Nobody Panic - How to E-Bike

Episode Date: March 21, 2023

Tessa has become London's premier E-biker. She constantly arrives late, dripping in sweat and needs you to walk with her to the designated parking spot so she doesn't get a fine, BUT she is very enthusiastic about the whole idea. Stevie has questions. Subscribe to the Nobody Panic Patreon at patreon.com/nobodypanicWant to support Nobody Panic? You can make a one-off donation at https://supporter.acast.com/nobodypanicRecorded and edited by Naomi Parnell for Plosive.Photos by Marco Vittur, jingle by David Dobson.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/nobodypanic.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/nobodypanic. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Carriad. I'm Sarah. And we are the Weirdo's Book Club podcast. We are doing a very special live show as part of the London Podcast Festival. The date is Thursday, 11th of September. The date is 7pm and our special guest is the brilliant Alan Davies. Tickets from kingsplace. It's coming to London. True on Saturday the 13th of September. At the London Podcast Festival. The rumours are true. Saturday the 13th of September at King's Place. Oh, that sounds like a date to me, Harriet. Zoom, zoom. There she goes. Wush, wish. Oh, she's stopped. It's just saying, whoosh, whoosh. Zoom.

On your bike. She's off. There she blows. On her bike. On her e-bike. There she go. Electric bikes. That's the topic of today's Nobody Panic,

which is the podcast. That felt like an open sort of spoken word piece. We should get on the spoken word circuit. Yeah, I think it needs us. I think so. We're clamoring for us to get on there. Clearly very good at it. This is a podcast.

We do how to. this was not really a planned one, was it? It was just that I was like, oh, I want to know more about electric bikes. And Tesla arrives, you'll notice maybe every fourth episode of this podcast, there'll be a reference to a chaotic entrance that Tesla has made,

which will make you feel like that's every fourth time we record. But we do record four episodes of session. So essentially what happens is the electric bike, sort of careers in the front, and there's always like a, you'll be like, oh, it's the best thing ever, and it's so great. But then I'm always like, but is it, is it stressful? And I have so much admiration for the concept of using one.

And I may be moving somewhere that it would be helpful if I did use one, but I don't understand them at all. Wonderful. And was like, well, who do I have? Who could possibly, ding ding, ding! There she is. Oh, the electricity kicked out years ago. I've just been dragging it with my own head.

Okay. Ask her about it. Oh, dear. Yes, I do. It is efficient? It is going to, is it you who said, it might be Amy Annette, you relate to me that you'd say something like, oh, I don't know anyone who uses those things. And Amy had said, I think Tesla does quite a lot.

And you'd go on, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, that does. It seems like the most chaotic way to travel I can possibly imagine. It's the least me way to travel, because I need to, everything to be exactly on time, although they are very, very stressed. But yes, the most to you. And also, as well, like, a bit of fun. Like, you always like to ride the bus because you're like, I like, I like,

to look out the window. I do love to look out the window. You'd get on the bus like Soho and rather than get home in maybe 45 minutes, you'd be like, yeah, it's an hour and a half, but I got to look out of the window. It's nice. I do, no, an hour is my cap. Fine, that's right. But I will choose, and some people, I know will agree wholeheartedly, and some people will be disgusted by this.

I would choose single journey, no change 20 minutes longer over multiple change. I fully. I fully agree. A little sit. Depending on what I'm, I think, depending on what you're doing. Oh my God. If I'm late, obviously, I will. A single journey and I'll be a journey. Thank you so much.

No, obviously, I've got somewhere to be. But if I'm not under rush to go home, a little sit. Oh, yeah, because then you can just bed into your scenery. That's the thing. You're in, you're sitting, you're reading your book, you're looking, you're making chats. Who knows? You're making jokes. You've got the whole top deck rolling on their sides. Yeah.

Rolling on their sides, that's not the phrase, is it? Gooby. So we're going to talk about electric bikes. Yes, we are. And before we do that, what is your adult thing this week? My adult thing. About, I don't know, a few months ago, I don't know when it will have come out on the podcast series of chronology. But we talked about OLLio, the OLLIO app, which is the kind of free app that I was like, oh, there's many, you know, people always say like, oh, you know, Shpok is amazing.

