In reference to the Nobel winning Linus, another famous Linus is Linus Torvolds. The man behind Linux. If you don't know what Linux is, and you have a mobile phone, you are holding some version of it or lines of code borrowed from it in your hands...Linus's changing the world!

With that out of the: in addition to changing the rear cog to change the effective range of the drive train, you may be able to install a rear derailleur, set the high/low limit screws to hold the alignment centered on the rear cog, then get a compact double and a friction shifter. The low is lower, the high is higher, and the derailleur takes the slack in the chain. I know it totally defeats the purpose of an internal gear hub, but a range of 15-130 gear inches would be the widest range & lowest and highest drivetrain around. If you were set back $50 in total from the local co-op I'd be surprised. There's an HTML5 gear calculator that would help you visualize for good non overlapping gear choices.

But, then again, just because you could, doesn't necessarily mean you should. It's only my problem solving brain kickin' out ideas here. How's the motor now with 6 months on? Hills better?