This is the best thread ever!

Many of the foods you have mentioned are ones my mom has made over the years. It's cool to see all the pics Timo, you and your friends look like me and my buddies (other Finns) from high school.

yes. timo's thread

shall we all get together for some sausage soup and freestyle?

hey timo - if i bring my camera and a q-tip box can you set me up?

oh and i like how the one cable matches the pads

Hei Timo,
your country has a new BMXer (she is gonna be dual Nationality, Finnish/English )

meet Emma Alexia Wallace, born 27-07-2007
3.58kg (7lb 8oz)





DINGO

[ July 31, 2007, 03:38 PM: Message edited by: dingobmxer ]

she is sooo cute! what great pics.

hey dingo, how about some pics of her bike?

Congrats Dingo!!!

Dani, you're absolutely right, brownies are perfect aswell as cold milk & freshly baked hot buns. There's nothing like it.
Ok, so you thought the belt alone was snazzy, huh? Check out the buckle, lol!


That's beyond snazzy, its..


Mikko,
i'm happy to hear you find this thread entertaining although it's just random ramblings and occasional obscurities but that's the beauty of it. More finnish "recipies" will be coming soon! You know the first time i saw a picture of you somewhere in freestyle section i immediately thought to myself "i wouldn't be surprised if that guy was finnish". There you go. We finns look more less alike i guess.

Now Dingo..

CONGRATS!! She is cute. Emma, how nice. A traditional finnish name. Awesome photos, when she get's older i bet she appreciates them. Hey, make sure you guys dig out those old Dingo tapes/LPs too for her and play some of the songs! LOL


Maybe you knew this already, but as a curiousity related to finnish history in regard to the name, there was a popular finnish song in the late 20's called "Emma" (commonly more known as "Muistatkos Emma")
At the end of 2nd world war finns had captured bunch of russian guns and nicknamed them Emma's (russian light machinegun M/27 Degtjarev). Here's why; (Quote) "Regardless, Finnish soldiers were very happy about the weapon and nicknamed it as "Emma" after popular Finnish song (with same title), when plate-shaped magazine of this LMG rotated on top of the weapon during shooting just like record in record-player the connection in visualisations is quite obvious."

On a more positive/peaceful note, here's the other of our two drooling toddlers in this end.


Meanwhile, remember y'all..

oh my dear timo. that buckle is beyond snazzy. it's beyond snappy. why it's positively fabu!

hey now! you aren't accusing kati of being a drooler are you? oh wait. nevermind. you were talking about the kitty...

i love that last pic! and where in the world did you find the little dude? he is cool too

Timo- some last names from my home town: Seppala, Havernien, Kumpala, Koskinien, Koskiala, Salmenien, Kotilla, Karjala, Tapio, Markula etc...

You can throw a rock and you will hit a Finn in Menahga MN. I'll have to post some pics (someday) of my trip to Finland. I am trying to talk my parents into another trip over there.

Many thanks guys
BMX Mom I will not be forcing BMX on Emma, she can make her own choice but her first bike is gonna be one of these:-



repainted pink with red parts

Timo
I didnt know about the gun so thanks for that information

I have yet to hear Dingo's music but have heard Lordi and The Rasmus and also some bands at an outdoor festival in Helsinki last summer and they are pretty good to listen to

This thread rocks

DINGO

this is one crazy thread !! keep it going ! LOL !!

and...Dingo, the new baby is a real cutey ! Congrats to you and your wife !

Are you going to MK this weekend btw ?
Matt

Thanks Matt
I can only make Sunday at MK but am packing my stuff already and the bikes are polished up
see ya Sunday
DINGO

cool mate !!

see you there,....i'll have the Quad with me too, knowing you're a big SE fan !!

Yeah, we have everything here.
Teriayaki, sausage soup, Dingo (both of them), Lordi, babies, machine guns, brownies, flatland, Karelian pies, skateboards, diamond belt buckles, drummachines, mathematical geniuses, public transportation timetable (of Helsinki).. you name it, we got it!!

Dingo, that bike's going to be awesome (the Lil' Ripper) dont forget to post pics then when it's done!

Here's a trick called "Bored scuff" from today. It wasn't really my day. But it's great to know that Chicago is where the fun begins so i'm kinda looking forward to that - whenever it does. What kind of fun, i can't say just yet. Fun fun: "Happy station". Ever heard of that?

Version une - basic, front pockets


Version deux - for the advanced, the back pockets


So basically i just wanted to show off to everyone how consistent i am in this trick.

don't forget mohko, hot tea and cocoa, those wacky boombox kids, q-tip boxes, the shack and hedgehogs. for goodness sake! don't forget the hedgehogs!

i heard the fun is scheduled to begin at 2:17. don't be late.

oh which is my favorite? une ou deux? duex ou une? too hard to choose.