Or like, eBay, you can sell stuff. And whenever I try and sell stuff on eBay, I can't. And whenever I go on Shpok, it's like, yeah, it's actually quite good. But then, like, sometimes there's not anywhere near you or you can't find something. Olio is like, literally, you Olio it. And then a woman just turns up immediately and it's like, at your door just to collect it. And she's Olios, is she? And she's just somebody who is on Olio who has gone like, oh yeah, I'm nearby.

I'll just come and go. I just like she was a, you know. She's a Jenny Ollio. Jenny Ollio. And she just goes, hello, welcome to the app. But yeah, it's absolutely wonderful. And I helped my sister move to Australia. I didn't really help, but I was there for like a bit.

And she was Ollowing stuff as it was happening, as she was moving out. And it was great. and I then became quite so we got sort of told to leave our rental that we're in and I was very stressed about it was very horrible and very distressing we couldn't find it anywhere else and my way of like regaining control

in a place where I felt like I had no control was I just started ollio week and I couldn't stop so I started to ollio things that I wanted and wanted to keep things that weren't mine stuff that was the dogs that was actually quite useful to have and, you know, like, so suddenly the camp bed had been oleode

and my parents were coming to stay and they don't have enough to stay and it was like, why have you given that to a man? But I just like became obsessed with it. And my adult thing is that I realised my obsession and I've now stopped. Gosh. What a roller coaster? Yeah, big roller coaster. Because I think I was like, basically you can get addicted to the feeling.

I was popular internet and television and elsewhere comedian Alistair Green does his funny sketches online and he's always got this backdrop that's like a flat with no with like white walls and nothing on them and I went for lunch with them and I was like so do you have a room or a wall with nothing on it I was like no my whole flat doesn't have anything in it

I've only got like one possession it's like an ornament everything else is go straight into the charge shop and I was like good Lord he's like you get addicted to it and I'll never get to do it I got it the rush of being like oh my god it's gone and I've got some space

was too much and I if I'd have continued I would have had no possessions and I would have essentially stolen my partner's possession. I started to... I'm really glad for you. Yeah.

It's a really interesting turn that I wondered, is it age? Is it just happening? Is it coming for us all? Which I too have started to be like, let it go. Be free. Get it all gone.

That's interesting. I too have started to simply be like, let it go. Oh great. Okay, so it's not just... I think it must be an age thing. Maybe. Or it's looking at as well.

I think maybe there's something in when you see because my partner doesn't have what way of saying this my partner doesn't have any parents my partner's parents both passed away and he had to like do out all of their stuff and the amount of stuff was astonishing and it was a very emotionally difficult thing

about being like all this stuff just all goes and in the end it's not about the stuff it's about the person and so when they're when they're alive and when they're living in it's like great and they've got this attachment but actually a lot of this stuff they didn't give a shit about It just sort of had.

And I sort of feel that Alistair put it very well. He was like, the less stuff I have, the more I'm able to focus on like work and creativity. And it's very funny because he's not that sort of person. So he sounded suddenly like Steve Jobs, but he's really not like that, obviously.

But it was very, I was like, that's too far for me. But I completely understand that feeling of being like, it's like the always wearing the same clothes all the time. So you don't have to like get up and go. And I've started doing that. I wear like,

I've got four tracks. it's somewhere I'm one now. I just rotate them all the way through unless I'm doing something specific that I have to dress up for because it's so nice just to get up and be like, shower, those clothes. Those are the clothes I don't have to think. Well, I quite often return to something that your partner, the shadow shared with me about your choosing to live in very close to the Millennium Dome. He was obsessed. I was obsessed in a Millennium Dome. It made him feel like he was on the moon. Yep. He loved it genuinely. Yeah. He loved it. Genuinely. Yeah. He loved the O2, by the way. Sorry, the O2. Sorry. He lived in the O2. More recently as in the last 20 years.

