It's a very busy time at the shop. I'm going on vacation on the 26th of March, and will be out of the shop for most of the month of April. It's been a long time coming. I'm headed to the warmth, sunshine and blue seas of Bali in Indonesia. I don't really know what to expect, except that when I get off the plane, the nearly translucent white skin that I've been cultivating over the past few months of Portland's cloud covered winter season will make me the whitest white-boy on the island. I'm sure I'll quickly turn pink, and then a deep lobster red, and I will love every moment of it.

For anyone trying to get ahold of me, Mike (my mechanic and helper) will be checking e-mails and filling orders for flask holders and flasks. I will be checking e-mails intermittently, but most things will have to wait until I return. I'll do what I can, but I want to thank everyone in advance for being patient. But now, moving on...

This years' North American Hand Made Bicycle Show came to a close a couple of weeks ago. All in all it was a success. There were a lot of people in attendance, and quite a local buzz about the bikes. It looks like the show really helped rally the bike community of Indianapolis, and the midwest in general. I talked with many people who had travelled anywhere from 2 to 12 hours to come to the show. There were people from Ann Arbor, Cincinnati, Chicago, Kansas City and St. Louis, and quite a few other cities. It was great that people were willing to come from so far to see what was going on.

Also, a huge congratulations goes out to Mitch of MAP Bicycles for his receiving this years award for Best City Bike. It was definitely deserved. 

I've fished around on the internet some, and there are hundreds, if not thousands, of pictures from the show.  There wasn't a lot of time for me to look everything over, but I did see some great things. I particularly liked the cargo bike by ZR Cycles; the crazy snow bike/commuter monster by Retrotec, and just about everything in the Bilenky booth. Some of the best photos I've seen of the show were taken by Brad Quartuccio of Urban Velo, and can be seen at: http://urbanvelo.org/nahbs-2009-friday-part-1/

There are several galleries of photos that you can find through this link.

I'll try and post something while on my trip about how things are going. I won't have a computer with me, so I'll be depending on internet cafes. And know that, for all of you who are enjoying the tail end of the winter months, I'll have you in my thoughts. Please reserve your sympathy for all those sun-burns I'll have to suffer through. Suckers!

Buon viage!

It's been a very long time since I've added any words to this blog. So much has happened that it would take a couple of volumes of words to even scratch the surface. I can be pretty wordy, and the longer I wait to write and the more events that take place, the more daunting the prospect feels.

To put the last several months in summary, I've been in the shop a lot. I've built quite a number of bikes, some elaborate and decorative, some simple and straight-forward, all utilitarian to one degree or another. While working away, filing/brazing/grinding/polishing/inventing/deconstructing and so on, quite a few major events have taken place. It's a good thing there is NPR, and that Maggie keeps me somewhat up-to-date on current affairs, or I'd be lost in the land of steel. We have a new president. In my eyes, it's not so important that he's African American, although I understand that this is a huge cultural step for America. What's even more important is that he's intelligent, and he seems to have a system of values that include (rather than preclude) making peoples lives better. He's not war-mongering. He's interested in helping us, as a nation, to take responsibility for our future rather than living like a narcissistic, muddled adolescent, full of trash and anger and apathy. It's been so long since I've had any faith in our government stepping up to the role of acting "for the people" that I find myself ambivalent, untrusting, and generally hesitant about giving in to having faith in the new administration. Obama has been put into a huge mess of difficulties, and it will probably take much longer than he has in office to make any sort of real dent in the problems that are here now, but we all have hope that we can at least get started in a better direction. I, for one, would much rather build bikes than be in his shoes. But I wish him a lot of luck, nonetheless.

One of the factors that's been haunting us all is the sour economy. I've had a lot of people ask me if I've seen the effects of this in my orders. It's hard for me to say. We're well into the slowest season for bikes, in which I usually don't receive too many orders anyway. My lead time is pretty long, as well. I think that, as far as the economy goes, the bike world has been fairly stable. I've had quite a lot of people interested in my bikes, and have gotten several orders over the past months. We'll have to see how things go as we get closer to this next cycling season.