Chicago - Where the fun begins What's that all about?

I suggest a new T-shirt: Helsinki - Where the weirdness begins! or Helsinki - Where the sausage soup ends!

lol daniel but perhaps sausage soup is the beginning. or maybe it is the beginning and the end...

wait! the world revolves around sausage soup! that is the key! sausage soup - the answer to all questions.

why is the sky blue? sausage soup

what is at the end of the rainbow? sausage soup

what is gravity? sausage soup

it really makes life quite simple. and tasty...


oh and maybe the deal with chicago is because rockford is right by chicago???

Makes perfect sense with the Chicago theorem Dani. As for the soup, indeed the sausage soup IS the beginning and the end. wow.
I found the shirt couple years ago from fleamarket, a nice lady was selling it, and it looked like it was a souvenir from their US trip. I like it especially because i also like Chicago house/acid-house (music) so to me it's a fan shirt sort of with a funny statement. Wow that went deep.

Sounds like perfect idea Daniel! *diggin up the pans and pots* The soup's starting to cookin up ya brain it seems.

ROAD TRIP!!!

Ok, now you're scaring me.

ok well more accurately it would be a road / air / road / water / road trip i suppose.

Way cool.

I'm now tryin out an experiment with the video link here, hope this works. This is a test.



[ August 04, 2007, 01:08 PM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

i see an image and when i click on it, it takes me to the video i think. i can't watch it on this computer but it does seem to link to it.

mm.. ok, so i suppose it works allright then but it seems the photobucket transforms it into a flash (.flv) file for some odd reason. hmm, maybe i'll just upload it to somewhere else as regular wmv or was it vmw, anyway.

i would imagine it works for others but i can't watch any online videos, not even youtube. my dialup stone tablet just can't handle it.

I was riding yesterday as usual at the ball courts. Some point i noticed there's group of four kids up at the rocks watching me ride. Ok, this has happened before, nothing new. But about 15 minutes later the same crew appears at the side of the court, seemingly getting closer and closer, slowly. It thought "ok, those kids will probably come over and ask me stuff about the bike and riding generally" cool, i don't mind as i'm always happy to explaing about riding & bikes.

And so finally they came over. There was two girls probably around age 6, the third one was really tiny, guessing maybe only two or so a real toddler and the two girls were looking out for him/her, and the fourth was maybe a five year old boy. So they come over and ask just about anything you could imagine and beyond about my bike and about freestyle/flatland riding. They were fascinated by the "weird pegs" (they didn't have a name for them though), the locking buttons on the brake levers (now those were SUPER interesting btw) the gyro and the green brake pads and, and, and, etc. etc.

Basicly everything (in bicyles) was new to them so i explained the best i could (in my friendly kindergarten teacher voice i have for such minors consciously skipping the "too technical" stuff as they would've been bored or confused easily).
Anyway, the little boy in his Skyway-green t-shirt ofcourse wanted to try out the bike (i was on my white Street Beat, my daily rider these days) and so i let him. He was so stoked. At first i walked behind him holding the Grabber seat lightly sort of checking out his skills on a bike and securing if he'd fall but he did ok and was very good for his age actually.
It was funny, he could'nt sit on the seat cause his feet wouldn't have reached the pedals from there as he was so tiny, so he spontaneously sat on the top tube/platform and drove the bike from there (mind you the Street Beat has huge platform so it's actually not that uncomfortable for a kid to sit on it).
He was stoked about the fact that you could turn the bars full 360, thanks to gyro, so next he wanted to try riding the bars backwards which was easier for him cause now he could steer easier. In total i guess he took some four or five test rounds on my St Beat and the bike looked soooo big for him. I think even if he had rode a 16" that would've been too big also. We locked the rear lever quite a few times as that was one of the coolest features he could think on my bike. The he would suggest me some tricks ideas like putting right foot on rear left peg and left foot on the left pedal and roll in that position without hands! I tried it and again he was stoked i could actually do that! At one point he mentioned how the green Skyway FS tuff pads were "pretty ungly" ..cause they were bright green, and i agreed reluctantly.
I also explained when he asked about the large bearings at the end of the handlebars (the homemade "bar end-rollers" for Hitchikers and stuff) but i wasn't sure whether he really understood the idea or not but it was irrelevant at this point. Also the Skyway Grabber seat with the cut-thru handle was very interesting and it was important to have strong chains. He found it cool that he could pedal backwards (freecoaster) while going forward, that was VERY cool feature in such bike. He told me he has "a mountain bike" and how he once flipped over the bars but wasn't hurt. I can't remember how he described the brakes but let's say he was thinking "out of the box" as they say. The girls didn't ask as much but they were also wondering how is it possible to ride on such hard plastic seat and whether my butt hurts afterwards. I told them i'm used to it and i'm okay.