Sorry, he lived up the Millennium Dome at the turn of the century. We don't live there anymore. We don't have there anymore. But at the time he was obsessed with the Millennium Dome and he was obsessed and he lived in there, I would thought was very white, very, you know, very little, what's the word I'm searching for? Sanitized, like, not much culture there. It's just rubbish. No, it's like a new build, very new build, relatively sterile, like, you know, just like clinical, crisp lines,

not a lot of character or bits or stuff. Is it independent bakeries? No independent bakeries. And I was like, what about it about this area? Is it that attracts you? Yeah, there's no character here. There's no character in here. And you seem quite a characterful person.

And he said that that is exactly what does appeal to him. And in London, in a place that asks so much of you, here is something that demands nothing. And allows you to be whoever you would like to be. And I think about it quite a lot of being like, yeah, if your house is covered in all the stuff, you know, how can you... How can you function? How can you function? Yeah, because we're moving from... a new build, another new build situation

into a, potentially, like, is a very old building again. Oh, wow. And already it's stressful thinking about it because it's like, oh God, on top of everything, like the bathroom's a bit janky or like, I don't know, there might be a draft or that. Whereas in new builds, you're just like,

everything is literally fine. Yeah. Nothing. Everything works. You're fine. But yes. But you must not go too far like I did. I think I was like dragging a chair out.

And he was like, you can't give the chair. What will we sit on? What will you sit on in your office? I was like, I don't need to sit on anything. It was like, okay, no. And then I got a bad review on OLLIV because I didn't give the chair that I'd said away. But look, I needed a chair.

What a journey. Yeah. I think I've spoken for 45 minutes. Where else could you take a journey on a bicycle? Hang on. What's your adult thing? My adult thing is that I agree with you. Oh my God.

Your level of adult things the last few weeks have been astonishing. The bar is pinnabino or high. It might have been too deep. It's like, oh, oh. And then yours are like, sorry, you put a bit of chocolate in your bag, you arrived or you agreed with me. Great.

You know what I'm bringing. Look, that I'm happy and I agree. I agree with you. I support you. I really enjoyed your adult thing. That's my other thing. Thank you. It was very long.

Okay. The journey, please, will be the e-bike, because in this new place I'm going to, the journey to him from the tube station, bit too far. A little bit of a. scary road. I was like, oh, I could walk there, but I'll just never walk in the dark. That's why no sense. Scary Babadook or scary motorway? Not scary motorway, just too quiet.

Too quiet. Yeah, so scary in, in, scary more pennywise. They are the three scares. Motorway, Babadook or Pennyway. So the three scares, which will you choose? So it was not, because if it was motorway, I wouldn't even be considering the e-bike. No. It's a main road for a bit, a little tiny bit, and then it's like three increasingly more quiet and isolated roads until you get to a nice park. And that's lovely. But like, it was just, when I was walking back in the dark, I was like, this is fine. This is, oh, oh, no. Maybe. And maybe it's lovely. Maybe it's not.

And then someone whizzed past on an electric scooter that was like a lime bike one. And I was like, that's what I should do, that or a bike. So I would, but I think bike more because you can't, I don't really understand what a scooter race. So I really wanted to know about it. Please, do you have a beginning question? What is it? I don't understand any element of how it works. I don't understand how, for example, I mean, obviously we're going to be talking about many different types of electric bike, I'm sure.

But the ones that I've noticed are, well, there was the classic Boris bike situation. And then, and that is, I understand that because it's like, oh, you take it from, it's, It's port and you drive it to another port. Okay. And that's where it charges. Whereas this one, the Lyme one, seems to be like, this is all a bike in the road. You pick it up, you scan it, and then it doesn't matter.

Who's charged it? We'll never know. You get on it, and then you just throw it over your shoulder when you're finished. I don't understand how that works. Okay. Let us begin. Thank you. So, to begin with the charging question.

So obviously they are visually, an electric bike looks exactly like a normal bike. They have a slightly bigger, I'm going to use the word crossbar. Okay. and why not? She means wheel, but... No, she doesn't. I know what you mean. I'm joking. I know what you mean. Yeah, they just look like a bicycle, exactly like the borough spikes, except they have an electric motor within them. So you are zooming along. If at this point you're like, no, no, no, no, I cannot stress enough how they don't go that fast.

It's not necessarily a speed thing. And I'm overtaken constantly. Right. You can go slow in it? Absolutely. You are still pedaling. It's just that you're doing less work. you, it's sort of, the momentum is sort of taking you along. So you, even though I've traveled quite a large, I've traveled several miles sometimes to get here, but I'm out of breath sometimes when it's gone awry, which will move to.