One difference that I am noticing is the type of bicycles that people are interested in getting from me. There is definitely a lot more interest in the general purpose, utilitarian bikes, including commuters, Randonneuse, light touring, and fully loaded touring bikes. This is a direction that I've always leaned, which is why I got into building custom bikes and especially custom racks in the first place. I really love a good mountain bike, but I consider this a second bike. The first bike, or the bike I would want to have if I could only have one, would definitely be a general purpose touring bike that would accommodate racks, fat tires and fenders. It's a bike I could ride all year, it would carry anything I'd need it to carry, and could be stripped down for faster, lighter day trips, or could be taken on the trails for some non-technical and quiet out-of-town riding.

With this in mind, I move on to this years' North American Hand Made Bicycle Show in Indianapolis, Indiana, from 27 February through 1 March. That's at the end of this week, in case you weren't paying attention. Because of it's location, and some of the politics that revolve around the show, there are quite a few of the west coast builders who won't be in attendance. It was very lucky for me this past year that the show was here in Portland, within about 10 blocks from my shop. I do think it's a good thing that the show goes on the road, so that builders can present their wares to a different audience each year. I look forward to seeing the work of builders from the midwest and the east. Now that I've gone through the process of getting everything in order for the show, and working out the details of shipping, travel and accommodations, I fully understand why many of the builders from the midwest and east were unable or unwilling to travel across the country to show their bikes. It's expensive. It's requires a lot of time. There are so many worries involved in having bikes shipped; hoping they arrive undamaged; hoping they arrive at all.

Thanks to the initiative and organization of Sacha and Scott at Vanilla Bicycles, some of the local Portland builders have gone in on having our bikes shipped on pallets in the back of a truck. This past Friday the truck came by the shop to pick up our pallet, and there was quite a scare involved. The driver showed up and, within the first minute of being there got his finger lodged in a latch at the back of the truck. It nearly tore off the end of his finger, and as it was it looked like he would need quite a few stitches. We gave him some bandages and some time to clean it up and asked him several times if he needed to call someone else so that he could go to the hospital, but he declined each time, saying he'd be alright. He said he'd called to chew-out his boss for giving him a defective truck, something about the lift not working properly.

When it was time to load the pallet, three of us helped him, and it's a very good thing we did. He pulled the pallet onto the lift with a pallet jack and I noticed that the truck was parked on a slant so that it was listing heavily to one side, but thought that he know what he was doing so didn't say anything. Once the pallet was on the lift he started raising it and the whole thing shifted precariously. As the lift came even with the truck bed he started pulling on the jack and the whole lift suddenly dropped about 6 inches. There was only a small part of the pallet on the truck bed so the entire load tipped and nearly fell on top of Mitch, Mike and I, who were standing on the ground trying to keep the thing upright. We stood there physically holding our pallet upright, while Mike grabbed a couple of pry bars, which we wedged under the pallet to support it. The driver started cussing at the lift and tried to raise it again and the wheels on the pallet jack got lodged between the lift and the truck, so the lift couldn't go up anymore. Only after grabbing a cro-bar and prying the wheels of the jack free we were able to raise the lift and get the pallet on the truck. It was all very bad, and very scary. He very nearly dumped our pallet on our heads, or in the street, which would have destroyed at least 2 of our bikes. Then he joked about how it looked like he gave us a scare, and that we must at least have a couple or 3 thousand dollars worth of stuff on the pallet. When I told him it was more like 25 thousand he became quiet. I don't wish ill will on the driver, but I do think there were some bad judgement-calls made on his part.

As you can imagine, this did nothing to instill any confidence in me that our bikes are going to arrive in Indianapolis undamaged. My only hope is that this is the worst that any of our bikes are going to see for the entire trip. I'll be relieved only when I get there and see the condition of things.

I am excited for the show. I've been to quite a few of these, and it's always good to see what other builders come up with, and to talk with people about what I do. I've not built a bike for anyone within 500 miles (at least) of Indianapolis, so I'm excited to have a whole new group of people see what I can do. I really enjoyed attending the show in Portland, but I felt like most people here knew who I was, and what sort of work I do, and many had surely seen a bike or two that I'd built. It'll be good to have something tangible, something more than pictures on the internet, that people can experience and touch and walk around and ask about. I also feel it's important for people to be able to talk with the builders, discuss the possibilities, and see how great a custom bicycle can be. This is how bicycle dreams really get rolling. It can be very inspirational.