Then as quickly as they had appeared they just left which seems to be very typical for small kids. They don't say bye see ya later, they just - go. But it sure was pretty cool and different 15 minutes at the courts and you got to love their the open mindness and sincereness and the ability to look at things they way we "adults" can't.



More about the recent incidents, well, would you believe if i told you the prime minister of Finland (mr. Matti Vanhanen) looked at my green Street Beat today? No kidding. We were coming home from the shack and i saw him jogging on one of the popular beach walks. You see in Finland it's not unusual to spot some of the politicians on the streets or where ever.

About the discs, it all depends greatly on your chain alignment whether you have it set up in relatively straight line, in which case the paint on the sides of the teeth will last on for a loong time.
But even a slight kink in the alignment and the chain will start eating either side of the disc and scratch off the paint and slicing down the sides of the teeth aswell. The only place where the paint always wears down always is obviously between the teeth.
Thinking about it, i guess the type of chain you have plays a big part too, those newer ones like KMC Z chains have rounded edges on the sides of the plates of the links, therefore it's quieter and also it won't hurt the disc/freewheel/cog teeth sides even if the alignment isn't 100% perfect.

Worst case scenario guaranteed to eat the sides of the teeth on your disc: exaggerated chain tension, mis-alignment, stretched chain.

Ok, please correct me if i'm making up my own here but these should be pretty close to accurate.

The prime minister was too busy joggin so he didn't try out my bike that time, but i know he wanted to! Maybe next time.

Yeah it's funny with kids that age, if something's bothering them they will just ask it up straight the way it is. It's cool.

That chain thing.. not making this one up, it should be exactly like that. The noise could be the sum of many thing like chain being just a little bit too tigh, too dry, non-concentric disc/freewheel/cog, slight misalignment etc.

Unfortunately the prime minister didn't have the time to get my number either this time (i knew he wanted to jam bad). Maybe i'll just have to stalk him on his joggin route.

we saw the President, a red haired lady? in Helsinki one afternoon just walking down the street which was weird for me as our Queen or prime minister could never do that

we had a big old school meeting/festival/race here in the UK this weekend with about a 1000 people there and 60 riders in the os 20" class

a couple of pics of me racing





I managed to eek my way into the A final only to crash

great weekend though and loads more pics on the english os site

you should come next year Timo

DINGO

[ August 06, 2007, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: dingobmxer ]

some show and shine pics:- (my candy blue alloy Quad 3nd in line, best mid-school race)









DINGO

[ August 06, 2007, 03:01 PM: Message edited by: dingobmxer ]

Yeah, our President Tarja Halonen is pretty cool lady so she don't need no body guards.
By the way, did anyone wacth the Late Night with Conan 'O Brien shows while back when he claimed he's a look-a-like with our president? Howbout the special episodes where he actually visited us here in Finland? That was funny.

Hey Dingo thanks for sharing those photos, the event looks like lot of fun! And the bikes.. wow. Me racing huh? That would be something.. as i have never raced in my life but i might just do that one of these days. Watch out you!!

Guess what we had few days ago.. Yep. SAUSAGE SOUP!


My latest project, restoed my home made "FRE3STYLIN FANATICS" (yeah, my one man team) t-shirt cause the paint had faded i bit since i made it. Now looking like brand new again with all the paint dripples and leaking masking-tape-used-as-a-stencil etc flaws lol! But hey, it's genuine home made with love and it has that unique "street cred" to it, don't you think. haha!


Went riding yesterday as usual, here's a sketchy Lawnmover attempt and sporting the other "FF" t-shirt i've made, also now restored to it's full glow with neon colors.


Then it was time for a short pause and some cold drink cause we're boiling up here. It's been 80-something degrees for the past week and counting. Remember our "hot" is different from the "hot" say, in mediterranea or Death valley etc. We're used to the chilly climate and not to this.

ok, i guess the black jeans aren't helping.. i'll admit.

Then i felt somewhat refreshed and went on.