But when it's gone well, I'm just, I'm like, oh, dizzler. Whereas when people overtake me on their regular bikes, everyone's dripping in sweat and they're going the same. So I say you're going the speed of a fast bicycle. Yes. But not Tour de France style. I certainly. You didn't think so.

No. Understood. and certainly not motorbike style. But some people, when they say about it, some people are very scared and they don't want to go on them because they're like, well, how fast is it? You know? And it's going to shoot off and just take this, you know.

And some people who have tried them are like, no, it sort of shot off. But I swear to God it doesn't shoot off. And if you don't pedal like it isn't going to go anywhere. So you do have to do the work. But just nowhere near. It's like being taken along by a wind or something on your bicycle. It's just doing not the work for you.

So there are three. currently companies in London, more will come and go. The big ones are lime, human forest and Tia, like T-I-E-R. And the charging question is they charge at night. So somebody comes around at night. Wow, someone's jobs are just going like charge all. Yeah. So somebody's job is to go get them, charge them up and put them back in more central hubs.

Oh, so if you leave it somewhere, so say I was like cycling from the tube station to my house and I let it outside my house to be like, well, I'll just get on it tomorrow. Someone will have taken it. Yes, it might be there, but it might not have lasted the night with its charge. It might have done. And so people, not always are they all get collected.

So sometimes they are there the next day. But by and large, they probably are collected, taken to the charging hub and then left in more central locations outside tube stops. So sometimes if you commute in the morning, you'll see like a long line of them parked, ready to go at the tubes. So the nice thing about them is you just get them on your app

and you attach a debit card to it and then it has an unlocking fee. Some of them have got different things. You can get like a £5 monthly pass and you don't have to pay an unlocking fee depending how much that you use them. Like maybe a 50p to unlock it. Oh, right, that's really cheap.

Wait for it. And then between 10 and 20 pence you're charged by the minute basically. Okay. So a 10 minute journey, a pound. That's fine. And the thing about loving thing about human forest, is firstly they plant a tree for however many people who sign up to it.

So they're really doing a sustainable good thing. And it's free for the first 10 minutes. So if you're just going, as I am, my tube is also too far to walk. If you're just going there to the tube, you know, in and out, free journey. Oh, and you're away. What if there's not one near your house? Great questions. And here we are.

They are getting increasingly more common. So get yourself the apps, see what's available in your area. And when you go to the app, just show them app and it just shows you where they all are. in the vicinity. Absolutely. Let's get it up for you to see.

Oh my God. This is great. It's like the Lime app or the human forest of the tier app. Is TIR Uber? They probably are all owned by the same people.

Oh my gosh, there's so many. Yeah. Well, we are in Zone 1 of London Town. Are they in other cities like Manchester and New Liverpool and stuff?

So Manchester have got something called Vivo, I believe. So if I'm wrong, Manchester. Birmingham also had its own one. So lots of cities I've been to have got, have got their own brand. Lime seems to be pretty UK wide, but they are getting, I would say, even, I only started bicycling in lockdown. I'd never been on a bicycle before. Sorry, I rephrase. I hadn't even on a bicycle in London

before. I can bicycle, but I'm not nature's most competent. And I thought, probably not for me, actually. But lockdown's a great time to start because no car. Of course. So I would go crazy for the bites and I used to bike from my house. I used to bikele from my house all the way to Buckingham Palace. You know, I was going around and around the mall. I was going up and down Regent Street, you know, and it was completely empty, apart from other people on bikes getting a picture of it empty. You know, so that's when I started. And then when I like understood the journey a bit, so I had the real benefit of like getting to practice in a truly traffic empty city, which was sort of get up at 3 in the morning, have a go. Have a little, have a lovely 3 a.m. practice, you know,

so that has been nice. But I would say that they, um, I find them truly fun and nice and really easy and accessible and like, oh, look at the speed I'm getting places. And I feel like they're just, I'm really, I'm very pro them. I think they're really fun. And they just make you have an, if you do live somewhere that isn't ideal, it does give this an extra bit of like, oh, I'll go home on one of these. Yeah, because one of my friends was saying one of the other things I could do. I've just had a look and there are actually some, I would have to walk to get one of the bikes. So in the morning, when you try and get a bike,

