Alright Sally, let’s cut to the chase, can I hire you?
WHOA! Geez louise, buy a lady a drink first! Hahahaha haa. *sigh* Um, of course you can hire me! If you’re interested in working with me, you should refer to the web site for my User Experience Design business, Fixpert Design. You can contact me for work-related stuff there.
Who is Fixpert?
Alright, that’s more like it. Fixpert is me, Sally Carson. Retired bike messenger. Illustrator. User experience designer. Lover of bicycles and all things awesome.
Technically, Fixpert.com is my web site, but it’s been around so long that people have just started calling me “Fixpert.” And now I have a business called Fixpert Design Inc, so it’s all become this confusing mush of Fixpertitude. But if you yell, “hey Fixpert!” across a crowded room, I will probably turn around.
Where are you from?
The short answer: I’m from Richmond, Virginia but I currently live in San Francisco, California. Don’t wanna read the long, boring answer? Skip ahead!
The long, boring answer: Oh jeez, well let’s see. My dad spent his working life in the Army. I was born on an Army base in Georgia, in the midst of a family relocation from California to Kentucky. That makes me an Army Brat/Georgia Peach… an Army Peach? We moved all over the place including the obligatory stint in Germany.
My family now resides in Richmond, Virginia — except for my brother and his wife in Tokyo. I currently live in San Francisco. So if people ask me where I’m from, it’s a tricky question but I usually just say that I’m from Richmond, Virginia. That photo to the right is me in Richmond.
Are you a messenger?
I’m a retired bicycle messenger. I used to suffer through every type of weather delivering packages on my bike in New York City, and then in Richmond, Virginia. Here on Fixpert.com, I write about a lot of issues that touch on city cycling and messengering. Spending two years as a messenger completely changed the course of my life (in a positive way) and was the spark that made me fall in love with bikes forever and ever. ( love you bikeys! <3 <3 <3 )
What do you do now?
I’m a User Experience Designer. I’ve worked for Yahoo, Crutchfield, Widgetbox and others. But now I run my own User Experience Design company and can go ride my bike any time I want! Mwah ha ha!
Where did the word Fixpert come from?
The word Fixpert refers to expert fixed gear bike riders. Fixed…expert…Fixpert! It’s a word that I made up. With my brain, and my mouth, and now I’m typing it with my fingers.
The story: I was messengering in Downtown Richmond and some of my fellow messengers came from BMX backgrounds and were doing all kinds of sick BMX-style tricks on their fixies. There were bunny hopping stair sets, pedal grinding marble benches, doing no-handed backwards circles, etc. This was back in 2002 when that kind of thing wasn’t commonplace.
After I was done cleaning up (because my brain had exploded), I created Fixpert.com in the hopes that I would be able to put some video footage of these guys online. The group disbanded before I could film anybody, but I wanted to keep Fixpert, so I just started writing about bikes here.
That’s where the name Fixpert came from, I made it up. Mystery solved!