I'm not showing any pictures of what I'll be taking to the show at this time. It's something of a surprise. But I do have to say that I'm excited about the bikes I'm taking. I've incorporated a couple of elements that I've not yet tried, and I think they came out really well. If you're in the area and are able to attend the show, you really ought to stop by. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

I intended to keep this blog entry fairly short, but I see that I've run on for quite a while. There is a lot more to say, but I've got to finish getting ready to go. I'll try and get another post up soon, so that I don't have to ramble quite so long.

Hello! I'm going to be in Virginia from the 4th to the 14th of June. There's a vintage bicycle show there, the Cirque du Cyclisme, from June 6th through the 8th. After the show I'll be going for a short tour (about a week) to experience some of the beautiful countryside by bicycle. I'll be back in my shop on the 16th. Cheers! Joseph

It’s been a while since I last added a blog entry. I sometimes wonder if anyone really reads these things, but I get periodic reminders from people that actually they do. As you can imagine, a lot has happened since the last entry. I think the only thing that hasn’t really changed here is the weather. Which is to say that here in Portland, Oregon it’s still basically acting a lot like winter. It’s still cold and rainy most days, with only the rarest glimpses of sunshine. And, yes, this has become something of a sore point with me, and I can imagine it’s the same with quite a lot of others living here. It’s almost the middle of May, and we’re all hoping for some hint that spring has arrived and that summer is maybe right around the corner. I guess it’s true that things are starting to bloom and you can smell flowers when riding around town. But damn I’m tired of my cold weather gear, and really tired of all my rain gear that smells like stale old socks. But enough of that. Fortunately there are some optimists around me that keep claiming the sun is going to come out soon and stick around for a while. I hope they’re right, but have my doubts.

Recently, there was a Good Man who left Portland, apparently for all time. Mike Muzik took off in a van, headed back east where he’s from. For quite a few years Mike worked as a bike mechanic at the (self proclaimed) Death Star bench at River City Bicycles. He also helped me out at my shop here and there from the very beginning of my frame building career. He was there when I was starting out in the one-car garage that I shared with yard tools and a stack of fire wood.



Together we drank the 12-pack of cheap beer, the box of which became the template for the very first “Half Rack” that I built. After the first 12-pack was empty, we had to go get another one, because an empty box doesn’t have the same specs as a full one, and the rack needed to be built with exactitude, both in regards to size and stability. The whole process became very confusing. But in the end we prevailed, our session of R & D resulted in one of the most popular styles of racks I’ve built.

I’ve had a lot of fun hanging out and working with Mike over the years. He’s one of the best bike mechanics I’ve known, one of the most meticulous and the most ethical. He always had some goofy, witty comment to make, and he was never short on Good Ideas. He’s one of the most golden-hearted humans I’ve ever met, and more than anything, he is a great friend. As much as I’ll miss his company, I also understand that sometimes a life change is needed, and that when it’s time to go, it really is time to go. Fare thee well my friend. Lucky for me, I’ll be heading out east in about a month for the Cirque du Ciclismo in Virginia, so we’ll get to hang out again.



To offset the recent departure of my good friend Mike Muzik is the even more recent return of my good friend and love Ms. Michaels. She’s been off in India for the past 8 months (!), just having arrived back this past week. She’s been traveling around eating mangos and dhal and studying yoga, and is understandably in something of a state of bliss. Her hair’s all sun-washed blonde, her skin is dark, she chants strange words in the morning, smiles a lot, even though she’s somewhat mystified by all the cars and the price of food in America. There are no cows wandering around, no street vendors selling just about anything you can imagine, Bollywood films are very hard to come by, everything here is so neat and orderly and the people don’t smile nearly so much as in India. But, one thing she does have is her really nifty bicycle, which, when she rides causes her to smile so much that the first insects of the year get caught in her teeth. It’s very cute, and I’m really glad she’s back.



Now, on to business. After the North American Hand Made Bicycle Show here in Portland this year, the PDC (Portland Development Commission), working with the Port of Portland, decided to put up a display of hand made bicycles at the Portland airport. The display has 12 or so bikes, all made by Oregon builders. You can read more about the display at bikeportland.org. This is a really cool thing; that we, as bicycle builders, are being recognized by the city of Portland as an important part of the culture and economy of the city and state, enough so to warrant this sort of public display. The display will be up for about 6 months, and an estimated 3 million people will pass by and have the opportunity to check it out. So if you’ll happen to be flying into Portland over the next few months, you ought to make your way to concourse E to see it. I haven’t flown anywhere since the display was set up, and it is on the secure side of the airport, so I haven’t even seen it myself, except for some pictures. You can also watch a short promotional and informational video about the display and the PDC here.