Do you sometimes have to walk to get the bikes? Yeah, you might have to walk. For me, it's like just the end of the... That's the thing. They have, truly, in the last year, get so much more popular and there are so many more now. And I can think that's only increasing, as increasingly we move in this, like,

cycle pro cities. And there are, you know, because you can't make all these legislation about, like, not using cars and then not make it easy for people to do a different option. So I really think we're moving in a good direction. That usually at the end of my road or close, I never have to walk that far to get one.

You can also online book them for up to 30 minutes. That's so good. If you see one in the morning because that's what used to happen. So two things have come into play since I started doing it, both of which I believe myself to be responsible for. One is the booking thing because it used to be like, oh, there's one in the park and then you'd run there and there'd be someone else running for it. Even if it's be like, well, who got here first?

And so one of them was the booking of like, can you secure it? And then it goes offline so no one else is disappointed. and you can put them for up to 30 minutes and before you get on it for free. That's amazing. And the other thing was that you used to have to park it in the special zones. So it would be like you must,

and obviously some of the zones are red like the middle of Hyde Park or something that people are like, please don't leave that bike there. So it will actually just go beep, beep, beep, and it won't let you lock. Oh, interesting. And walk away.

And obviously you just, you can should you find yourself in an emergency or whatever, but it'll just keep shouting at you. Right. So they're like red zones, but then there were also these other zones that were like, you can't park here, you have to park in the special bit. And my special bit was actually quite far away from my house.

And so I said at night, or especially if you're a woman, can there be an option, please, that just says, I'm prepared to pay the £2 fine for being parked in the wrong zone. I'm obviously not going to park in the middle of Hyde Park, but can I just park it on my pavement to say, please, can I go all the way to my house? Because really, what's the, you know, if I'm doing my special penny-wise trip, and then I still have to park it here. And then, lo and behold, they got rid of the thing. So I truly believe myself to be responsible for it.

So now increasing you can just part them more and more places. They are just getting better and better at that. Or sometimes with human forests it says please park in these zones. But if you don't, it's a £1.50 charge. And I would say like if you want to get somewhere and you're like, well, I'm here right at the door, I'm happy to pay £1.50 for the benefit of being right here if I'm in a late rush or whatever. Or the zone won't be that far away. And in the middle of the day, you're like, yeah, fine.

I parked in the special zone. It's only at night when you're like, yes, yes, I'll pay £1.50 to get right to my door. So, yeah, they're constantly improving. And it's just, yeah, it's on your thing. You just have to, when you finish it, you just literally press end and you take a photo of it to show that you parked. And you walk away. Great. And you walk away.

I think they're fantastic. What are the downsides? The downsides are, number one, not always where you want them. Yes. So in Central London, for example, we're currently in Central London now and there's hundreds. There's so many. But then when I went to look at where I was in Zone 2, which is still very, very central, I would say.

There was like maybe four within like a five minute walk or to 10 minute walk of the flats. So you're like, well, that's all right. That's still good. But then I suppose where I live now, which is in Zone 4, there are none anywhere. You just can't get them. But I would trust and hope and believe that they will come to you. If you build it, they will come. If you write to them, they might well come.

They will come. Listen, so far my writing has gone well. No one ever responds, but change be happening. And so downfalls are from Central, getting home, gorgeous. Home coming in, sometimes a bit, you can't rely on them. And then when you're late and you're rushing and then you're like, there's no bikes and it's like, now what am I going to do? I committed to this being the bike journey.

That can be a bit stressful. But increasingly they've got more and more popular. The other downfall, obviously the cost, they have got. increasingly more expensive. Right. And that's something that I hope they sort of cap that off because it's getting to a point where you're like, maybe for big long journeys, this is maybe getting to be a bit not that as an option.

