Written by awneitsch on August 24, 2020

The Road – Two Wheels Good

Mutterings And Murmurs

It’s unnerving to travel at 120 kmh, on a motorcycle, following a truck towing a trailer with a car on it and the car isas loaded backward onto the trailer meaning the car is facing you in the same lane that you’re driving in. Imagine that for whatever reason the car has it’s headlights on adding to the unnerving oddity and anxiety. Add the rider’s marginal drowsiness and distracted, lost in thought self talk, and the rider will have the best on board situational rapid wake up call that ever could be. The rider gets so used to having the rig around because its moving at the right speed and not throwing off any turbulence to speak of so he forgets about it…until he has quietly gained on the rig…the bike having droned on so steadily and sweetly…enough to notice a car coming at him with its headlights blazing. Time to think :

HOLY SHIT MOTHER OF GOD WAKE UP RIGHT OH LORD I’LL BE GOOD

The heart and breathing stop and the stomach and sphincter clench.

Gearing down and trail braking are required.

That visual acuity is probably the most important human sense and capability required to safely operate a motorcycle at any speed is a given. A number of other vital senses are also important and are often enhanced while operating a motorcycle. All senses are heightened when riding a motorcycle because of the inherent vulnerability that comes from not being protected by layers of steel and plastic and a seat belt. Consider too that a motorcycle license grants special powers to the rider. Invisibility comes to mind. The rider can wear any manner of reflective garb or ride the largest bike ever made, equipped with klaxons and holographic lasers projecting images of erupting volcanoes but the distracted Motorista will not see you for all the social media coming at them as they drive. Siri will not intervene.

Motorcycle riders have greater opportunities for smelling the world around them than those cocooned in automobiles, even those with moon roofs, t-tops and top down convertibles are wide open for sensation. Following is a list of smells that I have personally sensed while riding.

1) motorcycle exhaust – yours and others, 2 or 4 cycle and small block trikes

2) diesel exhaust

3) diesel exhaust without fuel stabilizer

4) rubber to road

5) fresh cut hay or grass

6) earthy, wet swamp or marsh

7) salty ocean

8) dirt – moist, wet or dry

9) various poo and pee – cow, swine, horse, human, bear (red berry topping optional)

10) ozone

11) smoke from distant ANTIFA lit forest fires, campfires, or passing tobacco/nicotine/flavored vape junkie exhaust.

13) personal body odor – regardless of whether you are bathing daily or not

14) helmet interior odor

15) odd unidentified smell that sometimes comes out of your nostrils

16) your bad breath after that lunch

17) road kill – fresh roadkill smells of butcher shop – aged roadkill smells different

18) dead skunk – ripe dead skunk smells different

19) musk of beast – cow, moose, deer, elk, coyote, cat or passing motorists with strong cologne or perfume

20) standing or running water

21) automobile and truck catalytic converter emissions (bouquets vary by make and model)

22) dried alkali lake or pond bed

23) feed lot – multiply item 6) by one million

24) Rain, mist, or sleet – each with it’s own signature odor.

The true marvel is that any of these odors actually make it to the olfactories of the rider. Turbulence is typically the enemy – or friend – of the nose and it’s owner. Traveling at 120 kph means that wind turbulence can double or triple, meaning that it should be impossible that any smells survive. Breaking wind while riding present laws of aerodynamics that cannot be fully explained.

The rider typically operates from a seated position and while wearing tight, armored clothing for safety. The airspace around any expelatory orifice is typically constricted. Tight pants restrict the abdomen and compress the bum. The urge to expel gases doesn’t care. If the rider trusts that the urge is truly gas and not a liquid or semisolid brought about by the bad lunch or chemo therapy, he or she will attempt to release it. The trouble is that the gas has nowhere to go. No matter how much the rider squirms, the gas can only travel vertically, either up or down the crack of their bum. An odd sensation to be sure. The only release can come from standing on ones pegs when it is safe to do so and gently wriggle it out and hope to some God that it is indeed a gas. If, in the unhappy event it is not a gas, a new olfactory sensation will present itself regardless of turbulence.

Other senses will spring into action.

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Other points.

Keep the shiny side up, the rubber down and stay between the ditches.

Automobile operators are typically blind assholes.

Wear adult absorbent underpants.

Wear tight brown pants.

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‘Two Wheels Good’ is an album release from a band called Prefab Sprout.

‘Bonny’ is a standout track.