A week of cycling

It's been a week since I got my fifth bike in Australia, and I already I rode at least 250 km. In that week, I lost about two kilos of weight which I believed to be the result of having cold and cycling. 

Place that I went:

• Wed 24: Kew Boulevard (1.5 laps)
  
• Thurs 25: My friend's parents house in Burnside height (~24 km from my house): I didn't like the head wind on the way there at all, but the road is flat.
  
• Fri 26: Feeling sick as the cold kicked in and ended up shopping. 
• Sat 27: Mordialloc + chocolate. After a nap: A ride to JZ's house was 26 km of hills after hills. My legs got a good work out. 
• Sun 28: A ride back from JZ's house after yum cha. It supposed to fill my stomach but the waiters kept ignoring our table. I have a feeling that they think we can't order yum cha.
• Mon 29: A train to Geelong and then 40 km "scenic" ride to Anglesea via Torquay. It was brilliantly beautiful although the hills were quite punishing if you are on single speed. We took an easier route on the way back along the highway. I don't remember much but we went pretty fast with the tail wind.
• Tues 30: Completely exhausted from cycling. Dropped about three kilos, so I took a chance to eat up and sleep a lot.

Plan for New Year: Wake up really early and ride to Arthur's Seat. If I am all pumped, which I doubt, my friend and I will try to do the whole trip without taking a train. The idea is to get wasted just like getting pass out. Also this will be my first attempt at Arthur's Seat too. ~200m in altitude in 3km of road. I heard that someone did it in 12 minutes. I will be happy if I can do it in 30 minutes on the smallest gear. :P

Redesigning product towards behavioural change

I found something cool on the net today...

Heat-sensitive wallpaper: The idea is to redesign the product so that it forces the user to change his/her appliance usage behaviour. In the article I have read, the author draws on his experience with Prius., which force the author to lock the door from outside and thus ensure that he doesn't forget the key inside. Now, the idea here is that the usage of heater near the wall will force the flowers on the wallpaper to "blossom" (yeah, that's right). Although this product may not change the behaviour of the user, but it can indicate that the heater is on during winter. I mean most of us probably forget to turn heater off every now and then. This product could be one of the tools which helps by reminding us. 

no heat

with heater on

www.etre.com/blog/2007/10/shi_yuan_heat_sensitive_wallpaper/

Power aware cord: This is a cool idea. Instead of covered electrical wire, we have a glow wire. The idea is to increase awareness of power electrical usage. Apparently, this product is commercially available in Europe now.

Check for more energy awareness program at STATIC!.

Energy saving adaptor: The aim is to reduce the power consumption from the equipment on "stand by" mode. The adaptor monitors the power usage through each socket. If it detects an appliance connected to one of its sockets on standby mode, then it will signal a warning to the user to switch off the appliance. If the warning is ignored, then after a certain amount of time, it will switch itself off. According to the designer, it was hope to change the behaviour of the user, while ensuring that the objective of saving energy is met regardless to the user response. However, I have a slight problem with this. I don't believe that this product will change user behaviour at all. The user will most likely get used to the fact that adaptor will automatically turn itself off regardless of the user action, and thus he/she will continue to behave as before. Never the less, it is a little neat idea for lazy people like me.

Check out for more stuff at Gilles Belley's website.

Ecoshower: My personal favourite. I always a shower that tells me how much I use the water. Normally, I try to have less than 4 minute shower, but depending on the day, I might turn the shower a bit more than other days and hence I use more water even though I am in the shower for the same time. Now, you can go even further and recycle water used during shower. This product is designed by Peter Brewin, a design student at the UK's Royal College of Arts.

Restart blogging

After some talking today, I realised that I need to start writing all my thought down before the disease of old age sneaks on me. So, here I am, start blogging again...