this once.  Joan Miro’s version recently sold for $36.9 million.

The Sotheby’s sale of Miro’s “Peinture – Etoile Bleue” was an auction record for the late artist.

“[This piece] … is among arguably the most important works by Miro ever to come to the market and a painting the artist himself identified as key to his oeuvre.”

Miro rocked – and still somehow rocks.

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Location Friday:  Seven     ||     8:20 am – 9:10 pm

How I felt after the latest mountain bike ride

• Design:  Had a big 2013 brochure meeting at Seven Cycles this afternoon.  Shared my proposed plan.  We’ll see what people think after they sleep over the weekend.  I’m up for it.  Skunk’s on board.  John seems ready to roll.  A few others look to be on board.  It’s okay if not everyone is.  Dissent is descent.
• Graphic Design:  2013 Seven Cycles website progress with Skunk again today.  It’ll be interesting to see how the website and brochure diverge and converge.  Definitely more different than ever before.  Technology acceleration.

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Machining head turning at a blur | Photo: Rob Vandermark

Location Thursday:  Seven  |  Studio     ||     7:50 am – 7:55 pm

• Graphic Design:  Ride Studio Cafe cycling kit.  We’ve added knee warmers and arm warmers to the kit.
• Graphic Design:  Helmet decaling for the Ride Studio Cafe team is creeping along.  Plotter cutter problems today.  Always something.
• Recruiting:  Eight hires to happen in the next few weeks.  Chantal is doing a lot of the prelim work for Ride Studio.  Matt O. is doing most of the prelim work for Seven Cycles.  I sound like a broken record.
• Engineering:  Carbon testing continues.  Next round for frames in process.  Always progress too slow for me.  Regardless, Bryan H. and Lloyd G. are doing a great job of thinking it through and coming up with likely good solutions.  We’ve got three frames going around in what feels like circles.  Final results soon.  I think the second test will be completed on Tuesday.

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Location Wednesday:  Seven     ||     7:25 am – 9:15 pm

•  Graphic Design:  White Team Kits arrived today!  For the Ride Studio Cafe Team.  Looking sharp.  And good for the cool weather.  Great job Verge.
• Project:  Retailer program 2013 for Seven Cycles.  We’re making some big changes for the season.  All positive for our retailers.  We’ll see but I’m excited.
• Engineering:  Fatigue testing stress risers.  As part of our latest titanium testing I’ve added some stress riser tests.  Years ago we did some testing that yielded pretty counter-intuitive results.  I’m hoping we can recreate these results for this new generation of material enthusiasts.  I want to get going on this but we can’t begin until the carbon testing round is complete.  Soon.

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Location Tuesday:  Seven  |  Studio     ||     8:40 am – 8:35 pm

The Ghost of Seven Cycles. The halo left by bead blasting Seven’s head tube badges. | Photo: Rob Vandermark

• Graphic Design:  Website 2013:  for Seven Cycles.  We’re beta testing now.  I’m liking it.  Clean, simple, more informative, more content, more images.  Stripping apart the old site.  New user interface is coming along, too.  Getting some push back on this idea.
• Month end.  Seven Cycles continues to have a very good year in spite of all the external signs – domestic and international.  We still have a tremendous amount to do but domestic sales volume is up more than anytime in the past five years.  Good momentum that we’re working on continuing.
• Design:  Brochure 2013.  Everyday we’re moving a bit farther along on this.  I’m pulling together some of Seven Cycles old technical manuals for reference material.  As I mentioned before, because this is actually two project – not including the website – I’m working on them both, in tandem.  On of the “brochures” is just about done already.

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The World of Welding Tandems | Illustration: Skunk

Location Monday:  Seven     ||     7:50 am – 9:25 pm

• Project:  Retailer newsletter refresh for Seven Cycles.  We’ve had a newsletter since we started Seven 15-years ago.  It used to be print 12 times a year.  A few years ago we went to email version and weekly.  We’re in the midst of a revamp.  This is a newsletter that’s just for Seven’s retailers.  It’s a great communication tool.
• Production Process:  The never ending iteration of entropy.  Working with entropy is the key.  And very difficult to do.  Fighting entropy sometimes seems necessary.  I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about entropy flow and how to harness it.
• Design Project:  Cold brew growlers for Ride Studio Cafe.  Erica’s been working on this idea.  It’s going to be a cool drink in the Lexington area.  Working on permitting and growler design right now.

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Location Sunday:  Studio     ||     7:20 am – 7:10 pm

“Happy birthday to the ground.”  Sorry; I love that line.  At 1:38.  Too tired to do much else this evening.

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Location Saturday:  Seven  |  Studio     ||     6:50 am – 7:40 pm

Rorschach’s Devil. My favorite cortado | Photo: Rob Vandermark

• Design Project:  Brochure 2013.  Worked on Seven Cycles brochure project a bit.  Iterated the list of contributors.  Too many; whittling it down.  How many pages can we afford to do?
• Sleep.

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