Yeah, so it might as well just take the tube. Yeah, you might as well just take the tube. It's definitely, if the journey is difficult or whatever, you can't, you know, then it's perfect, especially if it's like you've got yourself in, when there isn't a good tube thing or a good bus and you're like, oh my God, look at me, I'm free to bicycle as I wish. But yeah, like for me to get to here, there is no. good from my house to, where the podcast is, there is no good bus or train option. There is, but like they're not good.

It just takes, yeah, it takes too long. Whereas I can do it. Yeah, a lot of changes, tedious, whereas I can do it on the bike much quicker than going as well as I could on the train. And that's a downfall, the money. But what you lose in money you gain in the exercise and the being in the outdoors and they're like, oh, look at me go. I'm a one woman show.

The smugness. they do sometimes run out of electricity. Right, and this is what you said. I cannot lie. Again, we are improving day by day, but they do sometimes just stop working, at which point you are just peddling an incredibly heavy bicycle. Right.

So they just stop sometimes. Can you continue to cycle? Very much so. We just have to stop. No, no, you can pedal. Yeah. But it feels like being on a bicycle at the gym that's got the resistance turned up. Oh, my God.

So it's just the opposite, which is why I have sometimes a riven, I have a ribbon dripping in sweat from head to toe. Yes. The opposite of what I wanted. Because then you're just going quite slowly and you're having to push this bicycle. Yeah, it feels like maybe, look, from where I'm coming from, I'm like, this sounds like a great option. But maybe I buy a shit bike and that can be, because I would need to do it like all the time. So maybe I do that. That's my baseline.

but I do check to see if there's an e-bike available in case because it'll be an easier journey because we have to pedal so hard and it'd be a nice little. Definitely. The thing that I found very positive in why I've gone for this over getting a bicycle, though I have another idea that I will share with you now.

I've gone for this so far because I'm worried that I'll do the bike one way and I want to come back on my bike, you know? But I think you've just got to get better routine. I don't understand what you mean actually. Like what if I bicycled in on my bike, but then I was like, oh, I'm actually going to go home on the bus

or I'm going to go to a different place. I was like, do you want to go for dinner? I'm like, yes. So I leave the bike. One of them fixy bikes that you can like go do, do, do, and they go really small and you just carry them. Oh, yes, I'm so weak. They're very expensive. I'll never carry it.

Also, they're quite lame. And they're lame. And I look like a lame banker who's like, I'm still a fun dad, you know? Sorry to all the fun dads and bankers out there. The shit bicycles, I worry they just get stolen even if they're shit. Yeah, my friend's quite into biking and she has a terrible, her bike called Susan. and then she has a fancy bike that she's like

cycled the length of france in and Susan is bulletproof like everyone's like you basically have to get she's like well you have to get it you have to get like a shit bike

like a bike that looks like a teenage boys like shit bike like a basket like a weird basket that just looks mental and it's not as well not quaint

because that's cool like sort of weird sporty one that's just odd and looks like yeah knock off shit sporty one Yeah, always.

Everyone's too embarrassed to be seen with. Yeah. That's what you need. And that's what you need. And then it will never get stopped. Probably a mountain bike as well in the city. Probably, yeah. Where people are like, cringe?

Yeah, why would have a mountain bike? I don't know anything about bicycles. So that maybe we, even if we just choose at random, we'll probably choose a thing that's cringe. Yeah, this is cool. Yeah. So that's, yeah, maybe we'll just, yeah. So I would be very pro definitely trying to get into bicycles as well. I'd be interested to try a bicycle and see just how much I think I'm good at biking,

but really I'm being whisked along by my electric bicycle. Yeah. Something that has been introduced to me, and I say this publicly, lest they would like to send us some, gosh, we'll be positive about them. They're called Van Moof. V-A-N-M-O-O-F. Oh yeah, Van Moof. Van Moof. And the strap line is, you just can't put the feeling of riding a Van Moof into words.

Oh, my God, I'd like to try. So they're an electric bicycle. They obviously are pretty pricey, as all electric bicycles are. But I was like, well, I'm paying all this money to buy these. at these line bikes every day. Maybe I invest in this or I save up for this. Or perhaps they are friends of the podcast. The Van Moved bicycles are amazing electric bicycles, but what they also have is a anti-theft technology. Oh yeah. So, oh yes. So they're actually like fingerprint activated like James Bond. So it's your bike and your bike alone. And you have to put in all this

stuff to like make it, it'll only go for you. And if it is stolen, the GPS tracker will immediately alert a team who will immediately begin tracking it down. Oh my God, that's amazing. Electric. And it's electric. Isn't that cool? So it's really cool, lovely bicycle. Why don't they have that for people?