I just received word of another recent piece of publicity from Patrick, a friend of mine who had me build him a bike quite a while ago. Patrick got a devoted single speed 29er, pictures of which are on my website: http://www.ahearnecycles.com/pages/patrickss29er.html

He sent me a picture of his bike, which is shown in the June issue of Mountain Bike Magazine. I think it’s pretty exciting for someone to see their bicycle in a widely circulated national rag. I think the blurb is kind of funny because they head it with “Ahearne Patrick SS 29er,” which makes it sound like my name is Ahearne Patrick. But I’m not complaining. It’s a really cool and unique bike, and press like that can’t be beat.



One of the constant struggles for small independent builders is visibility. None of us has much of a so-called “marketing budget.” In fact, I’d be willing to guess that for a lot of us our yearly gross sales wouldn’t even compare to a percentage of the marketing budget of some of the big-time production bicycle companies. But don’t let that fool you – we may be smaller in the sense that we’re less visible, but we do it way better. It’s like the old Buddhist saying that it’s usually the most vocal ones who have the least to say. Thanks, Patrick, for the link.

A bike I finished recently that I’m pretty excited about is Ken’s green 29er. It’s a straight up fillet brazed frame, uses some really nice, light tubing, has Paragon “sliders” and a really good package of components. Ken is a fairly big guy, quite tall, and he rides hard, getting out on the trail at every opportunity. So far, the word is that he’s really enjoying it, that it climbs and handles better than anything he’s ridden. And, he’s said, with some of the guys he rides with there is definitely some bike envy happening. As a builder, that’s always a pleasure to hear. I wish him many miles of fun this summer, and for many years to come.











A bicycle I’ve put a lot into recently and is nearly finished is Adam Marx’s commuter. This has been a very involved project, since it includes a frame, fork, stem, and a heavy-duty porteur style front rack. Making all these things individually takes quite a lot of time, but in the end it’s so very worth it because it’s all built to work perfectly together, to serve specific needs, and the end result – the complete bicycle – will be far more than the sum of it’s parts, functionally, visually, and most importantly, in the quality of the ride.



Aesthetically, there is no compromise anywhere, front to back, top to bottom. Each part of the bicycle has been built to compliment and enhance the rest. The fork was built to steer with stability even under a load; the rack was built to mimic an older style porteur, and was beefed-up where needed so that it’ll easily carry 50+ pounds, and also has ports for internal wiring to the front light, which runs off the generator hub. The stem was built to accommodate the French style swept back “porteur” bar, and has a boss (the “Dust Stop”) for a single stem shifter and 1 x 9 gearing. The frame has classic style lugs, thinned to a subtle minimum, and has been built with commuter comfort in mind. Strength has been added where necessary to keep the ride stable even when carrying a lot of weight on the front.



We decided to go with the Paul “racer” brakes for strength of braking and the classic style, so the brake bosses are set high and wide, on the outside of both the fork legs and seat stays, and the boss openings were capped with vintage coins (I know, it’s ridiculous; but hey, I’m building the thing, so let me have my fun, as nerdy as it may be…). The bike has fast-back seat stays with an internal seat binder which is almost completely hidden. The components we picked based on function and style, choosing a complimentary mix of the classic and the modern, parts that will work really well for many years to come, and will enhance the overall appearance and theme of the bike.



The finishing touches are nearly complete. I’m very excited to see this bicycle painted and built. And, lucky for me, Adam and I are nearly the exact same size, so that I’ll get to take the bike for a spin when it’s ready and see what it’s really all about. If you have the opportunity to get to Virginia for the Cirque do Ciclismo from June 6 – 8 this year, you’ll be able to see this bicycle in person. You can be sure I’ll post more pictures once this bicycle is painted.



That’s all for now. One of the many optimists around here told me it was sure to be sunny and warm today. I expected rain. Stepping outside now I see that it’s neither sunny nor warm, as I expected. But at least there’s no rain. I can deal with that. I think I’m going to tempt Mother Nature and go for a ride and not take my stinking rain jacket. In fact, I’m going to ride my bike that has no fenders and if I get dumped on I’m going to find the nearest optimist and give them an ear-full. But the funny thing about that is they never seem daunted. They’ll just smile and tell me that the sun will surely be out tomorrow. Sure, OK.