We were at the shack with Kati on thursday, it was hot just like it is now and we went for a swim. Well Kati swam, I just had our small inflatable boat with small paddles looking like a sea captain and Kati was floating around, swimming occasinally with me on the the inflatable beach mattress/raft (is that the correct word for this thing? i have no idea)

Anyway, i was rowing the boat and Kati held on to a rope that's attached to it. We went pass the nearest small rocky island (we're talking about couple hundered meters here, not farther than that by no means) and just foating around cause the weather was warm and sunny. Whenever there was a motor boat passing we'd rock on its waves to see if we'd tip over, we didn't though. Then we were heading back to shore and *snap* ..the right paddle broke in two.
No problem really, but trying to row with just single paddle and the boat will go nowhere but just spin in circles in one spot (there's no keel in the bottom obviously). Not good as we weren't exactly near the rocks either and there was boats going pass in a distance. So, Kati had to paddle (rescue) us both back to the rocks using his arms while i was holding on to the raft. I must admit we were just tiiiny bit worried for a second or two but fortuntely there's no strong currents in these waters. Otherwise we would've probably been out there in the open sea, lol!

It turned out the other paddle (both are made of hard plastic with inside threaded joints) had broken just at the end of the inner threads. I guess i was either rowing too hard or the paddles were simply crap. Anyway the boat in all only cost about $3 so what can you expect. We're making new ones the next time out of old kayak paddles, so those should last for a long time.
Here's the boat i'm talking about. Kati floating.


We're such sailors.
hmm maybe i should take this with me on the boat the next time as a precaution..


[ August 11, 2007, 05:32 AM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

go dingo go! did you have some kind of secret weapon? in that second pic it looks like there are spikes on your front tire. congrats on the win for the quad.

love the shirts timo!

death valley is a very interesting place. i remember the salt flats and the painted valley or something like that. real temperature extremes too. i remember one time when we went camping there my oldest cousin decided to be a man and sleep out on the picnic table. he got darn cold that night. his shaving cream even froze. he didn't do that the next night

kati looks like she is having fun but you know timo, i wouldn't think that paddles made of crap would do very well in water... unless perhaps they were petrified. yeah. that might work.

Thanks.
Cool story about the death valley, shaving cream froze? wow. But why did he sleep on the table and not like on the ground or in a tent?

Okay, you got me, we're making wooden paddles next.

yo timo! where you be? what's shakin' at the shack?

What's shakin' at the shack huh?
Currently, the hammer:


We're putting together a new outdoor toilet. The old one (on the back right) will be transformed into an outdoor shower. I guess, but that's not up to us. Yesterday we finalized the new one with the base planks for the roof with my Father while Kati was handing us the planks and holding her patented nail-carrier which looke dlike a periscope of a submarine. Still need to add the protective weather proof coat and the actual roof panels and we're done.

Here's some more along the way.

Hard labour all day and no fun ..while "some people" are just having casual fun snapping photos like these, oh the nerve of things You know we (Kati and Me) had to take the walls apart completely two times cause we hadn't read the instructions careful enough at first, lol! We just rushed in to get it built fast and then realized "hmmm.. there's too many parts here, how is that possible?!" scratching our heads. We completely forgot the hatch (just like the one at "Lost") which should be on the back. Forunately we didn't have to blow up anything to get one made. Oh and we didn't tell my Father until later, LOL! We're such construction workers.. Oh well you live and learn i guess.


Testing the strength ..of the top beam.


Having a break as usual. You got to have food!


At the roof of the old toilet. Now if something's shaking it must be this. It felt as if it would just collapse under me. We'll have to think again about the shower converting plans if it's too rotten. Looks like a warm weather doesn't it? Well it was crazy windy which made the weather extremely chilly.


Father in the middle on setting the planks.


We wouldn't be in Finland unless there's a photo of a person talking on the cellphone. A Nokia cellphone. The finnish national scenery, traditional wooden house and a cellphone. Just lovely.

In all it was all good fun and we all had a great time. But the REAL fun starts when somebody's got to empty the old toilet and move the bowl..

[ September 04, 2007, 05:38 AM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

if i had taken a wild stab about what you were next going to post about i would never in a million years have come up with outhouse building. lol. good stuff. say who is peeking in the first pic? your dad?

[QUOTE] But the REAL fun starts when somebody's got to empty the old toilet and move the bowl../QUOTE]
eeewwww how do you decide who is going to get that nasty job? rock, paper, scissors?

Nice work Timo. Looks like a great place to sit and read a book! lol
At least your dunnys (aussie slang for outhouse) don't have Redback spiders under the seats!

Dani, yes that's the Dad peeking in there aka "the construction site supervisor" to see we weren't slacking. Emptying the bowl.. well, it's voluntary so whoever wants to be first can do it whenever feel like it. But usually it's the same people every time for some reason, unfortunately. Til then, "three feet high and rising" or what was that Dela Soul tune.