Right? Well, as soon as you're kidnapped. If you go missing, you get tracked down. It's like, God, but you, as a kid, I genuinely asked my parents if I could have a tracker. I'd like a tracker. Right. Now, I'd like everyone I know to have, like all my family to have trackers. Let's all get a tracker.

This is good stuff. Or a van moof. I'll just put a van move implanted into my arm. Yeah. That's very cool. So the main thing you'd be worried about with your electric bike is it being stolen. You'd never really relax because your expensive bike is out there. But it's got this amazing technology. You can't even sell them on the black market.

They're selling them on the black market for like 50 pounds because people are like, please take this thing I stole off my hands. Like I can't do anything with it. I can't break into the GPS. I can't make it work. I can't do anything. So do you want like basically a bike for parts? Like that's all people can sell them for if they do get stolen.

So they've worked so hard on the anti-theft technology. And also it's an amazing bicycle. And I really think maybe that's my future. That is your future. And it has a detachable, because then obviously I'd be like, well, obviously I'll forget to charge it up, like an idiot. It has a detachable. It talks to you to tell you when it's like, take me inside, please. And it, you do what?

It talks to you. No, sorry. It probably just says beep, beep, beep. Oh, sorry. Right. Beep, beep, I need to charge. I'd hate that. Take me inside, please.

Take me inside. Sorry, I really did say that out loud. That's not what I mean at all. It just says beep beep beep. Boop. to which you know, oh, let's go charge. And you detach the charging thing, and it can just charge up at the mains socket in your house.

So you don't need to be plugged into a fancy thing. And the thing, because I would be like, well, how am I going to carry my bike up the stairs to my house to plug it into the socket, all of this? But it just detaches. Oh, that's really nice. Okay. Could be.

Great. Van Moof, if you're listening, send us your bikes. Please, let's have some bikes. That was genuinely really interesting. So if you are in a city, if you're in London, check out Lyme Tier Human Forest. Human Forest, remember, has the free 10 minutes. If you're in the other cities, you have other options available,

but also get writing to Lyme and Humphoros and all these other people to be like, hello, please, this city? Could we have some? And they are going in that direction, but with some encouragement, they will come to your town if they are not already there. Yeah, I also think it's a good thing to just do because it's like, it shows people how, what the demand is. There is demand and people want to live a non-car life,

and they want to be on bicycles, and we would love to be a more cool city like, Amsterdam that's like very pro-cycling. And yeah, the demand is there. And I really feel that the infrastructure is coming, slowly edging up to meet that demand. Great. That's how I feel. For the supply.

Will you try it? I'm going to try it. I'm actually, I'm going to try it. We're not moving for a bit. There's no point we're trying it now. But like I will try it when we move because it seems like I'll try it for something that I don't need to go. Like I'll just have a go.

Have a little practice. And then start to actually, yeah. And then I might buy like a short. ship bike just to kind of in case I can't find one because I'm not going in or out I'm just going to the tube so I don't have the problem of like you know like oh right yeah oh that's perfect yeah in and out to the tube just be a deck of 10 minute but either way I think it's a really great thing and it just getting a bike bike really makes you feel so much more a sense of freedom yeah and not ever not that sort of sinking feeling being like I've got to do the walk now yeah I've got to do the walk down

I'm frightened I've got to do the penny wise walk oh the penise walk well look thank you so much um tessa tessa's cyclist thank you And if you're listening and you're thinking, I'm going to get an E-Bike, do it. Have a go. Yeah, have a go, everyone, truly. Have a go. On your go? On your bike. Wear a helmet.

Please do. And also, if you have an episode suggestion, we should also do like a broader one. I think there's going to be a bike part two coming up. But yes, if you have any other episode suggestions, please do DM us at Nobody PanicPod or email us. Nobody Panicpodcast at gmail.com. And just have a lovely cycling. week, everybody, and Godspeed. God save the king.