Brethren!

It’s Saturday. I woke up to the sun shining here in Portland and had an overwhelming urge to go for a mountain bike ride. We’ve had a few days of really nice weather, and I’d been feeling the need to get away from town, see the trees and experience the quiet. There are a series of trails only a few miles north of town, near Scapoose, that would do the trick. These trails are on a hilly tract of forest that is, I think, privately owned. They are maintained by some local folks, but I don’t know much about it. I’ve only been out there a handful of times. It’s a kind of playground for mountain bikes. There’s a gated gravel road that goes maybe a mile or two back, and has a whole network of trails that run off into the trees on either side. The loops are short, and many of the trails link into each other, wind around, crossing other trails, so you’re constantly choosing paths to one side or another. It’s a lot of fun. There are some fast parts, short somewhat technical climbs, I saw a few ramps, drops and ladders that people had built, there are a lot of switchbacks – there is a little bit of most everything, at least a taste of it, so that if you’re in Portland and you need a MTB fix, it’s there for you.

I checked out my sorely neglected mountain bike yesterday, put the wheels back in (I use them for dummy wheels on frame builds), dialed in the brakes and shifting, lubed the chain. It’s always fun getting a bike back into order, making it ready to ride. It’s like reacquainting yourself with an old friend you haven’t seen in a while.

One thing about mountain biking that is an issue with me is that for the most part, if you want to get to the good trails, you have to take your bicycle there with you. You have to drive. There are those who are lucky enough to live within a short distance of a trail head, but for most of us, the really good trails are too far away to be that easily accessible. Fortunately, well within a hundred miles of Portland are some of the best trails anywhere. I drove to the trail today, but one consolation is that my car, an old Mercedes wagon, runs off of biodiesel and WVO (waste vegetable oil). Most of this trip was fueled by veggie oil. The exhaust smells like a hamburger and fries, but so be it, I got where I was going and I didn’t fuel a war in the process.

I went out to these trails today because I needed to think. It’s been a couple of weeks since NAHBS, and I’ve been slowly coming off of all that was involved with the show, letting the dust settle. My world had become pretty small. For the three or so months prior to the show I worked a lot, and I mean crazy amounts, trying to attend to all the regular business, and also to make a couple of extra special things. It’s taking some time to decompress, and to reacquaint myself with the rest of the world.

Every year just before the show I think I’ve got a show-stopper, something really great that is going to blow everyone away. That feeling lasts until about the time I enter the hall and start to set up my booth. As I see more and more of the bikes around me I am floored. The builders who go to the show are so very creative, so innovative, and I am amazed at all the great work being done in the name of the bicycle. This brings me back to the planet, gives me a good humbling. There are a lot of folks out there doing really incredible work, and I feel very privileged that I can present my bikes in the same room with them.

This years’ show was a success in most all senses of the word. There was a large attendance, somewhere in the nature of 7100 people came over the three days. This in spite of the (in my opinion, and, I think in the opinion of many others) outrageous cost to get in the door. Having paid as much as I did for my booth I had the obviously ill-conceived notion that this was to cover the rental of the convention center, and many of the other expenses involved.

I go to this show each year because it is a way to make what I do visible to whoever might be interested. The high cost at the door serves to limit the attendance only to those who are really very interested in bikes. This suddenly cuts out a large portion of the people who I really want to see attend, mainly, those who may like bicycles but maybe aren’t living a bicycle lifestyle; people who ride on the weekends and enjoy going to bike shops but don’t really know more than what they’ve seen from Trek, Specialized and the rest. These are the folks I really want to attend the show because I think we, as bicycle builders, as crafts people, will knock their socks off, will give them an education in bicycles that they didn’t even know they needed. I guess that what I’m saying is that I’m not only interested in showing my bicycles to bike-people. I want converts; I want people to come to the show and look at all the amazing things there and say, “My God! I had no idea that a bicycle could be like this!” We, as frame builders, are setting the bar so far above what is available in most bike shops, and most people don’t even know it. The people who do know it are the only ones willing to pay so much to get into a hand made bicycle show. Most of those who don’t know what they’re missing aren’t going to pay $18 to see it, and so they’re still missing it. That’s a bummer. I have a lot more to say on this subject, but I’ll reserve the really fiery part of this for another day. For now, I’ll get off the soap box.