Coasty, cheers. Your're right but during construction there were dozens of these dudes creeping and sleeping in the plank piles:


*shivers*

[ September 05, 2007, 03:42 PM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

congrats on 1000 posts timo!

*gasp* that much already..?! sheesh. I remember when it was just couple hundreds.

Well, thanks! So my thousandth post was about emptying a toilet bowl and a subtle side note about my spider-phobia particularly for the long legged ones, lol! Not too glorious stuff for 1000th huh? haha!!

Hmm.. let's see if this 1001:st is any better. Although i've always liked the figures with something-and-one better anyway *excuses, excuses*

For the 1001:st let me show one of my pencil drawings from the past, from 1996 to be exact, with bunch of fictionary people hanging around in our apartment, one of them holding the TB-303 for discussion.
There's our old brown office cabinet we used as a clothes drawer with my Mother's old bowling pin she once won on top of it, the sleeping space with a hippy 90's techno-era fractal poster on the back wall and the curtains halfway aside mounted with a (invisible) steel wire and the big light sphere that i found from fleamarket around '93 or 94 hanging on the ceiling (still is). One of the imaginary guys on the left is sitting on one of our of our old lowered dark green couch chairs we found from salvation army's shop just when we had moved in together with Kati. We carried those couches by foot from the shop to our place. The frame was made of styro-foam so they weighed nothing but we must've looked a bit like Dani's avatar only with much bigger mushroom-shaped "helmet" on top of us, haha! There's the white wool rug also from slavation army's shop, that probably cause us both asthma but we liked the looks until we really had to get rid of it. Oh, almost forgot the tall stool with the traffic sign to sit on. Good times, and even better memories.


[ September 06, 2007, 05:29 AM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

wow timo! one heck of a 1001th post. i would love to see more of your drawings. you are one multi-talented guy you are.

THanks Dani!

Here's some old quick scratchings from the early 90's. Someting i've made on whatever piece of paper available at the time.
This one is called "comfort the lame" (with custom parts) from '91. In those days i was making all sorts of custom parts for my bike, still am. Guess this would've been my ad in a magazine. Or not.


Next up a rough sketch with a camera guy and a reporter thru a frame from '94. I worked a year in a art museum/gallery in 1994-1995, this was something i made in one of those days behind the counter when there's no one visiting the museum.


"What is it?" from '92. A too fresh sphere. I was in my own world in those days. guess i still am.


Ok, i think i can say i know quite much about drawing a person as in physics/anatomy and proportions but with this i was inspired by a tiny pic in a dictionary book of a composer whose name i can't remember. An old guy from way back. Anyway in all it's sketchiness i like this image in some strange way because it's so bad. It became a "self portrait" of me programming my drum machines sometime around '96 or '97.


T

[ September 09, 2007, 04:24 PM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]

Ok..
It's the return of "Timo's Freestylin' Food Recipes"!
This one is called the "Oky Doky Oat Meal Porridge" that'll keep you rolling for a while whether you're going out to ride or to work or where ever. By default, i'm assuming everybody likes oat meal right? RIGHT?
It's a healthy breakfast that provides lots of energy and fibers for the whole day, or atleast half the day, depending how energy consuming stuff you're up to.

Ingredients:

Water
Oat meal flakes
Salt
Butter
Grinded Cinnamon & sugar (additional)

Turn the heat on and take a small pot, pour in some 3cm of water (roughly a little over an inch or more depending how hungry you are) and a whee bit of salt cause the oat meal itself doesn't taste like much.

Before the water starts to boil pour in some oat meal flakes while constantly stirring the water. You don't wish for a lumpy oat meat now do you?

Don't pour too much all at once cause once the flakes expand & heat starts to effect suddenly there will be more oky doky oatmeal than you will ever expect.

Keep stirring until the oats start to cook and form a porridge. Now is the time to turn down the heat to minimum and add that tea spoon of butter for the taste.

If the porridge gets too sticky, add some more water, turn down the heat and keep stirring. You will want a smooth & flexible composition, not a bowlful of gray sticky concrete ..mmkay?

Once you feel the oky doky is done and you're ready to eat pour the stuff into a bowl and serve with grinded cinnamon/sugar mix or just with sugar, whichever you prefer. You may also add a tiny piece of butter on top if you want for that slaty and sweet balance. Nam nam!

Have a glass of orange juice and a slce or two of whole grain (dark) bread and yourrready to go!

A public service announcement brought to you by Timo's Freestylin' Food Recipies.

[ September 11, 2007, 06:06 AM: Message edited by: 2FRESH ]