At this years’ show I received the award for “Best City Bike.” I consider this a great honor, especially considering that this year the show was in here in Portland, which is one of the best commuter towns in North America. That I’ve won this award for two years running is especially heartening, considering the category for “Best City Bike” as an award possibility was only begun at last years’ show, meaning it’s a category that wasn’t even initially thought worthy of an award. That’s kind of funny to me. Bicycles were made for transportation long before they were mountain bikes or cross bikes or race machines of any sort. And most especially, for custom builders, the commuter presents a vast amount of potential for pushing the limits of the craft, where function is the name of the game, and aesthetic follows suit. I think we're going to start seeing a lot more effort put into building these sorts of bicycles in the future. I certainly intend to keep on building them and continuing to refine what I know. I really enjoyed building Maggie's mixte, which won the award last year. I'll tell the story behind that one some time. It was quite special. And this year, Tony's commuter really caught a lot of attention. I know he's very excited about it.

The race scene began early in the history of the bicycle, and has probably given it the most visibility over the years, but throughout the world, by far the most common bicycle on the road is one that takes a person and their stuff from point A to point B; in one variation or another, the commuter. Granted, here in America we do things a little differently, but I think we’re catching on. If you look through any of the most popular cycling magazines you’ll see that a lot of the talk is devoted to racing bikes, the “newest” technology, the lightest weight, the most plastic, and so on. Fortunately there is a new trend coming. Momentum Magazine, based in Vancouver, BC, is a really good example of this burgeoning awareness of the bicycle as a viable form of transportation. There are a lot of reasons for this, many of them quite obvious. You’ll probably be hearing a lot more on this subject in the near future. You certainly will be from me.

Now that it’s Sunday (no, I haven’t been writing all night, I took a break to eat and sleep) and the sun is again shining, I think it’s a good time to go for another bike ride. Peace, and out.

!!!

Greetings Brethren!

Will you just look at all this new stuff! I've been working my ass off for the past few months to get ready for the North American Hand Made Bicycle Show, and also to put together everything required to for this new website.

On the show side of things, I've got bikes, racks, forks and stems, even a custom made chromoly picture frame. In regards to bikes, there are a couple of design ideas that are new for me. Strange and interesting variations on some older, "classic" ideas. If you can make it to the show, you'll see them there. If not, you'll hear about them soon.

Another bold ray of light shining through this February gloom in Portland, at least in my little world, is this absolutely fantastic new website. Will you take a moment to take a gander? Look at how clean, clear and concise it is. Look at how easy it is to get around. Everything seems so intuitive, so sensible, and it really makes a person want to hang around for a while; click some buttons, view the pictures, read some words; generally learn something. Right? It's great! A really sizable note of appreciation is in order.

I take no credit for any of this. When you're ready to dole out the praise, you need really to give it where it's due, which is to the web guru Julie -- she's the true conductor behind the magic you see here. I'm just the troll in the workshop. She designed everything, and she put it into action. I built some bikes, wrote some words, had some pictures taken. Beyond this I've kept myself mostly to what I know, which has mostly to do with steel. I think she's done a really fine job.

Along with a new website, there's also a blog. You're reading it now. For anyone who paid attention to my old site, you may have at one point or another checked the blog. The first and, I think, last post was somewhere around this time last year. You may have checked once or twice, saw that it wasn't changing, and having assured yourself of how lame a blogger I am, you probably gave up entirely. If you didn't give up, my condolences for your futile persistence. You're right. I was a lame blogger. But the key and operative word here is "was", meaning past tense. Meaning I've vowed to be a better blogger, a better human, a better... everything (this could quickly go too far, but if you keep reading, you may begin to understand).

What does this mean, exactly? It means a lot, to be sure. But for our purposes it means that you're going to have the option, from now on, to read what I have to say. So much happens in my little world, and I may be going out on a limb here, but I suspect that at least a few crumbs of it might be interesting. Though, your level of interest isn't for my speculation. I figure I'll just have to write, and you'll read it, or you won't, and the world will keep on moving, because that's what it does.

Next, the show...